Book excerpt: * SAP is investing billions to redesign its flagship R/3 product line based on its ESA, and that ESA will become the standard framework for developing all new SAP ERP applications with NetWeaver * This book provides an overview of the core building blocks of SAP's new ESA, and shows how ESA works with the NetWeaver platform as well as mySAP ERP * A step-by-step action plan proposes ideas for designing ESA-based SAP applications * The companion Web site contains in-depth case examples that show how to build various SAP services and applications using the NetWeaver development tools, plus third-party tools * Some of the SAP tools covered include NetWeaver Developer Studio, WebDynPro and NetWeaver Portal, NetWeaver BI, and the SAP Composite Application Framework