SAP Hybris Cloud for Customer server-side integration for Microsoft Outlook

[former_member192750]

With our February 2017 release, we are excited to launch our new server-side integration between SAP Hybris Cloud for Customer and Microsoft Outlook (Microsoft Exchange).

 



 

Key Features:

Our users can now be productive in any e-mail client including mobile and tablet.

You can synchronize the following information from SAP Hybris Cloud for Customer:

• Contacts, Accounts, and Individual Customers


• Tasks


• Appointments and Visits


• E-mails

You can work with SAP Hybris Cloud for Customer without leaving your inbox by doing the following:

• Creating items in your SAP solution from your inbox


• Viewing data from your SAP solution in the context of an e-mail, appointment, or visit


• Searching for items in your SAP solution

Quick comparison:

Supported Groupware systems	Client-side Integration	Server-side Integration
	Microsoft Outlook 2010, 2013, 2016 Lotus Notes 8.5.3	Exchange 2010+ for sync, Office 365 Outlook add-in supports Outlook rich clients (Windows and Mac) Outlook Web App, OWA for Devices or Mobile browsers (requires Exchange 2013+)
Supported objects and scenarios	Accounts Contacts Tasks Activities Visits (Outlook only) Attach emails to SAP objects (assign in add-in)	Accounts Contacts Individual Customers Tasks Activities Visits Attach emails to SAP objects (via Outlook add-in)
Synchronization Filters	Fixed (‘My’ queries)	Configurable with Sync Profiles
Supported end-user devices	Microsoft Windows only	Microsoft Windows, Mac OWA on mobile devices on iOS, Android, Windows Phone
Attachments support	Yes	Yes
Additional information	Field mapping is fixed (standard fields only)	Custom fields supported via Smart Descriptions
User interaction	Rich user-interaction using the inbuilt side-panel which provides access to Feeds, Shelf, Notifications etc.	Rich user interaction possible (via Outlook add-in) on a wide range of devices
Single Sign On	Supported	Supported
Synchronization	Manual sync and auto-sync at fixed intervals Client-based synchronization	Auto-sync in the background Server-based synchronization EWS based sync infrastructure
Deployment	Client based Outlook add-in installation on end-user machines Centralized deployment via third-party tools	No client footprint or deployment required Centralized deployment for Outlook add-in is possible

With server–side integration, you can effectively use the features and functionality of the rich client-side integration without the complexities of an add-in or a user-based sync process.

 

Key takeaways:

• Provides most of the functionality of a client-side integration with NO add-ins required


• Simple to use and there is no user sync cycle to worry about


• Server-side sync can be configured by the user/admin to filter just the dataset the end-user requires


• Add-in provides real-time access to Cloud for Customer data associated with an email, task or calendar entry


• Basic PIM types (Contact, Task and Calendar information) available offline across all devices


• Contextual and detailed Cloud for Customer data available online from within Outlook on a wide range of devices


• Simpler deployment process

 

Note: Our existing client-side integration continues to be available and will be actively developed. As a customer you have the choice to use either solution (but NOT both at the same time).

Please reach out to your SAP contact for further details on the new server-side integration.

 

UPDATE: With our May 2017 release, we have now released the server-side integration with Gmail (including a new Chrome extension).

[loganathan_p3]

Hi,

Why Gmail Add-On is not considered?Any there any specific reason? Because some of the clients are having corporate Gmail IDs

 

Regards

Logan

[former_member192750]

Server-side integration for Gmail is currently in the works - it should be available over the next few releases.

[loganathan_p3]

Hi Ankan,

Thanks

[Former Member]

Hi Ankan,

 

Where to download this outlook server side add-in? In my C4C, I only found the "Add-in for Microsoft Outlook" which is the client side add-in. Could this one be installed on outlook exchange?

 

Thanks & Best Regards,

Frankie

[former_member192750]

Hi Frankie,

The server-side integration is new functionality that has contractual dependencies (it is not available to all customers out-of-the-box).
Please reach out to your SAP account executive for details around it.

Thanks,
Ankan

[RadekStefaniak]

Hi

is this server-side integration also valid for MS Exchange in Cloud?

where can I find any technical documentation regarding server-side integration? - there is not so much in help.sap.com and in C4C academy.

 

BR
Radek

[former_member192750]

Yes it is.

 

Details are available in product documentation is available as usual.

End-user: https://uacp2.hana.ondemand.com/viewer/e3d4d4173c6f4231a6a35885511484ee/1702/en-US/b629f2105f464cb18...

Admin: https://uacp2.hana.ondemand.com/viewer/cea15f900ca04c4faa35d3044577fe27/1702/en-US/76e20fe2ccac4ccf8...

[Former Member]

Hi Ankan,

Does the decision to utilize the server-side integration have to be made at the enterprise level, which would affect all users, or can it be made at the client level? For example, we may have some users that still want to use the Outlook Add-in and not the server-side integration. Reading the above note from your blog on this point, it could be perceived that one user can not utilize both solutions, but it isn't clear if this rule also applies to all C4C users utilizing the Outlook server.

Thank you,

Jared

[former_member192750]

Hi Jared,

 

Yes - the decision can be made to enable ONLY select users for server-side groupware integration while others continue to use client-side groupware.

The restriction is that a single users can't be using BOTH at the same time.

Regards,
Ankan

[Gabriele_Barth]

Hi Ankan,

quick question: is also a multi exchange server scenario supported with the new outlook integration ?

Thanks

Gabriele

 

[former_member192750]

Yes, it is.

[Former Member]

Hello Ankan,

our business really likes the features of the client based "side-panel". Is it still possible to use the side-panel with the server-side integration or will this feature be lost?

 

Kind regards,

Benedikt

 

[former_member192750]

Hello Benedikt,

The server-side integration has it's own 'side-panel' - there is a new server-side add-in (optional) which provides the same features as the existing client-based side-panel.

Regards,
Ankan

[taelmana]

Hi,

Some of our end users only use an iPad. What are the functionalities when not using OWA (Outlook Web Access)?

On the Q&A of the server-side webinar hosted on the 30th of May I read  that contacts, tasks and calendar events can be synced & modified directly from C4C in the standard iOS and Android apps. But is it also possible to create a contact, task and calendar event in a standard iOS and/or Android app and synchronize to C4C? In this case you have to download a OWA app?

Many thanks for your advise.

Regards,

Anne

[former_member192750]

Answered in your questions post https://answers.sap.com/questions/267124/server-side-integration-no-use-of-owa.html

[Former Member]

Hello ankan.banerjee ,

 

Thanks for the blog it is very informative.

 

What i would like to ask is how can we achieve automatic sync for all emails, from Outlook to C4C.

For outgoing emails we have the send and save which syncs the email to C4C upon sending.

For incoming emails in Outlook is there a way to setup to automatically sync them all to C4C?

Furthermore can this happen to the client-side or we need the server-side integration?

 

Best Regards,

Dimitris Doulamis

 

[Andreas_S]

Hi,

Any feedback on this? ankan.banerjee

[former_member192750]

This is not possible as of today in either solution.

UPDATE: It is now possible to achieve this in server-side integration.

[Former Member]

Hello Ankan,

thank you very much for this very interesting blog post. Now that I have also read the documentation on help.sap.com, I wonder if there is any documentation on necessary configurations on the Exchange side? It would be great if you could provide me with any information about this.

Best regards,

Fabian Orth

[former_member192750]

Hello Fabian,

There is no setup required on Exchange as long as the Exchange server is accessible via EWS (enable EWS and Auto Discover services). If it's an Exchange online system, then we support OAuth for Exchange as well.

Regards,
Ankan

[Former Member]

Hello Ankan,

Thank you for the quick answer. It has helped me a lot.

Best regards,

Fabian

[Former Member]

Hello,

does anyone have exact setup information (Setup-Guide) what has to be done here in C4C or what needs to be installed on the Exchange server or how the connection between Exchange server and C4C is set up?


Best Regards,

Florian

[pschepers]

Hello,

We have the exact same question? Any news on this?

Best regards,

Pieter

 

[AndrewGriffin]

Given that all of the client side functionality seems to be supported on the server-side offering, plus more besides, why would a user/organisation choose client side over server side?  Are there negatives of server side integration that you haven't explored above, or have I missed something?

[former_member192750]

Please check the previous replies - there is no setup required on Exchange. We need the ability to connect to Exchange via EWS.

[former_member192750]

The choice is up to the customer depending upon their requirements. Also, note that server-side integration has specific licensing requirements which you can check with your SAP account executive. Client-side integration is available out-of-the-box.

[former_member499606]

Hi ankan.banerjee , thanks for the blog. My question is quite same with the previous. i am as administrator and need to make a connection,  and set up the email connection like below

Actually what information need to fill in this section and do we need to make any configuration in Exchange Server?



 

Thank you

Rindang

[former_member192750]

Your email address and password to the mailbox – thats also what the textbox mentions in your screenshot. This is the credentials of the mailbox you want to sync.

Check my previous comment for Exchange side (optional) steps written in your question thread

[former_member499606]

hi ankan, thanks for the answer. But i am getting an error when  trying to connect. is there any configuration may be missed?

[Bharathraj_A]

Hello Ankan,

Please help in the below scenario,

We have tried server side integration with outlook by following the standard steps suggested by SAP. As per standard, C4C has to connect to Exchange server via standard EWS interface. But unfortunately, C4C system is not getting connected to exchange server via EWS interface due to our Organization IT Firewall security policy.

When approached our exchange team, they confirmed that they are not ready to expose the exchange server to C4C (as it is Cloud Solution) due to security policy.
Also, they suggested to use the architecture which involves API gateways and SAP PI with the below security levels for establishing connection.

Exchange Server --> API Gateway ESZ & SAP PI --> API Gateway DMZ --> C4C Server

In this architecture, our exchange team would expose the EWS interface of Outlook to SAP PI and then it will process on with the above security levels and pass on to C4C Server.

Could you please suggest whether this approach is feasible as standard.? If so, what are all the prerequisites and considerations to be followed.

Please advise is there any alternative way for server side integration with outlook (without ews interface).?

Thanks in advance..!

 

Regards,

Bharathraj

[former_member192750]

That’s not a valid approach and we don’t have plans to support it at the moment.
You can ask your IT team to re-evaluate their policy as Exchange supports various configuration options for security in such scenarios (e.g. enabling EWS access with IP whitelisting).

[Bharathraj_A]

 

Hi Ankan,

Thanks a lot for the quick Response.

As mentioned above, we understand there are various option available to configure this setup without any security issues. Please let us know the details of these various configuration option, please provide us the documentation in case available for the same. This would help us in having a further discussion with our exchange team.

Also, just to confirm, Does that mean the possibility of connecting C4C with Outlook through PI itself is an invalid option?

Please let us know if we need to discuss separately on this topic. Awaiting your response, Kindly help on this topic.

Regards,

BharathRaj

9894613156

[MikaK]

Hi Ankan

I am assisting a client to move from the client side to the server side addin. You mention above that the side panel in the server side addin has the same functions as the side panel in the client based addin.

However, we cannot see the feed function within the server side addin. Is the feed function only available in the client side addin?

Feed within client side addin

Best Regards

Mikaela