Technology Blogs by SAP
Learn how to extend and personalize SAP applications. Follow the SAP technology blog for insights into SAP BTP, ABAP, SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP HANA, and more.
cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
tashley
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
The SAP Fiori tools team continues to deliver capabilities to simplify the SAP Fiori development experience. With the SAP Fiori tools 2302 update, we have focused on making annotations  easier, expanding support for flexible programming model and OData V4, and releasing more open source modules that can be reused by the community. In this post, I’ll focus on some of the new functionality.

Making annotations easier for SAP Fiori elements OData V4 apps


We hear your feedback that annotations can sometimes be a challenge when developing SAP Fiori elements applications. We received positive comments that we are moving in the right direction with the annotation code completion, Guided Development, and annotation support in the Page Editor (OData V4 only). Hence, we continue to build upon the foundation. I am pleased to announce the availability of code completion to reference annotations used in building blocks. You will find the latest features in the UI5 Language Assistant  extension version 4.0.3. If you had installed SAP Fiori tools via the extension pack in Visual Studio Code, you should already see the extension installed (manual update maybe required if you do not have auto update on). The UI5 Language Assistant is also included in the SAP Fiori and Full Stack Cloud Application dev spaces in SAP Business Application Studio.


Code Completion for annotations referenced in flexible programming model building blocks


Page Editor now supports annotations needed to add analytical features to your OData V4 apps (with an analytics-enabled service). You can add analytical charts and visual filter to the list report page. As we try to get the new capabilities to the hands of our customers as quickly as we can, you can expect to see further enhancements to support more use cases.


Page Editor adds support for visual filters for OData V4 apps





“Grow As you Go” approach to managing project artifacts


Consistent with our goal to make SAP Fiori development simpler, we want to make management of the project artifacts easier. Currently, when the project is generated, the start scripts are already included in the `package.json`, based on the selection during project generation. It is often a challenge for users to know what configuration needs to be done in what artifact if they want to add a new one post project generation.

We made the management of project artifacts modular so you can easily add or update the artifacts when you need it. To do that, we have added a new module @sap-ux/create in the open-ux-tools repo.  You can trigger the command from the Application Info page for your project, or type “npm init @Sap-ux” at a terminal. This module is already being used in SAP Fiori tools to add/update mockserver config. We plan to add support for other configurations such as deployment or FLP  configurations in the near future.


New open source module to manage project configuration files





Integrated Troubleshooting Experience


In my last blog on the 2211 update, I talked about how you can make use of the Guided Answers extension by SAP for troubleshooting. We are making this even easier by integrating the Guided Answers extension into the development experience using SAP Fiori tools. At the time when you encounter an error while using SAP Fiori tools, we are now providing you a direct link to the answer in Guided Answers for some of the most common problems such as destination errors encountered in SAP Business Application Studio during project generation. While the messages shown to you is slightly different between VSC and SAP Business Application Studio, they both link to Guided Answer content. We hope this enables you to get past the problems quickly so you can focus on your development tasks.

 


Direct Link to Guided Answer when error is encountered for faster troubleshooting


 


Troubleshoot destination problems in BAS with Guided Answer





Guides made simple with multi-code snippet feature in Guided Development


When the guides were first introduced, we followed the principle of providing very specific steps for each artifact that needs to be updated to configure a feature. We wanted each step to be simple to follow and for developers to know exactly what need to be changed in what artifact. As with most things, there are pros and cons to every approach. Spreading different artifacts into multiple steps means that you need to insert code snippets in each step. To make the experience simpler, we have now introduced the multi-code feature in Guided Development. To see it in action, check out the “Add a custom card to an overview page”. In this guide, we have reduced the number of steps from 4 to 1. Once you enter the requested parameters, the file names of the artifacts are dynamically adjusted, and you can create all the artifacts in one go. You can expect that we continue to deliver simplifications  to applicable guides using this feature.


Multi-code feature in guide to insert multiple code snippets in one go





Next Steps: we continue to focus on making flexible programming model easier, add more TypeScript support, and expand on the “Grow As you Go” approach to managing projects


In the coming months, you can expect that we continue to deliver more capabilities on flexible programming model using Page Editor. We are also working on adding more configuration options to the “@sap-ux/create” module I talked about earlier. You can also expect that we will introduce guides for TypeScript in Guided Development.

 

 

 
8 Comments
Hi Ashley,

thanks for sharing this with us.

I have a question regarding the UI5 Tools for Freestyle SAPUI5 Applications: Is it planned to add the same functionality as in the WebIDE to generate a new View plus a corresponding Controller plus the Definition of a Navigation Target in the manifest? In the WebIDE it was called by the Context Menu of an App -> New SAPUI5 View.

I'm missing this feature a lot in the BAS.

Thx, Max

 

 
prasbist2023
Explorer
0 Kudos
If you want to make it really simple which is not the SAP way though the  control + alt + delete this horrible annotation based framework and make the AppGyver kind of UI tooling available or go back and pick the initial web ide based WYSIWYG UI tool and refine it. CDS with UI annotations is a cheap solution. SAP should learn from Apple on how to do things man don't create this crap RAP CAP with annotations is horrible .

 

Thanks,

Prasenjit
0 Kudos
Hi,

 

How to get oData V4 APIs in VS Code ?

 

Regards,

Vaibhav
SchiwekM
Advisor
Advisor
Hi Vaibhav,

with the SAP Fiori Tools - Extension Pack - Visual Studio Marketplace you can use the application generator to start a new Fiori application. It offers a variety of data source options, like specifying a direct OData Service URL or connecting to an SAP System or use a local CAP project.

CAP is the cloud application programming model and the recommended way to build backends on the SAP BTP. CAP offers a fully fledged generic implementation of a OData service. You only have to model your entities, expose them as a service and then you have a local OData service, which you can use in the application generator. More information about CAP: capire - Getting Started (cloud.sap)

I hope that answers your question.

BR, Marten
0 Kudos
Yes it worked. Thanks.
rb
Active Participant
0 Kudos
Hi Ashley,

in the March Release of the Fiori Tools, following was changed for the application generator:

  • Application Generator

    • The SAP Fiori freestyle templates SAP Fiori Worklist Application and SAP Fiori List-Detail Application have been deprecated and are now reorganized into a Deprecated Templates section when choosing your template type. The Basic SAPUI5 Application template has been renamed to Basic and is the first template available within the SAP Fiori templates




We still have many OData V2 Services so flexibel programming model is not really usable for us. What is the best approach to create an freestyle List Detail App now? easy-ui5 generator?  Or just use the deprecated generators?

best regards Richard
tashley
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
0 Kudos
Hi Richard,

Thanks for reaching out. You are right that SAP Fiori Worklist Application and SAP Fiori List-Detail Application has been deprecated. Having said that, you can continue to use them and we will continue to support them. The usage of these templates has been very slow compared to the Basic and SAP Fiori elements templates. We wanted to simply the template selection and focus on investing on customer's needs. At this time, there is no set timeline for removal of these templates so we can collect feedback from customers like you. Have you considered using SAP Fiori elements? Please feel free to drop me an email at sapfiorielements@sap.com with your use cases so we better understand your needs.

Best regards,

Ashley
tashley
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
Hi Maximilian,

Thanks for reaching out. Your request is noted and it is in our backlog. Please stay tuned for our planning for this request.

Best regards,

Ashley