Note 1322923 - Maintenance strategy / deadlines BW Business Explorer (BEx)

Summary

Symptom

This note explains the maintenance strategy and deadlines for the  BW Business Explorer known mainly as BEx Frontend.

Other terms

Frontend, BW, Business Explorer, BW frontend, GUI, maintenance, patch, upgrade, installation, Windows, JAVA, support, deadlines, release, 20B, 30B, 3.5, 3.x, 700, 7.x, 7.10, 7.20

Solution
Important remark:

For the maintanance strategy of SAP GUI please refer to note 147519.

Preliminary remarks

• Pay attention to the hardware requirements (see note 1425805 for the BEx and note 26417 for the SAP GUI).

• You can also find a support platform matrix on SAP SDN under http://sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/sap-gui or in the Product Availability Matrix (PAM)at http://service.sap.com/pam.

Business Explorer 3.x and 7.x - Maintenance and Support Deadlines

• GUI 6.20: End of Support at December 31st, 2010.

• GUI 6.40: End of Support at October 14th, 2008. Please use a supported GUI version.

• GUI 7.10: End of Support at April 12th, 2011. At this date the used development environment Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 will stop being maintained by Microsoft. Therefore no extension beyond this date is possible.

• GUI 7.20: Up to April 9th, 2013. For 3.x check also note 1410878.

Please make sure to check the limitation note 1424366 for SAP BEx 7.20 Frontend before using BW related functionality in SAP GUI for Windows 7.20.

BEx (Business Explorer) is released with the DVD of SAP GUI for Windows 7.20. For the delivery schedule of Patches, please refer to the SAP notes below:

1085218: NetWeaver 7.x BW Frontend SP/Patch Delivery Schedule
1118754: NetWeaver 04 / BW 3.5 Frontend Patch delivery schedule


Compatibility - 7.20
SAP GUI for Windows 7.20 is compatible with all releases of SAP products which are supported by SAP (this includes releases in extended maintenance).

Support for releases of the SAP BW Business Explorer

If the SAP GUI version you are using is not or no longer supported, you can proceed as follows:

• Upgrade the SAP GUI on your PCs to a supported version. We recommend to change to the highest available release in an upgrade to save additional upgrades later on.

• Use Terminal Servers and install a new GUI version on the server.

• The latest releases of CD or DVD with all the SAP frontend releases are given below.

           Latest CD\DVD releases

• • 7.10 Compilation 4 - Material number 50095979 - Released

• • 7.20 Compilation 1 - Material number 50098620 - Released

• • 7.20 Compilation 2 - Material number 50102369 - Released

• • 7.20 Compilation 3 - Material number awaited - Not released

• • 7.30 Compilation 1 - Material number awaited - Not released

BEx for Windows: Support for specific operating systems

Support for a specific operating system is usually closely linked to the support offered by the manufacturer for the operating system.

If the operating system you are using is not or no longer supported, you can either upgrade the PC to a supported operating system or use Windows Terminal Services / Citrix Metaframe / SUN Secure Global Desktop (see note 138869for information on SAP GUI for Windows on Terminal Servers).

The end dates for support of BEx (SAP GUI) on various operating systems which are no longer supported completely by the manufacturers (independent of the SAP GUI version) are listed below. When support has ended, SAP no longer processes errors regarding operating systems, but for an additional period of up to 12 months, SAP checks the compatibility of patches to be delivered on platforms which have already reached the 'de-support' date ("post mortem QA procedure").

• Windows 95:          De-Support: December 31, 2001 (*)

• Windows 3.x:         De-Support: December 31, 2001 (*)

• Windows NT 3.51:     De-Support: December 31, 2001 (*)

• Windows ME:          De-Support: June 30, 2003 (*)

• Windows NT 4.0:      De-Support: June 30, 2003 (*)

• Windows 98:          De-Support: January 15, 2004 (*)

• Windows 2000:        De-Support: June 30,
                      Post mortem QA: until June 30, 2011

• Windows XP Prof:     De-Support: March 31, 2014
                      Post mortem QA: until December 31, 2014

• Windows 2003 Server: De-Support: March 31, 2014
                      Post mortem QA: until December 31, 2014

• Windows Vista:       De-Support: April 11, 2017
                      Post mortem QA: until March 31, 2018

• Windows 2008 Serv:   De-Support: July 9, 2013
                      Post mortem QA: July 10, 2018

• Windows 7:           De-Support: January 13, 2015
                      Post mortem QA: January 14, 2020
  

(*) The use of Terminal Services with these client platforms is still supported as long as SAP GUI is installed on a supported operating system (on the server).

In addition, there are restrictions on support for SAP GUI on the following platforms, which are no longer "mainstream" for the manufacturer, if a problem only occurs on the following operating system versions. SAP is striving to solve such issues, but in individual cases, it may show that SAP cannot solve the problem. Here SAP reserves the right of proposing the use of a current operating system version and/or SAP GUI Release to solve the problem.

• Windows 2000:        restricted support since June 30, 2005

• Windows XP Prof:     restricted support as of April 14, 2009

• Windows 2003 Server: restricted support as of December 31, 2009

• Windows Vista:       restricted support as of March 31, 2012

Manufacturer information for operating systems

Microsoft communicates the support periods for individual operating systems at http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/
SAP recommends their customers to read the information available there regularly to be able to plan the PC infrastructure efficiently.
At the time of the last changes to this note, the following dates are valid:

• Windows 2000:        "Not supported" as of July 13, 2010

• Windows XP Prof:     "Not supported" as of April 8, 2014

• Windows 2003 Server: "Not Supported" as of July 14, 2015

• Windows Vista :       "Not Supported" as of April 11, 2017

Frequently asked questions

How is the compatibility with different SAP GUI versions?
Please make sure to check the limitation note 1013140 for SAP BW 7.10 Frontend before using BW related functionality in SAP GUI for Windows 7.10. Note 1025122 describes an additional issue in the BW Frontend delivered on 7.10 Compilation 1.


Will there be a successor of BEx 7.x in SAP GUI 7.20?
Yes. Business Explorer will continue to be shipped as an add-on to the different SAP GUI versions available at that period. SAP GUI for Windows 7.30 is being in the planning phase for shipment now.


Which version of BEx should I use?
SAP recommends to always use the latest available version of BEx when installing new clients. The reason for this recommendation is that only the latest releases / patches contain the most recent new features / corrections you might need. By using this approach you will effectively have to do less BEx upgrades. If you do not want to install a new release of BEx you can keep using your current release (as long as this is supported), but you will not benefit from the new features available in newer releases.

• You should also take into account that new platforms (like Windows 7, Windows 2008 server) are only supported with new SAP BEx releases.

SAP Developer Network
For further information on the topic Business Explorer please refer to the developer network at http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/bex