1. Easily Implementing Fluid User Interface
110620
Dave Alexander
Manager ERP Applications
Children’s Hospital Colorado
Project, system and human considerations for a successful implementation

2. Children’s Hospital Colorado
Here, it’s different.
This is an extraordinary place. With an optimist's outlook, a pioneer's hunger and a celebrated history, we are creating the future of child health.
16 Colorado Locations, Pediatric Experts on Staff, 100 Years+
/TheChildrensHospital

3. Our environments Milestone Dates Implemented January 2003
Upgraded to 9.2 in summer of 2014
Upgraded to PeopleTools 8.55 in summer of 2016
Annual maintenance cycles
Applications
FSCM
HCM
PIH

4. Scope of this presentation
Define “Fluid” terminology
This presentation is for Fluid User Interface
Not Fluid delivered applications
Not Fluid development
Discuss Fluid User Interface features
Discuss Fluid User Interface implementation

5. A look into the Fluid User Interface

6. Fluid Terminology Fluid User Interface Fluid Applications
Delivered in 8.54 PeopleTools
“Required” in 8.55 PeopleTools
New way of navigation throughout PeopleSoft
Enables simplified navigation on mobile devices
Destination can be Fluid components, or traditional components within Fluid “frame”
Fluid Applications
Pages, pivot grids, and components of applications
Developed in Application Designer like every other page
Different design paradigm, again centered around mobile usage
All new development of application functionality is considered using Fluid

7. Fluid User Interface Basics
Navigation Controls
Fluid Tile
(Size is adjustable)
Homepages adjust to form factor
Homepages
(Up to 10)

8. Example of a Homepage full of Tiles
Nav Collection
Direct link

9. Example of Classic Page in Fluid UX

10. Navigation Controls New Fluid Navigation Bar
The important icons you will use are located at the right side of this bar
Icon
Name
Purpose
Home
Takes you to your default PeopleSoft homepage
Search
This will let you search for your destination, for example Job Data, User Profile, etc. A quick way to your page!
Actions List
General user interface options, like Sign Out, and some personalization options
“Nav” Bar
To open the NavBar on the right side, which contains Recent Places, Favorites and the classic Menu Navigator
Current Homepage
Change homepage by clicking the triangle

11. Navigation Controls: Navigator
To get to your pages, click the NavBar icon ( ) and click Navigator
Your menu will appear and you can click through the levels of navigation as you always have.
Favorites is the same as before, and converts during upgrade
Recent Places is Very Handy
“Navigator” Menu Navigation

12. Navigation Controls: Navigator Controls
Takes you to the top of Navigation
Takes you back one level
Navigates to the Folder (>) or Component/Page

13. Navigation Controls: Action List
Adding a tile link for a Classic/Fluid page to a Homepage
Adding a link when on a Fluid Landing page or Homepage – Personalize Homepage

14. Navigation Controls: Personalize
Personalize Homepage is what you want to train your users to use
Copy/Move to Delete Tile
Homepage Order
Tile Order

15. Navigation Controls: Personalize
Name the Homepage what you want
Add Tile from Catalog
Add existing Homepage

16. Navigation Controls: Search
Don’t forget to build the Portal Registry search index

17. Navigation Alerts/Notifications
Will show as a number on the flag icon, like cell phone badges

18. Fluid User Interface Implementation Strategy

19. Fluid UI Adoption Strategy
Took PeopleSoft advice and implemented Fluid UI
8.55 “required” change of User Interface to utilize Fluid Navigation & Landing Pages (i.e. Homepages)
Non-Fluid landing pages and Breadcrumb Navigation not recommended
How we did it
Minimized Scope
Research Phase! Important with any new functionality
Testing
Training

20. Minimizing Fluid UI Scope
Core applications only
Did not impact self-service users
HCM and FSCM users were more familiar with application
Our Portal Interaction Hub and Manager/Employee Self-Service needs some work anyway – we’ll do Fluid in a separate project
Fluid User Interface only
No Fluid components / content (that will come later)
100% Fluid UI (no breadcrumbs navigation)
Multiple navigations is very confusing
We felt having both would increase help desk calls

21. Fluid User Interface Project Plan
Research phase
Produces Fit/Gap and Project Plan
Determine navigation requirements for users
What should be available immediately? Homepages, Tiles and Links
How should we organize navigation objects?
Implement Fluid UI homepages and navigation tiles
Create simplified navigations for them (Nav Collections/Tiles)
Test
Train

22. Project Plan: Research Phase Goals
Understand Fluid UI, Homepages, and different types of Tiles
Learn tools used to implement and maintain Fluid UI
Determine which teams will support maintenance activities
Determine security maintenance team should have
Research no longer supported tools/controls our teams currently used
Breadcrumb interface
Non-Fluid landing pages
General Fit/Gap: Put together an implementation plan

23. Research: Breadcrumbs User Interface
FACTS:
PeopleSoft advanced users have used this interface for a LONG time!
Breadcrumbs are tremendously difficult to use on a touch screen!
The navigation tree is complex and extremely large; takes a while to become familiar (and memorize) for any user.
PeopleSoft Developers, Administrators, BSAs and Power Users used this interface all the time for the last 15+ years.
Starting with PeopleTools 8.55, Fluid UI is the supported user interface, not breadcrumbs
Change can be difficult. We found, in general, it was most difficult for developers, administrators and BSAs to accept the switch to accept this change; however nearly all power-users love the new user interface!

24. Research: Using Breadcrumbs and Fluid UI together
We did the analysis, and simply these two technologies don’t live well together
Having both together is possible using the powerful Portal Branding features of PeopleSoft
Breadcrumbs and Fluid UI are not integrated; so navigation through one does not flow to the other
If a user only used one or the other, it was okay, but combination usage was really confusing and frustrating !!!
SEARCH is an easy alternative to get to your destination!

25. Research: Are Breadcrumbs Really Needed?
Breadcrumbs only really are fully used by power users and support staff
Using the Navigator controls, you can get to another component in the same folder using “back”, or you can start over by “back to home” icons
You can still get breadcrumbs for documentation purposes by using this fantastic SQL (thanks Jim Marion!), but how often do you document navigation in a month?
Another place with breadcrumbs that could be helpful?
PeopleTools / Portal / View Menu Folder Structure

26. Research: Turning Off Fluid UI
There is a way to change your application to land on a classic page, we only did this temporarily in our Portal product (as a reimplementation of our Portal was out of scope)
From DOC ID
The classic homepage will continue to be supported, however it is recommended that fluid be adopted moving forward. From tools perspective you can tweak the default PC home page for all your users under the tools personalization options e.g change from Fluid to Classic (Note that it will impact all PC users) But as our tools development and strategy stated, we don't encourage customers to do this switch, as for all apps 9.2 the default foreseen would be Fluid in all scenarios - that means the testing done under apps Q&A process might not include further on such classic home pages unit testings.
Any new issues reported to apps support would have to be handled under the defaults provided by apps 9.2 as well

27. Research Phase Findings
Do your research!!
Plan ahead and save yourself the headache !!! Ensure there is enough time in your project for this important step!
Quick! Took about a week.
Prototype and learn features of Fluid UX and how it will impact end-users
Navigation collections are a form of Fluid Workcenters
Fluid Objects are Security aware (nice!!!)
If user doesn’t have access to the destination, they don’t see it!!!
Allows a consolidated and simpler design
Understand required tools for Build & Maintenance phases
Navigation Collections
On-line configurable
Tile Wizard
Structure & Content (to change required/default attributes of tiles/homepages)
Security
Understand navigation choices
Homepages
Navigation Tiles
Navigation Collection Tiles

28. Researching Findings: Fluid Homepages & Tiles
Homepages contain tiles
Default homepage can be configurable to the user, or not (whatever you choose)
Homepage order is configurable by the user by default (or you can enforce order)

29. Research Findings: Fluid Homepages and Tiles
Homepages can be secured by Role or Permission List, or public
Each user can create their own homepages, which is private to them
Each user can add to existing homepages without other users seeing their links (nice!!!)
Tiles can be interactive or static Components, Pivot Grids/Charts, Navigation Collections, simple Navigation Links, etc
We are using a variety of navigation options in homepages
Fixed tile links
Navigation Collection work centers
User defined tile links

30. Implementation and Maintenance Findings
Homepages, Tiles and Nav Collections are quick to build
Business (BSA) maintains most objects
Since Required/Fixed attribute types require Structure & Content this is maintained by our technical team
Likely this will be a one-time configuration during implementation
End-users can add their own tiles onto existing or new homepages
Does not impact other users that utilize the same homepages
Candidate for a public Tile / Homepage?
If used a couple of times a week or more by several users, then a candidate for Tile or Navigation Collection link
Lower usage components are added ad-hoc by each user
Alternative is Favorites like before
Don’t forget the Production Support Nav Collection!

31. Designing your Implementation
Here is how we designed what Homepages and Tiles were needed
Interviewed all our “power users” and customers about what pages they use
From the list of places they go, determined how often they go there
Created Navigation Collection(s) for Teams if there were more than several destinations amongst a Team
Otherwise, had users create single tiles
Granted security to Tiles; security to the links was already configured!!
Set defaults in Structure & Content to install some standards in the way folks navigate the applications
Set security on the tiles; some teams could use others’ tiles

32. Example of Navigation Collection
Landing page in this case is a classic page
Folders are only one level deep (simplified)!
List/content frames
Nav collapses
These are CREF Links
Can be migrated
If user can’t access, it won’t be seen (nice!)
Folders and links organized for users. Note that you can only have one folder depth to reinforce simplicity!

33. How to Create a Navigation Collection (Structure)
Use Add Link and Add Folder buttons to create Navigation Collection structure

34. How to Create a Navigation Collection (Content)
Click & Choose

35. Using the Tile Wizard Navigation: PeopleTools / Portal
Used to create tiles from Navigation Collections
Simple, follow the activity guide’s train stops…
Create tiles in a folder structure in Personalize Homepage
Secure by Permission Lists or Roles

36. Testing Security Ensure navigation works (Tiles & Nav Collections)
Which Roles can/can’t access homepages
If users can’t see content, Tiles & NavColl Links are not available
Ensure those who maintain content have security to do so
Ensure navigation works (Tiles & Nav Collections)
Ensure search works
Ensure personalization works

37. Training Provided a one-page quick start guide for back-office teams
Explains navigation icons
Explains how to Personalize Homepages
Also Favorites / Recently Used lists
Hindsight…so simple to use, no other training was or will be required
FYI…Your most difficult audience will be your developers, BSAs, power users
They have the entire navigation tree memorized
Have been using “Breadcrumb” navigation for years
But Fluid is simpler for the vast majority of your users

38. Success Tips for your Fluid UI Project
Find an executive sponsor that wants to enable mobile device capabilities
Research and Prototype
Demonstration is worth a thousand words to your decision makers
Take the time to understand the technology; it’s quick and worth the effort!
Understand that turning off Fluid UI or adding breadcrumbs is not advised by Oracle – its yet another customization now
Fluid UI is made to make your PeopleSoft mobile ready

39.
110620

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