13.3    Integrating SAP BusinessObjects BI and SAP Fiori Launchpad

The SAP BusinessObjects BI suite is a complete business intelligence solution. It offers a set of tools for content developers, business analysts, executives, and data scientists. The following are some of tools in SAP BusinessObjects BI:

• SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio: Create dashboards, analysis applications, and planning applications intuitively based on SAP BW, SAP HANA, and universes.
• SAP BusinessObjects Lumira: Explore data.
• Crystal Reports: Create highly formatted reports.
• Web Intelligence reports: Useful for ad hoc report development.

These powerful tools allow you to put decision-ready information within a business user’s reach. In this section, we’ll explain the steps to seamlessly integrate these SAP Business Objects BI tools with SAP Fiori launchpad. Before we move on to the technical configuration, let’s look at the high-level architecture in Figure 13.31.

Figure 13.31    SAP BusinessObjects BI and SAP Fiori Launchpad Integration

On the left side in Figure 13.31 are design-time tools such as SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio, SAP BusinessObjects Lumira, WebI, and Crystal Reports on the BI platform, which can connect to pretty much any data source, like SAP S/4HANA, SAP BW, and so on. You can integrate these with the SAP Fiori front-end server through OpenDoc URLs.

In the following sections, we’ll highlight the steps to integrate SAP Business Objects BI and SAP Fiori launchpad and to publish a dashboard to the SAP Fiori launchpad.

13.3.1     Configuration

In this section, we’ll highlight the most important steps that you need to follow to integrate SAP BusinessObjects BI platform and SAP Fiori. We highly recommend working with your SAP BusinessObjects BI administrator to perform most of these steps.

Configure SAP Web Dispatcher

When a user clicks on a tile in SAP Fiori launchpad, SAP Web Dispatcher forwards the calls from the SAP Fiori front-end server to SAP BusinessObjects BI. To enable this call forwarding from SAP Web Dispatcher to SAP BusinessObjects BI, we need to add the following parameter in the SAP Web Dispatcher profile file and restart SAP Web Dispatcher:

wdisp/system_<number> = SID=BOE, EXTSRV=<BI Platform https hostname> : < BI Platform port>, SRCSRV=*:<reuse same port with Fiori Launchpad>, SRCURL=/BOE/.

Configure SSL

If your SAP BusinessObjects BI platform’s web application server certificate is signed by the same certificate authority as SAP Web Dispatcher, you can then skip this step. Otherwise, proceed as follows:

1. Export a key certificate for the key store file from the SAP Business Objects BI server by running the following command at a command prompt:
   keytool –export -alias <certificate_alias> -keystore <keystore_file> -file <certificate_file> -storepass <password>.
2. Import the certificate into SAP Web Dispatcher:
   • Log on to the SAP Web Dispatcher OS.
   • Launch a command prompt, and navigate to the sapgense file location: <Install_dir>\usr\sap\<SID>\SYS\exe\nuc\NTAMD64.
   • Run the following command: sapgenpse.exe maintain_pk -p <Client_PSE> -a <Tomcat_certificate>.
   • Restart Tomcat.

Configure SAP BusinessObjects BI Authentication

In this step, we’ll add your SAP system, then import roles from SAP to SAP BusinessObjects BI:

1. Create an SAP user account that authorizes access to connect the SAP BusinessObjects BI platform and your SAP system.
2. Add your SAP entitle system in SAP BusinessObjects BI from Central Management Console (CMC).
3. Import the user and roles from the SAP system to SAP BusinessObjects BI.

Setup SSO between SAP Systems

In this step, we generate a key store file and a corresponding certificate, then add the generated certificate to your SAP ABAP front-end, SAP ABAP back-end, and the SAP BusinessObjects BI platform:

1. Login to the SAP BusinessObjects BI server and then generate a key store file by running the following command in command prompt: java -jar PKCS12Tool.jar.
2. Export the public key certificate by running the key tool program from a command prompt: keytool -exportcert -keystore <keystore> -storetype pkcs12 -file <filename>-alias <alias>.
3. Import the certificate file to the SAP ABAP front-end system and SAP ABAP back-end system via Transaction STRUSTSSO2.
4. Import the certificate into SAP BusinessObjects BI from the Authentication Management area in CMC.

Enable SSO for OpenDocument

Set the default authentication to SAP in the OpenDocument.properties file in SAP BusinessObjects\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\config\default.

Create RFC Destination

Create an RFC destination to connect SAP Fiori launchpad and SAP Web Dispatcher:

1. Login to the SAP Fiori front-end server, and run Transaction SM59.
2. Create a new connection.
3. Enter the RFC Destination name, and select H for the Connection Type (see Figure 13.32).
   

   Figure 13.32    RFC Destination

4. Enter the fully qualified SAP Web Dispatcher name in Target Host and the SAP Fiori launchpad port in the Service No. field (see Figure 13.32).

You’ve successfully configured SAP Fiori and SAP BusinessObjects BI. In the next section, we’ll show you how to deploy a dashboard to SAP Fiori launchpad.

13.3.2    Create an SAP Fiori App

This section walks you through the steps to integrate an SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio application called Liquidity Forecast with SAP Fiori launchpad; you can follow the same steps to integrate any report or dashboard from SAP BusinessObjects BI platform into SAP Fiori launchpad. Most of the steps are like those we’ve covered in previous chapters, so we’ll just highlight the main steps.

First, you need to generate the OpenDoc URL from the SAP BusinessObjects BI Launchpad. Log in to the SAP BusinessObjects BI launchpad, and right-click the report or SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio app you want to make available in SAP Fiori launchpad. Click Document Link (see Figure 13.33), and copy the URL.

Figure 13.33    Open Document Url

Next, you need to create the semantic object. In the SAP ABAP front-end server, run Transaction /UI2/SEMOBJ and add a new semantic object, as shown in Figure 13.34.

Figure 13.34    Adding Semantic Object

Now, create a new catalog:

1. Log in to SAP Fiori launchpad designer from your browser via the following URL: http://<server>:<port>/sap/bc/ui5_ui5/sap/arsrvc_upb_admn/main.html?sap-client=<client>?scope=CUST.
2. Create a new catalog, and click Save (see Figure 13.35)
   

   Figure 13.35    Create Catalog

3. Click + to add a tile to the new catalog (see Figure 13.36).
   

   Figure 13.36    Add New Tile

4. Add the static tile by clicking + (see Figure 13.37).
   

   Figure 13.37    Static Tile

Next, you’ll create a new tile and perform target mapping, as seen in Figure 13.38:

1. Enter the following information in the General section:
   • Title: “Liquidity Forecast”
   • Information: “Design Studio”
2. In the Navigation section, select LiquidityForecast from the Semantic Object list by clicking .
3. In the Action field, enter “display”.
   

   Figure 13.38    App Launcher

4. Click Save.
5. Add a target mapping by clicking the Target Mapping icon, then click Create Target Mapping, as shown in Figure 13.39.
6. In the Intent section, select LiquidityForecast from the Semantic Object list by clicking .
7. In the Action field, enter “display”.
   

   Figure 13.39    Creating Target Mapping

8. In the Target section, select URL from the Application Type dropdown list, then enter the following (see Figure 13.40):
   • Title: Enter “Liquidity Forecast”.
   • URL: Paste in the URL you generated previously. Ignore the host and port; just paste it from /BOE/Open…
   • System Alias: Enter “SAP_FIORI_BOE”. This is the same RFC destination that you created in the configuration section.
   

   Figure 13.40    Target Mapping

Next, let’s create a custom group and add the tile which we created in the previous step:

1. Create a new group (see Figure 13.41) by adding a Title and ID, (in our example "SAP BusinessObjects BI" and "ZSAP_BI_GROUP") and then click Save.
   

   Figure 13.41    Creating Group

2. Select the catalog you created previously. In this exercise, we created a catalog with the name SAP BusinessObjects BI.
3. Click + to add the app (i.e., Liquidity Forecast) to the new group.

Figure 13.42    Adding App to Group

Next, you’ll create a new role for the catalog and group:

1. Log in to the ABAP back-end server, then create a new role via Transaction PFCG.
2. Add the new catalog (see Figure 13.43), which you created previously.
3. Add the new group (see Figure 13.43), which you created in previously.
   

   Figure 13.43    Creating New Role

4. Add the username (for whoever needs access to this app) in the User tab (see Figure 13.44).
   

   Figure 13.44    Assigning Users to Role

5. Click Save.

To test the app, log in to SAP Fiori launchpad; you should see the Liquidity Forecast app under the SAP BusinessObjects BI group (see Figure 13.45).

Figure 13.45    SAP BusinessObjects BI Group in SAP Fiori Launchpad