“… That’s right- less painful for users. Products like IBM WebSphere Portal and SAP Netweaver Portal were supposed to bring much improved user interaction models to enterprise IT, but unfortunately traditional systems-focused IT departments, rather than user interaction specialists and their web brethren, did the work …”

James eludes to the crux of the problem in the above quote and Thomas Otter highlights it further in a comment saying …

I sense that most of the problems/challenges with enterprise UI are not just a tool challenge. It is a design thinking problem. Until design thinking permeates enterprise application development, UI will be a sore point.

Thomas is right, it is a design thinking problem, more precisely, the problem is that there are no design thinkers in most teams that build or customize enterprise software…. A quick search for Job posts with keywords “interaction designer SAP” and other related terms on various reputed job boards here, here, here and a few other places revealed almost no relevant results .. clearly we don’t even realize yet that we need to design the interaction a user has with the software we build .. so it should be no surprise that our business software is a pain to use.

It is easy to blame vendors like SAP and IBM in this scenario though … our company portal is a pain to use, SAP must not have done a good job building it .. this is not always the right assumption, software like SAP portal etc. are platforms that allow an extreme amount of customization and often its this team doing the customization that puts together most of what a user will experience .. believe it or not SAP portal is HTML and JavaScript in your browser … yes the same HTML and JavaScript that powers GMail, Google Reader, Apple.com or numerous other engaging experiences on the Internet that you can find listed on various web showcases like this and this.

I bet if the same people who build these experiences on the web were part of the team building and customizing your corporate portal we would not be having this conversation. Yet, I’ve been on this side of similar conversations many times before and this is right about the time where you hear the words …

“… but, I don’t need all this flashy stuff on my business app …”

Unfortunately, many business decision makers very often fail to see beyond the commercial glitz of well designed applications on the Internet and quickly dismiss or underrate the need of an Interaction designer on their team. They miss to see that Interaction design is about thinking and researching how a users interacts with your software, how he feels and how can his feelings be optimized to pleasure, comfort and satisfaction. Its not about rounded corners or gradients or “flashy” animations .. those are just some visual design tools that sometimes (not always) help enhance how a user feels when using software.

Things are changing though, as Anne points out in a comment on James’ post .. the last year or so has seen a lot of new interest in the business value of good user interfaces and James’ post mentions that companies like Deloitte and Accenture realize this value and “have built practices dedicated to using Adobe technology to make existing enterprise applications and their portal front ends less painful for users”. He goes on to quote Jaco Von Eeden from Deloitte …

“Virtually every ERP deal we see we ask where can we use Adobe. We have a reasonable revenue flow and fantastic pipeline.”

This increasing interest in the value of good user interfaces is great for the industry, but I’m not sure if the above approach that Deloitte is embracing is the right way to go .. we should not be force fitting a particular technology into a solution, but instead asking what is the best way to solve a problem and what is the best technology to build that solution.

Adobe’s technologies can be used to build some great solutions but this choice of using a particular technology should not be made by business drivers … instead, it should be based on proper understanding of what is needed. Remember, it is very easy to use these so called Rich Internet Applications technologies to build a Not So Rich Internet Application.

The Mentors’ website defines …

The SAP Mentor Initiative identifies and provides special status to exceptional and high-value members of our SAP Developer Network (SDN) and Business Process Expert (BPX) communities.

SAP Mentors are role models who differentiate themselves through the high quality and frequency of their community contributions, their perspectives, attitudes, and interaction styles. They are subject-matter experts who are passionate about SAP and share their opinions and insights with the community.

It’s truely an honor to be named along with such an extraordinary group of people, some of the brightest brains in the SAP world …. like Marilyn Pratt, Dennis Hewlett, Anne Petteroe, Dick Hirsch, Darren Hague, Michael Bechauf, Craig Cmehil, Ed Herrmann, Thomas Jung, Dan McWeeney, Blag, Abesh (the list goes on …) a mere conversation with some of these people has the potential of blowing your brains out … I deeply respect all of them, so I’m humbled, I’ve been given such a great opportunity to learn.

I also see this as an excellent opportunity to evangelize and promote RIAs in the enterprise, I strongly believe that enterprise applications can gain a lot by adopting RIA ideologies, so I look forward to mangling together my experiences in the Adobe and SAP worlds.

The blog post shares code on how to do this and also tries to explain SAP Flash Islands from a Flex developer’s perspective ….

Check out the SDN post for more

What are Rich Internet Applications? .. while there are many definitions on the web, I like to decide if something is an RIA or not based on the following criteria …

1. It has to be an Application … something that deals with dynamic data, takes an input and processes it to produce valuable output.
2. Its primary function should be to deal with data that lives on the Internet (or intranets).
3. It should offer a user experience that is Richer than what we’ve been used to in the past in a particular environment.

If a piece of software satisfies the above criteria, in my opinion, its an RIA. If you think about these points for a little bit, you’ll quickly realize that, even though a fairly new buzzword, is not a new concept …. Microsoft Outlook, Yahoo Messenger, Gmail etc are all RIAs that came out several years ago. After some more thought, you’ll realize that in today’s context majority of applications that we build have something to do with data that lives elsewhere on the network, therefore the dominant factor that defines an RIA is the richness of the experience users have while using it. So if we oversimplify, RIAs are applications built with special attention to user interface and user experience.

Many modern interface development technologies have been labeled as Rich Internet Application Technologies .. these include AJAX, various Javascript libraries and frameworks, modern browsers, Gears, Flex, Flash Player, AIR, Silverlight, JavaFX etc .. while these technologies facilitate building an RIA it does not automatically imply that everything built with them is an RIA … in fact, it is very easy to build a Not So Rich Internet Application with these so called RIA technologies. At the same time, it is important to note that the use of these technologies is not a prerequisite to building an RIA either.

This is how I understand Rich Internet Applications .. what is your interpretation of the term RIA?

The workshop is aimed at educating developers about the new UI features in the new version of Web Dynpro (SAP’s UI development technology) available in Netweaver 7.0 Enhancement Pack 1, Thomas also posted the below video that shows a preview of these new features that they will be discussing in the workshop.

All the new enhancements are exiting, but what really got me charged up was the feature called Flash Islands (mentioned around the 6th minute of the video), In summary, Web Dynpro now allows you to embed Flash/Flex components within Web Dynpro Interfaces and there is seamless integration, Web dynpro elements can communicate with Flash and Flash elements can communicate back with Web dynpro … this has 2 very exciting implications …

• Web Dynpro is a closed framework and till now could not have customized controls, now it can have any kind of UI components you can think of with Flex
• More importantly, this can totally change the face of enterprise interfaces, imagine highly interactive engaging UIs, innovative data visualizations, video etc. etc.

So dare I call this Enterprise UI 2.0 .. yeah I know 2.0 is such a cliche these days .. but this stuff is exciting.

Now that we have a url exposing a REST api, it is fairly easy to use an HTTPService and have Flex/AIR applications talk to SAP. Here is a video that Abesh created a while ago that walks you step by step through how to do this.

Abesh has now also released an AS3 wrapper around the exposed REST API, which makes it even more simpler to use this method of communicating with SAP from AIR applications.

There are of course several other ways of making AIR talk to SAP, the most obvious one is to expose a BAPI as a web service and make Flex/AIR talk to that directly using the WebService component. You could also have a server part to your application and have that communicate with SAP using the various connecters available for various programming platforms.

When I was working with SAP my job was to create prototype applications that showcased how data from SAP could be used in conjunction with various RIA technologies to make life easy for the enterprise users and I found the widget foundation approach of making my applications talk to to SAP very easy and useful, I hope you do too.

The project is extremely exiting and was one of the many triggers that made me take this big step. Currently we are a small team of three where I’m the only developer, the other two guys are the ones who had the idea and understand the business in the idea very well. So from a development standpoint I’ll be doing it all on my own, although we may seek more help if needed down the line. I’ve done many such all on my own projects at SAP so I’m pretty confident that i can pull this off. The scary part is the working from home bit …. while I used to occasionally work from home while at SAP, doing it full time scares me a lot .. hopefully I can deal with it .. If you have some tips please do share.

I would like to thank all my peers a SAP for all the support, encouragement, guidance and learning that they provided me over the past 14 months and wish all of them a very bright future. I had an excellent time working at SAP … I worked on several Flex/AIR/SAP applications that showcased how SAP could be used as a platform for rich experiences and all my projects very well received all across the company, many of them even helped SAP win big sales deals. The people I got to work with are some the best is their respective fields and I learned a lot form all of them and best of all I made some very good friends.

These past 14 months couldn’t have been better and now its time for me to take on some exciting new challenges, so wish me luck.

 
When: Saturday,15th December, 8.30 am onwards Sunday, 16th December, 8.30 am onwards

 
Where: Honeywell was kind enough to sponsor the event location ..
HoneyWell Technology Solutions (opposite IIM Bangalore)
151/1, Doraisanipalya, Bannerghatta Road,
Bangalore 560076

 
What topics can be talked about?
The talks can be about any RIA technology … AJAX, Flex, AIR, Silverlight, JavaFx or others. We are hoping to get a good mix of talks on different technologies. The nature of the talks has to technical in nature … this is not a marketing event so no marketing mumbo jumbo please.

 
How long can a talk be?
55 minutes max … including setup and questions. If you wish you could have talks that are shorter in length.

 
How many talks?
We are currently looking at 1 track of 8 talks, althought this may change if we get a good number of interesting proposals . Send your topic proposal to organizers@initria.org After we receive your topic a panel of experts will decide if your talk has been selected

 
Who can speak?
Anyone can submit topic proposals by sending a proposal to organizers@initria.org . After we receive your topic a panel of experts will decide if your talk has been selected. In your proposal please describe in detail the nature of your talk.

 
Who can attend?
Anyone who is interested in development of Rich Internet Applications. We will soon have a registration website up and running that will allow you to register to attend. As this is our first attempt at organizing something like this the number of attendees is capped at 100. Registrations will be on a first come first serve basis. If you register and later feel that you cannot attend please unregister so that someone else can attend.

To keep track of the registration announcement , subscribe to my blog via rss or email.

 
How much is the fee to attend?
Its FREE, thanks to our sponsors: TeknoPoint Multimedia and Honeywell

 
What do I get if I present at the event?
Self satisfaction, a lot of applause, and the gratitude of the community.

 
Can I blog about this?
Yes of course, although it may be easier for people to find us when our website goes live in a couple of days.

 
How can i contribute?

1. Become a speaker: share your knowledge with the community

2. Make a logo if you are one of the artistic kinds we are looking for a logo for initRIA, send it across to organizers@initria.org and if we like it we will use it as the official logo of initRIA.

3. Spread the word Tell the whole world about it, get experts on al sorts of RIA technologies to speak and attend.

For suggestions please write to organizers@initria.org

With regards,

Mrinal Wadhwa
Manager, Bangalore Flex User Group

Update: There was a slight change in plans, the event is now on Sunday the 16th
instead of Saturday the 15th, sorry about the confusion.

Do stop by to say hello if you’re here too.

• Some experience with Flex or the willingness to learn and explore this exciting platform.
• Experience in developing User Interfaces with other technologies like Java Swing, .Net, AJAX etc.
• Good understanding of Object Oriented Programming
• Experience in developing Enterprise applications
• Preferably, some knowledge of SAP technologies etc.

So, if you are interested in working with me and my team on some very new and innovative Flex projects at one of the best software firms in the world send me an email with your resume at mrinal[dot]wadhwa[at]sap[dot]com.