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Different ways to call methods in ABAP

Sorry for this basic ABAP question. What are the different ways to call methods in ABAP? And what are their "official" names? I've heard of perform, method call, and internal/inline method call.

Perform uses the PERFORM keyword and method call the CALL METHOD syntax, I guess. But what is an "internal" or "inline method call"?

Answer*

You have massively mixed up many things.
Lets be kind, and start with some basics here:

Method is the official name of a member function of a class, means, if You talk about methods, You talk about object oriented prorgamming ( OOP ).
There are about two or three ways of method call variants, at least in abap. Lets go into detail later, after You promise me, to read about this, If You decide to develop following OO-paradigms. And You should.

Function is just a function, a small(or big) piece of code, which can be called from several callers, to be reused. It is no OOP paradigm, and exists since prorgamming started. Nevertheless in abap it has a slight "bigger" definition, let us talk about this in detail, if You promise me, to read about it.
And You should, If You want to develop ABAP at all.

Perform ? "Perform" is an abap keyword to call form-routines. Form-routines are the real old school functions-equivalent in abap, most similiar to functions from the good old times, when programming started.
Small pieces of reusable code, which can be calles from anywhere in Your prorgamm, but sometimes from somewhere else ( this is too far for You now ).

So, if You are mixing up those three ( or two of those three ) already, then You are not even in a good position, to talk about internal or inline, at all.
I am sorry, but it is, as it is. It is no offending.

Do You ever developed in another language ?

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Actually, I develop in Java and work on an (existing) tool that automatically analyzes and transforms ABAP programs. These ABAP programs are given to us as text, so the tool does not have direct access to SAP systems. I'm a beginner to ABAP and I'm learning on the fly. I promise you to my heart that I will never have the intention to program in ABAP. But in front of me I have gigantic ABAP code bases, stemming from all ages and styles, and I try to figure it out.

Ulrich Scholz
– Ulrich Scholz

2015-02-05 13:52:51 +00:00
Commented Feb 5, 2015 at 13:52
So, then for perform: perform is followed by a name of a formroutine. If You search for this name in the code, You will find all it's calls. Be carefull and check each include. The definition is preceeded by form. So perform calculate_sth using x , y. Has somewhere its definition like "form calculate_sth using x type i , y type i. " bla endform."

icbytes
– icbytes

2015-02-05 13:56:09 +00:00
Commented Feb 5, 2015 at 13:56

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