Book excerpt: The purpose of this book is to remove the veil of secrecy surrounding SAP upgrade techniques and concepts, and to provide the user with a detailed description of the steps needed for a successful implementation. Today more than 12 million people in 120 countries who are working for 36,200 companies are using SAP on a regular basis. This popular, but very complex software system must be constantly reconfigured and upgraded to accommodate its latest releases. Upgrading SAP provides a complete overview of the process to upgrade from one SAP release to the next one and explains with detailed descriptions, the use of all relevant SAP upgrade tools. Along with a technical description of the SAP NetWeaver Application Server (AS), it also discusses personnel issues and the economic ramifications of such an upgrade project. Examples in this book are based on various different SAP products and releases, such as SAP NetWeaver 2004, 2004S (also known as NetWeaver 7.0 and 7.1), and SAP Business Suite 2005 with SAP ERP 6.0, BI, CRM, SCM, and SRM. Conceived as both a teaching book and as a reference manual, it covers all the techniques, background information, notes, tips, and tricks needed for any SAP upgrade project. A CD-ROM accompanies the book with templates and outlines for the upgrading process, as well as third-party SAP-related material.