Will the SAP Forms Service by Adobe on SAP Business Technology Platform continue to be supported?

[MustafaBensan]

I would like to know if the SAP Forms Service by Adobe (Cloud Foundry), which uses the Adobe Document Service on SAP BTP, has an end-of-life or end-of support date? I ask this after having made the following observations:

1) There doesn't appear to be a roadmap for the SAP Forms Service by Adobe, giving the impression that no further innovation is taking place with this product.

2) The SAP Forms Service requires Adobe Live Cycle Designer 11.0 for SAP Solutions to create form templates. The general version of Adobe Live Cycle Designer for non-SAP use cases was discontinued by Adobe in 2018 and replaced with Experience Manager Forms.

Given the above, I would like to know whether the SAP Forms Service by Adobe on BTP Cloud Foundry will continue to be supported? Should new projects requiring PDF print or interactive forms use the SAP Forms Service or should we expect a replacement service soon, in line with Adobe's product strategy and roadmap? At the moment, it appears that SAP is continuing to maintain what has essentially become an Adobe legacy product, rather than aligning with Adobe's latest product direction.

Thanks,

Mustafa.

[peterbarker · Accepted solution]

Hello Mustafa,

"SAP Forms service by Adobe" on Cloud Foundry is SAP's recommended solution for print forms and interactive forms. There is no end-of-life date for this product.

It is important to distinguish between Adobe's LiveCycle Designer and the LiveCycle Designer used for SAP's products. It is the latter which is used with SAP's forms products and SAP continues to support it.

It is important not to confuse Adobe's products and forms strategy with SAP's products and forms strategy.

I hope that helps.

Best regards

Peter Barker

[MustafaBensan · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the clarifications Peter and Pascal. I think my question is now answered.

Regards,

Mustafa.

[MustafaBensan]

Hi peter.barker,

Thanks for the clarification. This is encouraging news. I have the following additional questions:

1) Is there a reason why there are no roadmap items for the SAP Forms Service by Adobe on the SAP Roadmap Explorer? Does this mean there are no planned ongoing innovations for this service?

2) Regarding the statement "It is important not to confuse Adobe's products and forms strategy with SAP's products and forms strategy.", while I understand this, since the SAP Forms Service is ultimately based on the Adobe platform, isn't there some dependency on Adobe's product strategy and maintenance timelines?

Regards,
Mustafa.

[PascalBremer]

Hi Mustafa,
I am from the development team of Forms service by adobe and can ensure you that we constantly improving and innovating the service. For example not long ago we added an option to maintain static texts for your form templates directly in the template store ui ( Link to Help ). If you are missing anything in particular please feel free to address this via our influence portal.

Regarding the second question. While it is true that our product is based on Adobes technology we are independent from any roadmap by adobe. As a matter of fact we have dedicated developers from Adobe sitting in our office in Walldorf and working on SAP customer specific requirements.

Best regards
Pascal