Want to learn SAP HANA? Where to Start? Certification?

[vivekbhoj]

Hi Everyone,

Now a days many people like want to learn and start their career in SAP HANA but they are confused and have questions like :

1. Are there any prerequisites to learn HANA?

2. Whether knowledge of BW / BO is required to learn HANA?

3. Can experienced ABAPers learn HANA?

4. How to get started in SAP HANA?

5. How to get access to HANA Server?

6. How to get SAP HANA certified?

7. Want to learn JSON, JavaScript, Ajax, Odata, JQuery, HTML5?

I know that there already are a lots of discussion threads and blogs spread throughout the SCN for these questions and every week new threads are being created so here i would like to take this opportunity to explain some of these questions as per my personal experience and provide links to other threads and blogs to make this a single point of source from where everyone can easily get the information they are looking for :

1. Are there any prerequisites to learn HANA?

No, there are no prerequisites to learn HANA but if you know Database Concepts and have knowledge of SQL then its very helpful.

2. Whether knowledge of BW / BO is required to learn HANA?

As per my experience when i started learning SAP HANA , I had experience in BW and ABAP but i had no experience of BO.

Knowing BW helps you in understanding Modeling concepts and when you want DXC to transfer data from SAP Business Suite System to HANA.

But even if you don't have the knowledge of BW, you can easily learn HANA Modeling concepts.

BW knowledge is a must if you are going to work on BW on HANA.

If you have knowledge of  BO then reporting on HANA would be a piece of cake for you

But even if you don't have knowledge of BO, when you start learning HANA Concepts on Reporting you will be easily able learn BO concepts

Knowledge of BODS is a required as it is used to transfer data from Source System to HANA

But even if you don't have knowledge of BODS, there are many step by step guides that help us in how we can transfer data from Source System to HANA and as you read them you will find it relatively easy

Some other questions that arise in everyone's minds are :

Does SAP HANA replace BW? :

Check this blog by steve lucas :

http://www.saphana.com/community/blogs/blog/2012/06/13/does-sap-hana-replace-bw-hint-no

Check the below links for more information related to BW and HANA :

BW on HANA Community:

http://scn.sap.com/community/netweaver-bw-hana

BW On HANA Cookbook :

https://cookbook.experiencesaphana.com/bw/

SAP NetWeaver BW on SAP HANA Project Approaches  - Webinar Presentation :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-41509

A good collection of How-to Guides for SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse 7.3 powered by SAP HANA by michaela.pastor :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-27694

Good blog by vijay.vijayasankar on BW on Hana in 2013, Are you ready for the "new normal"? :

http://scn.sap.com/community/netweaver-bw-hana/blog/2013/01/20/bw-on-hana-in-2013-are-you-ready-for-...

To learn more : visit the blog series How does all this work together – BW, BW on HANA, Suite on HANA, HANA Live by ingo.hilgefort :

It has 3 parts as of now :

http://scn.sap.com/community/bi-platform/businessobjects-bi-for-sap/blog/2013/05/28/how-does-all-thi...

3. Can experienced ABAPers learn HANA?

Yes, anyone can learn HANA.

I would recommend an ABAPer to start by reading the blog by kumarmayuresh :

http://scn.sap.com/community/abap/hana/blog/2012/12/04/key-learning--in-sapteched--abap-on-hana

Check the below links for more information :

ABAP for SAP HANA Community :

http://scn.sap.com/community/abap/hana

Check this video on Future of ABAP Platform :

http://www.sapvirtualevents.com/teched/sessiondetails.aspx?sId=3349

Check this blog for ABAP for HANA Reference by jens.weiler:

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-35518

Check this document for SAP Netweaver as ABAP 7.4 :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-41400

ABAP ON SAP HANA – Optimization of Custom ABAP Codes for SAP HANA- Presentation :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-42445

SAP NetWeaver 7.4 - Optimized for SAP HANA, Cloud and Mobile :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-35002

ABAP on HANA Development Guide:

Brand-new ABAP 7.4 for SAP HANA End to End Development Guide with Latest ABAP 7.4 SP5 Features

Participate on the openSAP course on ABAP on HANA:

ABAP Development for SAP HANA

4. How to get started in SAP HANA?

At present SAP is offering free online course Introduction to HANA Software Development through OpenSAP :

This is the best opportunity to start learning SAP HANA

• Warm-Up: In-Memory Data Management:-

https://open.sap.com/course/hana-warmup

• Introduction to Software Development on SAP HANA:-

https://open.sap.com/course/hana1

The course has ended but still you can access all the learning material and videos.

Also check the below two courses on openhpi by Prof. Hasso Plattner

• In Memory Data Management:

     In-Memory Data Management  (2013)

• In-Memory Data Management (2014) - Implications on Enterprise Systems

     https://open.hpi.de/courses/imdb2014

New Course on HANA is going to be started in openSAP, if you are interested you can join in here:

Next Steps in Software Development on SAP HANA

Check out the videos of SAP HANA Academy:

SAP HANA Academy - YouTube

You can also start by reading a blog SAP HANA for beginners by Marc Bernard :

http://www.saphana.com/community/blogs/blog/2012/09/07/sap-hana-for-beginners

Also read SAP HANA Essentials book by Jeffrey Word

You can get it here, it's free:

http://www.saphanabook.com/

You can get most of the HANA Guides by SAP form :

http://help.sap.com/hana_platform/ - All the guides have been updated to HANA SPS8

Read my below two blogs that have  links to most of the topics in HANA and are categorized as per the Topic:

HANA Reference for Developers - Links and SAP N... | SCN

HANA Reference for Developers - Links and SAP Notes(Part-2) Updated 04.12.2013

Read John Appleby's blogs:

SAP HANA - a guide to Documentation and Education

6 Golden Rules for New SAP HANA Developers

Visit SAP HANA Academy for Video Tutorials :

http://www.saphana.com/community/implement/hana-academy

SAP ERP on SAP HANA Cookbook:

https://cookbook.experiencesaphana.com/erp/d62e56e8ac5840f2b198c0c905892407.html

CRM on HANA Cookbook:

https://cookbook.experiencesaphana.com/crm/

CRM Experts can also read the blog on CRM on HANA is reality for business users at SAP by matthias.wild:

http://scn.sap.com/community/crm/blog/2013/03/07/crm-on-hana-is-reality-for-business-users-at-sap

Check the below two awesome blogs by bill.ramos

Where to look for the latest SAP HANA information? :

http://scn.sap.com/community/developer-center/hana/blog/2013/01/20/where-to-look-for-the-latest-sap-...

The ultimate set of HANA related links from SAP :

http://scn.sap.com/community/developer-center/hana/blog/2012/11/30/the-ultimate-set-of-hana-related-...

Read the blog The Road to HANA for Software Developers by juergen.schmerder:

http://scn.sap.com/community/developer-center/hana/blog/2012/11/30/the-ultimate-set-of-hana-related-...

In HANA SPS5, SAP also introduced SAP HANA XS Application Services,

The concept of XS has been explained beautifully in the blog SAP HANA Extended Application Services by thomas.jung:

http://scn.sap.com/community/developer-center/hana/blog/2012/11/29/sap-hana-extended-application-ser...

To learn about XS Services in detail, register yourself at OpenSAP :

https://open.sap.com/

5. How to get access to HANA Server?

SAP provides 30 days of free access to SAP HANA developer edition :

Check the below link for more information :

Get 30 days of free access to SAP HANA, developer editionhttp://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-28191

But this trial version is not recommended for OpenSAP course as this trial version is still on HANA Rev 48 and to work with OpenSAP course material,  you need HANA Rev 56 or at least HANA Rev 52.

You can download Rev 56 HANA Studio and HANA Client from here :

https://hanadeveditionsapicl.hana.ondemand.com/hanadevedition/

Alternatively, you can get your own HANA development Server on Amazon Web Services :

To know more about this check the below document byjuergen.schmerder :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-28294

Also check the below link on HOWTO - Update your SAP HANA, developer edition on AWS :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-30980

6. How to get SAP HANA certified?

Check these  below links for SAP HANA Certification:

UPDATE: New SAP HANA Application Associate Certification "C_HANAIMP131" is available now:

This certification is heavily focussed on Modeling and covers Modeling in great depth.

To know more about this certification, check the below link:

https://training.sap.com/v2/certification/c_hanaimp131-sap-certified-application-associate-edition-2...

To find the comparison between C_HANAIMP_1 and C_HANAIMP131 Certifications, check the below blog:

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2013/10/03/new-sap-hana-application-associate-certi...

UPDATE: New SAP HANA Technology Associate Certification "C_HANATEC131" is available now:

To know more about this certification, please check:

https://training.sap.com/v2/certification/c_hanatec131-sap-certified-technology-associate-edition-20...

A nice blog explaining about different Certificate options available for HANA  - SAP HANA Certification Pathways by vishal.soni :

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2013/01/10/sap-hana-certification-pathways

Check this document onSAP HANA Education: Course & Certification Program 2013 by tim.breitwieser :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-39531

SAP Training Site :

https://training.sap.com/in/en/search?query=hana

Check the below links to different SAP HANA Certification related documents and blogs :

A blog on Preparing for SAP HANA Application Associate Certification :

http://scn.sap.com/community/training-and-education/certification/blog/2013/08/21/hana

Read the below blog on SAP HANA Technology Associate:

SAP Certified Technology Associate: SAP HANA - by the SAP HANA Academy

A blog My Experience on HANA Certification by anjan.reddy5 :

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2012/08/27/my-experience-on-hana-certification

A blog My HANA Certification (C_HANAIMP_1)Experience by prashanth.reddy2

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2013/06/25/my-hana-certification-experience

A blog SAP HANA Professional Certification ( P_HANAIMP_1) by kiran.musunuru2 :

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2013/06/11/hana-professional-certfication-phanaimp1

A blog on Technology Associate Certification by tom.cenens :

http://scn.sap.com/community/training-and-education/certification/blog/2012/10/29/preparing-for-hana...

Read the following blog SAP Hana Training & Certification: What is the Value of SAP Hana Certification by tammy.powlas3 :

http://scn.sap.com/community/training-and-education/blog/2012/09/25/asug-sap-education-awareness-web...

Those appearing for HANA Technical Certification can also read the blog on SAP Hana Commands and Command Line Tools and SQL Reference Examples for NetWeaver Basis Administrators by petr.solberg :

http://scn.sap.com/community/hana-in-memory/blog/2013/05/27/andy-silvey--sap-hana-command-line-tools...

Some of the threads where you can find more information related to HANA Certification :

http://scn.sap.com/thread/2095335

http://scn.sap.com/thread/3288969

http://scn.sap.com/thread/3220487

http://scn.sap.com/thread/3362494

Learn more about SAP Global Certification :

http://scn.sap.com/community/training-and-education/certification/blog/2013/07/02/what-is-new-in-sap...

You can also read the blog on How to Prepare for a Certification Exam in 5 Simple Steps by katrin.rissberger:

http://scn.sap.com/community/training-and-education/certification/blog/2012/12/06/how-to-prepare-for...

To learn more about SAP HANA Certification : visit SAP Education Enablement & Certification Webinar Series :

http://scn.sap.com/docs/DOC-42717

7. Want to learn JSON, JavaScript, Ajax, Odata, JQuery, HTML5?

If you want to learn more about these google them or visit the following links :

To learn JavaScript, please visit http://www.w3schools.com/js/ or http://www.javascriptkit.com/

To learn JQuery, visit http://www.w3schools.com/jquery/ or http://learn.jquery.com/

For learning AJAX visit : http://www.w3schools.com/ajax/

One of the sites from where wecan download the moving GIFs for our web design is : http://ajaxload.info/

For learning JSON visit : http://www.w3schools.com/json/default.asp

For learning HTML5, visit : http://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_intro.asp or http://www.html5rocks.com/en/

For learning OData, visit : http://www.odata.org/documentation/odata-version-4-0-may-2013-public-review/

Also read and follow SCN Space on HTML5:

SAPUI5 Developer Center

My personal experience on HANA Certification :

I passed my SAP HANA Application Associate Certification in September, 2012.

I got 2 months Hands On training on HANA from my Company and after that used 30 day trial HANA Development Server for my practice at home for the next month.

Carefully read TZHANA, HA100 and HA300 books and completed all exercises given at the end of the book.

Also read other HANA related books and content available online - links to most of them are already mentioned by me in the above blog.

Everyone should carefully read TZHANA & HA100 as these are very important books and are common for both Technology and Application Certificate,

If someone has additional points that can be added in the blog, please feel free to write in the comments below and i would add them in the blog.

Thank you for reading my blog.