ABAP - CL_ABAP_CONTEXT_INFO
Collected information about the user and the system was previously only obtained from the SYST structure. There is now a class that provides much of this informations.
Table of contents
In many current applications on an On-Premise system, the SYST (or SY) structure of the system is used to determine the user, the date or the time, and this has also been standard from the start. SAP now wants to try something new with the cloud and the new version of ABAP.
CL_ABAP_CONTEXT_INFO
The new class offers various methods for determining environmental data for the current application. The various methods should replace the corresponding fields from the SYST.
To make things easier, a comparison of the methods for the individual fields from the SYST structure and an assignment to the fields used on the SAP Cloud Platform:
| New Method | Old environment |
|---|---|
| GET_SYSTEM_DATE | SYST-DATUM |
| GET_SYSTEM_TIME | SYST-UZEIT |
| GET_USER_TECHNICAL_NAME | SYST-UNAME |
| GET_USER_LANGUAGE_ABAP_FORMAT | SYST-LANGU |
| GET_USER_LANGUAGE_ISO_FORMAT | ISO format for language |
| GET_USER_TIME_ZONE | SYST-TZONE |
| GET_USER_ALIAS | Alias of user master data (Cloud) |
| GET_SYSTEM_URL | URL of the system (Cloud) |
| GET_USER_FORMATTED_NAME | BAPI_USER_GET_DETAIL |
| GET_USER_DESCRIPTION | BAPI_USER_GET_DETAIL |
| GET_USER_BUSINESS_PARTNER_ID | Business-Partner-ID of the user (Cloud) |
You will most likely not need some of the fields that only affect the cloud on your On-Premise system. The date and time are determined using the TIMESTAMP function, which you can also use normally in the cloud.
Hint: There are still many fields of the SYST structure available that you also need for your daily work (SUBRC, INDEX, TABIX, DBCNT).
On-Premise
Even if the class is not yet a must in the on-premise landscape, we recommend that you use the new fields. Especially if your company wants to be “Cloud Ready” or is migrating its own developments to the cloud via side-by-side extension in the near future. If you get used to the new auxiliary class today, it will be very easy for you to adjust later because you are already doing everything as described.
Cloud
On the SAP Cloud Platform, up to release 2008 (August 2020), many of the fields were not released for use and you could only use the class to access the other information. Since this release the remaining fields have been released again, but probably temporarily for the time being.
When using the new fields, you will receive a warning in Eclipse that the field should no longer be used with this language version.
It is therefore possible that in the future the fields will be removed again by SAP and can no longer be used. As already described above, some fields are still relevant and can only be accessed via the SYST structure.
Conclusion
The new class CL_ABAP_CONTEXT_INFO already offers some nice features for determining the full user name. However, we recommend that you include them in your daily development so that you are prepared for the future and the cloud.
