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With every SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition release, SAP introduces a number of innovations and deprecations. On one hand, customers want to adopt these new innovations, but they must also adapt to deprecations, in order to keep their system up to date. Therefore, being able to justly balance the efforts required to adopt and adapt becomes of primary importance. This means, knowing with greater certainty the time at which an object is going to be decommissioned from the system.
With that in mind, SAP will, in the 2408 release of SAP S/4HANA Cloud introduce an update to the lifecycle of – Released – CDS views or elements, by adding more specific information to the existing ‘deprecated’ status. To be more specific, there will be a distinction made between a CDS view or element being simply ‘deprecated’ or ‘deprecated with a planned decommissioning date’.
A reference to this change is also announced in the 2408 What’s New Viewer.
Whilst this update is applicable to SAP S/4HANA on any premise, it is hopefully from the title of this blog clear that everything detailed here only applies to CDS views or elements in SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition (as documented in the SAP Business Accelerator Hub, here), bound by the C1 Stability Contract, and not any other objects.
Before we go into the details of this change and what it means, let’s first look at the current situation (pre-2408).
Current State
In case you are only finding about this now, the Lifecycle of a released CDS view has always been well documented in the SAP S/4HANA Cloud help page here, and the corresponding CDS Deprecation Policy in the SAP Business Accelerator Hub help page here.
These pages detail the transition between the three customer-facing statuses that a CDS view or element can go through (namely, Released --> Deprecated --> Decommissioned), and the same is expressed by the diagram below. We have also bound the area of change that we will detail later, by a red box.
Translating in layman’s terms, what is stated, is that once SAP announces the deprecation of a CDS View or CDS element (field), SAP will continue to maintain -but no longer enhance- and keep the object in the system in a deprecated state for a minimum of 12 months, before it can be decommissioned.
Whilst 12 months might arguably be sufficient time to plan and process an adaption and is provided with the best of intentions, it is unclear if the decommissioning will indeed occur after 12 months. It could be 18 or 24 or more. Similarly, you may not see the need or urgency to adapt, if the use of a CDS view or element, albeit being deprecated fulfills your requirements (why fix it if ain’t broke? Might come to mind here). So, as a customer the conundrum becomes, do I bet against the clock and hope decommissioning happens later rather than sooner, or do I perform the adaption work now?
Now that the current state is understood, let’s explore what the change being introduced in 2408 is.
Future State
After talking for several months with some of our customers, we decided to address this and change the way we handle the deprecated status of CDS views or elements, by adding to it SAP’s planned decommissioning date, when known, to give customers a clear timeline, and decide when to invest in adaption efforts.
To further understand how and where this status update fits in within the lifecycle of a released CDS view or element, make sure to consult the official corresponding updated Product Assistance page here, and below the graphical representation of it. Again, we have bound the area where this change is introduced.
What is clearly notable is that a new milestone named ‘Planned decommissioning date is set for CDS view’ has been inserted between ‘CDS view is deprecated’ and ‘CDS view is decommissioned’, but what does it mean? Well, as the name indicates, it means that a planned decommissioning date has been set. I.e SAP, with this new status, is now informing customers of the date on which it intends to decommission a CDS view or element, and thus allows customers to plan with greater certainty the time by which you will need to execute the adaption of this CDS!
Importantly, note also the addition of the text highlighted below (Decommissioning date can be set at the same time as deprecation):
The nuance of this statement is that a released CDS view or element may first be ‘deprecated’, without an advertised decommissioning date, before being some time later updated to ‘deprecated with a planned decommissioning date’. Alternatively, a CDS view or element may directly move to a ‘deprecated with planned decommissioning date’ status. From the time a CDS view or element is advertised as being ‘deprecated with a planned decommissioning date’, the decommissioning date will occur no less than 12 months later, minimum.
The planned decommissioning date will be advertised in the format of <MonthName><Year>.
The below diagrams will illustrate 2 such possible hypothetical deprecation scenarios, where a fictitious CDS view element named I_SampleCDS-DemoField (CDSName-FieldName) is considered. The adaption guidance and adaption urgency (green = not urgent, red = urgent) is also highlighted in these scenarios.
Scenario 1: Sequential Deprecation, first without and then with planned decommissioning date
- In the 2408 release, the CDS view element is announced as being deprecated, without a planned decommissioning date set. Whilst it is encouraged to adapt to the successor CDS view element, there is no urgency to do so, if the deprecated CDS view element still fulfills your requirements.
- Fast forward to February 2025, wherein the 2502 release, the CDS view element is announced as now being ‘deprecated with a planned decommissioning date’ set, and the planned decommissioning date is advertised as February 2026 (i.e. in 12 months time). This is the signal for you that you must within the next 12 months perform the required adaption work.
Fast forward to February 2026. As announced the CDS view element is now decommissioned. If you did not perform the required adaption work within the 12 months period prior, there is a high risk that your key user and / or developer extensibility objects that use this now decommissioned CDS view element, will not function properly or at all beyond this period.
Scenario 2: Direct deprecation with planned decommissioning date
- In the 2408 release, the CDS view element is announced as being deprecated, with a planned Decommissioning date set, and the planned decommissioning date is advertised as February 2026 (i.e. in 18 months time). This is the signal for you that you must within the next 18 months perform the required adaption work.
- Fast forward to February 2026. As announced the CDS view element is now decommissioned. If you did not perform the required adaption work within the 18 months period prior, there is a high risk that your key user and / or developer extensibility objects that use this now decommissioned CDS view element, will not function properly or at all beyond this period.
Reflecting the change in practice
Now that we covered the theory you probably want to know how this will be reflected in the SAP S/4HANA Cloud system (rework tasks), in ADT (ABAP Developer Tools), or documented in the API Hub for example.
Unfortunately reflecting this change in the UI, in all areas, in all apps (such as the Custom CDS app or the Extensibility Inventory app…) will be implemented over the coming releases, but fortunately, there are no CDS views or elements being deprecated with planned decommissioning date in the coming 2408 Release! So, whilst I look forward to writing the next blogs to advise you of the changes implemented as and when they are implemented in the next releases, I want to share, as an outlook with you below what you can expect to see in the future:
Changing priorities
In various apps and tools where adaptions are relevant, you will see a priority indicated reflecting the urgency for you to perform said adaption. Such an example, taken from the Extensibility Inventory app, is shown below. The task priority is clearly displayed.
As a result of introducing this updated deprecated with planned decommissioning date status, the priority of rework tasks will, in some cases also be revised to reflect the change priority. The below table recapitulates the extensibility area (Key User vs Developer) where the change will be applicable and how the change will be amended/reflected.
| Deprecated, without planned decommissioning date set | Deprecated, with planned decommissioning date set | Decommissioned |
Syntax warning in the code editor (ADT for developers or Web Editor for key users) | Warning (no change) | Warning | Warning (no change) |
ATC Check (for developers) | Information (today: Warning) | Warning (new) | Error (no change) |
Rework task (for key users) | Priority Medium (today: High) | Priority High | Priority Very High (no change) |
In summary, with this change, what is important to note is:
- This status change will be effective from the 2408 release of SAP S/4HANA Cloud. Unless a deprecated CDS view or element has an advertised decommissioning date, then it can be understood that SAP currently has no plan to decommission the CDS view or element in question at this time.
- It is from the time the status “deprecated” without a planned decommissioning date is set on a CDS view or element, that you should start to plan the adaption of your CDS view or element, but it is not mandatory and the CDS view or element will continue to function as before.
- Similarly, it is from the time the status “deprecated with a planned decommissioning date” is set on a CDS view or element, that you must start to plan the adaption of your CDS.
- From the time the status “Deprecated with a planned decommissioning date” is set to the time a CDS is actually decommissioned, a time window of at least 12 months will elapse before the CDS view or element is actually Decommissioned
- The planned decommissioning date will be advertised in the format of <MonthName><Year>.
