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Author's profile photo Dallas Marks

Which Browser Is Best for SAP Analytics?

It seems like it was just yesterday that SAP analytics customers were waiting for SAP to support Internet Explorer 9 in its products, but alas that was an eternity ago in 2011 (see related ASUG News article, Waiting on SAP, User Communities Fix SAP BusinessObjects Browser Woes). Fast forward eight years and the desktop browser situation has changed dramatically.

For many years, Internet Explorer (IE) was the only browser most organizations cared about because it showed up on user desktops “for free” as part of the Microsoft Windows system. But Internet Explorer hasn’t been receiving new features for nearly two years – only security updates. And last week, Microsoft published a blog entitled “The perils of using Internet Explorer as your default browser” which among other things states that

Internet Explorer is a compatibility solution. We’re not supporting new web standards for it and, while many sites work fine, developers by and large just aren’t testing for Internet Explorer these days.

Chris Jackson, The perils of using Internet Explorer as your default browser

A “compatibility solution” and no longer a browser?

So which browser should SAP analytics customers use in 2019?

SAP BusinessObjects

The SAP BusinessObjects BI Platform supports all of the major browsers including Microsoft Internet Explorer 11, Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Apple’s Safari. As always, check the Product Availability Matrix (PAM) for Supported Platforms. But with the latest SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP6 (and 4.2 SP7 that should arrive next month), customers can deploy a plug-in free analytics platform, with viable HTML-only options for both Crystal Reports and Web Intelligence users.

SAP Analytics Cloud

SAP Analytics Cloud (SAC) requires Google Chrome, which gives SAC its clever capabilities to keep customer data safely in the browser so it never leaves the enterprise. SAP Analytics Cloud provides read-only support in Microsoft Internet Explorer and Edge, but full functionality requires Chrome. Microsoft recently announced its intention to move to adopt the Google Chromium open source project in future versions of its Edge browser. It also plans to support Edge on all supported versions of Windows (not just Windows 10) and teased that it may also bring Edge to the Apple MacOS platform. So Microsoft Edge may eventually provide more than just partial support to SAP Analytics Cloud.

Google Chrome: The Best Browser for 2019

But today, Google Chrome is currently the best browser for all SAP analytics customers, providing full support to both SAP BusinessObjects and SAP Analytics Cloud. Microsoft Edge currently comes in second place but may be a tie sometime in the future.

Although it is still supported, Microsoft Internet Explorer has gone from being the most preferred to least preferred browser for SAP analytics. Your BI team may want to reach out to your organization’s desktop support team and work together to direct users to Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge instead of Microsoft IE.

Resources

Is Microsoft Internet Explorer still the reigning standard in your organization? Does your organization allow users to choose their favorite browser? Share your thoughts about browsers in the comments below.

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      5 Comments
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      Author's profile photo Danny Lacerte
      Danny Lacerte

      Thanks for that blog! I went through the same steps when I was asked "When is SAP Analytics Cloud going to support Internet Explorer, because IE is the only browser we support?" 🙂

      Author's profile photo Darren Smith
      Darren Smith

      I avoid using Chrome when I run Web Intelligence Training Courses, and prefer to use Internet Explorer. This is why:

      • In Chrome, using the HTML Web Intelligence application, you cannot move or swap columns in a table by dragging one cell of a table between two others, or over another. It doesn't work!
      • In Edge, if you try to copy the SQL from a query, the browser doesn't let you highlight all of the text

      I recognise that means that I am using a browser which is not being developed, but in my opinion it is the only one that has no issues with Web Intelligence.

      Author's profile photo Phu Le
      Phu Le

      The work around is to drag the column to Outside of the table (which looks like it does nothing but the mouse icon will then change) and then drag it to where you want to drop it.

      More info can be found below:

      https://launchpad.support.sap.com/#/notes/2503900

      https://launchpad.support.sap.com/#/notes/2070406

      Author's profile photo Atul Divekar
      Atul Divekar

      Thanks Dallas for sharing such a nice information. We will surly recommend our users to use Chrome web browser.

       

      Thanks.

      Atul Divekar.

      Author's profile photo Amber Rust
      Amber Rust

      Thanks for this information Dallas! We are using Crystal Reports for Enterprise and have seen that Internet Explorer is the only browser that consistently works with no other add-ons installed. When we try to open these reports in google chrome, it prompts users to install Adobe Flash. I know that IE is going out of support soon, and am informed by my desktop support that Adobe Flash will no longer be supported shortly after.

      Have you or any one experienced this issue before? We are trying to find a solution, but haven't been able to yet.