Mastering SQL Queries for SAP Business One

5 *

Packt Publishing has come out with some good books for IT folks and they are starting to gain a reputation for providing both technical and functional books. "Mastering SQL for SAP Business One" is another example of what this publishing house is striving for: IT books which provide both theory and actual application of a topic with a hands-on, sensible approach. Packt has the catch phrase of "professional expertise distilled" for their publications, which might be more on target of what this book is all about. Many of Packt's books are excellent self-teaching tools, and this book definitely falls into that category and goes a bit beyond.I might have some skin in the game on this one, but if you deal with SAP Business One (SAP B1) at all, you quickly realize one of the most useful tools to have around is the ability to write SQL to provide additional information which users require throughout the life of SAP B1's usage. The author might refer to it as "Business Intelligence" and "Data Mining", but I tend to be old school and think of SQL's purpose as: the user needs information which is in the databases, and IT needs some special SQL written to get it into the hands of the users.Besides the obvious benefits of the skills you will receive from the book, an additional benefit of this publication deals with the author: Gordon Du is widely and openly recognized in the SAP B1 Forums as being a complete, well-rounded expert on SAP B1, and one of the best SQL writers to be found in helping others straighten out or improve the SQL that is posted on the SAP B1 sites. If you are at all slightly familiar with the SAP sites, you know this fellow has some pretty incredible credentials. We are talking about someone with real, hands-on expertise in a field with is fairly tight; you might not be able to get better advice than what Gordon Du provides.This book hits the subject head-on and, without a doubt, is one of the books you must have on your shelf before you start using or implementing SAP B1. Having taught non-technical users how to write SQL many times during SAP B1 implementations, I wish I would have had this book at hand. It will be an excellent teaching tool for me in the future where those learning can refer back to the book over and over again to solidify their skills. The book provides just enough technical information without getting too technical. By the way, I like the limited amount of technical references: the technical aspects of the book are balanced pretty good - enough to explain to the novice for basic understanding and enough for the advanced to research further what is being said.The book also provides a good amount of actual SQL which can be copied into SAP B1 and used immediately. I do not know how many SQL statements are contained within the book, but it must be over 100 (maybe 125?) actual SQLs you can have for every day business usage. The icing on the cake is when the author provides the many different ways in which SQL can be used within SAP B1: formatted searches, user-defined fields, stored procedures, using SAP B1's function of creating a report layout directly from the Query Manager, etc (check the index and table of contents). These are some subjects which directly relate to SAP B1 and how they are used. The author brings together a lot of points which are scattered throughout other sites and publications (some of them are almost impossible to find). So the consolidation of these topics in one book is another great benefit to anyone interested in SQL for SAP B1.But the previous points are not the best part of Gordon Du's work; the best part is that the author takes the time to show what he was presented with from various users in actual business scenarios and how he changed and/or improved upon the SQL to get the user the answer they needed. I can easily see how he worked through the problem and can learn what to do in similar cases.If there is a good indication of the author's intent, it can be found on page 19 with his constant slogan and approach to any SQL which he has written: "Keep it simple is the key to success...simple, simpler, the simplest" is the way to go - cut it down to bare bones where possible and forget the fancy inclusions sometimes found. In juxtaposition to many other books on SQL, the intent is to make it and keep it simple, and thereby, making the subject less intimidating for folks new or just starting to stretch their wings in writing SQL. It is a lesson often overlooked and causes immense problems when any change or enhancement to SQL is done. Many SQL authors think the SQL has to be complex to be appreciated, but the real appreciation comes in when others have to understand or touch up SQL previously written by someone else.Still not convinced to order this book? Then let me put it in a format which drives any business: costs and money. If you figure the average hourly rate for an SAP B1 Consultant to come in and write some SQL for your company (say with a low-ball estimate average of two hours per SQL), and if you end up using only one, just one, of the SQL given in the book, you will have already covered the cost of the book by itself. If, however, you study and pick up some skills in writing SQL without the aid of an SAP B1 Consultant or classroom training, you will actually be saving your company money with the demand made by users within a short time of going live with SAP B1. The topics are so different, I doubt anyone would have all of the SQL the author presents - I know I don't have all of these, and I have been doing SQL for some time now. And don't be easily fooled, the need for new SQL after going into production mode will be there time and time again! Save yourself some headache AND time AND your company's money.I am suggesting to everyone I have dealt with on SAP B1 that they buy this book and take 15 to 30 minutes each day to do one example from the book in their test system. Copy both the problem SQL and Gordon Du's solution SQL, run both of them, and see the results with what the author suggests. If they do that small task every day, their skill level and understanding of SQL for SAP B1 will increase since the author peppers various SQL pointers throughout the book. They might not immediately become an expert like Gordon Du (he does have over 20 years of experience after all), but they will surely become one of the best in their company when users need additional information out of SAP B1. And, believe me, if you have SAP B1 at your company, someone internal MUST become proficient at SQL for SAP B1 for the outlay of cash can skyrocket.If you are familiar with my reviews, you know I am really stingy with 5 stars on Amazon, but this book will receive it. But if I had a choice to give incremental ratings, the rating would be a 4.75. Why not a five star if incremental ratings were available? One technique I would have liked to have seen used in the book is a version of how an ending SQL standardized structure would look like - too complicated to get into here, but a technique which goes along with the author's intent of "keeping it simple" - Gordon knows what I mean. Another improvement would be if the book had a listing of all tables in SAP B1 (like Teufel has in his SAP B1 book). The last suggestion I have for the author deals with including some specific SAP B1 "gotcha" situations (Query Wizard does not show all tables, certain words which stop one from getting drill-down arrows, etc). I would have gone over the top with the incrementals and said a solid, no doubt about it five star rating if those three suggestions had been present. But, again, that is just my own personal opinion. According to the Sample Chapter provided by Packt, Gordon Du will be working on other books on SAP B1 - maybe he will include these items in his upcoming publications?But let me give you the bottom line: order it and thank Gordon later on, after you have reaped the benefits.

The software version is not working.. Skipping pages. I have ordered paper back edition

I've some familiarity with SQL and with queries written in it, but no experience using SAP's Business One package, unlike perhaps some of the other reviewers who seem well acquainted with it. It appears that the value of this book is in its extremely detailed examples of how to implement the trendily termed "Business Intelligence" as actual and useful queries.The specialisation to SAP Business One means that you have this already installed on your computers. While the book does offer an introductory chapter on the general basics of SQL, it's pretty rudimentary. You really should be already up to speed on SQL. The second chapter moves onto SAP, with an all too brief description of their Query Generator and Query Wizard.But it is the third chapter, on the Query Manager, that you should start to focus. It lets you make complex queries and just as importantly to group them into categories. You can use its user interface to build a first attempt at a query. Then, from looking at the text of how the Manager has instantiated the query, you can if necessary manually edit it to customise it further for exactly your situation.The ability to group queries is the other key valued added aspect of Manager. Introductory books on SQL rarely talk about this. But in practical situations, and not restricted to the SAP packages, once you starting building a set of interrelated tables and writing queries against them, you start accumulating many queries. In itself, this can be a source of complexity and error.The rest of the book then goes into several extended examples that let you learn about how to use these tools.

Tutto ok. Consegna perfetta

Very helpful if you don't have experience building querys on SAP B1, I've been learning a lot of details, I recommend it 100%

My programmer says this book is a great tool.

A+ great product and was everything I expected!

I have found it very useful. Would have give it 5 stars if the book had included some compendium about operators, sap tables and relationship and the formatting for kindle were better adapted.