Managing Spaces and Pages

Objective

After completing this lesson, you will be able to manage Spaces and Pages for custom SAP business roles

Spaces and Pages

In the previous lesson, you learned about restriction types and restriction fields as you configured the access restrictions for your business role. Now you need to assign launchpad Spaces and Pages to complete your business role. In this lesson, you will focus on Step 4: Assign Launchpad Spaces and Pages.

Step 4: Assigning Launchpad Spaces and Pages

The final step for defining a business role is to assign the appropriate spaces and pages for the SAP Fiori launchpad. As you saw in previous lessons, the business role is assigned one or more business catalogs. Each catalog contains the SAP Fiori tile definitions and the target mappings needed to execute a specific application.

However, it is also necessary to provide layout and display information about the catalog contents to the SAP Fiori launchpad to ensure an optimal end user experience.

Managing the User Experience diagram

Spaces and pages provide the organization and layout structure for the SAP Fiori launchpad. Spaces were developed to provide more options to organize the business users' launchpad and access to assigned SAP Fiori apps. Pages, organized into sections, let you design the layout and order of the applications for users with that specific role.

This allows you to control the look and feel of the launchpad and improve the users' experience with the SAP system.

Predefined Spaces and Pages in the SAP Fiori Apps Reference Library

You can identify which spaces and pages are available for a specific business role template by using the documentation in the SAP Fiori Apps Reference Library. You may use the spaces and pages delivered by SAP directly or you may use them as a starting point to create your own space and page configuration for a custom business role.

Technically, each SAP predefined space is assigned to a business role template. By this connection, either the predefined spaces can be assigned directly, or a space derived from a predefined space can be created. To view predefined spaces, you can use the Manage Launchpad Spaces app.

Manage Launchpad Spaces App - screenshots

The Predefined Spaces overview tab in the Manage Launchpad Spaces app contains all the spaces provided by SAP for your product scope. The ID of an SAP predefined space refers to the SAP role template or the business area it was designed for. For example, SAP_BR_BILLING_CLERK. The space title usually reflects the work area for which the space is designed. You can use this information to identify which spaces interest your user group.

You can directly use SAP predefined spaces and pages when working with business roles based on role templates delivered by SAP. You need to assign the predefined space to a business role for this. You can also use the mass change wizard to simultaneously assign predefined spaces to several business roles.

Evaluating Page Assignment to Predefined Space

SAP predefined Spaces and Pages may not be edited. If you want to make changes or adjustments to a predefined space or page, you must create a copy and use an ID with a customer namespace prefix, starting with the letter "Z". When making a copy of a predefined space template, you can also decide if you want to copy and assign the pages that belong to the template.

For your custom business roles, you can copy the predefined spaces or pages and assign them to your business role. This will allow you to see how the SAP predefined spaces and pages look, whether they will satisfy your needs, or if you need to create a custom space and page configuration.

Copying a Predefined Space

To copy a predefined space, SAP provides an easy-to-use guided procedure to walk customers through the process.

Procedure

  1. Select the space that you want to copy in the overview or the space details view of the Manage Launchpad Spaces app. Choose the Copy button to open the guided procedure.
  2. Enter a unique space ID, a description, and a title for the new space. All three entries are mandatory. The space ID must be unique and start with a Z. Note that you can no longer change the space ID. When you have entered all the information, click on Step 2.
  3. Select how to proceed with the pages currently assigned to the original space. You can decide to ignore them (Ignore All), you can assign the existing pages to the new space (Assign All), or you can copy the pages (Copy All). It is also possible to select different options for each page. When you copy a predefined space, you can only copy or ignore the assigned pages; predefined pages cannot be assigned directly.
  4. If you have selected pages to be copied, you need to enter a new page ID, description, and title for each page. The page ID must be unique and start with a Z. When you are done, click Review to see a preview of the new space with the selected pages.
  5. Click Edit to change the space details or the selected pages. When you are satisfied with the new space, click Save. The space is then added to the customer-created spaces list and can be assigned to a business role.

Work with Spaces and Pages

In the exercise below you will manage and configure Spaces and Pages.

Defining New Spaces and Pages

Administrators can also create their own custom spaces and pages from scratch. Below is a step-by-step procedure to set up a new space with one or more pages for the users assigned to a specific business role.

Procedure:

  1. Open the Maintain Business Roles app and select the business role for which you want to create a space and a page.

  2. Go to the tab Assigned Launchpad Spaces and click Edit. Then click Add to add a space to this business role.

    Note

    Note that local changes are impossible when working in a production system and the Adaptation Transport Organizer (ATO) is configured. In this case, the space assignment in the Maintain Business Roles app can't be edited. Edits must be performed in your quality system.

  3. The Add Launchpad Space dialog opens. Select the Create New Space option in the Assign Space to Business Role field. The Create Page from Business Catalogs and Groups checkbox determines if the page should contain the content provided by the groups.

  4. For a new space, you need to enter the following information:

    • The space ID. It is mandatory. It starts with a Z, can't start with a number, and can't contain special characters. The ID should be no longer than 32 characters. Please note that you can't change the ID afterward.

    • A mandatory description for the space. It can be up to 100 characters long.

    • A mandatory title for the space that can be up to 100 characters long. To ensure a consistent user experience, we suggest you use title cases and nouns. Users will see the title in the Launchpad navigation bar.

  5. Click Create and Assign Space. The new space is assigned to the selected business role and shown in the Assigned Spaces list.

  6. Click on the space entry in the list to go to the space details view of the Manage Launchpad Spaces app.

    Note

    You are now in a different app, and your changes to the business role have not been saved yet. This will be done later. Here, you see the space information in the Pages tab. It shows the empty page that was created and assigned to the space. The page ID is entered automatically as it is identical to the space ID. The page title and description are also copied from the space. Both can be changed if necessary. Here, you can also add other pages to the space.

  7. Now you need to define your page content. Click on a page to see or edit it. You are directed to the Manage Launchpad Pages app.

  8. Click Edit to start. Define one or more sections for your page and add the apps that you want your users to see to these sections.

  9. You can check how the page looks for your users. Click Page Preview. You can edit the page further if necessary.

  10. When you are satisfied with the page, save your changes.

  11. Return to the Maintain Business Roles app with the back button. The assigned space is shown in the Assigned Launchpad Spaces tab list. Save the business role as well. The space is automatically assigned to the user group via the business role.

Manage Launchpad Spaces and Pages

In the exercise below you will create a new Space and Page, configure a page layout, and enable the spaces mode for end users.

Summary

You now know how to manage spaces and pages for your custom SAP business roles.

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