Usage¶

This guide describes commonly used functions of the php-sapnwrfc extension. For a more detailed overview of available methods, refer to the API overview.

For getting started right away, refer to the Quick start.

Connecting to a SAP system¶

To connect to a SAP system, we create a new instance of SAPNWRFC\Connection, passing connection parameters:

<?php
$parameters = [
    'ashost' => 'my.sap.system.local',
    'sysnr'  => '00',
    'client' => '123',
    'user' => 'DEMO',
    'passwd' => 'XXXX',
    // if you need to connect through saprouter, uncomment the following line
    //'saprouter' => '/H/my.saprouter.local/H/',
];

// connect
$connection = new SAPNWRFC\Connection($parameters);

// do work here

// close the connection
$connection->close();

If the connection attempt fails, a SAPNWRFC\ConnectionException is thrown with details about the error.

We can also use a sapnwrfc.ini file to specify connection details. See SAPNWRFC\Connection::setIniPath($path) and SAPNWRFC\Connection::reloadIniFile() in the API overview for details.

For available connection parameters refer to the sapnwrfc.ini parameter overview.

After we are done using the connection, it is recommended to close the connection using SAPNWRFC\Connection::close().

Connection options¶

Added in version 1.2.0.

The SAPNWRFC\Connection takes a second (optional) parameter specifying options for the connection.

<?php

$parameters = [ /* <...> */ ];

$options = [
    'use_function_desc_cache' => false,
];

$connection = new SAPNWRFC\Connection($parameters, $options);

The following options are available:

use_function_desc_cache

If set to false the local function desc cache is cleared before looking up a function using Connection::getFunction(). This can be useful if a function module signature changes in the backend while a script is still running. If the script continues to use the old (cached) function description this will result in garbage/missing values.

Note

Setting this option to false can result in degraded performance as the function description has to be fetched from the backend every time Connection::getFunction() is called.

Setting the global logon timeout¶

Added in version 2.1.0.

The global logon timeout can be set using SAPNWRFC\Connection::setGlobalLogonTimeout():

<?php

// Set the logon timeout to 10 seconds
SAPNWRFC\Connection::setGlobalLogonTimeout(10);

This controls how long the logon in the ABAP backend can take when opening a connection. The valid range of values is 1 - 3600 seconds, with the default being 60 seconds.

The timeout can also be set via RFC_GLOBAL_LOGON_TIMEOUT in the DEFAULT section of the sapnwrfc.ini file.

Retrieving a SSO ticket¶

A SSO ticket can be retrieved from an existing connection using SAPNWRFC\Connection::getSSOTicket():

<?php

// $connection is an existing connection with parameter GETSSO2=1

$ssoTicket = $connection->getSSOTicket();

Note

For this to work, the following requirements must be met:

The connection must have been opened with parameter GETSSO2=1
The profile parameter login/create_sso2_ticket must be set to a value different from 0 in the backend.
The used SDK version must be 7.50.1 or later.

Calling remote function modules¶

Looking up the function module¶

Before we can call a remote function module, we have to lookup the desired function module to retrieve a SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction object. This is accomplished with the SAPNWRFC\Connection::getFunction($functionName) method. We simply pass the name of the remote function module:

<?php

$remoteFunction = $connection->getFunction('RFC_PING');

If the lookup is successful, an object of type SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction is returned which can be used for invoking the function.

If the function lookup fails, a SAPNWRFC\FunctionCallException is thrown.

Calling the function module¶

After we have retrieved a SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction object, we can invoke the function module by using its invoke() method.

To invoke the function module RFC_PING, we can simply call invoke() without parameters.

<?php

$returnValue = $remoteFunction->invoke();

If the function module returns parameters, invoke() returns them. On any errors, a SAPNWRFC\FunctionCallException is thrown.

Parameters and return values¶

In practice, most of the remote function modules will require us to pass parameters and/or will return parameters after invocation.

Passing parameters is possible using the $parameters array of the remote function’s invoke() method. Parameters are passed as arrays, with the key being the name of the parameter and the value the value to pass.

The same is true for return values. If a remote function module returns parameters, they will be available in the array returned from invoke().

Note

ABAP function modules know four different types of parameters:

IMPORT: set by the client.
EXPORT: set by the server.
CHANGING: set by the client and can be modified by the server.
TABLE: set by the client and can be modified by the server.

To call a function module STFC_CHANGING that requires input parameters as well as returns parameters to the caller, we can do as follows:

<?php

$function = $connection->getFunction('STFC_CHANGING');
$result = $function->invoke([
    'START_VALUE' => 0,
    'COUNTER' => 1,
]);

/*
$result looks like this:

array(2) {
  ["COUNTER"] => int(2)
  ["RESULT"] => int(1)
}
*/

The types of the parameters and return values are mapped to standard PHP types.

Parameter type mappings¶

Remote function modules execute ABAP code and therefor use ABAB data types. This extension maps between RFC data types and builtin PHP data types as follows:

ABAP type	RFC type	PHP type	Meaning	Notes
C	CHAR	string	Text field (alphanumeric characters)	right-padded with blanks; see `rtrim` option
D	DATE	string	Date field (format: YYYYMMDD)
T	TIME	string	Time field (format: HHMMSS)
X	BYTE	string	Hexadecimal field	use `hex2bin()` to convert to binary
N	NUM	string	Numeric text field
STRING	STRING	string	String (dynamic length)
XSTRING	BYTE	string	Hexadecimal string (dynamic length)	use `hex2bin()` to convert to binary
I	INT	integer	Integer	INT1 and INT2 are also mapped to integer
INT8	INT8	integer	Integer (8 bytes)	Only available on 64bit systems.
P	BCD	string	Packed number / BCD
F	FLOAT	double	Floating point number
DECFLOAT16	DECF16	string	Decimal floating point number	Uses string to prevent rounding errors.
DECFLOAT34	DECF34	string	Decimal floating point number	Uses string to prevent rounding errors.

Additionally, there are also tables and structures:

A structure is mapped to an associative array, with the keys being the field names and the values the field values.
A table is an array of structures.

Passing options when calling function modules¶

When calling function modules using RemoteFunction::invoke() a second parameter can be passed specifying options for the function call.

<?php

// ...
$options = [
    'rtrim' => true
];

$function->invoke($parameters, $options);

The following options are available:

rtrim

In ABAP, there are two ways to store strings: as fixed length string type C or as dynamic length type STRING. When using type C strings are right-padded with blanks, if the string is shorter than the predefined length. To unify the extensions behaviour with strings, the rtrim option is available. If set to true, type C strings are right-trimmed before being returned.

Default: false

Activating/Deactivating parameters¶

The SAP NW RFC library supports the activation and deactivation of parameters of a function module. This is especially useful if a function module has a lot of (possibly big) return values that you are not interested in.

To activate or deactivate a parameter, we call the method SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction::setParameterActive($parameterName, $isActive) on the remote function object. We can use SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction::isParameterActive($parameterName) to check if a parameter is active or not.

<?php

$function = $connection->getFunction('STFC_STRUCTURE');

$function->setParameterActive('IMPORTSTRUCT', false);
$function->setParameterActive('RFCTABLE', false);

$function->isParameterActive('IMPORTSTRUCT'); // returns false

// we don't need to pass parameters when invoking the function module,
// as we deactivated all of them
$result = $function->invoke([]);

// $result will not contain the 'RFCTABLE' parameter

$function->setParameterActive('RFCTABLE', true);
$function->isParameterActive('IMPORTSTRUCT'); // returns true

// we need to pass the 'RFC_TABLE' parameter now
$result = $function->invoke([
    'RFCTABLE' => [],
]);

Function module details¶

The SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction object defines a public name property and a getter getName() fetch the name of the function module it represents.

To get detailed information about a function module, including it’s parameters, the SAPNWRFC\RemoteFunction::getFunctionDescription() method can be used:

<?php

$function = $connection->getFunction('STFC_STRUCTURE');

$desc = $function->getFunctionDescription();

// $desc = [
//     'ECHOSTRUCT'   => [
//         'name'        => 'ECHOSTRUCT',
//         'type'        => 'RFCTYPE_STRUCTURE',
//         'direction'   => 'RFC_EXPORT',
//         'description' => 'Exporting structure',
//         'ucLength'    => 264,
//         'nucLength'   => 144,
//         'decimals'    => 0,
//         'optional'    => false,
//         'default'     => '',
//         'typedef'     => [
//             'RFCFLOAT' => [
//                 'name'      => 'RFCFLOAT',
//                 'type'      => 'RFCTYPE_FLOAT',
//                 'ucLength'  => 8,
//                 'ucOffset'  => 0,
//                 'nucLength' => 8,
//                 'nucOffset' => 0,
//                 'decimals'  => 16,
//             ],
//             /* ... */
//         ],
//     ],
//     'RESPTEXT'     => [
//         'name'        => 'RESPTEXT',
//         'type'        => 'RFCTYPE_CHAR',
//         'direction'   => 'RFC_EXPORT',
//         'description' => 'Exporting response text',
//         'ucLength'    => 510,
//         'nucLength'   => 255,
//         'decimals'    => 0,
//         'optional'    => false,
//         'default'     => '',
//     ],
//     'IMPORTSTRUCT' => [ /* ... */],
//     'RFCTABLE'     => [ /* ... */],
// ];

Manually clearing the function module description cache¶

Added in version 1.3.0.

A call to Connection::getFunction() uses a local cache of the function module descriptions to speed up the lookup. This usually is desired behaviour but can lead to unexpected results when the function module signature changes in the backend while a script is still running (missing/garbage return values, etc.).

In addition to setting the use_function_desc_cache option on the connection level the cache can also be cleared for individual function modules using the function \SAPNWRFC\clearFunctionDescCache($functionName, $repositoryId). Pass the system ID as the repository ID (unless you know what you are doing).

<?php

// Clearing the system ID cache
$sysId = $connection->getAttributes()['sysId'];
\SAPNWRFC\clearFunctionDescCache('STFC_STRUCTURE', $sysId);

// Clearing the default cache
\SAPNWRFC\clearFunctionDescCache('STFC_STRUCTURE');

Warning

Manually clearing the function desc cache does not affect already existing RemoteFunction objects:

<?php

$oldFn = $connection->getFunction('STFC_STRUCTURE');
\SAPNWRFC\clearFunctionDescCache('STFC_STRUCTURE');
$newFn = $connection->getFunction('STFC_STRUCTURE');

// $oldFn still uses the old function description!

Trace levels¶

The SAP NW RFC library allows the creation of trace files to troubleshoot connection and/or function call problems.

We can set the desired trace level via the trace parameter when establishing the connection or change it at any time using the SAPNWRFC\Connection::setTraceLevel($level) method.

The extension defines constants on the SAPNWRFC\Connection class for the five trace levels (from least to most verbose): TRACE_LEVEL_OFF, TRACE_LEVEL_BRIEF, TRACE_LEVEL_VERBOSE, TRACE_LEVEL_DETAILED and TRACE_LEVEL_FULL.

Note

Changed in version 2.1.0: TRACE_LEVEL_DETAILED is available starting with SDK version 7.50.9. Earlier SDK versions only have the TRACE_LEVEL_FULL level.

Additionally, we can set the directory for the generated trace file using SAPNWRFC\Connection::setTraceDir($path). The default location for the trace file is the current working directory.

Getting the version¶

The extension provides the methods SAPNWRFC\Connection::version() and SAPNWRFC\Connection::rfcVersion() for getting the extension version and the RFC SDK version in use.

Both methods return a string formatted as MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH (for example 1.1.3);

Exceptions¶

If an error occurs during any interaction, an exception is thrown with error details. Currently, there are two exception classes:

SAPNWRFC\ConnectionException for any errors that concern the connection itself.
SAPNWRFC\FunctionCallException for errors that stem from function module invocations.

Both exception classes extend the base exception class SAPNWRFC\Exception, which adds an additional getErrorInfo() method to the standard methods and properties provided by RuntimeException.

getErrorInfo() returns an array with detailed error information and contains at least the keys code, key and message.

Depending on the type of error, the following additional keys might be available with detailed information: abapMsgClass, abapMsgType, abapMsgNumber, abapMsgV1, abapMsgV2, abapMsgV3, abapMsgV4.