How to copy an existing Service Builder project for a similar use case to save time and
effort.
Context
To reduce development effort and save time, you can create a new Service Builder project by
copying an existing project together with its data model and service implementation.
Note that while you can copy the mapping information contained in a project's
service implementation, you cannot copy the generated ABAP classes since these have
to be generated explicitly for the project created as a copy.
It can be particularly helpful to copy a project if a project has already been
created for a similar use case and you can reuse its artifacts with only minimal
changes being required.
To copy an existing Service Builder project, proceed as follows:
Procedure
- Ensure the project you want to copy is open in the tree view. To open a project, choose
Open Project and enter the project's name directly or
use the input help available.
- In the tree view, right-click the name of the project you want to copy and
choose Copy Project. Alternatively, choose from the Service Builder menu.
- In the Create Project dialog box, overwrite the name of
the existing project with the name of the new project you want to create as a
copy. Enter the new name in the Project field.
- If you want to create a new version of an existing project, you can
simply append a version number, for example, 0001, to the original project
name. In this way, it is apparent, that the new project is based on an
earlier version of the project of the same root name. In some cases, it
might be helpful to have several versions of the same project indicated by a
numeric counter of this kind.
- Overwrite the description of the existing project you want to copy with a
suitable description for your new project. While it is not mandatory to enter a
short description, it is helpful to do so.
- In the Copy from Template Project section of the dialog
box, ensure the name of the project you want to copy is displayed in the
Project field and verify that this is the correct
project.
- If you want to copy the project together with its data model and service
implementation, select the Data Model and/or
Service Implementation checkboxes. In this context,
copying the service implementation refers to the copying of the mapping
information, not the actual runtime artifacts. Note that if you want to copy the
service implementation, you must also copy the project's data model. However,
you can copy the project's data model without having to copy the service
implementation.
- Under Attributes, the project type (either
Service with SAP Annotations or Service
with Vocabulary-Based Annotations) of the project you are
creating as a copy is displayed in the Project Type
field. The type displayed here depends on the type of project specified when the
original project was created. If the original template project was specified as
type Service with SAP Annotations then the copied project
will inherit this project type.
- Under Attributes, specify the generation strategy you
want to use. The Standard generation strategy is used as
default and it makes sense to use the same generation strategy that was
specified for the original project.
- Under Object Directory Entry, enter the name of the
package in which you want to create the copy of the project and choose
Enter. If you do not want the copy of the project to
be created in a package to be transported from one system to another in the
system landscape, enter $TMP as the package name or choose the Local
Object pushbutton.
Results
The Service Builder creates a new project as a copy of the template project you selected.
The new (copied) proiect is displayed in the tree view on the left-hand side of the
screen. The newly created projects contains the same arfiacts as the tempate project you
copied. Consequently, if you selected the
Data Model and
Service Implementation checkboxes in the
Create
Project dialog box, these are included in your new project. That is, if
you copied the data model from the existing project, the new project contains the same
entity types, properties, navigation properties, associations, and entity sets contained
in the original data model.
To save the new project in the Service Builder,
chooseSave. Your project is saved and you can
subsequently return to the Service Builder at any time, open this project, and
continue the service development and modeling process. If you do not save your
project, your data will be lost when you close the Service Builder. After you have
made all the relevant changes to the new project, choose
Generate to create the runtime artifacts for this new
project. After the runtime artifacts have been generated, you must register the new
service in the relevant system using the Service Maintenance function.