Which versions of NWBC are available?

The initial version of NWBC, SAP NetWeaver Business Client for ERP (NWBC 1.0), was released in 2007 exclusively for SAP Business All-in-One and the SAP Business Suite. It was soon followed by NWBC 2.0 based on new Microsoft .NET technology with the new Signature Design supporting a multi-window paradigm. This version was limited for use only with SAP Business ByDesign. The next version of NWBC, the 3.0 version, builds on the Signature Design, reintroducing SAP GUI support, and is available for all SAP business lines as one product providing universal access to SAP applications. With NWBC 3.0, a light-weight HTML-based version is also available specifically for single SAP NetWeaver AS ABAP/ABAP system scenarios.

NWBC 3.5 comes with enhanced navigation features, new menus, and a side panel, which shows additional context information that relates to the main application. The latest child of the NWBC family, NWBC for Desktop 4.0, has been released with the user interface add-on 1.0 SPS01 for SAP NetWeaver for SAP NetWeaver 7.0/7.01/7.02/7.03/7.31 (a direct shipment). It follows the tabbed browsing paradigm known from modern browsers such as Internet Explorer 9 and Google Chrome.

The following table provides an overview of the NWBC release versions and the related patches:

As a successor of NWBC 3.0, NWBC 3.5 can also run against the back-end systems supported by NWBC 3.0. However, some features supported by NWBC 3.5 depend on functionality in the SAP NetWeaver 7.03/7.31 back end and are not available when you connect to an older system (see What Is New in NWBC 3.5).

Which SAP NW AS ABAP release is required to run a specific NWBC client version?

NWBC client requires a server runtime, which is a bundle of all the services that NWBC uses in the SAP NW AS ABAP. The NWBC server version is the version of the NWBC server runtime. The NWBC server runtime provides role navigation information and navigation resolving services.

NWBC for HTML is a browser-based shell for which a desktop installation is not needed. NWBC for HTML relates to the SAP NetWeaver Application Server ABAP on which it is running.

The following table provides an overview of the different back ends to which all the versions of NWBC for Desktop (NWBC 3.0, NWBC 3.5, and NWBC 4.0) can connect:

(*) You can find the NWBC server version in NWBC for Desktop by choosing  Help About NWBC System Info .

Besides functional enhancements supported by NWBC for Desktop 3.5 and higher, the NWBC server version 3.5 provides performance enhancements through server-side caching of navigation menus.

Which features are available for which SAP NW AS ABAP for NWBC 3.5 or Higher?

Some features in NWBC for Desktop 3.5 and higher depend on functionality in the back end. They are disabled when running with back ends that are not suitable. Not all SAP NetWeaver releases support the NWBC runtime that is required to use a specific feature.

The following table provides an overview of which feature is available with which SAP NW AS ABAP version: