No update for the next 3 weeks

Just to let you know: There will be no update for the next 3 weeks, because I'm on vacation far far away :-)

So I will probably miss the release of Oracle APEX 3.1, but if you want to be informed as soon as it is available, I would suggest to subscribe to the Oracle APEX 3.1 Beta program, because David Peake (product manager of APEX) has promised to inform all participants as soon as it is available.

Cu
Patrick

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More undocumented new features in Oracle APEX 3.1

A quick posting.

In one of my last posting I wrote about some undocumented new features in Oracle APEX 3.1, but there are more of them. I'm really short with my time, because I have to pack and get ready for my vacation, but

• have you already tried to enter
  

  PCT_GRAPH:777777:111111:200

  into the format mask property of a report column? Try it out! There is also an equivalent PL/SQL function called

  apex_util.html_pct_graph_mask

• Did you know that you can double click a Shuttle entry in 3.1 to move it to the other side?
• Or that there is a package to handle JSON communication? Have a look at the apex_util package.
• An On-Demand process will return an error message when it's called in debug mode, currently it just returns a blank page if an error occurs (because of security reasons). Note: I couldn't try this feature on the Eval Instance, because there seems to be a problem with the debug mode in general.
• Last but not least, Carl did a complete rework of the APEX Javascript libraries, have a look! Ok, now you can't have a look, because they a minified, but I'm sure they will still deploy a readable version for us developer so that we can have a look.

That's it for now. I have to continue packing...

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Thanks Anthony!

Anthony Rayner was so nice to have a look and send me corrections for the documentation of my recently released Oracle APEX Builder Plugin. I also have updated the documentation to make it more clear what the pre-requirements are to be able to open the "APEX Builder Plugin Settings" dialog.

The updated documentation can be found in the new 1.9.1 release. If you already have installed the plugin, you don't have to upgrade. The Plugin itself hasn't changed.

Thanks again Anthony for you help I really appreciate that!

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Oracle APEX Builder Plugin v1.9 release!

The Oracle APEX Builder Plugin is a productivity and usability enhancement tool for the development environment of Oracle Application Express (APEX).

It integrates with Firefox and Internet Explorer 6 & 7 to put a wealth of new features to your favorite development tool. The good news is, it's Open Source and you can use it for free!

If you haven't heard about it yet, have a look at the newly designed project homepage to read about all the enhancements it adds to the Oracle APEX Builder!

What's New?

• Split "Display As" select list for page items.
• Quick Pick Links for Report Column "Display As" select list.
• Resizable Textareas can now store the size.
• Anchor Highlighting has been enhanced to do the highlighting for "Conditions", "Security" and "Build Option", too.
• The different features can now be enabled and disabled.
• Works with Oracle APEX 3.1: Considers the new item type and the Interactive Report Region. I also had to adapt to a structure change. On two pages the name of a div was changed which broke my code for the ApexLib integration :-(
• Thanks to Chris for fixing a problem with Keyboard shortcuts.

A detail list of changes can be found in the Change Log.

What else has changed? The APEX Builder Plugin now has it's own domain builderplugin.oracleapex.info and I totally redid the documentation and the installation process to make it even simpler. I would appreciate it if a native speaker could have a look and send me corrections for grammar and spelling errors. Thanks a lot! BTW, you can now also subscribe to the APEX Builder Plugin RSS Feed.

Have fun with the Plugin!

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More Translations for Oracle Application Express?

Joel Kallman, the Software Development Senior Manager for Oracle APEX has raised the question: Should Oracle Application Express be translated into other languages?

Oracle Application Express (APEX) currently comes with built-in support for 10 languages. But that doesn't mean that you can't use it with other languages, too. You always have the possibility to translate the system generated messages into the language you want to use for your application. I think with the last release (3.0) all of this text strings are now translatable.

If everybody is happy, why the question?

Because the development environment will still appear in English (or any other supported language). For some people that is a problem and it also raises the barrier for the "Power Users", Oracle APEX is also targeting. I think most of them want to work in there native language. Personally I have a different preference.

Another drawback is that the wizard generated text strings (eg. for buttons, validation errors, ...) are always generated in the language the development environment is running. So you always have to go through them and change them. Stupid work. That reminders me an OTN Forum thread where I discussed this with Scott Spadafore some time ago. The idea was that the wizards should not use the language of the Builder/Browser, instead it should use the Primary Language of the Application for all the text it generates. That would help a lot if you run the Builder in English, but you want to develop an application with Primary Language German.

But back to the topic.

What additional languages should Oracle APEX support?

In his posting, Joel asked

I am specifically interested in the market opportunity for Application Express, and not necessarily your personal preference.

I think two languages could have a good market opportunity for APEX, especially because you see more and more people from this countries on the OTN APEX Forum.

Hindi and Arabic

This languages cover countries with a growing economy and nearly 1 billion people (Hindi: 240–550 million, Arabic: 186-422 million).

I'm sure there are a lot of other languages where a translation would also make sense. Dutch is a good candidate. Just have a look at the usage statistic of apex.oracle.com

But do we need a full blown translation for all languages?

For a lot of languages it would already help if the system messages and the wizard generated strings are translated. That are about 30-40 strings for each language. That's a big difference to a full blown translation which has to go through the full translation cycle when the UI of the Builder is changed in a new version.

I'm sure the APEX community is happy to contribute to provide this translations! Or even better, put them into a table which is modifiable. That would give the biggest flexibility.

But that are just my thoughts about this topic. Now it's time for you to participate in Joel's one question survey so that he hears your voice!

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Building Interactive Reports in Oracle APEX 3.1

In the newest issue of Oracle Magazine, David Peake has written an article about Building Interactive Reports. "The" new feature of the upcoming Oracle APEX 3.1.

If you haven't looked at the beta yourself, this article is a good chance to get some more details about this exciting new feature of Oracle APEX.

BTW David, reading the article someone could have the impression that it was planned to have a released Oracle APEX 3.1 when the article is published. I just say: "Deadlines" in the software industry... ;-)

For more Oracle APEX 3.1 coverage read:

• Undocumented new features in Oracle APEX 3.1
• New Features in Oracle APEX 3.1 - update of Evaluation Instance
• Oracle Application Express (APEX) 3.1 - Preview Video

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New Features in Oracle APEX 3.1 - update of Evaluation Instance

The beta testers have been informed that the Evaluation Instance of Oracle APEX 3.1 has been refreshed last Friday. Looks like that I was lucky with my The undocumented new features in Oracle APEX 3.1 posting, because without knowing it I was already working on the new version.

But there is more new stuff, which I didn't discover. Read the announcement mail from the APEX team.

Thanks again for all your participation in our public evaluation instance of Application Express 3.1. We wanted to let you know that late last Friday, we upgraded the evaluation instance to bring it up to date with our development. If you haven't used your workspace in a while, now is the time to check it out again. Interactive Reports should be more stable and you will be able to try out our new BLOB support. Deinstall and install the Sample Application - some BLOB support using images has been included on the home tab and on the Products tab. You can also create an application, page or report and include a column that is a BLOB then edit the column or item and click the new link below the format or source to see the full format - more info to come in our doc and on the comments site.

If you find any new issues, please report them using the feedback application. The link is also available from within the hosted Application Express 3.1 evaluation instance Home page.

As you can see from the feedback application, I already did some testing of the new BLOB feature. But your help is also needed! Register if you haven't done it yet and start testing this new beta version!!

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Undocumented new features in Oracle APEX 3.1

The Oracle Application Express (APEX) 3.1 Beta contains a lot more new features than just the Interactive Report Region. Some of the additional features like enhanced wizards, new themes, runtime installation, attachments for mails, ... are mentioned in the Evaluation Feedback Application.

But actually there are a lot new properties in the existing features which are "undocumented"....

Ok, I have to confess that they are actually well documented when you click onto the label of the field. But

1. I needed a good title for the posting :-) and
2. because they are not documented in the Feedback Application, probably a lot of the beta tester missed them because we didn't expect that the existing features got some tweaking too (without mentioning it).

So here we go with a list of properties/features I found when browsing around on the evaluation instance. Most of the text is from the online help.

Workspace Themes

Workspace themes allow you to add to the theme repository. They are available when you create an application or when you create a theme for an existing application.

You create a workspace theme by selecting a theme from within an application. Once created, it cannot be edited directly. To edit, create an application based off the theme, edit the theme within that application and then you can create a new workspace theme with the updated application theme (and delete the old, if you no longer want it).

Page Item - Display As - Hidden and Protected

Automatically set for all Primary Key columns by the wizard. The value send during a submit is ignored. The field is checksum protected. This will solve some potential attack vectors demonstrated by Anton Nielsen during an "Unconference session" at Oracle Open World.

Region Definition - Region Attributes

Region templates that contain the substitution string #REGION_ATTRIBUTES# will be substituted with this value.

Note to Dietmar: I think that's something you where always looking for. It allows you to customize your template for a specific region. For example you could write

width="300px"

to set the width. No more special templates for a page, just to be able to set the same width for all regions on the page.

Report Attributes - Report Attributes Substituion

Same as above, just for the Report template.

Report Attributes - Enable Partial Page Refresh

Partial Page rendering for reports doesn't require a special template (the PPR templates) anymore. It now works with every template.

Report Column Attributes - Include In Export

Use the attribute to define whether this column should be included in a report export, this includes exporting to CSV and printing to PDF, Word or Excel.

Note: That's new for CSV. For PDF it was available before on the "Print Attributes" tab.

Report Print Attributes - Response Header

The response header is the information, that the server sends back to the browser in response to receiving an HTTP request. The response header contains the date, size and type of file that the server is sending back to the client and also data about the server itself.

The response header can be generated by Application Express based on your report settings or passed through from the print server. If you want to specify file name and content disposition, the response header needs to be based on your report settings.

Report Print Attributes - View File As

Using the View File As attribute, you can instruct the browser to either display a file open / save dialog when clicking on the report download link, or to display the report document inside the browser window. This selection is included in the http header of the document, using the content-disposition attribute.

Report Print Attributes - Print Server Overwrite

The Print Server Overwrite attribute allows configuring an alternative print server. A print server is typically configured centrally for all workspaces under the instance administration. Configuring an alternative print server at the report level allows for easier debugging and diagnosis of potential printing problems and also allows for the use of specific custom built end points to perform custom XSLT transformations.

Report Print Attributes - Total Width

Now showing the total of the column widths. Hurrah! :-)

Report Print Attributes - Column Width Units

Use the Column Width Units attributes to specify whether the column width values define the width in percent or points.

Report Print Attributes - Recalculate

The Recalculate button recalculates the column widths based on their current values so that the total is below or equal to 100.

Process - Automatic Row .../Multi Row ... - Runtime Where Clause

This SQL WHERE clause will be appended to all generated SELECT, UPDATE, and DELETE statements (e.g. DEPTNO = 10). Use this attribute to enhance the security of automatically generated SQL calls.

Page Definition - Include Standard CSS and JavaScript

Oracle Application Express typically requires specific CSS and JavaScript files. For some applications, such as mobile applications, you may wish to suppress the inclusion of these files in the HTML HEADER. Because suppressing the display of these files breaks typical applications, enabling this attribute is only recommended for advanced developers.

Report Queries

The wizard has changed a lot.

The definition page contains the new "View File As" property. You are now also able to derive the "Output Type" from an item.

There is also an export option available where you can download your report query as "XML Data" or as "XML Schema", so that you are able to test your report with real data.

Have you noticed other new cool features?

Then let me/us know!

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Integrating ExtJS Javascript Library into Oracle APEX

Do you want to know how you can integrate the ExtJS Javascript Library into Oracle Application Express (APEX)?

Mark Lancaster has set up an ExtJS example application showing the integration and how such an Oracle APEX application could look like. Check it out!

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