iOS + save to home screen: attachment lock in

[JaySchwendemann]

Dear all,

when using "save to home screen" feature (webclips) and the user opens an attachment there's no way to get back. I got this behavior in the "Approve Purchase Orders" app but I'm sure it  applies to other apps, too.

Problem seems that with using "home screen" feature, the browser navigation using back button or swipe from left are not there / working anymore.

Did anyone also encounter this? If so, is there a workaround? Is this a bug?

Cheers

Jens

[JaySchwendemann · Accepted solution]

Hi all,

thanks for your reply

: We didn't opt for fiori client because of no support for client certificates without SAP SSO. If that shortcoming would be eliminated, we'd be happy to switch

: The issue occurs when you use "save to home screen". In that mode the url window of mobile Safari completely dissapears including navigational keys for navigating back and forth. This is genereally a wanted behavior as it gives the Fiori App a more native app like look and feel. However, you currently seem to be stuck if you open an attachment within the app. Swiping from top of browser won't do anything in "safe to homescreen mode", I'm afraid (again generally a wanted behavior).

We have opened a call at SAP's. Will let you know the outcome as soon as SAP reports back 🙂

Many thanks and kind regards

Cheers

Jens

[masa_139 · Accepted solution]

Hi Jens,

Could you share the use case scenario?

Is save to home critical for the business? How many users are going to use it?

Regards,

Masa / SAP Technology RIG

[JaySchwendemann · Accepted solution]

Hi Masa,

thanks for asking. Trying to answer your questions in the following:

1. Our scenario:

We are planning to use fiori as an alternative way for request and approval scenarios, especially for on-the-go people (middle to upper management which typically carry a company owned iOS device). We also think there could be benefits for desktop based people which may use the intuitive Fiori apps as an alternative for basic tasks which may be cumbersome / difficult to perform in SAP GUI or WD.

Focus however, lies on the mobile use-case. Currently we only use transactional apps as we don't have HANA.

2. Is it business critical:

I think it would be helpful to use "Save to home" for the following reasons. I don't particulary think it's really business critical, but as said, pretty helpful:

• We could enroll the web clips via our own MDM solution
• We could give DEV and QAS web clips to some test group in addition to production web clip. Something that not seems possible with native fiori client, unless of course you are entitled to SMP and build your own client
• Users would not need to delve into mobile safari, then open a bookmark and only then being logged onto Fiori but just may tap on the home screen (less user interaction)
• Less user distraction: If you open in mobile safari there ought to be several open tabs. In my experience, users then often also do some other stuff, while they are already in the browser. Depending on the clutter of open tabs you may not easily find back to the Fiori tab.

However, there currently seem also to be some cons on using the "save to home" feature

• Ocassional caching problems, however being much much better with cache busting launchpad, so I woudl rate this as a non issue at the moment
• Links in emails that point to fiori would open in mobile safari instead of the web clip. This seems to be a limitation of iOS which...
  • Does not support URL Identifiers for Web Clips. Only native apps can register for an URL Identifier like "fiori://..."
  • Does not honour the existence of a web clip when opening a link. I think, from an iOS / Apple point of view it should be possible to check wheter a specific host:port/path combination was saved to a web clip. If a link was clicked tabbed that matches that combination, the web clip could open instead of the mobile safari. However, nothing SAP may directly do about that, but maybe you've got some contacts on Apple's side that you can give this improvement suggestion to...

3. How many users are going to use it?

We are currently in a pilot rolling out to approx 20 users but in the medium-term we expecting some 100-200 users to use Fiori or Fiori like applications.

Many thanks and kind regards, really appreciating commitment to user participation

Cheers

Jens

[masa_139 · Accepted solution]

Hi Jens,

Thanks for sharing the background. I still recommend Fiori Client with Fiori launchpad.

I was on a similar customer project implementing mobile apps to silver age managements who do just final approval. 1 single Fiori Client app opens personalized launchpad is simple and easy to use. They can not manage using browser, paging to the next on mobile, and save to home gives more challenge for them.

Demo scenario was well accepted.

1 finger - 1 app(Fiori Client) - 3 tiles (launchpad) - Approve and Reject buttons.

Regards,

Masa / SAP Technology RIG

[JaySchwendemann · Accepted solution]

Hi Masa,

thanks for sharing your views on this. I agree with you that Fiori Client has it's temptations and would probably be our choice if it could cope with client certificates.

There's some chatter about Fiori 1.3 client supporting X.509 certificates without SMP, but I haven't managed to get this working so far, using a standard / vanilla Fiori 1.3 client you can get from App Store.

If you happen to know:

1. Is there additional need for some infrastructure (SMP, SAP SSO, Mobile Secure) to support this or should this work just using the vanilla Fiori 1.3 Client? According to here there should be no need for SMP, however, it's not really clear to me what needs to be done instead (maybe has to do with Question 2 below)?
2. Or would we need to build our own client using Hybrid SKD? I however thought that SMP entitlement is needed for that, right?

We even would be happy if the user once typed in username / password and this gets remembered for the lifetime of the credentials and there would not be a need to re-type every time you open Fiori Client.

Again many thanks and have a nice day.

Cheers

Jens

[masa_139 · Accepted solution]

Hi Jens,

Devices need a SSL certificate for https communication.

http://help.sap.com/Download/Multimedia/fc13/e5f69d662130403ba64908aef7b3553f.html

If you have an issue, please create a new discussion.

Regards,

Masa / SAP Technology RIG

[JaySchwendemann · Accepted solution]

Thanks Masa,

About Fiori Client:

Client Certificates installed via MDM or imported via Email may only be consumed by Apple's stock apps, like Mail, Safari, etc, so that's one reason the vanilla Fiori Client cannot access those. Technical Q&A QA1745: Making Certificates and Keys Available To Your App. However, would open a new thread for that, if you think the discussion is wort the wile

About Attachment Issue with "Safe to Homescreen":

I opened an incident about that as I think it should be supported. One cannot forbid a user to save an Fiori URL to home screen, so I think also in this scenario, a functioning attachment handling should be provided. Will let you know the outcome.

Cheers

Jens

[JaySchwendemann · Accepted solution]

SAP "solved" this by disabling standalone (fullscreen) mode on iOS with this node http://service.sap.com/sap/support/notes/2219550

The wording of support was in the line of "Unfortunately it is not possible to navigate back in standalone/fullscreen mode when using safari browser, due to this restriction we decided to take out the fullscreen mode from the fiori-launchpad."

[former_member182874]

Adding..Regarding swipe issue, are you talking about, wheb you enter the tile.

The header bar is disappeared with back button. If yes? Could you try swiping from top of browser. The header bar will appear. Not sure if this is your issue. But generally i dont do "save to home screen" cz of cache issues.

[masa_139]

Hi Jens,

How about using Fiori Client?

Regards,

Masa / SAP Technology RIG