Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 2 Hidden Gems of APEX David Gale Software Engineer Oracle Application Express November, 2014

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 3 “I didn’t know APEX could do that” Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 4 David Gale has been working with Oracle Application Express since 2009 (v. 4.0). He has been part of the APEX development team since joining Oracle in D AVID G ALE Software Engineer Oracle Application Express Database Tools | Server Technologies 1900 Oracle Way Reston Virginia phone mobile

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 5 Safe Harbor Statement The following is intended to outline our general product direction. It is intended for information purposes only, and may not be incorporated into any contract. It is not a commitment to deliver any material, code, or functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decisions. The development, release, and timing of any features or functionality described for Oracle’s products remains at the sole discretion of Oracle.

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 6 Introduction Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 7 Oracle Application Express Database-centric development tool for Oracle Database application development Targeted at Web-based developers who know SQL and PL/SQL Develop Desktop and Mobile applications 100% Browser-based Development and Runtime Declarative framework for rapid application definition, and full application life cycle. On premise, on laptop, on cloud, on RAC, any platform Oracle DB is available

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 8 HTML DB 1.5  First Release HTML DB 1.6  UI Themes APEX 2.1  Oracle XE APEX 2.2  Supporting DB Objects for full app installation and upgrade APEX 3.1  Interactive Reports HTML DB 2.0  SQL Workshop APEX 3.0  Flash Charts  PDF Printing  Access Migration APEX 3.2  Oracle Forms to APEX Conversion APEX 4.1  Data Upload  Error Handling  ROWID APEX 4.2  Mobile  HTML5  Packaged Apps APEX 4.0  Websheets  Dynamic Actions  Plug-Ins  Team Development / 5 Application Express 5.0*  Universal Theme  Page Designer  UI Modernization  HTML5 Plugins , 3, 4 APEX 4.2 Dot Releases  Improved Packaged Apps Development initiated August 1999 *Available in Early Adopter Only (apexea.oracle.com) Also known as Oracle APEX (a'peks) History

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 9 Fully supported no-cost feature of the Oracle Database Supported as a no-cost feature of the Oracle Database No cost feature of database 10gR2 ( ), 11gR1, 11gR2, 12c Any number of developers, applications, any number of end-users Specialized Oracle Support Team – Included with Database Maintenance Agreement All database editions: EE, SE, SE1, XE Exadata, ODA, RAC, Partitioning, Compression, InMemory, Multitenant… Distribution Distributed with all editions of Oracle database 11g and 12c Available as a download from OTNOTN Oracle Cloud Services “Oracle Database Cloud Service” aka schema since October Sold as a fully managed service with 1GB free trial, and 5, 20, 50 GB paid services. Available as “development only” customer evaluation service on

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 10 Hidden Gem: APEX Data Dictionary Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 11 APEX Data Dictionary Set of views of (most) metadata for Workspaces, Applications, etc. Accessible through SQL Application → Utilities → Application Express Views

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 12 APEX Data Dictionary

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 13 APEX Data Dictionary (Tree View)

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 14 Hidden Gem: APEX Advisor Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 15 APEX Advisor Automated test suite for common APEX errors and security vulnerabilities Application → Utilities → Advisor

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 16 APEX Advisor

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 17 Hidden Gem: Application Search Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 18 Application Search Several shortcuts – - Open page in editor (current application) – : - Open page in editor – :s – Application Shared Components (new in 5.0) Search prior to opening an application: full workspace search

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 19 Hidden Gem: SQL Workshop Utilities Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 20 SQL Workshop Utilities Suite of tools for working with database objects – Data loading – DDL generation – API package creation – Schema comparison – …and more… SQL Workshop → Utilities

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 21 SQL Workshop Utilities

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 22 Hidden Gem: Query on Selected Table Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 23 Query on Selected Table Part of the Find (not search) functionality Automatically generates select statement with all column names Better than “select *” for usability and maintenance Find → Tables

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 24 Query on Selected Table

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 25 Hidden Gem: PL/SQL Column Headings Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 26 PL/SQL Column Headings Classic Reports only Combine with “SQL Query (PL/SQL function body returning SQL query)” report type for dynamic reports Function returning colon-separated list of column headings Can use apex_util.set_report_column_format(…) to specify format masks at the same time

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 27 PL/SQL Column Headings

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 28 Hidden Gem: Page Items to Submit Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 29 Page Items to Submit Automatically copy page item values from DOM to session state Attribute of reports and PL/SQL dynamic action steps Enables partial page refresh for reports, complex dynamic actions

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 30 Page Items to Submit

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 31 Page Items to Submit

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 32 Hidden Gem: Packaged Applications Oracle Application Express

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 33 Packaged Applications Suite of pre-built applications available for immediate deployment and use Two types – Sample Applications – demonstrate specific functionality Can be installed and inspected immediately – Productivity Applications – designed to meet actual business needs Locked upon initial installation Fully supported by Oracle* Active development

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 34 Packaged Applications

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 35

Copyright © 2014 Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. | 36