GMaps Mobile product to our existing customer base who are predominantly SAP BusinessObjects users. For the last 4 years, Centigon Solutions has been deeply linked to SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards Xcelsius. That coupled with our product naming convention has led to some anticipated confusion about what GMaps Mobile will do for existing Xcelsius customers.
So without stealing our marketing thunder, we wanted to publicly explain the differences for our existing customer base of dashboard developers.
What is GMaps Plugin?
GMaps Plugin is our leading map visualization design component for SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards. It leverages GMaps Framework, a Centigon Solutions created, Flash powered map visualization API that we have been extending over the last 4 years. GMaps Plugin will forever be aligned to the SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards platform, as long as SAP continues to support their own SDKs. GMaps Plugin as of today is planned to remain a Flash powered component, which creates some pitfalls for future mobility expansion.
Will GMaps Plugin ever go mobile?
While GMaps Plugin today will work inside of 3rd party mobile solutions like Antivia XWIS Anywhere, it is not optimized for a mobile experience, and our current focus is NOT to transform GMaps Plugin into a mobile component. With that said, SAP’s recent HTML5 announcements for Xcelsius does provide a potential opportunity for us to change that position. Once SAP releases their HTML5 integration and provides details for potential SDK options for third parties, we will evaluate, test, and keep our customers and community up to date.
NOW ONTO GMAPS MOBILE
What is GMaps Mobile?
In short, we have developed our own standalone cloud/on-premise hybrid platform and mobile app for location intelligence. GMaps Mobile is initially available for iOS with other platforms following shortly. The GMaps Mobile App is developed primarily in HTML5 and does not contain any code or linkage to our GMaps Plugin product, which will allow us to rapidly expand and integrate our solution with other mobile / cloud platforms.
How Does GMaps Mobile Link Back to BusinessObjects and Xcelsius
GMaps Mobile does not have any linkage or migration paths from Xcelsius, because it was built to exist as a standalone platform, granting us the ability to connect and integrate with a wider range of solutions in the marketplace. The good news is GMaps Mobile does have its own connector into SAP BI4 that ships with GMaps Mobile enterprise. Using WebIntelligence documents, you will be able to stream content from any data source using Webi for queries and data formatting. There is plenty of technical docs, videos, and papers that will be made available addressing any questions you may have about supported features, security, etc.
What is GMaps Mobile used for?
Like any new platform, we have created a rock solid foundation with a seemingly unlimited innovation pipeline over the next 24 months. On day one, we believe GMaps Mobile will serve as a valuable business productivity tool for mobile work forces who truly need location based visualization/analytics as part of their jobs. These are employees in the field selling, repairing, and performing any number of tasks where locating assets and events can save valuable time. From our dashboarding roots, we believe that showing data on a chart or map is only one small piece of the puzzle. Providing an engaging user experience for interacting with information is a top priority, while providing enough flexibility to serve a wide range of use cases for mobile location intelligence. Actionable location intelligence is goal for GMaps Mobile, and we will be moving at a breakneck speed to get there for our loyal customers.
Where do I learn more about GMaps Mobile
More information about GMaps Mobile can be found at GMapsMobile.com where you can also find upcoming webinars and white papers on location intelligence.
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