Skript: How to Install ABAP Development Tools (Fast) [002]

Table of contents

• Introduction
• Installation
• Connect System
• Settings
• ABAP Cleaner
• Completion

Introduction

In this episode, we'll look at installing the ABAP Development Tools, or ADT for short. We'll proceed step by step to ultimately have a working version and connect to a cloud system.

In the first step, we download the ZIP file, which saves us the trouble of installing the components.
In the second step, we install the ABAP Development Tools, and in the last step, we install any additional optional plug-ins we need for our work.

 

Installation

Using the search engine of your choice, we then go to the HANA Tools page. There, under ABAP, we'll find the appropriate links for downloading the Eclipse version. This link should take you to Eclipse.org. There, we'll find the correct version for our download. Please make sure you use the ZIP directory instead of the installable file. The download will take a moment.

Once the download is complete, we can move the file to a folder and unzip it there. Once the unzipping is complete, we can start Eclipse.exe.

If you're using Windows, you may receive a message from Windows Defender. Here, we confirm that we're getting a faster start for Eclipse. If you're using a company device, you may not be able to change this setting.

The next step is to install the plugin. To do this, go to "Help -> Install New Software." In the next step, copy the link for the Hana Tools and paste it into the popup. When you press Enter, various tools will be displayed. Here, select the ABAP Development Tools and confirm.

After reading the license terms, confirm them. During the installation, you will be repeatedly asked to trust various modules; you must confirm these for installation. The installation will take a few minutes.

Finally, we restart Eclipse.

After restarting Eclipse, we change the theme to the light theme, as this is our preference and is easier to read. It's best to restart Eclipse again for this.

In the next step, we install the ABAP git and ABAP Cleaner plugins. You can also find the links to both plugins on the page; we can copy them there and install them again via "Help -> Install New Software." The actual steps are repeated here: selecting the software, accepting the license terms, and trusting the various modules. After each successful installation, we must restart Eclipse.

Once we have installed both plugins, we are now finished with the installation.

 

Connect System

After completing the installation, we delete the Java perspective. The next step is to add the Abba perspective. On the left side, you will find two menu items for adding an on-premises system or a cloud system.

In this case, we are adding an availability: To do this, we simply need to enter the system's URL. In the next step, we need to authenticate ourselves to the system. Finally, we give the system a name and can add it to our settings. This completes your first system integration with Eclipse.

 

Settings

In the last step, we want to complete the Eclipse configuration. You can find the corresponding settings for Eclipse under Window Preferences.

The first setting we want to adjust is the Text Editor. You can find this under General Settings. There we want to set the width of the tab stop. In ABAP, this is normally 2 characters. Likewise, we don't want to insert tabs, but rather spaces, and when we delete them, we want to delete multiple spaces at once. This will save us work later when editing source code.

The next setting can be found in the Source Code Editors section. This is a personal preference, however, and it means that we don't get automatic brackets and literals at the end; instead, we have to insert them manually. We also don't want any additional whitespace.

Finally, we go to the "Keys" section. There, we enable the keyboard bindings to be shown when we use them. This setting is especially useful in YouTube videos, since the viewer can't see which shortcuts we've chosen.

Now we'll call a standard class. XCO_CP is a standard class of the XCO libraries. If we look at the source code, we see a lot of black and blue, and a lack of contrast to distinguish it.

To do this, we can go back to the settings and search for "Color." We then find it in the "ABAP Keyword Colors" section. There, we activate all checkboxes with "Select All." The source code is now colored accordingly. If we scroll down, we also see that the beginning and end of methods are better marked, giving us a better visual overview of the class.

 

ABAP Cleaner

In the next step, we add a Z package to our favorites. We've already created this package in the system. We'll create a corresponding subpackage under the package so we can perform an initial test. We'll then confirm everything until the package has been created. We'll create a new ABAP class using New. Give the class a new name and a description. In the Interfaces section, we'll search for the IF_OO_ADT interface and find the Class Runner interface. There, we'll implement the first output in the Main method to get a result in the console.

In this step, we'll also want to configure the ABAP Cleaner. In the "Source Code" menu, you'll find the corresponding option to start the interactive cleaner. We can create or upload a new profile using the "Configure" option. We've already saved a profile locally on the hard drive. We can search for and select the profile using the Import button. We have now imported the new profile using the "Save Profile and Exit" button. We can then apply the formatting using "Apply and Close," and the ABAP Cleaner is executed.

If we start our application with F9, the corresponding output is generated in the console. If we restart the console, the same line is generated again. However, we can still adjust some settings here. To do this, we go back to the settings and search for "Console." Under the ABAP Development section, we can check the box to clear the console after each execution.

If we then run our console application again, the console is cleared and the new result is transferred to the console.

 

Completion

As you can see, installing Eclipse and the ABAP Development Tools doesn't take very long. What we didn't show in this video, however, is configuring the backend system and activating the SICF service. Here, however, only the ADT service needs to be enabled and the appropriate user permissions must be present. Since we are using a cloud system, this configuration is no longer necessary.

If you would like to delve deeper into the topic of ABAP development tools, configuration, and troubleshooting, you can find a detailed community guide in German on GitHub. There you will also find a link to the English version in PDF format.

Thanks for watching and see you next time.

 

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