How do I automate SAP GUI with c#

Question

I would like to automate an SAP GUI window using the C# language. I am able to do it in VBScript but code reuse is horrible. Besides Id like to use threading instead of having 80 or more processes running. Where can I find any documentation and samples of how to do this? Here is the code I am working with. Basically, the problem I am facing is - how do I make a connection to SAP GUI then create an SAP GUI on the fly then start making transactions and entering text in some fields.

using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using White.Core.Factory;
using White.Core.UIItems.Finders;
using White.Core.InputDevices;
using System.Threading;
using System.Diagnostics;
using SAP.Connector;
using SAP;


namespace SAP_Automation
{
    class Program
    {
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            string ExeSourceFile = @"C:\Program Files\SAP\SapSetup\setup\SAL\SapLogon.s8l";
            White.Core.Application _application;
            White.Core.UIItems.WindowItems.Window _mainWindow;

            var c = SAP.Connector.Connection.GetConnection("**");
            var c = new SAPConnection("ASHOST=*; GWHOST=*; GWSERV=*; ASHOST=*; SYSNR=00;USER=user; PASSWD=**;");
            c.Open();


            }
        }
    }
}

As you can see I can create a connection but I dont know how to create a session to the GUI and start entering text in fields. Any examples and samples would be appreciated.

Answer 1

This might be necro-threading but I was in a similar situation where I work. We needed SAP GUI Automation for testing purposes that could integrate with the rest of our homegrown automation platform written in C#. I helped create a proposal for one solution that took advantage of a SAP provided library for GUI automation that could be used as the basis for an automation layer for SAP.

Does the following file exist on your SAP file installation? x:\Program Files\SAP\FrontEnd\SAPGui\sapfewse.ocx?

If so, add it to Visual Studio (or whatever IDE you're using) as a reference. It is basically a class library which contains a bunch of SAP specific objects that will allow you to interact with. It is very effective because it exposes most of what you need from the SAP GUI. We discovered in other attempts that a lot of the objects in SAP were not available.

This is an early proof of concept I did. Start SAP with a connection string, enter credentials, navigate to a transaction code.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Collections;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using SAPFEWSELib;

namespace SAPGuiAutomated
{
//created a class for the SAP app, connection, and session objects as well as for common methods. 
    public class SAPActive
    {
        public static GuiApplication SapGuiApp { get; set; }
        public static GuiConnection SapConnection { get; set; }
        public static GuiSession SapSession { get; set; }

        public static void openSap(string env)
        {
            SAPActive.SapGuiApp = new GuiApplication();

            string connectString = null;
            if (env.ToUpper().Equals("DEFAULT"))
            {
                connectString = "1.0 Test ERP (DEFAULT)";
            }
            else
            {
                connectString = env;
            }
            SAPActive.SapConnection = SAPActive.SapGuiApp.OpenConnection(connectString, Sync: true); //creates connection
            SAPActive.SapSession = (GuiSession)SAPActive.SapConnection.Sessions.Item(0); //creates the Gui session off the connection you made
        }

        public void login(string myclient, string mylogin, string mypass, string mylang)
        {
            GuiTextField client  = (GuiTextField)SAPActive.SapSession.ActiveWindow.FindByName("RSYST-MANDT", "GuiTextField");
            GuiTextField login  = (GuiTextField)SAPActive.SapSession.ActiveWindow.FindByName("RSYST-BNAME", "GuiTextField");
            GuiTextField pass  = (GuiTextField)SAPActive.SapSession.ActiveWindow.FindByName("RSYST-BCODE", "GuiPasswordField");
            GuiTextField language  = (GuiTextField)SAPActive.SapSession.ActiveWindow.FindByName("RSYST-LANGU", "GuiTextField");

            client.SetFocus();
            client.text = myclient;
            login.SetFocus();
            login.Text = mylogin;
            pass.SetFocus();
            pass.Text = mypass;
            language.SetFocus();
            language.Text = mylang; 

            //Press the green checkmark button which is about the same as the enter key 
            GuiButton btn = (GuiButton)SapSession.FindById("/app/con[0]/ses[0]/wnd[0]/tbar[0]/btn[0]");
            btn.SetFocus(); 
            btn.Press();

        }
    }
    //--------------------------//
    //main method somewhere else 
    public static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        SAPActive.openSAP("my connection string");
        SAPActive.login("10", "jdoe", "password", "EN");
        SAPActive.SapSession.StartTransaction("VA03");
    }

You're right there is not a lot of documentation on this subject. Below are a few sources that helped me get started

-Original source of our plan http://scn.sap.com/thread/1729689

-Documentation on the API (For VB and javascript but the general rules and objects are identical). Definitely read the portion on the SAP GUI Runtime hierarchy. It'll answer a lot of questions. http://www.synactive.com/download/sap%20gui%20scripting/sap%20gui%20scripting%20api.pdf

Answer 2

It is very important here to understand what UI Automation can do and what its limitations are. It was designed to automate a user interface's capabilities. You can click buttons, enter text in a textbox, move windows, etcetera, whatever a user can do using the mouse and keyboard.

What it can not do is bridge the tall wall that the operating system puts up between processes. A wall that prevents a process from accessing the memory of another process. This is a very important security and safety feature. It for one prevents a process from accessing data that should be private to a process. Like a password. And for another it stops a crashing process from affecting other processes that run on the machine. You can kill a process with Task Manager and everything keeps motoring along happily as though nothing happened.

A consequence of this is that creating a SAPConnection object in your program is a connection that only your program can use. There is no mechanism to somehow pass this object to another process with UI Automation. At best you could use the data you retrieve from the connection to affect what buttons you click.

The kind of process interop that would allow sharing data between processes is well supported in .NET. Low-level approaches are socket and named pipes, high-level are Remoting and WCF. Older programs have COM Automation support, Office is a good example of that. That however requires two to tango, both programs must be written to take advantage of it.

So if you are trying to automate an existing SAP application and this app does not otherwise explicitly support automation, the kind that an Office program supports, then you are pretty much stuck with just filling text boxes and clicking buttons.

Answer 3

You can automate any kind of application (browser, desktop, java, etc) with UiPath. Here's a tutorial on how to automate data entry, menu navigation and screen scraping on SAP.

You can

• use it from code (SDK). It has a tool that auto-generates C# code
• create and run workflows (visual automation) directly from UiPath Studio.

Here's a sample of the C# auto-generated code:

        // Attach window  menu
        UiNode wnd3 = UiFactory.Instance.NewUiNode().FromSelector("<wnd app='sap business one.exe' cls='&#35;32768' idx='1' />");            
        // Click 'Business Pa...' menu
        UiNode uiClickBusinessPamenu_3 = wnd3.FindFirst(UiFindScope.UI_FIND_DESCENDANTS, "<ctrl name='Business Partners' role='popup menu' /><ctrl automationid='2561' />");
        uiClickBusinessPamenu_3.Click(88, 9, UiClickType.UI_CLICK_SINGLE, UiMouseButton.UI_BTN_LEFT, UiInputMethod.UI_HARDWARE_EVENTS);            
        // Attach window 'SAP Business' 
        UiNode wnd4 = UiFactory.Instance.NewUiNode().FromSelector("<wnd app='sap business one.exe' cls='TMFrameClass' title='SAP Business One 9.0 - OEC Computers' />");            
        // Click 'Add' button
        UiNode uiClickAddbutton_4 = wnd4.FindFirst(UiFindScope.UI_FIND_DESCENDANTS, "<wnd cls='ToolbarWindow32' title='View' /><ctrl name='View' role='tool bar' /><ctrl name='Add' role='push button' />");
        uiClickAddbutton_4.Click(13, 24, UiClickType.UI_CLICK_SINGLE, UiMouseButton.UI_BTN_LEFT, UiInputMethod.UI_HARDWARE_EVENTS);

Here's how workflow automation of SAP Business One menus, buttons or typing looks like:

And finally the SDK documentation is located here... in case you don't want to use workflows.

Note: I work at UiPath. You should also try other automation tools like Automation Anywhere, WinAutomation, Jacada, Selenium, Ranorex use them side by side and choose the one that suits better your needs.