intermediate level form personalization

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Form PersonalizationIntermediate Concepts


After completing this module, you should be able to do the following:

Understand Trigger Events

Build rules that fire conditionally

Understand Sequencing

Use string evaluation

Use the Validate feature to confirm Conditions and Strings

Understand multilingual issues

Know the most commonly used Actions

Use debugging features

Objectives


This course builds on material presented in the module Introduction to Forms Personalization, and the viewlet Oracle Applications Form Personalization Demonstration.

The viewlet Oracle Applications Form Personalization Demonstration – Intermediate Concepts shows many of the concepts included in this module.

Related Course Material


Agenda

Understanding Trigger Events

Building rules that fire conditionally

The Sequence fields

Triggers+Conditions+Sequences

Working with Strings

How to handle multiple languages

Focus on common Properties and Builtins

Using debugging features


Form Personalizations allows you to fundamentally alter the behavior of the product that Oracle ships, and access any and all data. Therefore,

This feature should only be made available to trusted users.

Avoid building Personalizations on a production system. – Form Personalizations should first be entered and

thoroughly QA’ed on a test system before they are loaded to a production system

WARNING!


Trigger Events


All E-Business Suite forms send the following events: – WHEN-NEW-FORM-INSTANCE: once, when the form starts up. Trigger Object does not

apply.– WHEN-NEW-BLOCK-INSTANCE: each time the cursor moves to a new block. Trigger

Object must contain the blockname of interest.– WHEN-NEW-RECORD-INSTANCE: each time the cursor moves to a new record. Trigger

Object must contain the blockname of interest.– WHEN-NEW-ITEM-INSTANCE: each time the cursor moves to a new item. Trigger

Object must contain the blockname.itemname of interest.– SPECIAL1 through SPECIAL45: each time the user selects a menu entry from the Tools,

Actions or Reports menu.

Many forms send the following event:– WHEN-VALIDATE-RECORD: each time the current record has any change that needed

to be validated. Trigger Object must contain the blockname of interest.

Trigger Events, continued


Some forms send custom events– For example, a form may send a message like ‘REPRICE-ITEM’ at a

specific event within it’s processing.– We seed the Trigger Event item with the standard events, but you can type

other events into the field too.

It’s easy to learn what events a form sends– From the pulldown menu select Help > Diagnostics > CustomCode > Show

Events– Run the form of interest and a dialog will appear each time an event is sent– Turn this mode off by selecting Help > Diagnostics > CustomCode >

Normal

Trigger Events, continued


Conditions


The Condition field lets you create an expression in SQL– If it is empty or evaluates to TRUE at runtime, then the Actions are performed– If it evaluates to FALSE at runtime, then the Actions are skipped– The Condition is re-evaluated each time the rule is processed

The Condition expression can refer to:– bind variables, like :block.field– SQL operators, such as ||, TO_CHAR(), DECODE(), and NVL()– Server-side functions that do not have OUT parameters

Validate: this will process the Condition immediately and return either True, False, or an Error

– Errors are in standard ORACLE error format, with an ORA error number

Conditions, continued


Examples:– :users.user_name is not null and :users.description is null

TRUE if the User Name field has a value and the Description field does not

– sysdate >= to_date(‘1-1-2005’, ‘DD-MM-RRRR’) TRUE if today’s date is equal to or greater than January 1, 2005

Fire in Enter-Query mode: if checked, will cause the trigger to be processed while in QBE mode.

– It is rare that you would want this.

Conditions, continued


Both Rules and Actions have a Sequence that must be entered

– It is there in case you need things to be processed in a specific order

– The sequence does not have to be unique

For an Action, the Sequence is very important in various situations, for example:

– When using Builtins, you might first move the cursor to a particular block, then issue a query in that block

– With Properties, if you are moving an item you might first have to make the canvas a different size

Sequences


If a Rule has a context of ‘Site’, it will be applied for everyone

A rule with a context of Responsibility does not ‘override’ Site

A rule with a context of User does not ‘override’ Site or Responsibility

If 2 rules have the same Trigger Event, and Actions that change the same property, the rule with the higher sequence number will be performed last, thus it will ‘win’

Context is not a hierarchy


Triggers+Conditions+SequencesHere’s how it all works: When an event occurs in the form, we look for all enabled

rules that match that Trigger Event and Trigger Object

– Starting with the Rule that has the lowest sequence,

if the Condition is empty or evaluates to TRUE, we process each enabled Action, in the order of the Action Sequence

– Then we look for the next-highest sequenced Rule and process it, until there are no more Rules for that Event.


Working with Strings

Every property that takes a string can work one of two ways

If the string you type does not start with ‘=’, then it will be used exactly as you typed it

If the string you type starts with ‘=’, then it will be evaluated at runtime. You can refer to:

– bind variables, like :block.field– SQL operators, such as ||, TO_CHAR(), DECODE(), and NVL()– Server-side functions that do not have OUT parameters

Validate: this will process the string immediately and return either the result or an Error

– Errors are in standard ORACLE error format, with an ORA error number


Working with Strings, continuedString Typed In Result at Runtime='Your password will expire on '||(sysdate+7)

Your password will expire on 31-DEC-2004 {if sysdate is currently 24-DEC-2004}

='Your password must have at least '||:context.passwd_length||' characters.'

Your password must have at least 8 characters. {if passwd_length has a value of 8}

=‘User: ‘||NVL(:user.user_name, ‘New’)

User: SYSADMIN {if :user.user_name is ‘SYSADMIN’}

User: New {if :user.user_name is null}

=The field value is: :items.part_number

{an ORACLE error because the syntax is incorrect. It should be: =‘The field value is: ‘||

:items.part_number }


Some Actions are insensitive to language, such as setting the Required property for a field.

– For these, set the Language to ‘All’ But many Actions have text, such as Properties (PROMPT_TEXT, LABEL,

TOOLTIP…), Messages (Message Text), and Special (Menu Label) – For these, create one Action per language– Pick the appropriate language, and enter the proper text for that

language Don’t create Conditions that are language sensitive

– Refer to internal values of fields, not displayed values

Multilingual Issues


You can count on numbers to be confusing! Depending on your profiles, you may see numbers in fields as

1234.56 or 1234,56 However, much of Forms Personalization involves SQL fragments,

which require that numbers always be in ‘english’ format (1234.56). So, regardless of what your current settings are, enter all numeric

values in english format Examples:

– Setting the WIDTH property: 2.5– Creating a Condition based on the value of a numeric field: :block.field >= 2.5

Multilingual Issues, continued


Let’s make a Date• WRONG:

sysdate >= to_date(‘1-JAN-05’)• ‘JAN’ will not mean ‘January’ in all languages• Always specify an exact mask when converting a

string to a date• Avoid Y2K issues – enter years with all 4 digits

• RIGHT:sysdate >= to_date(‘1-1-2005’, ‘DD-MM-RRRR’)

Multilingual Issues, continued


Common Actions of type Property (1) For Items (fields):

– PROMPT_TEXT: the prompt of the item, typically next to or above the item

– DISPLAYED: if False, the item is hidden– INITIAL_VALUE: the value to default on a new record. This can only

be set in the WHEN-NEW-RECORD-INSTANCE event– UPDATE_ALLOWED: if False, prevents the user from changing the

value on a queried row– LABEL: the label of a button, checkbox or radio button– NEXT and PREVIOUS_NAVIGATION_ITEM: to control the behavior

of Tab and Shift+Tab– REQUIRED: if True, the user must enter a value– TOOLTIP_TEXT: the bubble tip on the item– X and Y_POS: the location on the canvas, in inches– WIDTH: the width, in inches– VALUE: copy a value into the item, as if the user typed it


Common Actions of type Property (2) For Tab Pages:

– DISPLAYED: If False, the tab page is hidden. Note that keyboard navigation may need to be changed to prevent access to items on the page

– LABEL: the title of the tab

For Canvasses:– TOPMOST_TAB_PAGE: Determines the currently selected Tab

Page

For Windows:– TITLE: the title of the window– X and Y_POS: the location within the MDI window, in inches


Common Actions of type Property (3) For Blocks:

– DEFAULT_WHERE: the WHERE clause of the SQL statement controlling queried records

– ORDER_BY: the ORDER_BY clause of the SQL statement of the queried records

– INSERT_ALLOWED: if False, prevents the user from creating new records

– UPDATE_ALLOWED: if False, prevents the user from updating any item in a queried record

– DELETE_ALLOWED: if False, prevents the user from deleting queried records


Common Actions of type Builtin GO_ITEM and GO_BLOCK: move the cursor to a specific item or the

first item in a block DO_KEY: acts like a macro, simulating user actions.

– Common Arguments: ENTER_QUERY: invoke QBE mode EXECUTE_QUERY: execute the query NEXT and PREVIOUS_BLOCK: move to another block NEXT and PREVIOUS_ITEM: move to another item

FND_UTILITIES.OPEN_URL: launch a URL. Can be as simple as ‘www.yahoo.com’, or as complex as a Discoverer page

FND_FUNCTION.EXECUTE: open a function, applying security rules. Parameters can be passed if the target accepts them.


Common Actions of type Message Show: displays a message of type Note, with an OK button. Hint: displays text on the message line Error: displays a message of type Error, with an OK button.

Processing is aborted afterwards. Debug: displays a message of type Note, with an OK button.

– Only displays when ‘Display Debug messages’ is checked.

Warn: displays a message of type Question, with OK and Cancel buttons.

– If the user selects Cancel, processing is aborted.


A rule or action may not run for a variety of reasons: The Rule or Action is not enabled The Condition has evaluated to FALSE The Trigger Event and/or Trigger Object were not what you expected The scope of the rule only consists of Responsibility, Industry and/or User, and

none is true for the current context An action is executing the Builtin 'RAISE FORM_TRIGGER_FAILURE' . That will

abort all further processing for that event. The Language of the Action, if not ‘All’, is different than what you are currently

running You have set Custom Code to ‘Off’ or ‘Core code only’ in the pulldown menu. Rules are created for a Function. You might be running the same form, but as a

different function.

Debugging: why isn’t it running?


Debugging: is it really running? It may not be obvious that your change was applied in

some cases. To resolve that:– Create a Message of Type ‘Debug’ after the Action

of interest. Add some useful text.– Save your changes.– Check the ‘Display Debug messages’ checkbox– Re-run the form– You should see your message pop up when the

proper event occurs


Often an Action may execute, but by the time control returns to the user the property you set has been overridden. What can you do?

Try performing the action at a ‘lower’ event.– Properties that affect all records of a block: set at WHEN-NEW-BLOCK-INSTANCE

or WHEN-NEW-RECORD-INSTANCE– Properties that affect a specific item in a block: set at WHEN-NEW-ITEM-INSTANCE– The downside of the ‘lower’ events is that they fire more frequently, and they may

yield a misleading UI (for example, a field may look to be updateable until you navigate into it)

Be aware of ‘item’ vs. ‘item-instance’ properties– ‘item’ level affects all instances of that item– ‘item-instance’ affects only the current row of that item– If a property is ‘off’ at item level, it cannot be turned on at item-instance level

Debugging: why isn’t it ‘sticking’?


Debugging: how do I stop it from running?

It is possible that a change you make completely breaks a form, to the point that it will not even run! Here’s how to recover:

On the pulldown menu, choose Help > Diagnostics > Custom Code > Off

– This will disable all callouts to Forms Personalization

Run the form of interest– It should run now, because your changes were skipped

Invoke the Personalization screen and correct the problem On the pulldown menu, choose Help > Diagnostics > Custom

Code > Normal to re-enable processing of Personalizations


Summary

In this module, you should have learned how to:

Build rules associated with the proper Trigger Event

Build rules that fire conditionally

Use Sequencing

Use the Validate feature to confirm Conditions and Strings

Use string evaluation

Handle multilingual situations

Use the most commonly used Properties, Builtins and Messages

Use debugging features

intermediate level form personalization

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