Roels Blog

In previous blog posts (like this , this and this one) I explained how you can integrate (or embed) Oracle Forms within an APEX Page. But yesterday I stumbled upon this question on the Oracle APEX Forum. There someone was looking for a solution how to access an APEX Page from an Oracle Form - so exactly the other way round. And, after some trial-and-error I came up with this solution: 1. Copy the basejpi.htm (or whatever html file you're using in the formsweb.cfg) on your application server to (something like) forms2apex-jpi.htm and reference that in your formsweb.cfg. 2. Edit the forms2apex-jpi.htm and add an IFRAME tag just before the closing BODY tag: <IFRAME src="http://localhost:7778/pls/apex/f?p=104" style="width:800px;height:450px;visibility:hidden" name="APEX" id="APEX" scrolling="auto" marginwidth="1" marginheight="1" frameborder="1...

Yesterday evening guys from Quest presented their latest cool new tools at one of our company locations. They started with Foglight , a tool for Application Management. Using that tool you can see on one page the status of the applications that are running, where users experience some problems (based on thresholds), the number of users affected and where in the application stack the problem occurs. With a few clicks you can drill down to the actual origin of the problem. Foglight supports a number of application types (like Java, .Net, Siebel, SAP), different types of access (o.a. Apache, Citrix, Rich Clients), multiple infrastructures (Windows, Solaris, HP/UX, VMWare) and different databases (SQL Server and - of course - Oracle). Foglight uses so called "Quest Collectors" on the web-, application- and databaseservers to sample data. That data is collected in the Foglight Management Server . Apart from that you can use an Experience Monitor and Viewer as a network sniffer. Q...

Developers and architects attend Kaleidoscope to find out how to use the new technologies to make their jobs easier. Your expertise and experience are key to our participants getting their questions answered. Click here to submit your abstract to speak at the developer event of the year. ODTUG Kaleidoscope 2010 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, D.C. is the conference for Oracle developers and architects. Kaleidoscope has it all - more than 150 technical sessions, day-long symposia, hands-on training, chats with participants and speakers, and even a community service project. So far the "offical" advertisement. My personal opinion is that Kaleidscope is the place to be for Oracle Developers. Just because it is at a 'somewhat' smaller scale than - for instance - Oracle Open World (last year there where around 700 attendees), you can speak to whoever is there (and 'everyone' is!). Also the content of the presentations is very good. But don...

Back from OOW I found the Oracle Application Express Forms Converter book in my pile of mail. I received a free copy - just adding the word 'free' in order to prevent a claim from the FTC ... ;-) for writing a review on this blog. I haven't had a change to read the book, although it is only 172 pages, significantly less than the other Oracle related books on my shelf. If you are interested in a review now , please read Marc Sewtz's blogpost - he has already read it and wrote a review. I will try to write the review somewhere next week (with the usual disclaimers applied). If you're curious, you can read a preview chapter of the book here .

When I opened my mail after a week in San Francisco I discovered that my article was published in the latest release of WeLoveIT (a free magazine for Oracle & Java users and developers). If you can read Dutch (or want to try), you can read it either here or here .

The day started easy: The first session had similar content as the last one of yesterday - which I didn't like too much - and the second one got cancelled. So a late start, what was fairly convenient because of yesterday's party... The first one was by Arup Nanda about 11g New Features for DBA's . Since 11g is already 'old school', I didn't learned that much: physical / logical / snapshot standby databases (quite handy for testing in a real production environment, performing rolling upgrades and reporting); partition by reference (where you can easily keep master and detail data in the same partition) etc. I was hoping for more R2 stuff, but maybe it is just to early as that version was released just a couple of weeks ago. The second one was all about Data Security . There are so many features and options regarding that subject. To name a few: VPD, FGA, Encryption, Data Masking, Advanced Security, Audit Vault, Database Vault, Label Security, Secure Backup.... I ...

I started off with a good breakfast with my roomies Marco and Jacco. Because there wasn't any interesting session in the first timeslot (or I couldn't find it), I attended the Exhibition Hall - which is mainly the same as previous years. Everyone wants to 'scan your badge' so they can spam you afterwards. Next there were two sessions I really liked, and - it may or may not be a coincidence - both were 30 minutes 'power sessions'. The first one was by Mark Drake, the Product Manager for XML DB, about Managing XML Content with APEX . Very good job, although having live demo's obviously are a risk...and that's why I like them! The next one was about Row Level Security / VPD and APEX. The presenter had a good demo and explained the stuff nicely. I followed the keynote from the OTN Lounge (it is less boring with a beer). It wasn't a surprise anymore that The Governator would attend. Arnold emphasized that technology will deliver the solution for CO2 redu...

This day started easy by skipping the keynotes. So the first session I attended was at 11:30, called The Life of a Query in which the presenter revealed the details on the internal processing of the Oracle database. Next was Giving your Application Express a Web 2.0 Facelift . Not that many new things, but Raj is always very entertaining to watch. The most interesting thing I saw was a new prototype of the APEX Developer page on Patrick Wolfs laptop: Instead of the current Page Definition view (with Page, Regions, Items, Processes and so on), the same information was presented in an DHTMLX tree view! Patrick showed how you can easily re-order Items, copy buttons etc by just dragging them around in the tree. And on every object you can do a right mouse click that would present the actions you can do with that object. It looked very slick! We shortly discussed whether or not you should expand that tree with one level (Page) or even two (Application), to make it even easier to copy and m...

Still suffering from the jet lag I woke up at 6 AM today. Due to all kinds of other 'obligations' I only attended one session today about "How to get 10x improvement of your PL/SQL Application performance time" . And that one was all about TimesTen (a.k.a. IMDB - In Memory Database Cache). The session started with a small - alas pre-recorded - demo that indeed showed a 10x performance benefit. But before you all start to move all your applications to TimesTen, be aware that there are 'some' limitations: - Not all standard PL/SQL packages are available in TimesTen - You can't call PL/SQL from SQL - You can't use triggers in TimesTen - You can't join between tables in TimesTen and the 'real' database So due to this limitations, you can't run all PL/SQL applications (like APEX!) in a TimesTen database. However it would be extremely cool if you could use TimesTen for APEX (imagine APEX running 10x faster!). So maybe somewhere in the future,...

This week I am in San Francisco for my third Oracle Oracle Open World. Because it was my second consecutive visit I received an "Oracle Alumni" tag (for my badge) and a nice jacket during registration. This Sunday the first session (at 800 AM! - OOW is really hard work...) was by...me! There were around 50 to 60 attendees, and IMHO that's not too bad for a session at that time. The session seemed to be interesting enough for 111 people to include in their schedule, but I guess for a few of them it was too early after all... The session went ok, not great, but ok. I would rather do a session after being a couple of days in the US, because then you're more used to the language. This one was within 20 hours of arrival. Right after my session - and a well deserved cup of Starbucks coffee with Edwin - I went back to the "Holland ACE House", where I am staying with Marco, Andreas and Jacco, to drop off my laptop. BTW the house, rented by Anjo (thanks mate!), is ve...

I just uploaded a video with a small demo of the integration of Oracle Forms and APEX. The quality is not quite what I wanted, but it gives - some kind - of idea. If you want to see the real (high res) demo, you can visit my presentation at Oracle Open World (at Sunday morning 8:00...) - or at the upcoming UKOUG.