Using ABAP Development tools

ABAP Development tools provide the following:

1. A brand-new ABAP development experience on top of the eclipse platform.
2. An open platform for developing new ABAP-related tools.
3. A set of open, language and platform-independent APIs that developers can use to build new custom tool for the ABAP environment.

The architecture of ABAP development tools for SAP NetWeaver is an architecture designed for ease of use and flexibility. It is designed to allow developers to use a single Eclipse client, installed locally, that connects to several ABAP back-end systems of different releases using a RFC/REST based protocol.

This allows developers to control all activities in a central location and helps avoid time-consuming context switches. The client provides a set of standard Eclipse development tools, such as project explorer for system browsing and search views.

There are two kinds of editors in ABAP Development Tools – those for which there is a native Eclipse implementation and those that appear in-place in the SAP GUI. The figure above shows each kind – the ABAP editor as an example of an Eclipse editor and the ABAP Dictionary showing how the classic SAP GUI visualization appears within the Eclipse environment.

Working with ABAP Development Tools

Examples of Keyboard shortcuts ABAP Developers-

1. Shift + F1 – format the source code
2. Ctrl + < and Ctrl +> - turn a line of code into comment or to remove comment
3. F3 – to navigate to the definition of the currently selected object

Debugging ABAP Code

The latest ABAP debugger is completely integrated into the Eclipse debug framework. It can satisfy most of debugging requirements. You can start the debugger by setting a breakpoint in your code and then running the ABAP program.