Oracle APEX Best Practices

298 Pages·2012·0.86 MB·English

by  Alex Nuijten

Oracle APEX Best Practices
Oracle APEX Best Practices
Copyright © 2012 Packt Publishing
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First published: October 2012
Production Reference: 1181012
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
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ISBN 978-1-84968-400-2
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Cover Image by Sandeep Babu ( )
<[email protected]>
Credits
Authors
Learco Brizzi
Iloon Ellen-Wolff
Alex Nuijten
Reviewers
Dimitri Gielis
Surachart Opun
Michel van Zoest
Acquisition Editors
Dilip Venkatesh
Dhwani Devatar
Lead Technical Editor
Susmita Panda
Technical Editors
Prasad Dalvi
Lubna Shaikh
Project Coordinators
Yashodhan Dere
Jovita Pinto
Proofreader
Aaron Nash
Indexers
Tejal Soni
Hemangini Bari
Graphics
Valentina Dsilva
Aditi Gajjar
Production Coordinator
Nilesh R. Mohite
Cover Work
Nilesh R. Mohite
About the Authors
Learco Brizzi received his MSc in Informatics in 1993 and then he started
working with the early versions of Oracle Forms (3.0), Reports (1.1), and
Designer (1.2.1). When WebDB was launched, he created his first steps
towards building Internet applications. When APEX (HTMLDB) hit the
market, he saw the potential of this tool and built a complete music
download store with it in 2004, including integration with e-mail, reports,
and payment service providers. This was one of the very first serious
applications ever built with APEX. Nowadays, Learco is dedicated to the
APEX and PL/SQL development. He is a very enthusiastic technician,
trainer of advanced APEX courses, presenter at conferences, organizer of
seminars, committee member of the OGh (Oracle user group in Holland)
and member of the editorial-committee for the Oracle magazine OGh Visie.
Together with a companion Learco started his own company, Itium, in
1999, which specializes in Oracle technology. In May 2010, Learco was
awarded the Oracle ACE membership. You can contact Learco at
.
<[email protected]>
I would like to thank my wife Judith, and my children Emma (my nine-
year-old daughter) and Dante (my six-year-old son) for their patience
and support they gave me while writing this book. Most of the work
had to be done in the evenings and weekends (our family time
together).
For me this was the first time I wrote a book and didn't know what to
expect. I didn't expect that it would take so much time, but it was fun to
do and I learned a lot of new things about Oracle and APEX as well.
I would also like to thank my fellow writers Alex and Iloon. Together we
were a great team and kept each other sharp.
Last but not least I would like to thank the editors of the book who had
good comments and suggestions on our material.
Iloon Ellen-Wolff started working with Oracle 21 years ago, employed by
several software houses in the Netherlands. Her experience goes back to
Oracle Forms version 2 and Report Writer.
Almost 14 years ago, she started working for Oracle Support Services for
the developer competency (Oracle Forms, Oracle Reports, SQL Developer,
and Application Express), assisting customers by solving their software-
related problems.
During those years, she applied the knowledge she had gained in many
ways such as coaching new engineers, team leading, teaching the
Application Express courses, and seminars for Oracle University.
Aside from being a very senior team member with excellent
troubleshooting and customer skills, in Oracle Support, she acts as
Advanced Resolution Engineer.
One of her responsibilities in Oracle Support is Global Technical Lead
Application Express. She works closely with Sustaining Engineering,
Product Development, and Product Management of the Application
Express team.
Starting last year, she is now involved in the Oracle Cloud project. She is
member of the platform as a service readiness team. Involved in testing
Application Express in the Cloud and being a trainer in this area, she
enjoys the challenge to prepare her engineers for the Cloud and ultimately
to support Oracle customers in the very near future!
Besides that, she is a frequent speaker for different Oracle User Groups
about Application Express, SQL Developer, and Oracle Public Cloud.
I would like to take the opportunity to thank the Application Express
development team and particularly Joel Kallman as Development
Director for the continuing effort to make Application Express an
excellent product.
I'd also like to thank my husband, Albert Ellen, for assisting me in
getting the layout right and supporting me in writing this book. Of
course, it took a big amount of time to achieve this goal.
I would also like to thank co-authors on this book, Alex and Learco.
Alex Nuijten works as a database developer and Expertise Lead
(database development) for AMIS Services BV in Nieuwegein, The
Netherlands. Besides his consultancy work, he conducts training classes,
mainly in SQL and PL/SQL. Alex has been a speaker at numerous
international conferences, such as ODTUG, Oracle Open World, UKOUG,
IOUG, OGh, and OBUG. He is also a frequent contributor at the Oracle
Technology Network forum for SQL and PL/SQL. He has written many
articles in Oracle-related magazines, and at regular intervals he writes
about Oracle database development on the AMIS Technology Blog
(technology.amis.nl), as well as on his own blog, Notes on Oracle
(nuijten.blogspot.com). In August 2010, Alex was awarded the Oracle ACE
Director membership.
I think this may be the hardest section to write. There are so many
people that inspired me and from whom I have learned so much along
the way. And each one of them helped me in writing my chapters. It
would be impossible to try to name you all and therefore do injustice to
the ones I let slip. My colleagues, fellow members of the OTN forums
and in the ACE program, the bloggers, the Oracle user groups all over
the globe, basically everyone I ever dealt with—a big thank you to you
all.
There are still some people I have to name in this section explicitly.
Let me start by thanking my co-authors, Iloon and Learco. Writing this
book was quite a journey. Thank you for allowing me to join you with
this adventure, it was a great experience.
Without the technical reviewers, this book would have looked totally
different. Thank you, Dimitri Gielis, Surachart Opun, and Michel van
Zoest, for your feedback and suggestions on improving the quality of
the book. Any outstanding errors in my chapters are, of course, my
own.
Without the continuing support of my wife Rian, son Tim, and daughter
Lara, I could never have worked on this. Preparing presentations,
writing articles and chapters take an enormous amount of time and my
family understands this, and they are alright with it. I could never do all
that without you, I love you so much.
Finally I would like to thank the Packt editorial and production teams
who have worked on this book, especially Yashodhan Dere, Susmita
Panda, Dilip Venkatesh, Dhwani Devatar, and Jovita Pinto.
About the Reviewers
Dimitri Gielis was born in 1978. Together with his family he lives in
Leuven, Belgium.
At an early age, Dimitri started experimenting with computers (Apple II and
IBM XT), and he quickly got to know that he would like to work with
computers and especially with databases all his life.
In 2000, Dimitri began his career working as a consultant for Oracle
Belgium where he came across almost every Oracle product. His main
expertise was in the database area, but at that time he was also exposed
to HTMLDB, which was renamed as Oracle Application Express later on.
From the very start he liked the Oracle database and APEX so much that
he never stopped working with it. Dimitri then switched to another company
to create an Oracle team and do pre-sales, to later create and manage an
Oracle Business Unit.
In 2007, Dimitri co-founded APEX Evangelists (http://www.apex-
evangelists.com), together with John Scott. APEX Evangelists is a
company that specializes in providing training, development, and
consulting specifically for the Oracle Application Express product.
On his blog (http://dgielis.blogspot.com), he shares his thoughts and
experience about Oracle, and especially, Oracle Application Express.
Dimitri is a frequent presenter at OBUG Connect, IOUG Collaborate,
ODTUG Kaleidoscope, UKOUG conference, and Oracle Open World. He
likes to share his experience and meet other people. He's also President of
the OBUG (Oracle Benelux User Group) APEX SIG.
In 2008, Dimitri became an Oracle ACE Director. Oracle ACE Directors are
known for their strong credentials as Oracle community enthusiasts and
advocates.
In 2009, Dimitri received the APEX Developer of the year award by Oracle
Magazine.
In 2012, Dimitri was part of the LA OTN Tour where he presented different
APEX topics.
You can contact Dimitri at .
<[email protected]>
Surachart Opun has been working on Oracle products for over seven
years. He has worked with Internet Service Provider Business for over
eight years. He is Oracle ACE, OCE RAC 10g, and OCP 10g and 11g. He
has experience in implementation, migration, and management of Oracle
Database in telecommunication business and so on. He has spent time in
helping people who are interested in the Oracle products as contributor. He
is working on APEX since version 3 and has worked on APEX
implementation and migration.
His blog is at http://surachartopun.com.
Michel van Zoest was born in 1976. He currently lives in Bergambacht,
The Netherlands with his wife, two daughters, and son.
In 2000, he started working as an Oracle Consultant. He now has more
than 12 years of experience in building (web) applications by using the
Oracle technologies such as Oracle (web) Forms, Oracle Designer,
MOD_PLSQL, ADF, SOA Suite, and of course, APEX.
Michel was one of the first Oracle Application Express Developer Certified
Experts in the world.
He currently works at Whitehorses in The Netherlands and runs his own
blog at http://www.aboutapex.com. As well as that, he blogs at the
company website at http://blog.whitehorses.nl and he regularly writes
Whitebook articles (in Dutch) for Whitehorses.
Michel is also one of the authors of the Oracle APEX 4.0 Cookbook
published by Packt in December 2010.
You can contact Michel via his website or by emailing him at
.
<[email protected]>