What’s “new” in Fiori 2.0?

Pieter Rijlaarsdam, 18 January 2017

SAP has been around for a while. A grasp from the past shows many faces when it comes to SAP’s UI strategy. Special thanks to sap.com for some ancient screenshots.

With the 00’s still showing multiple tracks for UI development (SAP GUI, Webdynpro, BSP’s, SAP Netweaver Business client), SAP introduced SAP Fiori in 2013.

It appears SAP Fiori is here to stay, and I must admit I am glad. SAP has been criticized for their lack of attention to user interfaces. This resulted in gluing, patching and scripting their way towards the light. This in turn resulted in unstable user interfaces and complex browserversion compatibility.

Long story short, from every perspective, I am happy that SAP Fiori is here to stay. Now that the dust around SAP Fiori is settled, SAP launched a new version last year, SAP Fiori 2.0.

Unlike the new version number suggests, SAP Fiori 2.0 is not a software version with an exact launch date, it should be more considered ‘a new era’ of Fiori, where it matures to a more completed product.

So what are the key take-aways for this new era of Fiori?

Belize

The new Belize design is clean and has more outspoken base coloring. Such as the background gradient, the dark blue notifications area and a fresh new set of icons and graphs. I was really impressed by the freshness.

Launchpad

The Launchpad can be considered as you SAP homepage, allowing you quick access to all the functions you need. Fiori 2.0 supports a catalog to select the apps that are relevant for you and add them to your ‘favorites’. These apps will appear on your homepage. Furthermore, the possibility to navigate between apps has (or will be) added. Obviously, SAP ran into the downside of offering functionality in small apps (i.e. My Opportunities vs My Contacts), as this disables the possibility to drill down into the details. With cross-app-navigation, this should be fixed.

Me area

The Me-area has been added (on the left), where functions around the user can be found, such as your personal profile, preferences and settings, the app catalog and recent objects.

Notifications area

The notifications area has been added (on the right) allowing you to quickly access your workflow tasks and alerts.

CoPilot

The copilot as introduced at SAP TechEd 2016 was launched as your digital assistant allowing you to interact with SAP using speech for instance. Comparable with Apple’s SIRI.
Demos at TechEd showed a tool allowing you to for instance ‘pin’ objects such as customers, contacts, orders, documents, but also for instance screenshots or quick remarks while browsing the system, allowing you to create quick to-do or don’t-forget lists.