A lot of new features have been introduced with NetWeaver 2004s and its ABAP SAP Application Server 7.0. Finally password is case sensitive and may have from 8 to 40 characters in length. Huge bunch of new system profile parameter have been acquaint as well:
login/min_password_lowercase
login/min_password_uppercase
login/password_max_idle_productive
login/password_max_idle_initial
login/password_history_size
login/password_change_waittime
login/password_downwards_compatibility
login/password_compliance_to_current_policy
For details see following SAP notes:
862989 1023437 992855 968558 943505
