The SAP User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX) revolution is truly underwa

y. There are some tactical solutions out there, but the chief strategic solution
that SAP is basing its UI/UX future on is UI5.
UI5. Otherwise known as SAPUI5. But what about OpenUI5? Plus, because no doubt y
ou've heard the word "Fiori" in the same sentence as UI5, where does SAP Fiori f
it in? Read on to find out this, and more.
Note that throughout this post, I'm also deliberately using the term UI5, and ha
ve been doing in forums on the SAP Community Network, in answers on Stack Overfl
ow and elsewhere for a while now. It's a useful (and short!) umbrella term that
encompasses a number of things, all related.
SAPUI5
SAPUI5 is the name of the toolkit that SAP has been building for the past three
or so years. You'd be forgiven surprise at the length of time it's existed, beca
use it's only really started to gain attention for the last year or so. I wrote
about SAPUI5 in May 2012, describing it as "the future direction of SAP UI devel
opment", and I stand by my prediction. And the official name? In the same way th
at the characters in Iain M Banks' masterful science fiction series about The Cu
lture have very long names, and practical short ones too, the official name for
SAPUI5 is the "UI Development Toolkit for HTML5" ... which is why most people do
refer to it as SAPUI5.
SAPUI5 is a series of core and functionally focused libraries and a runtime envi
ronment. The core provides essential services such as module loading and managem
ent, eventing, navigation, data management and various application development c
oncepts (such as Model-View-Controller). The libraries provide collections of co
ntrols that are used as UI building blocks in apps
tables, lists, date-pickers,
input fields and forms, buttons, and so on. Some controls are simple (like the B
utton), others are more complex (like the Shell, or the Table), but all work tog
ether to provide the interactive components from which applications can be built
.
The applications that are built with SAPUI5 are applications that run in the bro
wser. They are HTML5, JavaScript and CSS based. When you invoke an app, the appl
ication itself is dowloaded to the browser, along with the SAPUI5 runtime.
There's a theming concept for the controls within SAPUI5 which is why you might
have seen different designs in screenshots. The dominant theme so far for deskto
p-focused controls was "Gold Reflection", where the dominant theme for mobile an
d responsive controls is "Blue Crystal". You will see a convergence on Blue Crys
tal for desktop-focused controls in fact, if you examine the latest SAPUI5 Softw
are Development Kit (SDK) documentation, you'll notice that this has already hap
pened; the desktop-focused SAPUI5 controls (with which the SDK itself is built)
are now themed with Blue Crystal.
OpenUI5
OpenUI5 is SAPUI5's sibling. While the use of SAPUI5 is subject to an SAP licenc
e, OpenUI5 is Open Source. This is a big deal, and very important for many reaso
ns, best left for another post. Suffice it to say that in December 2013 SAP surp
rised us all by open sourcing UI5. The fact that they actually open sourced it w
asn't so much of a surprise, many of us outside and inside of SAP were lobbying
for it to happen. What surprised us was how quickly they turned it around (well
done SAP!).
OpenUI5 has its own SDK, and its own presence on the web on Github, which is cur

rently the most important place for Open Source projects such as this. SAP has a
way to go yet in fully embracing all of the Open Source concepts, but it's gett
ing there, and the all important first step has already been taken. SAP and deve
lopers like me can start to more properly engage with Open Source developers out
side the SAP ecosphere, developers with skills and expertise in UI/UX and many o
ther areas. One of the ways SAP will continue to be relevant is by reaching out
in this direction.
There are a number of differences between OpenUI5 and SAPUI5, mostly related to
libraries that are currently missing from the Open Source version. But the essen
tials (sap.ui, sap.m) are there. If you've written a UI5 powered app, as long as
it doesn't use charting, for example, there's a good chance that you can just s
witch the toolkits and it will still work. Of course, there's more to the detail
, but that gives you a rough idea.
Fiori

"...if SAP don't offer an app that suits your requirements, you can build one yo
urself."
Aaahh, Fiori. Let a thousand meanings bloom! What Fiori is and isn't, is again t
he subject for a long post of its own. But it's important to include Fiori here
in this rundown, because of its close relation to UI5.
SAP Fiori is a series of app suites, being introduced in waves. The apps in thes
e waves are written by SAP app developers. But Fiori is also a development appro
ach, a design approach, which has a number of soft constraints. And when an app
is built to conform to those constraints, it exhibits Fiori-like features: simpl
e and recognisable design, easy to use, a role-based approach, and following one
of a core set of UI patterns.
And crucially, Fiori apps are built with UI5. More specifically, they use specif
ic libraries from the UI5 toolkit, the most significant one by far being "sap.m"
. The "m" in "sap.m" stands for "mobile", but as we know, responsive is the new
sma
mobile, and this is essential in ensuring that Fiori apps run on all devices
rtphones, tablets and desktops, as the sap.m UI5 controls are designed from the
ground up to work responsively.
So putting these two observations together that Fiori is a design and developmen
t approach and set of constraints, and Fiori apps are built with UI5, it stands
to reason that you too, as an SAP customer, can build your own Fiori apps. With
some expert help and guidance, you can join in the UI/UX renewal yourself and if
SAP don't offer an app that suits your requirements, you can build one yourself
. Not only that, but if you build it right, it will happily live and run inside
the Fiori Launchpad alongside the SAP-delivered apps.
So there you have it. Hopefully if you've read this far, you'll have a better un
derstanding of the terms, and how what the terms represent relate to each other.
You may like to know that there's a public SAP Mentor Monday session on UI5 tha
t I'm arranging and hosting on Mon 24 Mar 2014. I'll be joined by special guest
Andreas Kunz, from the UI5 development team in Walldorf. All are welcome.
And if you'd like to hear more about SAP's open sourcing of UI5, or Fiori develo
pment, leave me a comment below!