APEX 4.0 EA version is now out. Everyone who has been waiting to get their hands on the new release can sign up at: http://tryapexnow.com/. Click on the Sign Up button.
tryapexnow.com Early Adopter Sign Up Page
I first launched the application in IE8 (browser) but realized that some of the buttons were not showing up. Oracle also posts a warning, “Internet Explorer is not currently supported with the hosted APEX 4.0 Early Adopter. The preferred browser for this evaluation is Mozilla Firefox. Internet Explorer will be fully supported at a later date (before Production).”
Application Express 4.0 EA Home Page
I first wanted to try the new application type – “websheet”. But as I clicked on the option, I got an error: “Websheets are not enabled at this time”. Looking at some of the messages, it looks like Oracle will have an EA Phase II.
The interface does look good. I will be reviewing the new features and posting my feedback/thoughts here in future posts.
Last week I had installed Oracle XE on our Linux DEV box. I wanted to make some changes to the instance settings and realized I had misplaced the password for Internal workspace account. After doing some research, I found that Oracle provides us a “password change” script with APEX source code. We can run this script using the SYS account and it will reset the password for internal account. Here are the steps and an example:
1) Log into sqlplus using the SYS account.
2) Execute apxxepwd.sql script in the APEX source code directory with the new password.
3) Log back into Application Express INTERNAL workspace using the new password.
Here is an example:
[home@localhost]# cd apex
[home@localhost apex]# sqlplus sys/syspassword
SQL> @apxxepwd.sql password123
Session altered.
...changing password for ADMIN
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
Commit complete.
SQL> exit
The code in apxxepwd.sql looks like this:
Rem Copyright (c) Oracle Corporation 1999 - 2006. All Rights Reserved.
Rem
Rem NAME
Rem apxxepwd.sql
Rem
Rem DESCRIPTION
Rem Changes the password for the INTERNAL ADMIN user
Rem
Rem NOTES
Rem Assumes the SYS user is connected.
Rem
Rem REQUIRENTS
Rem - Oracle 10g
Rem
Rem
Rem MODIFIED (MM/DD/YYYY)
Rem jstraub 08/01/2006 - Created
Rem jkallman 09/29/2006 - Adjusted current_schema to FLOWS_030000
Rem jkallman 08/02/2007 - Change FLOWS_030000 references to FLOWS_030100
Rem
set define '&'
set verify off
alter session set current_schema = FLOWS_030100;
prompt ...changing password for ADMIN
begin
wwv_flow_security.g_security_group_id := 10;
wwv_flow_security.g_user := 'ADMIN';
wwv_flow_security.g_import_in_progress := true;
for c1 in (select user_id
from wwv_flow_fnd_user
where security_group_id = wwv_flow_security.g_security_group_id
and user_name = wwv_flow_security.g_user) loop
wwv_flow_fnd_user_api.edit_fnd_user(
p_user_id => c1.user_id,
p_user_name => wwv_flow_security.g_user,
p_web_password => '&1',
p_new_password => '&1');
end loop;
wwv_flow_security.g_import_in_progress := false;
end;
/
commit;
For one of our clients, we developed an APEX application (APEX 3.2.1) and during a screen review they were particularly concerned with the look of the entry fields that had disproportionate lengths. As a best practice, its important for an application to have a uniform look to be aesthetically pleasing. The application required a form with multiple select drop down lists and by default “select lists” in APEX display different widths based on the existing data value lengths. During QA the users were not pleased with the look of the select lists and requested to see uniformed columns. We decided to make the width of the “select lists” to match the width of the longest select list value in the form.
Image of Form before the Select Lists are sized to match
Image of Form after the Select Lists are sized to match
Within APEX forms, we can control the width of the items by using the “Width” attribute for an item. Unfortunately setting this attribute does not work for a “Select List” item. My solution was to use inline style (CSS attribute) for controlling the select list width. To apply the style to control the width, edit the Select List item (Page Properties -> Edit Page Item -> Element Properties) and update the “HTML Form Element Attributes” setting to the required width. See example image below. (Example: style=”width:200px”).
Apply Style in HTML Form Element Attributes
I applied the same width to all the select lists on the form. Now, when we run the application, take note of the uniform ”Select Lists” on the form as shown below.
Select Lists in the Form have the same Width
The key here for such a simple task, was using CSS styles.