New Development guidelines for ABAP

Are you still following the old checklist (for the development and review) while working with S4 HANA or new ABAP syntaxes. If yes, this is the time to stop and make a new list.

Typically, a program can be judged on following parameters:

• Performance – How fast is the program
• Readability – Whether it is easy to read
• Maintainability – Whether it is easy to maintain. This is tricky. The new syntax are yet not widely known so make it difficult for maintenance.
• Stability – How stable the program will be with changing scenarios
• Testability – How easy is it to test the code

Performance has always got the special attention of the managers (favorite son of the boardrooms and client discussions), so much that quality can be interpreted as performance. In my opinion, this attitude should change. Performance can be a key criterion for time-critical activities, but where speed is not an issue, other attributes should not be compromised for sake of performance.

So do we need a new list. Yes.

But the good news is that we do not need to build it from scratch. Join me as I share my views on different factors and attributes and how the old standards should be rewritten with new ones. If you don’t agree or want to share your own views, please feel free to do so.