sap.ca.scfld - don't use it!

[former_member185575]

Hello,

just stumbled upon the tweet from Jan Penninkhof where he asked about the sap.ca.scfld library:

Anyone know if #SAPUI5 namespaces under sap.ca.scfld are supported by SAP? They're not in the API docu.

Yes, I know something about it!

I try to clarify this - take this as my personal opinion and my attempt to help as a SAP mentor.

First of all:

If it is not in the API documentation - DON'T use it! (personal experience)

But what is it?

It is called scaffolding and was only used internally by SAP.

But I saw some examples from SAP were it is used:

Again, if it is not in the API documentation - DON'T use it!

But it seems somehow useful!

Nope, don't use it!

Maybe it is a cool new upcoming feature and I want to get my hands on it!!

Nope, unfortunatelly not this time! This is not a cool new feature, it is legacy stuff.

But why didn't you tell me?

From my experience, if something isn't intended for the customer then it is not documented.

But those communication strategy is not open/helpful!

Yep, this is also my point of view.

I am in an unfortunate situation, because as an employee I know a lot of stuff, but I don't always know what the customer knows or how we should communicate this and that, but I try my best and report your feedback.

Personal experience:

From my personal experience, yes I have seen those things in Fiori applications when I worked at my former employee and at this time there existed even an API documentation about.

But I found no other documentation about it and at the same time the "Building SAP Fiori-like UIs with SAPUI5" appeared. No "scfld" in sight, ok don't use it, whatever. When the "best practice app" was introduced, also no "scfld" in sight, ok I should not use it then.

Since I work here, I noticed that the API documentation was removed because it was not intended for the customer and will be replaced and it is legacy stuff.

So my advice: Don't use it! I hope I could help to clarify some things.

[AndreasKunz · Accepted solution]

Thanks for clarifying this. 🙂

One additional aspect: with frameworks like Web Dynpro there was a clear separation between framework code and application code. Either something was part of Web Dynpro or it was using Web Dynpro. There was no way to extend Web Dynpro from outside.

With UI5, things are different: not only CAN it be extended (e.g. by creating additional libraries and controls), but there is no technical difference between controls/libraries provided as part of the framework and those created by application developers - or by groups sitting between them.

The sap.ca.* library/libraries (including scaffolding) have been created by such teams between application development and framework development (this is also indicated by the name not starting with "sap.ui.*", which usually says something has been developed as part of the framework). So this is not framework code that SAP wanted to hide from external developers to gain an advantage or so, but it is rather re-use code for a specific family of applications that has been developed more or less together with those app developers. It may indeed be deployed together with the framework (and hence appear to be part of it), but this has technical reasons - it is just simpler to do it like this than having different deployments.

As seen from the lack of documentation and examples, scaffolding was not meant for public usage. And as you can see from the in-process removal, you didn't miss anything important. 😉

I don't think SAP should communicate and document all code that has only been created for internal usage. Be assured: when there is a "cool new upcoming feature", we do communicate it in the OpenUI5 trial/preview/beta versions. 🙂