A SAP Fiori Client
Although one of the main selling points of SAP Fiori is that it’s browser-based and can automatically adjust its layout depending on your device (desktop or mobile), there’s also a native SAP Fiori app (version 1.4) for iOS, Android, and Windows 10 available. This appendix briefly introduces the native app, SAP Fiori Client, and discusses the pros and cons of using it as opposed to running SAP Fiori in a mobile browser.
A.1 Overview
SAP Fiori Client is a mobile app that can be downloaded from the app stores for iOS, Android, and Windows. This mobile app provides additional native functionalities, such as a barcode scanner, camera, geolocation, cache mechanism, and so on. Currently, the app works on devices running Android 4.3 through 5.x, iOS 7.1 through 9.x, and Windows 8.1 or 10. SAP Fiori Client was developed on the Apache Cordova architecture, with the APIs added through the Cordova plugins. Some of the common device features, such as the barcode scanner, the camera, and geolocation, work on all three OS types.
SAP Fiori Client implements an asset cache management strategy that allows the native app to maintain its own cache of SAP Fiori application assets. When the user runs the app for the first time, the application assets are cached in the device. The next time the user reopens the app, it uses the local cached assets while loading—unlike the mobile browser cache, which is purged every couple of hours.