Oracle Application Express 4.0 with Ext JS

393 Pages·2011·18.86 MB·English

by  Mark Lancaster

Oracle Application Express 4.0
with Ext JS
Deliver rich, desktop-styled Oracle APEX applications
using the powerful Ext JS JavaScript library

Mark Lancaster
professional expertise distilled
N
BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI
Oracle Application Express 4.0 with Ext JS
Copyright © 2011 Packt Publishing
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First published: March 2011
Production Reference: 1180311
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
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ISBN 978-1-849681-06-3
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Cover Image by David Guettirrez ([e-mail])
Credits
Author Editorial Team Leader
Mark Lancaster Vinodhan Nair
Reviewer Project Team Leader
Vincent Stanislaus Lata Basantani
Acquisition Editor Project Coordinator
Amey Kanse Leena Purkait
Development Editors Proofreader
Reshma Sundaresan Clyde Jenkins
Roger D'souza
Graphics
Geetanjali Sawant
Technical Editors
Gaurav Datar
Azharuddin Sheikh Production Coordinator
Arvindkumar Gupta
Indexer
Monica Ajmera Mehta Cover Work
Arvindkumar Gupta
About the Author
Mark Lancaster has been delivering business solutions using Oracle tools and
technology since 1995. He switched to using Oracle APEX in 2007 after using
MOD_PLSQL for years - "APEX is much better".
He has had the good fortune of consulting for a wide variety of organizations
in industries, including commercial fishery management, mineral resources,
superannuation regulation, property asset management, distance education, casinos,
and debt collection.
Mark is an Oracle ACE, having been actively involved in the Oracle community
for many years on national and state committees, as well as writing articles and
presenting at conferences.
He is the AUSOUG QLD Branch President, and maintains a blog at
http://oracleinsights.blogspot.com.
One of the really nice things about working with Oracle APEX is
the sense of community you gain through the forums with people
scattered all over the globe.

I've had the good fortune to have met face to face with several
members of the APEX development team and APEX enthusiasts
after communicating with them via forums and e-mails. It's really
surprising how much personality comes through in the written word.

One of the strengths of APEX is how accessible the APEX
development team is to the development community. They really are
interested in your feedback and making the APEX better. It's a real
buzz when one of your suggestions is incorporated into the product.

Finally, I'd like to thank my beautiful wife Jackie for giving me the
time and support to write this book. Oh, and for continuing to put
up with me for over twenty years now. You rock my world.
About the Reviewer
Vincent Stanislaus has been working in the IT industry for over 12 years, with
half of this time spent in the Finance Industry (especially around the Global Wealth
Management area) as Technical Team Leader/Senior Application Development
Analyst involved in several high-profile projects.
In the last couple of years, he has been focusing on enforcing standards within the
development team and is involved extensively in reviewing code to ensure that they
conform to technology standards.
Early on in his career, he focused on various projects involving government
organizations and universities, focusing on developing/enhancing their
management systems.
He currently resides in Melbourne, Australia with his wife Robina and his two
children, Jonathan and Marilyn.
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Table of Contents
Preface 1
Chapter 1: Setting up an Oracle APEX and Ext JS Environment 11
Setting up for success 12
Installing Oracle APEX 13
Downloading Ext JS 14
Which web server to use? 16
Storing your web assets 16
Customizing application builder files 17
Oracle HTTP Server 17
Loading Ext JS onto the Oracle HTTP Server 19
Embedded PL/SQL Gateway 20
Loading Ext JS onto the Embedded PL/SQL Gateway 21
Oracle APEX listener 23
Loading Ext JS for the Oracle APEX listener 24
Overviewing the production setup 25
Using Ext JS in a hosted APEX environment 27
Installing a source code repository 27
Automating the build process 30
Configuring and using APEXExport 30
More ideas for automating the build process 35
Setting up a local web server 36
Summary 37
Chapter 2: Getting Acquainted with Ext 39
Building a sandbox 39
Cross-browser DOM manipulation with Ext.Element 44
Heavyweight versus flyweight 46
Table of Contents
Sizing and positioning 47
CSS classes and styling 48
DOM traversal 50
Selecting multiple elements 52
DOM manipulation 54
Defining event handlers 58
Using event delegation to reduce memory consumption 61
One-off events 62
Parameter passing using object notation 63
Old-school parameters 63
Using object notation 63
Basic syntax 64
Use namespacing to avoid collisions 65
Ext.namespace 67
Ext.BLANK_IMAGE_URL 67
Summary 68
Chapter 3: Building a Ext JS Theme into APEX 69
Theme basics 69
Separation of concerns 70
Standard themes 71
Creating a theme 72
Building a Viewport Page template 73
Starting with a standalone template 74
Loading the page template into APEX 80
Issue when input items are outside the form 85
Ensuring that input items always remain with the form 88
Summary 92
Chapter 4: Ext Themed Regions, Labels, and Lists 95
Region templates 96
Report Region 96
Form Region 98
Additional region templates 101
Label templates 101
Optional label 102
QuickTips for error messages 103
Optional label with help 105
Mandatory label 106
Mandatory label with help 107
Hidden label 107
[ ii ]
Table of Contents
List templates 108
Vertical unordered list without bullets 109
Vertical unordered list with bullets 112
Building an Ext JS tree template using lists 113
APEX 4.0 tree template 115
Prior APEX versions tree template 119
Highlighting the current node 121
Customizing individual nodes 124
Summary 125
Chapter 5: Ext Themed Buttons, Popups, Calendars, and Reports 127
Button templates 128
Sliding doors meet CSS sprites 128
APEX sliding door CSS sprite button template 132
Building a hideous Ext.Button 134
Converting our buttons 138
Popup List of Values template 146
Breadcrumb templates 149
Benefits of using breadcrumbs 150
When not to use breadcrumbs 150
Basic horizontal breadcrumb template 150
Report templates 152
It's a classic 153
A better sorting indicator 158
CSS for the standard report 159
Calendar templates 159
Removing unused templates quickly 164
Publishing your theme 166
Summary 167
Chapter 6: Adding Ext Layout Elements 169
Speed dating with a Date Picker 170
Converting Classic Dates to the Ext.DatePicker 171
Resizable text areas 174
Auto-sizing text areas 176
Auto-completing text fields 177
Adding auto-complete to select lists 179
Building tab panels using subregions 185
Building the tab panel template 187
Configuring the tab panel template 192
Toolbars and menus 194
Attaching the toolbar to the center panel 198
Summary 199
[ iii ]