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What's SAP?

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Re: What's SAP?

#341

Post by Scoundreller »

organsnyder wrote: post #314
swampthinker wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone working in healthcare, I can attest to the value in getting an healthcare org to adopt standardized workflows. I'll take an org that follows process over better software that isn't used in a consistent manner. There is too much operational and human complexity to solve healthcare with software alone.

Oh, absolutely. My previous employer used an Epic migration to standardize workflows across a dozen hospitals that were brought together through a bunch of different mergers over three decades. Before the Epic migration, nurses/schedulers/etc. couldn't easily pick up shifts in other locations because the workflows were so different.

One of my amazements in healthcare is that you could go to 19 different hospitals with the same issue and get as many variations of treatment.

Same input, but vastly different outputs.

And I don’t think their differing constraints can appropriately justify it.

Re: What's SAP?

#342

Post by solarkraft »

kthejoker2 wrote: post #306
fogetti wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be interested to know if they are actually using SAP. These companies are so much better at software development and they are swimming in so much money that they could even implement something by themselves.

Google, Apple, and Microsoft do, Amazon does not, based on some moderate Googling for job postings, staff on LinkedIn, and conference attendees.

That's impressive. Of course Apple distributes hardware, so it makes the most sense to me. Microsoft, I suppose, had to distribute Windows boxes at some point, so it makes some sense to me. But I definitely wonder at which point Google started seeing a need for SAP. As soon as they started selling gadgets? Before then, to generally manage finances?

Re: What's SAP?

#343

Post by hef19898 »

Proziam wrote: post #193
tluyben2 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's 2020 and one would hope software companies realize the value of a good, clear, effective user interface. SAP is not the only one; ever tried the enterprise software from Oracle? Or the open source ERPs/CRMs? Painful. But everything has API's these days, so lot of departmental work is done on top. Small budgets so they have small, simple LoB apps made on top which are 'idiot proof'. These apps are very localize…

I have to agree. I've had the massive misfortune to have to implement and test (almost?) every open source ERP/CRM system out there from vTiger, Odoo, SuiteCRM, Yeti, NextERP, Dolibarr, ...and more that I can't recall from the top of my head. Each and every one of these systems suck. Sometimes they suck in creative and extraordinary ways. But, one thing you can count on is that there's a real reason that they suck. I…

Odoo was the worst experience I ever had. Granted, processes at that company could only be described, on a good day with a lot understatement, as st. But still, it felt like half of it was missing and the other half wasn't working properly. That and that the external developers had no idea how to manage inventories.

Re: What's SAP?

#344

Post by smichel17 »

ajsnigrutin wrote: post #269
mr_gibbins wrote: post #230

I teach enterprise systems at a university, with emphasis on SAP. It's hideous. Hideous. My students complain it is unusable (agree), doesn't make sense (agree), that they can't see the point (agree). When you look at the underlying database 'schema' (inverted commas deliberate) you'll find it's a massive, denormalised mess. Much of what SAP can do can be done at the local level using intuitive software. Reports, for…

I work in some other industry with some other software which is "our SAP"... and i look at it as "another IBM". You have a bunch of smaller companies with different products, and whichever you pick, it will have some faults, missing features bugs, etc., and you'll the the one blamed for picking the "wrong" software. ...or you pick IBM/SAP/..., which is "de facto standard" in your {industry}, and whatever is wrong, is…

The Ticketmaster value proposition.

Re: What's SAP?

#345

Post by hef19898 »

jkhaui wrote: post #192
1propionyl wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ERP software generally sucks The question isn't whether it "sucks" or not, but rather to whom it "sucks". It rightly reads as sucking to us as tech-savvy developers, but that's not the reality for the actual consumers of such products who are not programmers . To them, irregardless of our protests of inefficiency or bloat, there are only 2-3 possible platforms and the competitive advantages of each over the others…

Except it seems the consensus is that it really does suck - both from the perspective of HackerNews and the people forced to use it

I was one part of the latter group. And am also part of the former, evidently. User from the latter group hate it, rightly so, for bad UI and UX. I do, too. But then I see the intercontected processes you have to run a busniess. And you have to run your business, to a certian degree at least, digital. from that perspective, SAP sucks the less. Which kind of makes it a good software I guess?

Re: What's SAP?

#346

Post by TheHypnotist »

npace12 wrote: post #339

I was an ABAP developer around 10 years ago, wrote a bunch of Planning & Scheduling apps/"screens" running in SAPGUI R/3 and APO for a (brand new) manufacturing plant with a new SAP implementation. I learned ABAP in a literally one weekend and was able to make stuff really quickly. For the most part, you could just "loop at " extract what you want and show it on a screen using one of their existing ui components. The…

My biggest complains is running queries against tables in german. Most of my time is searching tables for fields i actually need. But i'm a complete SAP novice, i understand it gets easier with experience.

Re: What's SAP?

#347

Post by PeterisP »

julienfr112 wrote: post #173
ProstetnicJeltz wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'More modern' these days appears to be the 'thousand papercuts' approach - many SaaS products that collectively provide the same feature set. It's still hell, just a different kind of hell. Bespoke is a genuine competitor. In the UK it's not uncommon for SAP implementations to cost several million £s, this could be used to build bespoke software. There's a massive risk here though - there are thousands of ways bespok…

I know of a French Organic retailer that took that road ( postgres / java / angular). The story ends well. May be an exception. Or not.

M&A (mergers and acquisitions) is a big factor - for most large corps it happens all the time, you haven't finished integrating all your acquisitions before you get new aquisitions or get acquired yourself. So if you go the bespoke path, you have to continuously migrate departments and their data off of SAP or something like that. And when you get acquired, you'll likely have to migrate to SAP or something like that - and, more interestingly, you may come to a situation where you need to migrate to SAP or something like that before an acquisition to remove a potential risk factor for the acquirer you're targeting; that's going to cost a lot but it's worthwhile given the expected M&A money.

Re: What's SAP?

#348

Post by try-perforate »

It sounds like HN readers could stand to spend a little time studying microeconomics.

I would love to see a Valley solution to the problem of sourcing raw materials including energy, storing raw materials, sourcing packaging, storing packaging, sourcing machine parts, storing machine parts, keeping track of vendors, machine maintenance labor, machine maintenance scheduling, cost accounting for the inputs, manufacturing and machine schedule management, demand forecasting, supply & replenishment planning, WIP inventory management, finished goods inventory management, inventory accounting, sourcing shipping, planning shipping, actually shipping, invoicing, printing invoices, printing all documents (manifest, bills of lading), extending credit, managing credit lines.....

oh yeah accepting purchase orders, making to order, promising inventory, managing inventory allocation in tight markets, managing in transit inventory, collecting payment, transferring cash, reporting all of this to the SEC and IRS so you don't get sued, remitting taxes, managing headcount, paying employees....

I probably forgot a lot of stuff and this is only for domestic sales. Export has so many other problems to solve like tariffs and duties, container management on the dock, steamship management, etc.

I'm not being sarcastic either, I would LOVE to see a solution that has a better UX than SAP that solves all of these problems.

Re: What's SAP?

#349

Post by hef19898 »

mbesto wrote: post #225
julienfr112 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know of a French Organic retailer that took that road ( postgres / java / angular). The story ends well. May be an exception. Or not.

Amazon is mostly bespoke and from what I've been told, its basically hell.

True! But than, when Amazon started, there was no solution for their problem, e-commerce with an integrated logistics software suite, available. Which gave Amazon a huge advabtage over competitors. That changes since a couple of years if you ask me. Which could be a problem for Amazon in the long run. Very long, so.

Re: What's SAP?

#350

Post by vasco »

quietbritishjim wrote: post #147
deelly wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Its really super strange to adopt Google, Microsoft, Apple processes.. Yes?

This is like assuming that Microsoft or Google is successful because of the version control software they use, rather than because of the actual software they wrote. It may be a useful hint about good practices, but it's quite possible that it's not the best solution for you and it is certainly not THE way to be successful.

The other way to look at it is that if you truly believe your strength is your product (the software you write), you might as well not risk in other areas where you could either make a right or a wrong decision, and just standardize on every other process so you're on a level playing field. This way you lose the chance of innovating on how to do payroll more efficiently, but you focus your innovation efforts on your product (your software).
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