24 Aug A few words about SAP Fiori and how it can impact your business
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Keywords: SAP, Fiori
What is SAP Fiori
Fiori is a new user experience developed for SAP software and applications. Fiori provides a collection of apps, encapsulated into tiles, that address the most broadly used business functions such as self-service tasks, workflow approvals, and information lookups.
It is a collection of cross-device applications and software that allows you to share tasks seamlessly on your desktop, tablet, or mobile phone. The screens are simple, customizable and modern, and there are none of the unnecessary tabs and fields the previous UX had. The user interface uses a consistent design code and technical infrastructure that can work with different devices efficiently.
The Benefits of Fiori
• Increased productivity. Fiori is simpler and easier to learn, enabling you to do more in less time.
• Reducing costs on the application development side, users of SAP Fiori on HANA find less need to build their own tools.
• Giving the user insight that will help them prioritize tasks
• Improving user adoption. Its intuitive interface eliminates internal resistance to adopting SAP software.
• Decreasing errors. The simple role-based interface helps to minimize data entry errors.
SAP Fiori Architecture
Developed to meet new enterprise IT criteria, SAP devised Fiori to be available on-demand in the cloud and on-premises. Fiori must also support multiple device form factors. Some architectural principles underpinning Fiori include:
• Central Access to apps through the SAP Fiori launchpad – supporting personalization, navigation, and configuration
Security with single sign-on (SSO) as well as role-based authentication and authorization
• Open Data Protocol (OData), which facilitates secure provisioning and data consumption
• Fiori also embeds analytics into apps, if those are required. Developers can engage in custom development, so they are able to design, build, and deploy SAP Fiori apps rapidly.
As a result of this architecture, SAP Fiori is not tied to a specific device, session, or user. Fiori app users can start a task and save it in an incomplete form. Later, they can resume working on it from a different device. The app automatically saves data asynchronously. Users can even hand off partially-completed tasks to one another.
The SAP Fiori design system provides three different platform-specific design languages
Launchpad Configuration
The SAP Fiori launchpad is a shell that hosts SAP Fiori apps and provides the apps with services such as navigation, personalization, embedded support, and application configuration. Each tile represents a launchable business application, that can also display live status indicators, such as the number of open tasks. Furthermore, the launchpad is role-based, meaning that the user’s role determines which app tiles are shown.
The various tile types
KPI Tile
Key performance indicators (KPIs) are used to measure and monitor a company’s performance at a strategic and operational level.
KPI tile
Comparison Chart (Micro Chart)
You can use comparison charts to show detailed comparisons with semantic coloring for entries in a “Top N” list.
Tile with comparison micro chart
Bullet Chart (Micro Chart)
A bullet chart is a variation of a bar chart. It compares a single, primary value to one or more target values. The primary value is shown in the context of qualitative ranges (thresholds) such as poor, satisfactory, and good. All charts show certain thresholds to give the user a sense of orientation.
Tile with bullet micro chart
Trend Chart/Area Chart (Micro Chart)
You can use trend charts (also known as area charts) to show cumulated totals over time, based on amounts or percentages.
Tile with area micro chart
Column Chart (Micro Chart)
You can use column charts (bar charts) to compare categories using vertical bars. One axis of the chart shows the specific categories, while the other axis represents a discrete value. You can also cluster multiple bars into groups within the column chart.
Tile with column micro chart
Basic Launch Tile
The most basic type of launch tile contains a title and an icon.
Basic launch tile
Monitoring Tile
Use the monitoring tile when you want to display status updates or an object count.
Monitoring tile
Summary
Fiori offers a number of clear benefits over SAP GUI, including better productivity and multi-device task workflows. In architectural terms, Fiori gives you the advantage of RESTful APIs, which are more fluid and easily connected than traditional SAP application integration tools.
Moreover, Fiori has the kind of seamless movements and controls you expect from a modern mobile app, is simple for users, but it can be challenging to set up and manage.