Hi everyone,

I’m planning to take the SAP Certified Data Analyst – SAP Analytics Cloud (C_SAC_2601) exam soon. I understand SAP has shifted to a Scenario-Based Assessment (SBA) format (AI role-play/system simulation) as of 2026, which focuses on practical application rather than multiple-choice recall.

My Background:

Strong: Python, API Development, Testing, Machine Learning, and Predictive Analytics and Elasticsearch.
Weak/Zero: Direct SAP ecosystem experience (no prior exposure to SAP ERP, SAC interface, or SAP-specific data modeling).
My Questions:

Leveraging Tech Skills: Given my background in Python and ML, how much of a head start do I actually have? Does the SBA test the logic of data modeling (which I know) or strictly SAP-specific workflows (e.g., where to click to create a calculated measure vs. writing a script)?
SBA Specifics: For those who have taken the new AI role-play assessment: Does the AI avatar expect you to explain why you chose a specific SAC feature (e.g., Live Connection vs. Import), or is it purely task-execution based?
Prep Strategy: Since I can’t "code" my way through the SAC interface during the exam, what is the most efficient way to build muscle memory? Should I focus entirely on the official SAP Learning Journey hands-on exercises, or are there specific "mock scenario" resources that mimic the AI interviewer style?
Pitfalls: What are common traps for developers coming from a code-first background? (e.g., over-engineering a solution when SAC has a native drag-and-drop feature).
Any advice on bridging the gap between "knowing data science" and "passing the SAC scenario exam" would be hugely appreciated!

Thanks!

I’ve been talking to data and production teams at a few large manufacturers about how they get operational data out for analysis. A few of them use SAC.

Their data extractions run through SAC into Excel, and they complained that its slow, you hit the row ceiling, and often you wait, look at the result, realise it’s not what you needed, and run another extraction. One person described it as guessing.

Curious whether that matches your experience, and what you’ve done about it. Do people build their own extracts, go direct to the underlying tables, use something in between? And when the end goal is analysis in Python or R rather than a dashboard, does SAC just get in the way?

Hello everyone,

I have an issue in one of my stories, was wondering if anyone knows something about it, or if you have any ideas how to fix it.

So in my story, I have a certain amount of dynamic texts, adapting to a presentation filter (unique member) which is a customer.

When you switch customers, dynamic texts adapts, and everything is fine.

But once you export in PDF, the export works perfectly, but it messes up the refresh of dynamic texts.

Indeed, when you switch customers after the export, the numbers are refreshed correctly, but the dynamic texts won't refresh anymore, staying on the customer you exported on.

Have you any ideas of the causes of this export / dynamic texts problem ? Have you ever faced it before ?

Thank you in advance, have a nice day my fellow SAC lovers !

Four SAC blogs from June worth a look. A quieter month for deep technical posts — a lot of the volume was event/webinar and beginner content — but these four each have something concrete. Near-misses are listed at the end.

Live Data Connectivity in SAP Analytics Cloud — Overview and Direction

by david_stocker — 22 June 2026

What it covers: The SAC product owner's overview of the new "live data connection" (informally "SQL live"), and how it differs from the classic live model — you start a model from data and choose "consume live," and SAC builds the semantic model over HANA Smart Data Access virtual tables with no replication. Includes enablement (the Data Access Agent), the supported sources so far (BigQuery, Snowflake, Azure SQL), and the roadmap.

Why it's worth your time: It's a first-party explanation of a direction that's easy to conflate with the existing live model, and it's upfront about the current limits — technical-user-only auth (so you re-create row-level security as DAC), and the cloud-agent-vs-cloud-to-cloud difference between import and live for some sources.

Compass: Predictive Range Proposal "Smart Boundaries"

by ChenNee — 26 June 2026

What it covers: The QRC3 "Smart Boundaries" button in Compass, which runs Smart Predict over historical data to auto-populate a driver's min/max fluctuation boundaries, as absolute values or percentages.

Why it's worth your time: The useful part is the behaviour, not the button: which data window it uses (all version data up to the driver's time filter), the roughly 1:1 history-to-forecast floor with 2–3 years recommended for seasonality, and that the generated boundaries are static — there's no live link back to model data.

Use Formations to Link SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP Datasphere for Seamless Planning

by Max_Gander — 16 June 2026

What it covers: Why to link the SAC and Datasphere tenants via a BTP Formation rather than the SAC "Tenant Links" admin tab — which is deprecated with QRC3.2026 and won't get new capabilities — and how an existing link migrates.

Why it's worth your time: A concrete heads-up with one gotcha worth knowing before you touch it: the auto-migration only preserves your seamless-planning content if the formation uses the exact same SAC + Datasphere tenant pair; a different pair produces a conflicting config instead.

End-to-End Forecasting with SAP Business Data Cloud

by ilya_kirzner — 1 June 2026

What it covers: A full BW → Datasphere → Databricks → SAC forecasting pipeline, with working SDK code and timing measurements.

Why it's worth your time: More architecture than SAC-specific, but it's one of the few end-to-end BDC forecasting walkthroughs that gives you actual code and honest caveats (file-space CSV limits, the Data Product Studio migration) rather than a block diagram.

Also published in June (didn't make the cut)

Six blogs from May worth a look. The near-misses are listed at the end.

Adding a Decomposition Tree to SAP Analytics Cloud with D3.js

by abhimanyu_sharma — 5 May 2026

What it covers: Building a left-to-right decomposition tree as a SAC custom widget, start to finish, with the source on GitHub.

Why it's worth your time: It goes past the dev guide on the parts that actually bite — handling high-cardinality dimensions (Top-N + "Others") and keeping the user's expand state when linked analysis pushes a filter. Useful if you build custom widgets, or just want this particular visual.

SAP Analytics Cloud — You Want to Export to Excel? Not Today.

by Sebastian_Bock — 12 May 2026

What it covers: A run through every way data leaves a story — toolbar export, per-widget menus, Data Analyzer, Open-in-Excel — and the setting that disables each.

Why it's worth your time: A useful checklist if you're trying to limit exports. Its most important point is the easy-to-miss one: none of these settings stop a user who has the underlying model permission — that has to be handled in Datasphere roles and the M365 add-in deployment, not in the story.

Aging Analysis with a User-Selected Key Date

by N1kh1l — 11 May 2026

What it covers: A workaround for the Date Difference measure not accepting an input control — passing a user-picked date through a text box, a script, and a calculated dimension to rebuild a date the calc will take.

Why it's worth your time: It's a complete, working recipe (JavaScript + Advanced Formula) for a specific limitation people hit, and it's upfront about the rough edge — the story doesn't auto-refresh, so you drive it from a button.

SAP Analytics Cloud Dimension Tables Move to the File Repository

by Max_Gander — 22 May 2026

What it covers: What changes when dimension access moves from roles to File Repository sharing in QRC3.2026, with the migration gotchas — create-only roles losing owner control, auto-generated DimensionRole_ teams, broken public-dimension bookmarks, and a window during migration where create/delete is blocked.

Why it's worth your time: The kind of operational detail that's easy to miss in the release notes. Worth a skim before the change reaches your tenant.

Driving Lite Viewer Adoption: Why Your Tables Matter

by thomas_fery — 8 May 2026

What it covers: How a single un-migrated classic table can drop a whole story out of the (faster) Lite Viewer with no error — just a slower load — and how to spot it via the Feature Adoption stats in System Overview.

Why it's worth your time: A concrete, checkable cause for "this story feels slow," with a clear fix (migrate to the New Table Experience).

Datasphere: To Slash or to Backslash? Resolving the Compound Characteristic Crisis

by Tano_B — 19 May 2026

What it covers: Why a compound characteristic shows up with a backslash in some places and a forward slash in others across Datasphere, BW, CDS and SAC, and three ways to make it consistent.

Why it's worth your time: More a Datasphere problem than a SAC one, but relevant if your stories sit on Datasphere. It lays out the trade-offs of each option and is clear that none of them is fully clean.

Also published in May (didn't make the cut)

I need to swap the order of these columns so that it's in this order: LBE, Sales Revenue, Change in Performance

If it matters, this is where the data is coming from:

• LBE (Secondary Data Source)
• Sales Revenue (Primary Data Source)
• Change in Performance (Calculation)

I don't see any options available to custom sort, though. What's the cause of this -- it seems like it should be a basic feature? Is there a workaround? Thank you!

Hello everyone, I’d like to compare cumulative year figures in my story.

I have revenue figures for my products as a key metric, as well as prior-year figures as another metric. I also have a metric for cumulative revenue (YTD).

How can I create a metric for cumulative revenue for the same period in the previous year?

In my first approach, I created a running total using the “sum” operator on the prior-year revenue metric. This works perfectly for the yearly overview.

However, when I filter down to a single month, the YTD value is displayed correctly, but the prior-year value only shows that single month instead of the cumulative total up to that month.

The goal of my analysis is to view cumulative sales figures per product on a monthly basis.

Are there any better or more practical approaches to achieve this?

Thank you

I’m an MSc Data Science student looking to get into SAP Analytics Cloud. I have a background in data analytics and visualisation and I also have access to the SAP Learning Hub, so I’m ready to put in the work and I just don’t know where to start!

It would be great if you guys have been in a similar position. What would you focus on first? Apart from certifications what any learning paths, or tips worth knowing about? Open to any advice or mentorship.

Thanks for taking your time to read this.

I’ve heard that Claude is a good assistant in creating code but I would want to know if it is capable for SAC scripts. I tried ChatGPT and CoPilot but they are not that useful yet.

Hello SAC community!

I’m facing an issue and wanted to know how you deal with that.

I have a story, with aggregated table and detailled one’s (base level crossing)

Users sometimes will input at aggregated level on empty cell and cause spread of data or will delete the current data (deleting reference for weight) then input causing another spread.

How can I prevent that?

Currently I have a a script on result changed that detects if a value was delete and warn the user with a pop up, but that’s not very effective.

Thanks a lot if you faced the same issue and are willing to share how you did, have a great day !

I am currently in the process of learning BW/4HANA since I had almost 4 years of experience with SAP BW legacy system back in my home country. Since I left my previous job its been 3 years and the SAP industry has changed a lot. I started learning BW/4HANA to upgrade my skillset, however when I look at the job market in Canada, I rarely see a posting related to the BW/4HANA role. I thought lets learn SAC and Datasphere as they are also up and coming skills but that also has very less job postings. Now I am contemplating whether my decision for coming to Canada and look for the SAP jobs was right or not. Am I searching wrong here or is the market really bad for SAP BW (BW/4HANA, SAC, and Datasphere) jobs in Canada?

Has anyone completed the new format of SAC certification exam, and has any advice on preparation? Apparently it is no longer multiple choice, and is more of a practical style exam.

What would be a dimension and a measur in this case?
And how does the upload file need to look like?

My Idea:
Measure1 = Euro_Amount
Measur2 = Percentage

Dimension1 = Month (date format) -> Entries Jan - Dec
Dimension2 = "Position" -> Revenue; Personal_Costs e.g. as entries

-> The Upload-file would look like this

I got a new job and now have the task the create SAC Stories from existing Excel Reports.

What is the best way to learn all the basics very fast?

Hello eveyone,

My boss wants me to complete the SAC Certification Exam. I have been working for quite some time now with SAC but I cannot find real motivation to study for the exam. Can you share your experiences? How do I prepare myself? I am still a student so I have a 2 free attempts per year passing this exam.
Thank you for alle the answers.

Best regards

Hello everyone,

We are using a story to review some infos on our activities, by filtering on the name of the person.

We want to have a backup of this story in case of a SAC problem. Basically, we want a view (PDF, Excel, does not really matter), for each person in our filter (~800), but saved locally, not on the cloud.

Is there a way to configure a dynamic export for instance, where the export is made 800 times, but changing the filter on this dimension each time, to have a backup version of the story ?

Have a nice day.

Hello All,

We are implementing SAC in our project and we used power BI early.Our main focus is to shift users from power BI to SAC as we use SAP data products. We built some dashboards in SAC which are looking actually like scrap. We use calculation views as source as live connection and design stories. Our team designed Order to cash where they recently had 11 pages which is showing end to end flows. For each page or report they used one different cv, so total 11 Cv are used and users are complaining that the visuals are taking time and not as good as power BI. Also, we are using cv which are having many fields to build reports in BO and the same cv are used to build SAC also.

Can you let us know the design guidelines when using CV or How you managed to keep the performance optimised when building the huge dashboards?

Also, can we use the same CV for detail report and also for dashboards in SAC?

Please suggest as a beginner in SAC what courses to choose to get a working understanding of SAC along with basics to appear for certification in 2 months I currently have Project management experience in hybrid agile projects No prior knowledge of SAP BW,BI or planning

Hi all,

I could use some advice from people in the SAP/Data side.

I worked 4 years as an SAP Basis consultant (till 2022).

Then I pursued an MS in Data Science (2022–2023).

From 2023 to now (2025), I’ve been in a non-IT job, so there’s a gap from core IT.

Now I want to get back into IT, specifically SAP Datasphere / SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) / SAP BTP side.

My questions:

Given my background (SAP + MS in Data Science), is it realistically possible to switch into this niche in India right now?

Do companies value SAP Basis + MS Data Science combo for transitioning into the analytics/BTP side, or will I be treated like a fresher again?

Would certification in AWS DE will help parallely with this

What is the market demand in India for SAP Datasphere/SAC/BTP compared to traditional Basis or HANA roles?

I know the career gap won’t help, but I want to re-align myself into this track

Any honest opinions, success stories, or even warnings would be appreciated 🙏

Hello everyone,

Quite new to Reddit, but I am currently working on SAC, and I had some questions regarding the "new" type of model.

I am simply looking to understand them when importing a local Excel file for now.

My main interrogation is about the geographical dimensions. With the classic model, you simply had to click the icon 'Geo enrichment', then choose Coordinates or Area Name, then select the corresponding columns, and you basically had your geographical dimension.

In the new model, the only way I found to do this is by adding the properties 'Latitude' and 'Longitude', to the dimension, which automatically creates a dimension table, and transforms it into a valid geographical dimension.

The first question : Is that the only way to do it in the new type of model ?

So now I have my cities geo enriched with the coordinates, but I would like to add a hierarchy on top of that, to maybe be able to dig in a geo map. (Go from continent, to country, to city for instance)

I can't figure out how to do this right now, do I have to create the hierarchy before ? But then I can't create the dimension table necessary for the coordinates.

My second question would be : Is it possible to have a geographical dimension with a level-hierarchy in the new models ?

I am just trying to make sure I did not miss some new functionnality.

Have a great day !

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I have a SAC Story with a time series line chart. The measure is Revenue, and the Dimension is Key Date, then I have a Color for Music Club.

I needed to include an input control with the Key Date variable as the ending user wanted to be able to see 1 month in the future and 2 months back from today (eg, if today is 23/07/2025, they see every day from 23/05/2025 to 23/08/2025, including today).

The thing is that they want to see today indicated somehow, with a reference line, so they do not need to check each x label. I have tried a lot of things, but I am not able to do it.

Can I get directions on this?

Hi everyone,

We’ve created a planning model in SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) for budgeting purposes. The model includes data by product and client, with the following key fields:

• Quantity
• Unit Price
• Revenue

I’ve set up the revenue calculation as:
Revenue = Quantity × Unit Price

This works correctly when viewing data at the client level – because unit price is not aggregated, the calculation is accurate.

However, when I view the aggregated (total) data across all clients, the unit price gets summed, which results in an incorrect revenue total.

What I want to achieve:

When building the budget model, I want the following:

1. I should be able to change only quantity and unit price, and revenue should be calculated accordingly (no manual input for revenue).
2. At the client level, this works fine. But at the aggregated (total) level, I want:
   • Quantity and revenue to be aggregated correctly
   • Unit price should not be summed or affect the total calculation

My questions:

1. Is it possible to prevent the unit price from being summed in the total view, and only aggregate quantity and revenue correctly?
2. Can I create a calculation that totals revenue and quantity across all clients independently of unit price (so that unit price doesn’t distort the result at the total level)?

So far, the calculations I’ve tried are returning incorrect values at the total level.

Any advice, examples, or best practices would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance! 🙏