Approval emails - Jocelyn's License Issue

[Merrick, Phillip]

Brenntag,
 
It's fairly common that the use of any commercial software is subject to some form of licensing (as often is free software). In this respect, Jocelyn is correct to point out that the use of SAP software needs to be covered by an appropriate license agreement.
 
SAP has more than one form of license model, and as much as an SAP sales person would like to license every consumer, that's not always necessary :-). While your traditional R/3 user is often covered by a "named user" license, other licensing approaches are often used where the users cannot be easily identified, as might be the case for an online store.
 
For better or for worse, many SAP customers have negotiated specific licensing terms, so it's not possible to give a generalised response that will accurately reflect all of the people who form this workflow community of interest. The right thing to do is to hunt down your nominated account executive and ask them what terms may apply. I often use the phrase "licensing implication" when someone wants to interact with an SAP solution. That doesn't necessarily mean "per user", "per transaction", "per gigabyte", "per CPU" or any other specific metric (even dollars). Nor does it imply an order of magnitude of such. This can and often does vary from customer to customer.
 
A healthy dialogue with your SAP account executive can often help make you aware of the stuff you can use without having to spend hard money.
 
In general, the SAP e-selling solutions for consumers do not include the number of customers as a function of their price. I designed a solution once for a customer using the SAP Online Store for which they didn't have to pay any money; however, it's still subject to a software license. Again, talk to your SAP sales contacts - get to the source :-)
 
Phil.
 
-----Original Message-----
From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of Roger Myers
Sent: Tuesday, 24 February 2004 10:40 PM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Approval emails - Jocelyn's License Issue
 
Jocelyn:
 
I have am intrigued by your comments re licenses.
 
In a number of emails you have indicated a that all users of a generic id need to be licensed. How does this scenario play out in a web environment with an online store.
 
Does every web user/customer of an online store require a license?
 
Roger Myers
Brenntag
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of Dart, Jocelyn
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 7:11 PM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Approval emails
 
Hi John,
Be careful about the "no logon" option - you may be in breach of license agreements.
Even use of generic user ids needs to be licensed for the actual number of people who are going to access SAP using the generic account - even if technically they never log on directly.
 
The current best alternative to SAP MAPI is to use offline email reply as they do in SRM - essentially you send out an email notification with pre-formatted mailto hyperlinks.  When the reply email is received into SAP you evaluate it and apply the result to the work item (see business object WI_MAILREC method RECEIVE for a starting point).  This is easier if you get the new extended email notification program as it provides some BADIs where you can add your preformatted links. Simple but effective.
Regards,
Jocelyn
 
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of Roger Myers
Sent: Monday,23 February 2004 11:46 PM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: Approval emails
 
 
If you are into custom development, asp.net or jsp can do whatever you need to outside of SAP.
 
The .net connector  or java connector can bridge/manage movement of data via bapi calls to and from SAP as required.
 
Roger Myers
Brenntag
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: SAP Workflow [mailto:Owner-SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of John A Haworth
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 7:01 AM
To: SAP-WUG at MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Approval emails
 
Hi Workflowers
 
I have a Customer meeting tomorrow, where they want to know about the possibilities of web (non-sap) based Requisition Approval and the Pro's and Con's of them.
Initially they wanted SAP MAPI, but I havnt really given them a good alternative yet, hence the meeting.
My answer is simply using the ITS and form based approval task (thanks to those who have helped me on this) are there any answers based around Business Connector et al, that are pure web based with no log on (ITS or
SAP) and any Pros/Cons around it ?
 
Many Thanks
 
John
 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------
 
This is a PRIVATE message. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete without copying and kindly advise us by e-mail of the mistake in delivery. NOTE: Regardless of content, this e-mail shall not operate to bind CSC to any order or other contract unless pursuant to explicit written agreement or government initiative expressly permitting the use of e-mail for such purpose.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------