“Designed with Love” – VNSG UEX meeting about SAPUI5

The Dutch user group focusing on User Experience had another really good meeting today, this time fully focused on UI5.

Robert Eijpe from NL4B started the event with his presentation. As an SAP Mentor, he worked few weeks in Walldorf on UI5 training material, so he could not only introduce the technology, but also give us insights into future developments directly from Walldorf. He started off with explaining the evolution of UI technologies at SAP and he focused on a huge paradigm shift: modern UI should be “designed for you, your needs, and how you work”. He covered the basics of OData, how it can provide uniform data access consuming JAVA, ABAP, XS(2) and even .NET applications.

He explained the difference between Fiori and Fiori-like applications, where Fiori-like apps cannot run in the Fiori Launchpad in the same window using the FLP navigation.

His presentation was an overall journey in the “land of UI5”, he talked about Fiori Launchpad, S/4HANA, Fiori apps reference library, WebIDE and Fiori cloud edition.

Thanks to Jan Penninkhof, another Dutch SAP Mentor, we had a very special guest speaker: Kai Richter, Vice President – Global Design Concepts at SAP. Jan met him at DKOM Walldorf, followed up and thanks to Jan, we got a very interesting presentation about Fiori 2.0.

Kai talked about the Fiori guidelines and the central role of Design Thinking at SAP. I noticed that when he talked about a great example application, he mentioned that it was “designed with love”. I find this a very remarkable statement!

Kai explained how Design Thinking becomes a driver for software development and DT workshops are enjoyable and fun for the participants.

He gave us insights into what SAP is busy with regarding Fiori 2.0. Personalized home page, extendable notifications view (also for mobile devices), tabs for navigation, Me Area, improved tiles, hierarchical navigation, app finder, quite an impressive list of new features. Fiori will look even more awesome in the future.

After Kai I got the chance to present my UI5 implementation at Suiker Unie. This project was very interesting, because we used UI5 100%, but not for Fiori-like development. The application was designed by a design agency and we worked closely with an interaction designer. The result is visually very attractive. I shared my project experience from design, implementation, project management and testing aspects. I explained how a design created by people who have never seen SAP can be implemented pixel perfectly with SAPUI5. The implemented UI5 application is responsive. We have tested it for many browsers and all kinds of devices. The combination of Design Thinking approach and Agile project methodology helped us to reach great user experience and high customer satisfaction.

At this point in the agenda we had some “internal affairs”: Marcel Rabe resigned from his chairman position (I took over) and we welcomed Henny Claessens as the new secretary. Henny is a very well-known and respected member of the Dutch SAP community, so we can look forward to his activity.

Roelof Kuipers from SAP NL gave a very interesting presentation about using UI5 on HANA, actually on HCP. He introduced HCP and gave a live demo of using WebIDE, the HCP cockpit, etc. He presented a very interesting use case, where he, together with his colleagues developed an app on HCP for SAP employees driving electric cars. SAP NL has 20 charging stations, but 100+ e-Drivers. The app helps the drivers utilize the charging stations to the max by notifying when one is available, reserving places and showing usage statistics, etc. They are even thinking to extend it with predictive analysis. Roelof explained how such a useful app could be built in a few days on HCP.

Last but not least, this meeting was special becasue of its location too. Many thanks for our sponsor, Perfect for People (part of the SOA People group) to arrange this beautiful location for us!