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Create your first CAP plugin
A step-by-step guide to the cds-plugin.js extension point: scaffold a package, add an index.cds for shared model artifacts, and test it locally against a throwaway CAP project before publishing to npm, with a separate section on building the same plugin in TypeScript and compiling it with tsc. Points to the author's own cds-plugin-handlerscds-plugin-handlersA CAP plugin that structures handlers as one file per entity, in a folder per service, instead of one service implementation that keeps growing.independent, cap and ui5-cap-serverside-rendering-pluginui5-cap-serverside-rendering-pluginA CAP plugin that fills UI5 views and fragments with entity data on the server through Handlebars and streams them as XML, and renders a Vue app to HTML on a route of its own.independent, cap as worked examples.
Where it sits
Explains
Plugin authoringCAPPlugin authoringWriting a package that extends a framework or runtime rather than an application that uses it — a reusable extension loaded by its host, and the question you arrive at once solving a problem twice makes you want to solve it once for everyone.cds-plugin-handlersCAPcds-plugin-handlersA CAP plugin that structures handlers as one file per entity, in a folder per service, instead of one service implementation that keeps growing.ui5-cap-serverside-rendering-pluginCAPui5-cap-serverside-rendering-pluginA CAP plugin that fills UI5 views and fragments with entity data on the server through Handlebars and streams them as XML, and renders a Vue app to HTML on a route of its own.cds-spreadsheetimporter-pluginCAPcds-spreadsheetimporter-pluginA CAP plugin that adds an ImporterService accepting an uploaded Excel file, parses it on the server and writes its rows into the CDS entity named in the URL.
Since then
No major release of cds-plugin-handlers since this was published
Source
reachable
Who is behind it
Wouter LemaireWouter LemaireWrote this
In the atlas: maintains 25, contributes to 39, wrote 12@lemaiwoauthor
In the atlas: maintains 25, contributes to 39, wrote 12@lemaiwoauthor
Properties
About this work
For lemaiwo-cds-plugin-handlers
Covers
Shown as the author's TypeScript-based plugin that readers can study to see the possibilities of plugin authoring.
Offers here
For lemaiwo-ui5-cap-serverside-rendering-plugin
Covers
Shown as the author's JavaScript plugin example readers can study to see the possibilities of plugin authoring.
Offers here
For spreadsheetimporter-cds-spreadsheetimporter-plugin
Covers
Pointed to as a work-in-progress plugin readers can look at alongside the author's own for more plugin-authoring possibilities.
Offers here
Group by18 of 18 pieces
Piece, what it offersStill applies
What's in Daniel Hutzel's brain?What's in Daniel Hutzel's brain?A Devtoberfest 2026 session in the building-apps track, in which Daniel Hutzel and DJ Adams work through what the CAP team is building for agents. A bookshop gets an MCP endpoint beside its OData one from a single annotation, with the plugin writing the coding agent's configuration itself; in the xt-travels sample five services that know nothing about each other are served over MCP and an agent does the orchestration the hand-built UI and its value helps used to do. Hutzel then annotates a service as an agent so the ReAct loop and the choice of model move into the CAP service, and finally drops MCP for a skill that teaches the agent CQL instead, which is where the edges to Serve your application over MCP, Agent tooling and Agent guidance come from. The mechanism under all of it, a plugin file in the package root and event handlers that can be added to any CAP service, is the edge to Plugin authoring.published 2026-10-02
DRY CAP – Making Sustainable Solutions Through PluginsDRY CAP – Making Sustainable Solutions Through PluginsA Devtoberfest 2026 building-apps session on packaging the things you would otherwise write twice, from in-house API clients and shared data models to validation logic, as a CAP plugin. The presenter builds one live: a cds-plugin.js next to package.json is what makes CAP notice the plugin at all, an index.cds carries a reusable user context and service that the consuming application projects into its own and protects there, and the plugin registers an Express middleware at a chosen step of the bootstrap to put user properties on the request. A feature-flagging plugin his team already uses closes it, and the whole walkthrough is the edge to Plugin authoring.SAP Developers, published 2026-10-02
SAP AI Services - DOX - Gen AI with SAP CAP Plugin - Part 3SAP AI Services - DOX - Gen AI with SAP CAP Plugin - Part 3Building on Reusable components for CAP with cds-plugin by Daniel Schlachter, this part walks through a custom CAP plugin — a cds-plugin.js plus a lib_cap_dox.js helper — that authenticates against SAP's Document Information Extraction (DOX) service and calls its schema and job-status APIs to fill an entity from extracted document fields. It covers reading the service key from Cloud Foundry (cf service-key) for the OAuth token endpoint, and dynamically mapping DOX's header and line-item output onto CAP entity properties.sabarna17, published 2024-06-11
How to build reusable plugin components for CAP Java applicationsHow to build reusable plugin components for CAP Java applicationsA companion to Daniel Schlachter's Reusable components for CAP with cds-plugin, showing the same mechanism on CAP Java: a plugin ships as its own Maven artifact with an event handler and a CdsRuntimeConfiguration implementation, registered through the JDK's ServiceLoader rather than any CAP-specific wiring. The walkthrough builds a cds-emoji-plugin-java jar that decorates @emoji-annotated fields on read, installs it to the local Maven repository, and adds it as a runtime dependency to a cds init --add java bookshop application. It argues the plugin mechanism was not new to CAP Java, just previously undocumented.robinjayasinghe, published 2023-05-16
BTP CAP : Custom plugin to separate generic change log capture logicBTP CAP : Custom plugin to separate generic change log capture logicWalks through building a custom [CAP](ecosystem:cap) plugin that centralises change-log capture: on cds.once('served') it collects entities annotated @audit, then hooks srv.before('UPDATE') to read the existing record, diff it field by field against the incoming payload, and record old/new values with the user and timestamp. It also documents a cds build failure packaging the plugin's own directory into gen/srv for MTA deployment, fixed by adding it as a copyfiles build-parameter step in mta.yaml.sreehari_vpillai, published 2023-05-10
Reusable components for CAP with cds-pluginReusable components for CAP with cds-pluginThe post that taught the mechanism, and it teaches it by picking a requirement small enough to be absurd: every string a service returns should end in a random emoji. Working through that on the bookshop example leaves nothing to argue about except the plumbing, which is the point — what a cds-plugin is, where it hooks in, and why packaging it beats copying it into the next project. Vinícius Barrionuevo credits this post as the thing that gave him the idea for sap-cap-sdm-plugin, and it is hard to read the plugin ecosystem in this graph without it.published 2023-04-30
AI needs a foundation: A map of the plug-in ecosystem for CAPAI needs a foundation: A map of the plug-in ecosystem for CAPA map of the plug-ins for CAP (@sap/cds), official, community and independent, drawn across regions such as integration, performance and tooling, so that a team can see what exists to reuse and what it would have to build: the question plugin authoring answers from the other side. SAP's abstract places CAP at the centre of its AI strategy, with model context protocol support, and the map is offered as the foundation under that. A TechEd 2026 session (Tuesday 27 October, Community Theater, Berlin), presented by Mike Zaschka, written here from SAP's abstract; the recording is not yet published.
Building Code-Based AI Agents on the BAIPBuilding Code-Based AI Agents on the BAIPA Devtoberfest 2026 session on writing the agent yourself rather than configuring one, which is the agent tooling edge: an agent is a model with tools, skills, memory and context around it, and the session reads the code of one built in CAP as a LangGraph state graph, with an agent node that calls the model, a tools node holding the MCP clients, and the edge between them looping until no tool is needed. It then shows the shorter route, a CDS service annotated for the agent protocol with its instructions and skills in an agent.md file. SAP AI Core carries both, with the CAP service in front of it as middleware so the credentials never reach the browser, and that is what cap-agent-ui5-webui is demonstrated against: added as a dependency, it gives the annotated service a UI5 chat interface that can be deployed rather than only previewed. A Python multi-agent application on Cloud Foundry, where an orchestrator delegates to per-stack specialists so no single model sees every tool, closes the session.published 2026-10-09
UI5 AI Features library is now an npm PackageUI5 AI Features library is now an npm PackageThe release note for a demo turning into a dependency, and it is explicit about why that matters: the earlier version worked, but using it meant cloning the repo and copying both halves, which stops working the moment one of them changes. The post walks through what shipping the CAP plugin and the be.wl.ai control library in one npm version buys — a client and server contract that cannot drift — then lists the eleven controls by group, shows the two-line configuration that activates each half, and notes that this version is actually deployed on BTP behind both a standalone approuter and Work Zone. It closes on the demo repository, written with no library source in it as the test that the package stands alone.published 2026-08-31
UI5 AI Features library is now an npm Package
cds 8, line ended. Affects Runnable code.
Agentic AI on BTP: a Multi‑Agent App with Pydantic AIAgentic AI on BTP: a Multi‑Agent App with Pydantic AISplits a single CAP/TypeScript agent that had grown to juggle five BTP MCP servers behind one bloated tool list into btp-multiagent-app, a Python and Pydantic AI rewrite where the Cloud Foundry and BTP Core MCP servers each get a dedicated specialist agent, with an audit log specialist scaffolded but left disabled, behind an orchestrator whose only tools are delegation calls to those specialists, which is the agent-tooling pattern the piece works through. Each specialist authenticates to its MCP server over Streamable HTTP with OAuth 2.1, and a shared module centralises the SAP AI Core GenAI Hub model setup behind two credential layouts, one for local runs and one for the Cloud Foundry service binding, the LLM integration side of the rewrite. Tool lists per agent drop from well over a hundred to a dozen or two, and routing failures become separable from tool-misuse failures by reading the trace.published 2026-05-03
Agentic AI on BTP: a Single Agent with LangGraphAgentic AI on BTP: a Single Agent with LangGraphA CAP TypeScript agent puts a LangGraph StateGraph in front of AzureOpenAiChatClient from @sap-ai-sdk/langchain, reaching SAP AI Core's Generative AI Hub, and lets its tool-calling loop draw on five deployed MCP servers — OData MCP Proxy, CI MCP Server, AI Core MCP Server, BTP MCP Server and BTP CF MCP Server — through @langchain/mcp-adapters' MultiServerMCPClient. Because agent, servers and APIs share one XSUAA tenant, the chat service forwards the signed-in user's own JWT instead of a service account, so each downstream server enforces that user's own authorizations. Past roughly a hundred combined tools the single prompt slows down and stops separating concerns, which is why the author's next post splits it into one specialist agent per MCP server behind an orchestrator.published 2026-05-03
BTP Audit Log MCP Server: Security Monitoring with AI AssistantsBTP Audit Log MCP Server: Security Monitoring with AI AssistantsWouter Lemaire builds an MCP server over SAP BTP's Audit Log Retrieval API using odata-mcp-proxy, with a single entity set and zero custom code, so an AI assistant can answer natural-language questions like "Were there any configuration changes yesterday?" by calling AuditLogRecords_list against a BTP destination authenticated with the Audit Log service's service key. It covers the destination setup, the entity-set configuration that maps the PascalCase entity name to a lowercase auditlogrecords path, and handling the API's 500-record pagination limit.published 2026-03-13
BTP Cloud Foundry MCP Server: Managing CF Environments with AIBTP Cloud Foundry MCP Server: Managing CF Environments with AIWalks through a server built on odata-mcp-proxy that exposes the Cloud Foundry V3 API's 28 entity sets — apps, orgs, spaces, services, networking, quotas — as MCP tools from a JSON config with no application code. It shows the config shape that bridges the API's snake_case paths to PascalCase tool names via a urlPath field, and the OAuth2 client-credentials destination setup an assistant needs to reach a CF landscape.published 2026-03-13
UI for the BTP Application Vulnerability ReportUI for the BTP Application Vulnerability ReportAn open-source SAPUI5 front end for SAP's Application Vulnerability Report API, backed by a CAP Node.js service that projects the external findings as an OData V4 entity and forwards each query with api.run(req.query). The CAP service reaches that API through a Destination service instance configured with OAuth2ClientCredentials authentication from a service key, so the address and credentials stay out of the application code.published 2026-02-10
Consume ABAP RFC Function Modules in CAPConsume ABAP RFC Function Modules in CAPCalling an existing RFC function module from CAP instead of asking somebody to build an OData service for it — which is the actual decision, since the alternative is custom development on the ABAP side for a function that already works.published 2025-03-28
CAP multitenancy with Work ZoneCAP multitenancy with Work ZoneA gap in the tooling and the manual edit that closes it. cds add portal wires the Portal service, which is deprecated; Work Zone supports multitenancy but has no equivalent command. The author runs the portal command anyway and then rewrites the resource and module config in mta.yaml to point at Work Zone. Short, and honest that it is a workaround rather than a supported path.published 2025-03-14
Upload attachments in a Freestyle UI5 and CAP appUpload attachments in a Freestyle UI5 and CAP appAttachments where the UI is freestyle rather than Fiori elements, so none of the generated upload behaviour applies and both ends have to be written.published 2023-12-19
How to add OData v2 adapter proxy to your CAP projectHow to add OData v2 adapter proxy to your CAP projectThe problem is stated in one line — a UI5 application that only speaks OData v2 in front of a CAP service that speaks v4 — and the answer is a proxy in the middle rather than a rewrite of either end. Written while v4 support in the UI5 stack was still patchy, which is the whole reason the adapter exists.published 2020-06-30
How to add OData v2 adapter proxy to your CAP project
OData changed in @cap-js-community/odata-v2-adapter 1.10.0, 2023-04-05. Affects Runnable code.
Details
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Plugin authoringcapability, core only
cds-plugin-handlersartifact
cds-spreadsheetimporter-pluginartifact
SAP Communitypublishing source
Source
History
- Entered the atlasDiscovered via SAP Community.
For your agent
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content:create-your-first-cap-plugin- JSON
- /content/create-your-first-cap-plugin.json
- MCP
- Connecting an agent