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SAP Universal ID is live on SAP for Me. What’s in for me?
Pretty silently, we went live with SAP Universal ID on SAP for Me, last weekend. During this year’s DSAG (German SAP User Group) congress, we have started to spread the news and excite first people for SAP Universal ID.
What is SAP Universal ID?
My quick explanation: It’s like the Apple-ID for everyone in the SAP world. You will be able to link your S-user and P-users under one ID and login to SAP tools just via this ID.
If you want to learn more about what SAP Universal ID is, I do recommend:
The value for me, with SAP Universal ID
In general, what you can also read in the official SAP Universal ID page, the values of SAP Universal ID are.
In my own words, SAP Universal ID will help you in the following areas:
- Centrally manage your multiple S-User and P-Users and link them to SAP Universal ID (Phase 1 – available)
- Simplify your authentication on SAP for Me (Phase 1 – available)
- Simplify your authentication on other SAP tools (Phase 1 – coming soon)
- Manage your interests and consents centrally (Phase 2)
- Manage your SAP portal and tool authorization centrally (Phase 3)
The major values now are:
- Eliminate the users you don’t need
While generating your own SAP Universal ID to link your users to it, you might discover older users you don’t need anymore. Nice chance to get rid of them.
- Login to SAP for Me via multiple users through SAP Universal ID and password
SAP for Me supports SAP Universal ID and its account selector. Just remember one password and have access to through your linked users.Note: This is a benefit for S-users, as SAP for Me doesn’t accept P-users, yet. Linked P-Users will be displayed in the account selector, though SAP for Me won’t let them in. This case will be solved once SAP for Me is using SAP Universal ID in the so called “native mode”, later.
Additional values will come as soon as additional tools beyond SAP for Me are connected. Next will be the SAP ONE Support Launchpad. Once tools like SAP community will be connected, this will also add values to P-users.
Is SAP Universal ID GA or in a beta mode?
We wanted SAP Universal ID, like SAP for Me, to be available early so that we can consider your feedback for upcoming improvements. Both are currently in an open beta state. At the current point in time, our expectation is to end the open beta for both by SAPPHIRE 2020.
What are current limitations? [added Sep 20]
Be aware that some current facts can be a little confusing. I just experienced that over the last 24 hours, so I wanted to bring that into the blog, too.
There are currently two limitations you should be aware of:
- SAP for Me only supports S-users for login, by now
So, you can manage your ID and the linking of S-users AND P-users inside SAP for Me. But you cannot login to SAP for Me using the P-users. As we are in the middle of a couple of evolutionary steps in SAP for Me and SAP Universal ID, this is a side effect of the early implementation and will resolve over time.
- Other SAP tools must implement SAP Universal ID, too
If an SAP tool is not integrated with SAP Universal ID, it can’t support the login via your SAP Universal ID (mail address). So, you need to login to these other tools still with your existing S- or P-user. The number of tools being integrated will increase soon. So, also this side effect that leads to confusion at those early days, will resolve over time.
How can I get my own SAP Universal ID?
Getting your own SAP Universal ID is a quite easy thing as shown in the 3 steps below.
Just let me summarize what you will do (which if of course also explained in the UI)
Step 1
- Login to https://me.sap.com and login with your S-user
- Go to the user profile in SAP for Me and go to the “My Accounts”
- You will find the SAP Universal ID banner that invites you to start creating an SAP Universal ID. Just click the button and follow the instructions.
Step 2
- Once you are done, you will end up again in SAP for Me.
- Reload the page in your browser and you will see all your SAP Universal ID plus the linked S- and P-user accounts.
- From here, you can link additional accounts at any time.
- Logout and then sign-in again, to see the login screen and login with your SAP Universal ID for the first time. The account selector will appear.
Step 3
- You are now in SAP for Me, with the user account you have selected.
- Logout and login to use a different account. Note: Of course, in the very near future, the account selector will be embedded directly, to avoid logout/login procedure.
What’s next?
In the section “But what exactly is SAP Universal ID” above, I mentioned several phases to come. Let me outline a bit what these phases mean.
Phase 1 – (Authentication)
We are currently in phase 1, which is that SAP Universal ID is being implemented into key portals and tools of SAP. The new customer portal SAP for Me provided for us the best starting point.
Over the next months, we will add more portals and tools that will support the conditional login. Our focus will be driven by those tools integrated with SAP for Me. The next in our pipeline is SAP ONE Support Launchpad.
Phase 2 – (Interests and Consent)
Here we are currently in the planning phase.
Basically, the goal is to centrally store information connected to you as a person such as
- your interests in the SAP world that you want to be considered when interacting digitally with SAP through SAP for Me or other tools.
- Your consent to item like newsletter, mail communication and more.
I think we will be able latest by the end of Q1/2020 to talk about more details. Of course, the earlier we have more information, we are going to share it with you.
Phase 3 – (Authorization)
Also, in the planning phase is to provide a central authorization capability that satisfies today’s needs of our customers while considering and complementing existing authorization environments (e.g. S-User authorization)
Here we also need more time to share details, but at least I wanted to share the rough plan.
Who are the experts?
I hope this helps a bit to jumpstart with SAP Universal ID. Please just use the comment section of this blog to raise your questions or feedback. Obviously, SAP Universal ID is not a pure SAP for Me topic, and would close this blog by naming the two colleagues being the key contacts for SAP Universal ID:
- Rosa Gast (Business Owner SAP Universal ID)
- Cornelia Mitschke (IT Program Manager SAP Universal ID)
All the best,
JJ
Chief Product Owner of SAP for Me
Twitter: @JJComment
I just tried to use this and it said it doesn't work with P-userIDs. Isn't that the whole point of it?
Hey Nathan,
Thanks a lot for your reply and questions which is related to the following segment in the blog:
Additional values will come as soon as additional tools beyond SAP for Me are connected. Next will be the SAP ONE Support Launchpad. Once tools like SAP community will be connected, this will also add values to P-users.
The point of SAP Universal ID in phase 1 is, to link multiple users to one Universal ID. This allows to simplify authentication, as you just need your mail address and your password to access all your users that you want to connect with a certain tool. SAP for Me currently doesn't provide content for S-users. This will change over the upcoming 6 months. Until then, however, you are benefiting from SAP Universal ID in cases where you had to switch between S-users before using SAP for Me.
Next tool to join SAP Universal ID will be SAP One Support Launchpad. SAP Launchpad accepts S-users and P-users, though I would say the content for P-users is rather limited.
Based on your comment, I assume you are a heavy user of one or multiple P-users, maybe to access the SAP community. To benefit from SAP Universal ID in the context of P-users, your SAP tool of choice (like SAP community) that provides P-user related content HAS TO join SAP Universal ID. In the case of the SAP Community, there is no precise date defined, yet. But we hope to make it until end of this year, latest.
Regards,
JJ
What about C-userIDs? My company is an SAP Partner and I have a C# which is how I can consistently access the SAP Support portal. Will that be linked?
I'd love for this to work but I've curated a lot of information under my C# and would hate to lose it when I link it to my P-user. Also, I have multiple S-users that I use for different customers throughout the year. Will this handle that? Can I easily switch at the Support portal between them to work on issues for different customers?
This is a very fragmented area because in the SAP industry, people tend to wear a lot of different hats... and those hats change over time. Someone can be an SAP employee, partner, customer, and then completely un-attached (solo) all within the same year. I hope this can handle that scenario.
Hi Nathan,
Actually, also C-users will be integrated in the future, as well as SAP employee users. Current plan is to make it happen until SAPPHIRE 2020.
By the way: The account switcher of SAP Universal ID allows you to switch between users. When you talk about Support Portal, I assume you most likely think of the SAP ONE Support Launchpad. And the answer to this is yes, you will be able to switch between users, once the portal is connected.
In general. We have started with SAP for Me as a first step. More tools and portals to come. The next in our pipeline is the SAP ONE Support Launchpad. So there is a good chance for you to benefit here soon, at least with a portion of users you might have. As said the other types are coming, too, over time.
Just as further (technical) explanation and outlook. Your possibilites are depending on how SAP Universal ID will be implemented by the different SAP tools. There are basically two ways. One more or less quick one (conditional login) and another one (native login). The native login will provide more options for the individual tool, like overlooking content across multiple users at once. Nevertheless, it requires more integration work. At the current point in time, I cannot say which tools with implement native by when. But I can say that the SAP for Me team is very keen to do this soon, to provide more value.
Again, its an evolutionary thing and I would be more than happy if you would join us at this journey. I'm taking it serious to help you guys by simplifying things and so do the people around me like the SAP Universal ID team (e.g. Cornelia Mitschke / Rosa Gast. We are with you and will continously improve. 🙂
All the best,
JJ
Congrats on this feature. It had to be done.
Simple and intuitive to use.
Would be nice if there was a possibility to be able to change the description (nickname) of the account even after the initial configuration.
All the best,
LT
Hi Liviu,
appreciate your feedback!
We are really happy this option is now available (still limited, but will be expanded more and more of of course).
Sure, you can change your nickname associated to the accounts if you go to “My Accounts” Section on SAP for Me. Via “Add additional accounts” you will land on the linking Manager where you will be able to see/add the accounts and also update your nickname.
Hope this clarifed more. If you have further questions please let us know or visit us on sap.com/universalid.
Regards,
Rosa
Hello,
I have additional questions to this Universal ID.
Whenever I change my employer I get a new S - ID related to that company. How can I deal with this in regards to this new Universal ID?
Subsequently; I will get another (working) Email address once I am leaving my company, so which Email address to use while creating my Universal ID?
And; I do have an P User as well but with another (private) Email address. On which address shell I register my Universal ID?
Regards
Christina