Horizon themes now available with the SAP Launchpad service and SAP Work Zone

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Please note that this blog was published prior to the re-branding related to SAP Build portfolio, which was announced at SAP TechEd 2022. SAP Launchpad service and SAP Work Zone come together under the SAP Build Work Zone brand, with two editions: standard edition (formerly SAP Launchpad service) and advanced edition (formerly SAP Work Zone).

You can learn more in this announcement blog post: SAP Build Capabilities Explained | SAP TechEd | SAP News Center.

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Just recently, the new modern and fresh Horizon theme family became available in the SAP Launchpad service and SAP Work Zone. These friendly themes help users to focus on getting their job done with an improved information hierarchy and simplified visual elements. The Horizon theme family comprises a light (Morning Horizon) and a dark version (Evening Horizon) as well as a light and a dark high-contrast theme for supporting visually impaired users.

SAP Launchpad site with Morning Horizon shown on the left and Evening Horizon shown on the right

In the SAP Launchpad service and SAP Work Zone, the new themes are available as of now via the Theme Manager, but at this time they are not assigned automatically as default themes to new sites. Yet, they can easily be made available as default theme or for user selection in a site via the theme manager which administrators can access via their user actions menu.

Horizon theme in Theme Manager

To support customers in creating their own themes based on the Horizon theme family, the Horizon themes are also available for theming in the UI Theme Designer.

Horizon themes in UI Theme Designer

Now, how about integrated content?

The new Horizon theme is starting to become available in SAP applications, e.g. with SAP S/4HANA Cloud 2208 (see Thomas Reiss’ SAP Fiori update blog post for more details). So, federated apps from SAP S/4HANA Cloud or custom SAPUI5 applications running on SAP BTP would also run with the Horizon themes. SAPUI5 supports productive usage of the Horizon themes as of version 1.102  (see Oliver Graeff’s blog post on Horizon in SAP UI technologies). For on-premise or private cloud customers, the Horizon theme family is planned to be available as of FPS01 of SAP S/4HANA 2022 in the first quarter of 2023.

In general, we recommend making sure that the theme, be it custom or SAP delivered, used in the central entry point on SAP BTP is also available in all connected backend systems to avoid inconsistencies. So, as long as the Horizon theme family is not included in all connected backend systems, the recommended approach for customers would be to use a common theme based on a theme that is available in all connected backend systems, e.g. Quartz Light.

Alternatively, customers can start using Horizon now by defining a fallback theme for older backend systems on SAP BTP. This fallback theme should be based on a theme that is supported for the SAPUI5 versions of all backend systems, for example Quartz. Using the UI Theme Designer it can be defined to have a similar look as the Horizon-based theme used on SAP BTP. The assignment of the fallback theme to the Horizon-based theme is also done in the UI Theme Designer via Theme > Properties. For more details, please see SAP Note 3342088.

Assigning a fallback theme to a custom theme based on Horizon

Please check out our updated documentation for more details. For information about SAP Launchpad service, see our product page on SAP Community, subscribe to our YouTube channel and follow us on Twitter. Looking forward to your feedback!