Food for thought for another productive system: until when must the system be identical, keyword: transaction log
Purpose of the SAP system copy
Depends on the extent of splitting and the degree of parallelization. When importing, the limiting factor is often the index structure.
Without interrupting operations, we copy your systems using established methods and products. We guarantee consistent quality and reliable reproducibility through standardized processes and a high degree of automation. Due to the SAP system copy, the test and development systems are up to date and tests can be performed reliably and trustworthily on the non-production systems.
Conclusion
Strategy as of NetWeaver 2007: Prerequisite: in the case of a Unicode conversion, conversion must be performed during export. If the target database can be built with unsorted unloaded data, all packages are automatically unloaded unsorted. R3load ensures that tables that must always be unloaded sorted are unloaded sorted.
Creating a consistent storage replica - splitting a clone or creating a snapshot on the disk array. Regardless of the storage size, this process takes only a few seconds.
With "Shortcut for SAP Systems" you get additional functions for the SAP system copy.
This means that you have all production data available on your test system in a short time.
Test and development system: After a new productive system has been set up, at least one identical development system or even one test system is still needed.