Installing Costpoint as a Progressive Web App

This section explains the benefits of using the Costpoint Progressive Web App on a mobile device and desktop.

A Progressive Web App (PWA) is a web application that uses a set of latest technologies to incorporate the historically associated features with either browser or native applications. As a result, the PWA provides the end-user with the best of both worlds.

The Costpoint PWA application provides the same rich set of capabilities regardless of the device. For example, if your company configured SAML or FIDO authentication for desktops, it will work on mobile devices, with no extra steps or additional deployment/configuration necessary. If you developed an Extension, it would work on a desktop, tablet, or phone. If your users access Costpoint from your company Azure portal using SSO, it will equally work on a laptop or phone.

Deploying a PWA application creates an icon on your home screen and also generates a real native application container on your device. For example, you can tap the standard "App info" option for the Costpoint icon on an Android device and it will show that the CP icon you just created is a native application, downloaded from the Google Play store.

Deploying the Costpoint PWA on your desktop creates a desktop shortcut to the application. When you access Costpoint using the app, more data is visible on your screen. Browser elements, like the address bar, tabs, and other controls are removed, offering a clearer view of your Costpoint data.

As Costpoint is continuously enhanced, you can be confident that your company and your users will always have access to the latest features and functionality while using Costpoint PWA, regardless of the device used to access Costpoint.

From an IT perspective, the use of Costpoint PWAs on mobile devices have these additional benefits:

• The instructions to install Costpoint PWA on your device (similar to installing a native app from a store) describe a manual process. However, because it is not required to publish PWA applications to the store, IT can push the Costpoint PWA application to your employee devices using standard MDM solutions (e.g., MobileIron). If your company has an internal company store which employees should use to download applications (for example, using MobileIron store), they can publish a PWA application in your company store.
• IT has full control over the version of Costpoint used by users, including the PWA application deployed to user devices. When your company IT or Deltek Cloud deploys any new update to Costpoint, the PWA applications on user devices will refresh automatically and seamlessly, always staying in sync with the version of Costpoint used by your organization.

  There is no need to worry about backward or forward compatibility issues with the version of applications deployed on user devices. There is no need to ask or expect users to download an updated version of the application from the company store.