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The SAP ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live SAP ERP, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.

With the SAP ODBC Driver, accessing SAP R/3 and SAP ERP is as easy as querying a database.

Viewing SAP Data in RAD Studio Data Explorer



How to view SAP data in RAD Studio Data Explorer using the CData ODBC Driver for SAP.

Embarcadero RAD Studio provides a development environment for Delphi and C++Builder applications. With the CData ODBC Driver for SAP, you gain access to live SAP data within RAD Studio, abstracting the data into tables, views, and stored procedures that can be used to both retrieve SAP data. This article will walk through connecting to SAP using the Data Explorer.

Configure a Connection to SAP

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

You can connect to SAP systems using either librfc32.dll, librfc32u.dll, NetWeaver, or Web Services (SOAP). Set the ConnectionType connection property to CLASSIC (librfc32.dll), CLASSIC_UNICODE (librfc32u.dll), NETWEAVER, or SOAP.

If you are using the SOAP interface, set the Client, RFCUrl, SystemNumber, User, and Password properties, under the Authentication section.

Otherwise, set Host, User, Password, Client, and SystemNumber.

Note: We do not distribute the librfc32.dll or other SAP assemblies. You must find them from your SAP installation and install them on your machine.

For more information, see this guide on obtaining the connection properties needed to connect to any SAP system.

Connecting to SAP Data Using Data Explorer

You can create a simple application for displaying SAP data by utilizing the CData FireDAC Components for SAP and a new VCL Forms Application:

  1. Open the Data Explorer in RAD Studio and expand FireDAC.
  2. Right-click the ODBC Data Source node in the Data Explorer.
  3. Click Add New Connection.
  4. Enter a name for the connection.
  5. In the FireDAC Connection Editor that appears, set the DataSource property to the name of the ODBC DSN for SAP.
  6. Back in the Data Explorer, expand the views for the connection.
  7. Create a new VCL Forms application and drag a view (for example: MARA) onto the form.

  8. Select the MARAView object on the form and set the Active property to true.
  9. Right-click on the object, bind visually, and link everything (*) to a new control (TStringGrid).

  10. Arrange the TStringGrid on the form and run the application to see the MARA data.