Preface
Oracle Application Express — APEX for short, or by its former name, HTML DB, is a declarative, Web-based RAD (Rapid Application Development) tool. APEX runs inside an Oracle database, tightly integrated with its internal resources, and utilize them optimally. Using a Web browser, it allows us to develop, test, and deploy a Web based, data-centric application in a declarative manner, but on the same time it doesn't limit our abilities to manually enter specific and tailored code, both on the client and server side, that will answer our most specific needs and demands.
Developing data centric Web applications can be a real challenge as it's a multi-disciplinary process. There are many technologies involved in the client side (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc.); the interaction with the database, in the server side; the typless nature of the Web environment; and above all, the need to put it all together, in a manner that will allow the end users to do their job, in the simplest and most efficient way, while enriching their user experience. If you are working in the Oracle environment, APEX can be your best solution.
What is the aim of the book
With this book, you'll learn how to easily develop data centric Web applications for the Oracle environment, using the APEX RAD tool.
This book is not a recipes book, although it includes many working examples. You will learn to understand the basic principles behind the APEX building blocks, and how they operate. It will allow you to take advantage of existing "APEX recipes" but more importantly to create your own.
The book covers the development cycle of an APEX application. It starts with the design phase, including building your necessary database objects infrastructure; continue with ways to implement the application logic (on the server side) and the User Interface (on the client side), whilst showing you how to enhance your applications features and functionality, according to your specific needs; and it ends with application deployment.
The book includes dedicated chapters that deal with the Globalization and Localization aspects of developing APEX applications, with dedicated chapter for developing Right-To-Left oriented applications.
Who this book is for
This book is for developers, in general, and web developers, in particular, who wish to learn how to develop data-centric web applications in the Oracle environment. It is also for novice APEX developers, who wish to learn how to use and best utilize the APEX environment, as well as for more experience APEX developers who wish to improve their knowledge and understanding of APEX and its capabilities and learn from the experiences of others.
Developers who work in a multi-lingual environment, in general, and in a Right-To-Left environment, in particular, will be most beneficial from the dedicated chapters on these subjects, which include issues that we believe are documented for the first time.
The book assumes basic knowledge of HTML, SQL, and PL/SQL. Basic JavaScript understanding is an advantage, and in general, can make your life much easier as an APEX developer. The book includes a dedicated chapter which gives a general review of these issues.
What this book covers
Chapter 1, An Introduction to APEX gives an introduction of APEX architecture and technology, while explains some of the above-mentioned terms in the APEX context.
Chapter 2, What we need to know to effectively use APEX reviews. Some of the basic skills we should have in order to better utilize the Web development aspects of APEX. It talks about HTML, the DOM, CSS, and JavaScript.
Chapter 3, APEX Basic Concepts discusses some of the major APEX concepts and explains how they can help us in our developmental efforts.
Chapter 4, The Application Builder Basic Concepts and Building Blocks explains the major building blocks of the APEX application, and how to create them using the APEX Application Builder.
Chapter 5, APEX Items discusses the major building blocks of the application page the application items. We'll review application items and page items and learn how they can serve us in our applications.
Chapter 6, APEX Buttons explains different types of buttons that a developer can place on an APEX page, creating/editing them, assigning attributes and using the REQUEST feature
Chapter 7, APEX Computations reviews the computation mechanism and sees how we can use it in our applications.
Chapter 8, APEX Validations discusses APEX validations, which help us to maintain the integrity and consistency of our data by making sure that only correct and consistent data will be used and saved into the database.
Chapter 9, APEX Processes reviews the main concepts of APEX processes and how they can help us to implement our application logic. It includes discussions on application level processes (including on-demand processes), page level processes, and the various types and options APEX provides us with to implement them.
Chapter 10, APEX Branches discusses APEX Branches, which are responsible for the flow of the application.
Chapter 11, APEX SQL Workshop reviews some APEX IDE built-in utilities that will help us define our application database infrastructure, either declaratively or by using DDL commands and scripts.
Chapter 12, APEX Forms reviews the various sources that we can use to create an APEX form. How to use the APEX Create Form wizard to generate a new form and manually create an APEX form.
Chapter 13, APEX Reports discusses how we can create and modify reports in APEX applications.
Chapter 14, Tabular Forms describe the APEX tabular form concept, with a very detailed discussion on how to generate one using an APEX wizard, or in more complex scenarios, doing it manually, using specific APEX APIs.
Chapter 15, Calendars looks at how we can use calendar components in our applications.
Chapter 16, Interactive Reports looks at how we can use Interactive Reports in our applications.
Chapter 17, AJAX with APEX looks at how we can utilize the APEX AJAX framework, both on the client and server side, to integrate and support this important technology in our APEX applications.
Chapter 18, Globalization and Localization With APEX Applications deals with the Globalization and Localization aspects of APEX applications. It include detailed discussion about the APEX built-in translation mechanism and sees how we can develop multi-lingual APEX applications.
Chapter 19, Right-To-Left Support in APEX review the specific actions we need to take in order to generate and support APEX Right-To-Left applications.
Chapter 20, Deploying APEX Applications discuss the means APEX provides us to deploy our developed applications.
Chapter 21, The APEX Runtime Environment explains what the APEX Runtime Environment is all about and how we can manage it.
Chapter 22, Security looks at APEX Security and how it can be used in our applications.
Chapter 23, Application Conversion looks at how we can convert Microsoft Access and Oracle Forms applications to APEX.
Chapter 24, APEX Best Practices looks at the best practices for developing APEX applications.
Appendix deals with APEX installation, upgradation, and configuration issues.
Standards and assumptions
This book assumes basic knowledge in the main technologies and programming languages that we are using while working in APEX. These include, for the client side, HTML/XHTML, CSS, and JavaScript; and for the server side SQL and PL/SQL.
You can practice developing APEX application using the Oracle hosted site on apex.oracle.com. APEX is also included in the free ORACLE XE database version, which can be downloaded from the Oracle OTN site (otn.oracle.com). You can also download the latest version of APEX, and use it to upgrade the built-in version in the Oracle XE.
Conventions
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text are shown as follows: "On a page level, we define the<style> tag in the<head> section of the HTML code."
A block of code is set as follows:
<head> . . . <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="myCSS.css" /> . . . </head>
When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:
select *
from emp t
where t.deptno = v('P1_DEPTNO')
and t.hiredate = (select max(hiredate) hiredate
from emp t1
where deptno = v('P1_DEPTNO'))
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "APEX includes some wizards and tools, such as the Wizard Report and Query Builder."
Note
Warnings or important notes appear in a box like this.
Note
Tips and tricks appear like this.
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