Iloon's blog

Nice scenario

2011-08-14T23:01:00.000-07:00

I received the following problem in Oracle Support that baffled me for some time.

Environment:
10.2.0.3 Rdbms
4.0.2.00.07 Application Express

Error in the browser:
Unable To Fetch Authentication_scheme In Application.

Error in the webserver log files:
ORA-06512: at "APEX_040000.WWV_FLOW", line xx
ORA-06512: at "APEX_040000.WWV_FLOW", line xx
ORA-06512: at "APEX_040000.F", line xx
ORA-06512: at "APEX_040000.F", line xx
ORA-06512: at line xx
ORA-20867: ORA-06502: PL/SQL: numeric or value error: character string buffer to small

Above error is also described in the known issues against Application Express Release 4.0.2
Known issues in APEX 4.0.2

Solution: Apply the patch for bug 5890966 (related bug) or apply the 10.2.0.3 Patch 6 on Windows Platforms (if on Windows Platforms) or apply the 10.2.0.4 database patch set or upgrade to 11gR1 or later.

But after applying the necessary patches the problem was not fixed yet.

Received the application without customer data. So a plain sql file.
Stripped the appliction completely.
At the end, I only had one page left.

Tried to create the most simple testcase as possible so replaced the tables used with the demo tables of Oracle DEPT and EMP.
Changed the authentication schema to application express.
Problem still reproduced.

Removed the form on the table and created a 'dummy HTML' region instead.
Tested the application:

After logging in, I received the ORA-06502 error
Could not write to error page

Checked the TAB pages and indeed, the problem was caused by the amount of TAB pages used!

Connclusion:
I was completely in the wrong direction because of the error message generated by the system.
Now, I can understand the error message generated by the system!
By eliminating, I was able to find the real underlying cause of the problem.

DBA Symposium at the 17th of May

2011-05-29T02:26:00.000-07:00

At the 17th of May, I presented at the DBA symposium in the Netherlands.

There were ten technical sessions spread over two parallel tracks.
Different Oracle DBA people shared their experiences with the participants.
They showed how to recognize, prevent and solve problems.

For me, it was the first time to deliver a presentation for only Oracle DBA people.
Normally, I present for Oracle Developers and therefore an extra challenge for me!

I presented about Application Express.
Application Express is very popular in the Netherlands.
An Oracle DBA needs to know were to take care of when dealing with application express.

In autumn of this year, a next DBA symposium will be organized.
I hope to meet you there.

Information about planboard symposium can be found here:
DBA Symposium.

Bulgarian User Group Conference in Sandanski

2011-05-14T07:53:00.000-07:00

Presented at the Bulgarian Oracle User Group in Sandanski.
Sandanski is the warmest and sunniest town in Bulgaria.

Around three hundred people attended the conference.
There were three parallel sessions available.
For me, a nice opportunity to broadening my knowledge in database area. I also very interested in DBA related stuff!
So next week, I am going to install Application Express in a RAC instance.

One of the sessions, I attended was the session from Daniel Morgan.
To increase your Pl/sql knowledge it is worth it to check the following website. Morgans Library.

Today, I attended sessions from Chris Date. Everybody of you has to recognize this name. Chris Date.

It was a very valuable conference and I did learn a lot.

I need to mention that the whole conference is very well organized, and that I will come back to Bulgaria!

Thanks a lot for the very warm welcome!

Book Review

2011-04-05T03:51:00.001-07:00

Beginning Oracle Application Express 4
Authors: Doug Gault, Karen Cannell, Patrick Cimolini, Martin Giffy D’Souza and Tim St. Hilaire

If you are thinking about developing a product with Application Express this book is a great place to start. It is a complete hands-on book. You will work through the examples and exercises. Example code is available at the website from the publisher. (www.apress.com) Downloadable code and exercises make the book very valuable for learning Application Express. It is really practical and covering almost all the essential application development aspects. You will learn Step by Step from this book with little knowledge of PL/SQL, HTML and JavaScript.

A ticket system for a help desk is created from scratch. In every chapter of the book, a part of the help system is built.
The book starts by making a description of the requirements of the help desk system and to create a database design. This book also covers the steps of creating an entity relationship diagram. Good database design is the key to creating a successful application, especially with Application Express in mind. The necessary database tables used in the ERD are created in Sql*workshop. Sql*workshop and not the ERD tool is used because the objects are created from scratch.
With the basic data created, a shell is generated for the ticket system. This will be done with the options available in Application Express. After the shell is created for the application, the application is extended with forms, reports, and charts. The strength of this book is that the theoretical part is completely integrated in the exercises. This makes the book even more valuable.
When the basic part of the application is built, there is also a chapter about more advanced techniques within forms and reports. It helps to understand Application Express even better and look behind the scenes.
Programmatic elements in Application Express can provide both simple and complex features to the Application Express framework. So the help desk application is extended with conditions, validations on item level and page level, tabular form validations, computations and processes and dynamic actions.

Security in an application is often an afterthought. This book covers this very important topic. The key features of security available within Application Express are added to the application. Authentication is added to the helpdesk application by making use of a customized authentication scheme. The scheme is used to allow control over users who access the sensitive parts of the application. User access is controlled by access control lists. In the help desk application a checksum is added to the URL. This prevents URL tampering.
Once the application is ready, it needs to be deployed. So you learn how to get an application out of the system and to deploy in the production system. Techniques like export, import, and supporting objects are covered.
Websheets is a new feature in Application Express 4. In the book, you will use the features to build a websheet application from scratch. With the application you can manage your corporate soccer team. Websheets is a very nice feature to manage the soccer team. A complete example is provided.
Advanced development features are also highlighted in this book. These tools help when dealing with large applications. Features like page locks, application and page groups are covered.
Of course, your Application Express side needs to be monitored as well. Each time a page is accessed, a log entry is stored. Subjects like activity logging, login attempts, and managing workspaces are covered.
The last chapter in the book is about the team development feature. Team development is a tool for managing Application Express projects. All features like milestones, to-dos, bugs, feedback and features are discussed.

Summarized:
This book is a ‘must’ for people starting to work and develop applications in Application Express.

Application Express OGH Day

2011-03-23T02:00:00.000-07:00

APEX OGH Day at Tuesday the 22th of March
---------------------------------------------
It was an exciting day with 250 attendees.
It is very clear that Application Express is very popular in the Netherlands.

The day started with three plenary sessions.
The first presentation was hosted by Tony Andrews and Nigel Blair.
1500 forms applications were migrated to Oracle Application Express.
A big project but the result is there!
So it is possible!

Hilary Farrell member from the application express development team presented about the new features in application express 4.1.
The most important new features are listed in the statement of direction.

Dimitri Gielis and John Scott gave a helicopter overview "How to deal with big application express projects". This proofs that application express can be used in big projects as well!

After the lunch break there were three parallel sessions available.
A lot of good presentations were available, so it was hard to make a good choice.
My own presentation was dealing about the awareness of security.
You need to think about security from the beginning of a project. Every line of code has consequences for the security. Security is your own responsibility and not from Oracle! Application express is secure, but developers make it insecure.

After my own session, I decided to follow the presentation from John Scott about 'How to build a application express plug-in' A lot of times, I can find a lot of information how to import a plug-in in application express, and rarely the information about the way How to build a plug-in. I am 100% sure that this was useful for everybody in the audience.

The last session of the day I attended was the presentation from Dimitri Gielis about APEX and Locator/Spatial. I can only say, I was impressed and could not believe my eyes and ears about the possibilities available.

It was a very busy day with very good presentations and content.

After the show was closed, I had a very nice dinner with
Alex Nuijten, Learco Brizzi, Christian Rokkita, Peter Raganitsch, Roel Hartman and Jan Leendert.

Thanks all for the nice evening!

Oracle Database Firewall

2011-02-21T07:32:00.000-08:00

I want to bring under your attention, the new Oracle Product, the Database Firewall.

Information at Oracle Technology Network about the Database Firewall

External FAQ

APEX Cookbook signed

2011-01-13T01:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday evening, I received the first official signed cookbook.
This book is written by Michel van Zoest and Marcel van der Plas.

At the picture, you can see Michel van der Zoest because Marcel van der Plas was not available.

Of course, I was very honored to receive the book and I am looking forward to read the complete book.

The book and description of the book.

APEX Patch Set 4.0.2.00.07

2010-12-23T01:40:00.000-08:00

It's a re-release of 4.0.2.00.06
+ One Off Patches 10347091 and 10406645

Patch 4.0.2.00.07

End of Year

2010-12-21T02:53:00.001-08:00

It was a wonderful year.
Highlight of the year was Application Express 4.0!
Application Express is a wonderful and powerful product!

The new statement of direction of Application Express makes me happy too.
New statement of direction

I enjoyed the different APEX conferences very much and hope to meet you face to face at one of the conferences.

Looking forward to the new challenges in 2011!

Merry Christmas and Happy and Healthy 2011 for you and your family!

Thank you all for the wonderful year!

Installation of APEX 4.0.2 with Oracle 11g 11.2.0.2.0 Failed - ORA-43853

2010-12-20T03:56:00.001-08:00

Environment
--------------
APEX version 4.0.2 Fresh Installation
RDBMS 11.2.0.2
Table Space were Application Express is installed: MANUAL

ERROR at line 1:
ORA-43853: SECUREFILE lobs cannot be used
ORA-06512: at line 7

What works
------------------
* Installation from APEX version 4.0.2 against Rdbms 11.2.0.1
* Installation from APEX version 4.0.2 against Rdbms 11.2.0.2 with Table Space set to AUTO were Application Express is installed

Underlying Cause
-------------------
A difference in the behavior exists between the 11.2.0.1 and 11.2.0.2 databases and the underlying space management of table spaces. When installing APEX, the underlying table space were APEX is to be installed must to be set to AUTO.

Solution
-----------
Set the table space were APEX is to be installed to AUTO.

UKOUG Conference 2010

2010-12-03T02:39:00.000-08:00

This year, I attended for the first time the UK Oracle User Group.
The UK user group is the biggest in Europe.

The UK user group has many different tracks available. ( Server/ Fusion Middleware/ APEX/ E-business suite/ MySql etc)

I cannot choose between ODTUG in the US and UK Oracle User Group.
The best people around the world are presenting.
Therefore, I was extra honored to be a speaker at this conference!

During the conference, I attended many different kind of sessions in different kind of streams.
To broadening my knowledge, I also attended sessions dealing about ADF.

My presentation was scheduled at Tuesday and I was a little bit concerned because it was the last presentation of the day. I was very happy with the amount of people in my room.

I also like to take the opportunity to congratulate John Scott with the well deserved 'presentation award 2009'!
John is awarded for his 'Scalability in APEX' presentation.

In the evening, I joined the dinner with APEX Development team.

I really hope to come back next year!

Service Dogs

2010-10-08T03:44:00.001-07:00

I want to bring under the attention service dogs.
A service dog is doing very good work for handicapped people.
Service Dogs Information

There is a special event at the 17th of October in the Netherlands to sponsor charities.
Marathon

UKOUG 2010 abstract selected for conference

2010-10-01T00:16:00.000-07:00

I am very honored that one of my abstracts is selected for the
UKOUG Technology Conference in Birmingham.

My presentation will deal about security in application express. A multi layer architecture is used in application express and therefore you need to take care for security in all the layers.
The main goal is to make you aware of security and to avoid the data will be 'hacked'

UK Conference

Many thanks to Dimitri Gielis for making this picture.

APEX Celebrity Seminar in The Netherlands

2010-09-13T05:19:00.000-07:00

Last week, I taught the application express seminar for customers in the Netherlands.

My seminar

It was a day with a lot of information of the new version of application express.

I am very proud on the evaluation results and therefore very satisfied with the result!

Patches

2010-08-23T04:37:00.000-07:00

Application express
--------------------
For application express 4.0

For 3.2.1 or earlier installed

See: Joel Kallman his blog for details

Apex Listener
---------------
Apex Listener

Stand alone feature included.

Apex.oracle.com

2010-08-15T23:21:00.000-07:00

apex.oracle.com is now running version 4.0.1.00.03 which should fix all the bugs on the known issue list.

Known Problems in Version 4.0

2010-07-30T04:19:00.001-07:00

Known problems and faq

ODTUG conference

2010-07-06T07:36:00.000-07:00

This is the best conference I ever attended.
The quality of the presentations is VERY high and I enjoyed very much.
I need to come back next year!

During the conference, the APEXLISTENER came in production.
About my experiences and solutions, I will blog later on during the week.

Application Express 4.0 in Production

2010-06-23T23:50:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, application express 4.0 is officially released.
This feels like my birthday!

How to start

Building a Websheet in Application Express 4.0 {New}
Building Dynamic Actions in Oracle Application Express 4.0 {New}
Extending your Application Using Plug-Ins in Oracle Application Express 4.0 {New}
Building Charts, Gantts and Maps with Oracle Application Express 4.0 {New}

And many other new features.

Installation /Migration
-----------------------
Please read the installation guide carefully

!!
Oracle Application Express 4.0 requires: An Oracle Database version 10.2.0.3 or higher

!!!
Note: You can upgrade the version of Oracle Application Express in
Oracle Database Express Edition 10g Release 2 (10.2), by installing
Oracle Application Express version 4.0. For more information, see the
Oracle Application Express page on Oracle Technology Network
!!!

Make a backup from the database before installing the new version.

Apex SIG In Antwerpen 17th of June

2010-06-19T00:54:00.000-07:00

It was the first Apex SIG in Benelux organized By Dimitri Gielis and Roel Hartman.

It was a wonderful day and a very complete overview of application express 4.0.
Everybody who has not been there has missed a lot.

The development and maintainability of applications in application express is much easier and improved!

Excellent work from apex development team.
It is amazing!

Presentations, will come available soon at the OBUG website!

Hope to see you again at the next Apex OBUG SIG.

Apex.oracle.com upgraded

2010-06-19T00:45:00.000-07:00

Apex.oracle.com upgraded to 4.0.0.00.46, plus all languages loaded.

See for details

Apex.oracle.com migrated to version 4

2010-06-05T05:13:00.000-07:00

http://apex.oracle.com is migrated to 'pre production' version 4 during the weekend.

See for extra details:
http://joelkallman.blogspot.com/
and
http://dpeake.blogspot.com/

Have fun.

World Cup 2010

2010-05-30T23:47:00.000-07:00

Dimitri Gielis created an excellent application for this tournament.

Tournament application

You can also play with your own company.

When everybody of your company has the same location entered,
you have the possibility to filter on the location!

It is really fun to play!

Pl/Sql Challenge Blog

2010-05-27T23:33:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I am very surprised with the answers from the Pl/Sql Challenge.
It is a nice way to improve your pl/sql skills

I am happy, a a blog is created about the challenge

I was also surprised with the CHR(10) in UTL_FILE

Apex and E Business Suite

2010-05-26T04:47:00.000-07:00

Application Express and E Business Suite

Oracle Applications Express
The Fast Way to Extend Oracle Applications 11i

How to install APEX wit E-Business Suite Release 12.0.4

Launching a page from Oracle Applications (E-Business Suite) 11i

Pl Sql Challenge

2010-05-19T02:23:00.000-07:00

Very nice to start the day with
Pl Sql Challenge of the day

It is a nice way to test your Pl/Sql knowledge

Apex Early Adopter Release 3

2010-05-12T01:54:00.000-07:00

Application Express Early Adopter Release 3 available now!

http://tryapexnow.com/

Have Fun

Oracle Learning Library

2010-05-06T00:51:00.000-07:00

Learning Library
This is a directory listing of free online training from Oracle - Oracle By Examples, Tutorials and Demonstrations from different Oracle Products

Important Events in June

2010-05-06T00:19:00.000-07:00

1.
Tuesday June 8th
Sneak Preview ODTUG at Amis office in Nieuwegein

Registration form

2.
Tuesday June 15th
Oracle Application Express Conference in Dublin

Conference details

3.
Thursday, June 17th,
The first official OBUG APEX SIG event is scheduled.
The location will be conveniently located for all attendees from Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg, somewhere in or around Antwerp.

All sessions, will deal about application express 4.0

Registration Form

4.
ODTUG Kaleidoscope
27th June - 1 July 2010

Website