Importing Data from SAP

Data can be extracted from SAP using the RFC interface with --#ImportSapQuery command in SQL scripting and ReadSap function in the expression language. In addition to the RFC interface, data can be fetched from SAP HANA with ODBC using the ImportODBCSecure function and ImportOdbcQuery.

Data conversion in RFC interface

Data extracted from SAP using the RFC interface, contains specific data type information, so data can be converted into respective data types used by the in-memory core and SQL Server as follows:

SAP data type	Expression language: ReadSap function	SQL scripting: --#ImportSapQuery
I (integer)	long	INT
F (floating point number)	double	FLOAT
P (fixed point number, packed number)	double	FLOAT
C(text)	string	NVARCHAR(length) or NVARCHAR(max) if length is greater than 8000
D (date)	datetime	DATETIME2
T (time)	timespan	TIME
N (numeric text)	string	NVARCHAR(length) or NVARCHAR(max) if length is greater than 8000
X (binary data)	byte[]	VARBINARY(length) or VARBINARY(max) if length is greater than 8000

Conversions are determined by the ConvertDataTypes setting for each data type separately. If no conversions are explicitly set, --#ImportSapQuery (in SQL scripting) does not make conversions (to maintain backwards compatibility), and ReadSap (in expression language) makes all possible conversion. When there is no conversion defined, data is converted to strings as defined by the table above.

Date (D) and time (T) type of fields are usually related to the same timestamp and thus they are bound together as follows: If T type of column is defined directly after the the D type of column, the time part in the T column is added to the D column, and no new column is created for the the T column. This is done only if both D and T types are among the converted types.

Note that in the C datatype, spaces from both side are trimmed away.

More information about SAP data types: https://help.sap.com/saphelp_nwpi71/helpdata/en/fc/eb2fd9358411d1829f0000e829fbfe/content.htm?no_cache=true.