Would Adobe Interactive Forms Solve This?

[shane_kelly2]

We are a commodity trading company who buys and sells commodities all over the world.

We rely on a massive network of third-party logistics providers (truck, rail, ocean), customs clearing houses, logistics brokers and storage facilities to help us deliver our products.

We run SAP ERP - and use LO/LE to manage all of our shipping data.   Our challenge is that our logistics documentation (loading instructions, packing lists, certificates of origin, bills of lading, invoices, etc) are all built on smart forms.

Our logistics coordinators constantly have to tweak the documentation to meet unique import/export requirements or to match letters of credit  - but this is a painful process using standard LO/LE.

I was wondering if we could use Adobe forms to help solve this challenge.

Ideally a user could enter or select from a list the information directly on the document and have the document save those changes back to SAP.  

Additionally it would be great if the form could pull data from the trade/shipment and prepopulate the form so the users can just review it, change what needs to be changed, and save the changes back to the system before printing or emailing the document to the carrier/customer.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

Thanks

[ChrisSolomon · Accepted solution]

Yes...all of those things you want can be done with Adobe Interactive Forms. Using AIF will incur additional licensing costs however, but you can use the "print" version for free. But also, why not just have a nice, simple SAPUI5/Fiori app to do all that (which would make it possible to use on mobile devices, pads, etc.) and allow for print/save to PDF if needed?

[shane_kelly2 · Accepted solution]

Thanks Christopher,

Fiori/mobility isn't a feature we need - our users are always at their desks. 

I just want to make it easier for the users to edit their forms.   Right now they enter the data in standard SAP shipments/deliveries transactions, run a form,  see a mistake, try to figure out where that mistake is coming from or how to override it, fix the mistake, then rerun the form.    It takes too long and the users just go offline and create their forms in Word.

The smart forms also aren't very flexible - for example i can program the address box to show 5 lines of the customers address - but sometimes our overseas customers have huge addresses that need 6 or more lines.   Smart forms ironically isn't smart enough to stretch that box to fit the content or pickup the extra address line(s) if they exist.

[shane_kelly2 · Accepted solution]

we also have challenges when we want to combine information from more than one shipment on a single form - we don't currently have a way to do that.

[ChrisSolomon · Accepted solution]

Ahhh got you! Soooo ......if "desk" users....then yes, you can use AIF....but again, be aware...

1. additional licensing cost

2. performance is not the best in some cases (too many people try to build an "application" out of what is essentially a "form")

3. SAP has somewhat pulled back from AIF (not much development there and not much has changed over the years in licensing costs either)

sooo...for all your "dynamic" needs....why not a custom WDA app....and again, the option to print/save the form as PDF from there? But, if you still are looking at AIF, yes, it will do all you mentioned quite easily....you can even embed Javascript in it to make it somewhat behave more like a web page (ie. dynamic show/hide fields or whole sections based on data or behavior/selection of data in other fields).

[peterbarker · Accepted solution]

Hello Mr. Kelly,

I am the Product Manager for SAP Interactive Forms by Adobe.

The go-to solution for both print forms and interactive forms are "SAP Interactive Forms by Adobe" (IFbA) and "Form Service by Adobe" (ADS on HCP). I would encourage you to take a look at IFbA and ADS on HCP as they may well be the best solution for you. However, we would need to take a closer look at your use case to make a decision.

Interactive forms would require a license with IFbA; with ADS on HCP you would buy blocks of billable requests.

Mr Solomon is also right in pointing out that one should not create industrial-strength applications with forms - we have Web Dynpro for that.

However, it is not true to say that SAP has pulled back from IFbA and that not much development has taken place here. Every year we deliver a block of new functionality and there is now the major innovation of ADS on HCP whereby the ADS runs on HANA Cloud Platform reducing your workload considerably. We also have a full roadmap for the future of IFbA and ADS on HCP. 

Please feel free to contact me by e-mail: peter.barker@sap.com

[ChrisSolomon · Accepted solution]

"However, it is not true to say that SAP has pulled back from IFbA and that not much development has taken place here."

We can agree to disagree. For probably the past many TechEds I have been too, the message/info has been the exact same for IFbA (and mostly the talk is about "print" forms). This blog ( ) was from 2013 and I heard the same thing each and every year since.

IFbA "in the cloud" (HCP) and "HTML5 generation" has been rehashed each year with no real "new" news. The licensing issue has never really changed and has been a BIG one (in my space, many clients halted or dropped projects due to it and simply waited till new technology came along....FPM forms and/or SAPUI5/FIORI....to bypass it all together). I wrote a blog about this long ago that got quite a lot of attention and nothing has really changed over the years. But we don't have to "got there" (haha).

[peterbarker · Accepted solution]

Yes, thank you: The messaging around IFbA has been the same from TechEd to TechEd. It would be disturbing if the overall messaging of IFbA were to change from year to year because most customers and partners value continuity.

Nor do customers expect every solution to be as disruptive as, say, Fiori, or HANA throughout its lifecycle.

However, the claim that the "info" (that is, the functionality) has been "the exact same" is demonstrably false since we provide new functionality in terms of continuous improvements.

This year at TechEd Las Vegas we also announced more continuous improvements and innovative plans for a cloud-only approach and we continue to invest in IFbA in 2017 and beyond.

Best regards,

Peter Barker, Product Manager

[chris_scott]

Hi Shane,

The short answer is 'yes'.

What you’re looking for sounds spookily similar a requirement we’re working on right now for another organisation.

The challenge they are finding when importing into various regions is that key documents such as the customs invoice and packing list need to be legalised manually, or include additional / specific texts (such as letter of credit details).

Currently that organisation manually edits the SAP-generated output (or even uses Word) for key shipping documentation.

One of their challenges is in the preparation of all the required documentation for shipment, which might include import permits & certificate of origin – documents that are provided to them but are required to be sent with the shipment alongside the SAP-generated output.

The solution we are looking at includes:

1. Converting existing SMARTFORMS to IFbA
2. Introducing multiple concurrent template versions to handling regional or country-specific requirements
3. Building control tables for dynamic template determination and text determination, which can be managed by the business
4. Building a Fiori app to provide an overall view of the shipping documentation preparation – what is ready to ship, what is awaiting letter of credit / import permit / COO etc. The Fiori app is used to track individual shipment status and also collect additional data which can be added to multiple document outputs.
5. Making better use of document texts in the sales order & delivery.

At this stage we’ve finished the blueprinting process and we’ve built a mock-up of the app, and I’d be happy to show you what we’ve got.

If you contact Peter Barker at SAP he will be able to put us in touch directly.

Chris