The Work Zone menu bar so far hardly offers any possibility for customization. Except the show&hide option in Admin Console, the menu items are fixed in number, names, and order. Now with the 2022 December release, we finally have a menu editor in place, which allows administrators to build a fully customized menu as they need. Let's take a closer look.
A company admin or support admin will be able to see an edit button on the right end of the menu bar. Clicking on it reveals the menu editor.
The side panel on the left is the place for you to define the menu items. A real-time preview on the top right always reflects how the menu will actually look like according to the current menu definition (it is even clickable!).
All the menu items already existing on today's menu are clustered under the "Predefined" category, ready to be picked up and put onto any position of the menu.
When you open the menu editor the first time, you'll realize that today's menu is just defined with a few Predefined menu items, namely "Home", "My Workspace", "Applications", "Workspaces", etc., ready for you to reorder, remove, and hide. The same type of Predefined menu item can only be added once onto the menu. Those which have already been added are greyed out.
Note that the "Top-Level Menu" setting in Admin Console is now removed since it's no longer needed. Existing show/hide settings will be inherited by the Menu Editor. This transition is transparent to all customers (i.e. the menu will be just the same as before if the menu editor is never used to make any changes; nothing required from customers side to prepare for this release).
The most versatile menu item type is the "Custom" one. It can link to any (internal or external) URL or to a Workpage. By only using "Custom"-typed menu items, together with Workpages used as home pages, you can already build a website-like corporate portal with a menu that navigates to arbitrary internal and external resources.
You may go the the Menu Content and create Workpages there which could be referenced by a Custom menu item.
Workpages in the Menu Content folder can only be accessed by company/support admins and can only be used by the menu. They are very much similar to the Area Home Pages but can be seen and managed directly in the folder, decoupled from the menu items that link to them.
When a "Custom"-typed menu item links to nothing, it will serve as a placeholder, and is supposed to have sub menu items. You can drag&drop other menu items into it to shape a hierarchical structure.
Up to 3 levels of nested hierarchy is supported in the Menu Editor.
On the runtime, lower levels of menu items will just show up in a dropdown upon hovering over the parent menu item.
Any "Custom"-typed menu item is also equipped with a powerful access control mechanism.
You could restrict the menu item to be shown to internal users or external users only, or to any specific group of users defined by a few User Lists or Workspace members.
With this feature, your menu can really look different to different audiences, making it more pertinent and more informative.
Your menu could also be living and breathing if you delegate some of the menu items to a few workspace owners.
The company/support admin can add a menu item of the type "Workspace", referencing any existing workspace.
If it is a private workspace, then the menu item will only be shown to its members. That is, the workspace's visibility is automatically observed by the menu item as well.
With the features above, the company admin could become much more productive by seamlessly integrating contents from trusted key contributors onto the menu, while avoiding giving out admin privileges unnecessarily.
Imagine what could be the next steps with the new Menu and Workpage in place. What else might be further put onto the menu? How might the Workspace nav tabs be improved? What other changes inside the Workspace might be introduced?
Follow me and stay tuned for any new updates from SAP Build Work Zone, advanced edition.
Follow the SAP Build Work Zone topic at https://community.sap.com/topics/work-zone, and post your questions at https://answers.sap.com/tags/73555000100800002781.
Feel free to share your feedback or thoughts with me in a comment.
A company admin or support admin will be able to see an edit button on the right end of the menu bar. Clicking on it reveals the menu editor.
The side panel on the left is the place for you to define the menu items. A real-time preview on the top right always reflects how the menu will actually look like according to the current menu definition (it is even clickable!).
Build a different menu by re-combining predefined menu items
All the menu items already existing on today's menu are clustered under the "Predefined" category, ready to be picked up and put onto any position of the menu.
When you open the menu editor the first time, you'll realize that today's menu is just defined with a few Predefined menu items, namely "Home", "My Workspace", "Applications", "Workspaces", etc., ready for you to reorder, remove, and hide. The same type of Predefined menu item can only be added once onto the menu. Those which have already been added are greyed out.
Note that the "Top-Level Menu" setting in Admin Console is now removed since it's no longer needed. Existing show/hide settings will be inherited by the Menu Editor. This transition is transparent to all customers (i.e. the menu will be just the same as before if the menu editor is never used to make any changes; nothing required from customers side to prepare for this release).
Build a custom-made menu by linking to arbitrary targets
The most versatile menu item type is the "Custom" one. It can link to any (internal or external) URL or to a Workpage. By only using "Custom"-typed menu items, together with Workpages used as home pages, you can already build a website-like corporate portal with a menu that navigates to arbitrary internal and external resources.
You may go the the Menu Content and create Workpages there which could be referenced by a Custom menu item.
Workpages in the Menu Content folder can only be accessed by company/support admins and can only be used by the menu. They are very much similar to the Area Home Pages but can be seen and managed directly in the folder, decoupled from the menu items that link to them.
Build a multi-level menu by nesting menu items
When a "Custom"-typed menu item links to nothing, it will serve as a placeholder, and is supposed to have sub menu items. You can drag&drop other menu items into it to shape a hierarchical structure.
Up to 3 levels of nested hierarchy is supported in the Menu Editor.On the runtime, lower levels of menu items will just show up in a dropdown upon hovering over the parent menu item.
Build a dynamic menu by defining access control
Any "Custom"-typed menu item is also equipped with a powerful access control mechanism.
You could restrict the menu item to be shown to internal users or external users only, or to any specific group of users defined by a few User Lists or Workspace members.
With this feature, your menu can really look different to different audiences, making it more pertinent and more informative.
Build an automatic menu by delegating to workspaces
Your menu could also be living and breathing if you delegate some of the menu items to a few workspace owners.
The company/support admin can add a menu item of the type "Workspace", referencing any existing workspace.
If it is a private workspace, then the menu item will only be shown to its members. That is, the workspace's visibility is automatically observed by the menu item as well.
With the features above, the company admin could become much more productive by seamlessly integrating contents from trusted key contributors onto the menu, while avoiding giving out admin privileges unnecessarily.
It's just a beginning!
Imagine what could be the next steps with the new Menu and Workpage in place. What else might be further put onto the menu? How might the Workspace nav tabs be improved? What other changes inside the Workspace might be introduced?
Follow me and stay tuned for any new updates from SAP Build Work Zone, advanced edition.
Follow the SAP Build Work Zone topic at https://community.sap.com/topics/work-zone, and post your questions at https://answers.sap.com/tags/73555000100800002781.
Feel free to share your feedback or thoughts with me in a comment.
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