Archiving in SAP
Connects SAP and all archived documents
Archiving in SAP® is the backbone for all of your document-intensive business processes. Regardless of how a document arrives at the company, whether by email, scan or PDF, your SAP® archive system bundles all the information and documents together on an audit-proof and retrievable basis.
Archiving and intelligent linking of documents in SAP
Companies that organise their business processes using ERP systems such as SAP want to make the most of such systems. A high number of digital documents can overload the system, however, and thereby lead to a poorer performance, which in turn results in more time being spent on processing. This is where digital document storage and archiving is required in order to appropriately manage and archive documentation which is no longer required for the day-to-day business. SAP provides an integrated document storage solution for this purpose.
There is a crucial catch, however: Once the data has been archived, it can no longer be made available in SAP without further action. Users still have read access, but the archived documents cannot be reloaded if you want to continue working with them. Another disadvantage is the system performance, which can be affected adversely by large volumes of data. For users of SAP S/4HANA, the in-memory database is also associated with high costs which arise on a regular basis.
The solution for archiving your data and documents is easy archive for SAP Solutions. The SAP-certified interface connects the SAP system to the underlying external easy archive via the integrated SAP component ArchiveLink and stores data and documents from the SAP system which are not needed immediately in the easy archive. This creates performance capacities, while the data which is archived on an audit-proof basis remains available for your daily work.
Put an end to long searches for the most recent invoice or pay slip. Place your trust in the market leader for archiving systems: easy archive for SAP Solutions is the link between your SAP system, your company documents and the archive.
The underlying easy archive not only processes the data and documents from your SAP system, but it also processes all the data and documents generated in other applications. This creates the basis for the numerous functions of the easy solution that go beyond simple filing.
Functions
Archive documents in SAP securely and continue working with them
Once documents have been archived, they can no longer be made readily available in SAP. An external document archiving software can provide a remedy. With easy archive, you have a storage location for your data and documents that offers several benefits.
Over time, the requirements of the legislator have become increasingly strict. On the one hand, it is necessary to store documents on an audit-proof basis. On the other hand, it is also necessary to comply with the data protection requirements. With a software solution, data protection-compliant digital archiving is guaranteed as long as it supports the SAP Information Lifecycle Management (ILM). In this respect, documents are managed automatically and erased, for example, after a previously defined period of time and according to specific conditions. This provides optimal support for storing documents in compliance with the sensitive data protection requirements regarding business documents, because every change, whether erasure, blocking or filing, can be tracked transparently.
The lean, high-performance solution has been largely preconfigured and can be easily connected to your SAP system without any problems – even during operation. The data and documents in easy archive can be made available again after archiving. The solution supports you through numerous additional functions for optimising your business processes:
- SAP documents and documents from other systems can be linked to each other according to process and bundled into thematically related files. You can easily see everything that belongs together.
- Archived SAP data and non-SAP data can be searched directly from the SAP environment using the full text search. This means you can avoid the inconvenience of switching between various systems when searching and saves valuable time.
- Data and documents can be linked with additional metadata via easy archive for SAP Solutions, which makes it possible to search SAP data with the archive client even outside SAP.
- Data and documents can be archived according to process for all enterprise applications and integrated into processes, meaning you can design versatile business processes that are not limited to SAP.
- Early filing: Your employees scan all documents immediately upon receipt, and via SAP Business Workflow, assign them individually to the correct operating process, which has already been predefined.
- Late filing: The incoming documents are issued with a barcode. They are scanned collectively and assigned to the correct operating process automatically by the barcode.
- Simultaneous filing: The operating process is posted, the corresponding document is then scanned and immediately assigned to this transaction manually.
Keep track of things with an archive for SAP
The easy solution manages far more than just the archiving in SAP. easy archive for SAP Solutions supports you with several additional functions for the optimisation of your business processes, such as
- the archiving of extensive print lists and journals
- the automation of your incoming invoice processing or incoming customer orders
- the storage of all documents, from purchasing through to payment processes
- the storage of personal data
- linking with external documents, e.g. externally generated service reports
You can easily archive any document in your company in SAP
- Print lists, journals, dunning lists
- Customer orders
- Incoming and outgoing invoices
- Personnel files, customer and project files
- Process emails
- Contracts
Benefits
archiving solution for SAP
If you want to increase efficiency and simultaneously maintain process security, then easy archive for SAP Solutions is the right solution for you as it offers numerous advantages:
- Cost and capacity savings – dthe volume of data in the running application is reduced, which improves system performance and eliminates the need to spend money on expensive additional storage
- Audit security – data and documents are stored in compliance with legal requirements for data archiving
- High access speeds – data and documents are quickly accessible thanks to full-text search and the avoidance of media disruptions
- Processing speeds – import and index up to 700,000 output documents per hour on a standard server platform
- Seamless process integration – Seamless process integration – by linking with external documents and other corporate applications, processes can be meaningfully linked and optimised. When archiving invoices, for example, linking with documents that originated outside SAP, such as service reports or project documents for instance, does not pose any problem. This means that all the documents required for a work process are directly available and redundancies are avoided, as all specialist departments have access to the same data sources. At the same time, this increases the transparency of the entire business transaction.
- SAP certification – Certification by SAP SE means easy archive for SAP Solutions supports all the functions of the SAP ArchiveLink standard interface and offers many useful expansions for SAP ArchiveLink
easy archive: SAP-certified integration with SAP S/4HANA
easy archive 7 has achieved SAP certification as integrated with SAP S/4HANA®. The integration enhances the experience with reliable, revision-proof electronic archiving. The (re)certified interface serves as the basis for customers to connect easy archive to existing SAP systems.
Recertification by SAP means easy archive 7 can continue to promise maintenance of existing and new archive installations. Certification for SAP S/4HANA is particularly important, so easy archive creates integration options for customers. With the successful certification, easy archive customers benefit from a future-proof archive with a long solution life.
information-centered work with the archive for SAP
easy archive for SAP Solutions interfaces flawlessly with your SAP system. This is no coincidence, because easy attributes considerable importance to the strict integration of SAP documents according to SAP standards. The integration has already been certified several times for the latest versions of SAP.
As an independent additional component, the archiving solution in SAP ensures that SAP documents are stored independently of the actual SAP system. Access to these documents is possible from a variety of standard applications, such as Microsoft® SharePoint and many more.
Archiving in SAP – the basis for clean data in SAP S/4HANA
The amount of documents and data in a company should not be underestimated. The information it contains is the basis for business success. Without an archiving system, they often cannot be used optimally for work processes. In addition, the legal situation is unambiguous; there are clear legal requirements as to how documents containing personal data have to be managed, for example retention periods for personnel files. The auditing of invoices also follows specific schedules. In fact, all business-relevant documents are subject to a life cycle which culminates in their archiving.
When it comes to a planned migration to SAP S/4HANA, it is a good idea to migrate all documents and data cleanly with the help of an archive system. This results in less complexity during the migration and significant cost savings with the use of SAP S/4HANA.
Enhancements for archiving in SAP
SmartAttach
Automated (late) assignment of documents to SAP documents
easy SmartAttach for SAP Solutions links stored documents to an existing SAP data record (SAP Business Object). easy Smart Link for SAP Solutions is a mass solution for linking external documents with SAP postings. For example, you can assign service slips to your outgoing invoices and therefore prove that the service has been provided at any time.
WebDAV for SAP ILM
GDPR-compliant archiving of documents and data
easy WebDAV for SAP ILM (SAP ILM) fulfils all requirements for SAP ILM-capable storage of archive data and archive documents. This integration provides you with the basis for sustainable lifecycle management of your data and is ideally equipped to meet the requirements of digitalisation. The retention policies and retention periods you set up in ILM are transparently linked to the deletion processes in the archive. Your company also fulfils the requirements of the GDPR.
SING
Document indexing for access without SAP access
The SING module enhances the original documents that have been stored with additional business metadata. This enables you to access and retrieve all your SAP documents via the easy archive client. You use the convenient full text search feature independently from the SAP system. The actual advantage, however, is also the possibility to search other systems directly from the SAP user interface and to search across several systems from the web client. This puts an end to the hassle of switching back and forth between different systems, and saves you valuable time that you can use for your day-to-day business rather than searching for documents.
Retrieval
Universal access to archives via SAP systems
easy Retrieval for SAP Solutions enables SAP system users to easily access all company documents (SAP and non-SAP documents) that are stored in easy archive using their usual environment. For example, when creating shipping documents, you can access test reports that are stored in a separate easy archive.
FAQ
questions about archiving in SAP
The SAP-certified interface connects the SAP system to the underlying external easy archive via the integrated SAP component ArchiveLink and stores data and documents from the SAP system to the easy archive. A good software package for the digital storage of SAP documents should be certified by SAP. Only in this way can you be certain that the solution will still be compatible with your ERP system in the future and will remain in use. The regular renewal of the SAP certification is therefore essential.
The easy WebDAV for SAP ILM module is used for technical integration of SAP ILM. The prerequisites for this are a corresponding easy archive and the basic module for easy archive for SAP Solutions (see above) as well as corresponding user licenses.
Not only the time required, but also the cost of S/4HANA varies greatly depending on the size of the database content to be migrated. However, a well-planned conversion with cleansed data brings many positive developments. These include, for example:
- Better performance
- Less storage space required after clean-up
- Easy administration of the HANA database
- Less ongoing costs for space on main storage
- Fewer resources to migrate and reduced total cost of ownership
