Devices

Technical Requirements | Pocket PC

The target devices for mobile SAP applications are primarily PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) and industrial, ruggedized devices which are—at least with regard to the screen size—similar to PDAs.

Mobile applications provided by SAP are developed with Java. Because the most recent release of the java virtual machine used by SAP only supports the "Personal Java Edition 1.1.8," classes from more recent java development kits should not be used. The general goal for the future is to be J2ME (Java 2 Micro Edition) compliant.

Technical Requirements

Minimum

In general, the user interface of mobile applications has to be designed in a manner that allows it to be run on every device with the following properties:

  • Minimum 32 megabytes of RAM
  • Physical keyboard with at least 16 keys
  • Scroll keys or imbedded mouse device
  • Screen size of 240 x 320 pixels

Keyboard

Figure 1: Pocket PC keyboard

Recommended

We recommend the usage of devices with:

  • Fewer, but larger, keys
  • Colored displays
  • Background lighting
  • Integrated backup batteries (to avoid losing stored data)
  • For mission critical devices, secondary memory backup (such as removable flash card or secure optical card) to facilitate data restoration

Pocket PC

On a Pocket PC, the maximum available screen space for an application is a width of 240 pixels and a height of 265 pixels.

PocketPC Layout

Figure 2: Pocket PC

Optional

  • The OS title bar can be used to label the application, but this space can display only 25 characters at a time.
  • The Start button can be disabled by editing the registry, which has the added advantage that users won't misuse other applications on the device.

Prohibited

  • Hiding the bottom taskbar is not allowed because the virtual keyboard can only be launched from there.

 

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Source:  SAP Style Guide for Blue-Collar Worker PDAs