SAP ABAP Training review of Online courses, Video training, Classroom based, Books and even DVD's
SAP is a very big and complicated piece of software and at times new functionality does not seem intuitive or user friendly.
You soon realise it's the sheer amount of functionality SAP can achieved that overwhelms you and makes it difficult
to use at first. This is why proper SAP training is essential for people who are going to be using SAP on a day to day basis.
It doesn't matter if you are an SAP developer or someone who is just going to be using SAP to do their job, effective training
is the key to success and will help you get the best ROI from your SAP system.
When it comes to training there are many methods that can be used including training provided by SAP themselves, Online training,
training provided by other SAP consultancies, SAP training books and SAP training CD's�
Training from SAP
From my experience getting your training direct from SAP is a very good option to take. The theory is that SAP produced
the software so they should know it very well. Also for some of the newer technologies they often have there training available before
anyone else. Obviously this is not always the case as with any training it is largely down to the actual trainer who is taking the course
but generally SAP is very good and if you do get unlucky you can raise any concerns directly with them. SAP is especially good for the new web
technologies such as Fiori, UI5, web dynpro etc as they get these courses available very earlier. I dont want to come across as some
kind of SAP training fanatic but i have been on many SAP courses and most have been excellent....but equally I have never had to pay
for them myself and have been lucky enough to work for companies that consider training a valuable resource.
Another advantage of SAP is that they produce a very detailed catalogue of courses including descriptions and dates available which makes
choosing the right course simple....and they obviousely offer the certification program which many of their course form part of.
Online SAP Video Training
For me online training can offer the best value for money option for the basic and more indepth development techniques. You can take part
in a quick training session online and be up and running with the basics of any topic or development language very quickly.
If the subject is more complicated online video based training offers you the ability to redo the course as often as you want, until you feel
confident with the techniques being taught. Its true that online can sometimes not be as effective as classroom based options but again this can come down
to the actual trainer. And as long as you get your online traning from a source such as udemy you will
be able to check its reviews and make use of the active online community to ask the trainer questions and request additional clarification on topics.
At the end of the day online video courses are a fraction of the cost of more traditional classroom based training so it might be worth giving it a go even
if you do end up needing to supplement it with an alternative course. The other
big benefit of online training courses from udemyv is that you can read reviews from people who have already taken the course, so that you can get a good idea of the quality before you take
part in it.
Take a look at the online training catalogue provided by udemy, this lists a large number courses for SAP,
ABAP and other related development technologies, most of which have a number of reviews from other users who have already taken the course.
Course also come with a preview period and a 30 day money back guranetee!
Training from other SAP consultancies
I have been on many training courses performed by external consultancies specialising in SAP and they have generally been very good.
The only problem I have is that there is not as much visibility of their courses and when they are available you also don't always get
something to take away with you apart from your own notes. From my experience although standard course are available you get to taylor
the course to your specific need and basically tell them what you want to learn and they produce a course to meet your requirements.
This method is often cheaper and can produce as good results as training from SAP but it may not be as recognised and not for part of the certification
process.
ABAP / SAP Training Books
There are many books available for various different areas of SAP which will allow you to teach yourself the many different areas of SAP development.
The advantage of using a book is that you can have the book with you at all times for constant reference.
Summary
This is quite an easy summary really if I needed SAP training for a specific project and you needed to guarentee you will come away with the knowledge
required within a tight timeframe I would recommend
going on the courses provided by SAP. If it was a more general training requiement or if there wasnt an imediate requirement or it was me wanting to do it
for myself I would definitely see if there was an online training course available which had good reviews and or had a large number of
people enrolled. See here to start your search.
If you are someone who likes to read and have a physical book to reference these are also a good option but I personally I don�t
like the none search ability of books. I guess you could get an e-book to solve this but you also can't read a book while doing somthing
else which you can kind of do with online videos depending on the topic.
Access or install an SAP system
Also if you don't have access to an SAP system there probably little point in any of the training methods as
you will not be able to practice anything you have learnt. Check out this guide to help you decide which is the best
method of SAP access for your needs. Whether this is via miniSAP, Local trial installation or remote access to full SAP system
-->Get access to an SAP system
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