I'm new to Oracle Forms.
I want to be sure that an item considered "valid" as soon as inputed, at time T0 (thru When-validate-item trigger), is still valid when the relevant row is inserted (or updated) and committed at time T1, where T1-T0 could be, say, a long coffee time, during which the system status may have changed so as to invalidate the item.
I thought about coding specific item-level program unit to be called both by WVI trigger and by a higher level trigger. Which one would be best?
Is this double check a common practice in Oracle Forms?
Note: I need to double-ckeck both in case of form layouts and in master-detail layouts.
Thank you.
You don't need to double-check on normal validation. Then a when-validate-item trigger will be enough to make sure it is valid. If you need to check a field that needs also a value in another field, for example a person is a firm it needs only a lastname otherwise it needs a first and a lastname then you could use the when-validate-record trigger to check this.
If your data depends on the system date or other data that might be inserted/updated in the time between validate and commit. You should place your validation on the pre-insert and pre-update trigger. Then it will always fire just before the insert or update.
Related
Background
Each Dataverse table contains a primary name column. When displayed in a subgrid, clicking on the primary name column will navigate to the form so that the user can edit that row. Most subgrids in my application work this way.
The Problem
I have a Course form with a list of participants displayed in a subgrid. The subgrid displays each student's name (as a link) and the grade received in the course. There is no appropriate primary name column for this Participant table. To edit the participant record, the user must select the row in the subgrid, then click the subgrid's Edit button. As a result, this UI is different from all other subgrids in the application and I know that user's will click the student name to try to edit the participant record and be confused when they are presented with the student record.
Am I missing something? Is there a better way to handle this?
It's a common problem I face quite often. Here is usually what I would do.
Make sure the Primary Name Column always contains relevant information to the user to be able to quickly identify a record. Sometimes it requires copying information from one or multiple other columns into the primary column.
In your case that would probably means concatenating the student's name and grade.
How to do that?
Common to all solutions below
Use one of the following solution to copy the content of one or several fields into the primary column.
Make sure the solution you select also updates the content of the primary name column when one of the copied field is updated.
Remove or hide the primary column from the form, the name of the record will be displayed at the top of the form anyway and you probably don't want users to play with it.
Display the primary name column in every subgrid.
I would recommend not adding the fields copied into the primary column in the subgrids to avoid confusion.
Solution 1 - Classic Workflow
Create a classic workflow that runs when a record is created / updated
Pros:
Very quick to put in place
Runs synchronously (users will see the name updated in real-time)
Cons:
Not very practical if you need to add business logic (using different fields as source depending on a certain condition for example)
Solution 2 - Power Automate
Create a Flow that runs when a record is created / updated
Pros:
You can implement complex business logic in your Flow
Cons:
Runs asynchronously (users will have to refresh the page after the creation of a record to see the record's name)
According to Power Automate licensing that flow would certainly be considered as an "enterprise flow" and you are supposed to pay 100$ / month. That specific point must be taken with a grain of salt. I had several discussions with Microsoft about it and they haven't given me a clear answer about what would be considered an enterprise flow.
Solution 3 - Plugin
Create a plugin that executes when a record is created / updated
Pros:
You can implement very complex business logic in your Flow
It can run synchronously
Cons:
Pro-code (I put it as a con since Model-Driven App is a low-code / no-code approach but there is nothing wrong about pro-code per say)
Developing a new plugin for each entity where you need this logic is kind of overkill in my opinion. I would consider developing something very generic that would only require some sort of configuration when the logic needs to be applied to a new table.
I am creating an Oracle Form. This form has a field by the name FILE_NUM. There is one more field by the name CLIENT_ID in the form. I have to generate unique FILE_NUM. The process is:
If the CLIENT_ID already exists in the table, get the FILE_NUM and assign it to the new record
ELSE, take the maximum of FILE_NUM, add 1 and assign it to the new record.
This should be taken care when multiple users are working on the form. Hence I did the following:
In Key-Commit trigger, I check if there is a lock on the table.
If the table is locked, I make form wait for 3 second and check again.
If the table is not locked, I am locking the table and inserting the records with the above check.
My query is: is this the right way to do? Is there any other way to generate the FILE_NUM (maybe via trigger?). The problem with key-commit trigger is that if the form closes forcefully, the lock is not removed. This will cause more issues, hence I want to remove the lock feature.
Please advice.
This is the correct way, but indeed the lock can stay in some cases.
If the number doesn't have to follow each other you can use a sequence instead.
This will give you a number when needed and it will be unique.
Users are PASTING data into a form in DATASHEET mode, so many records are being entered at the same time. For a specific field called ID, I need to validate the ID against another table. In the sense that the IDs they enter should be already available in another table. Drop down box, selection is not possible.
I also need to return the values that are not VALID
What kind of SQL statment or VBA or validation rule should I use?
"In the sense that the IDs they enter should be already available in another table" - you need an event to trigger the check, so perhaps have them enter into a datasheet on a form rather than a back end table then you can use the various on-changed events, search online for them. In that event simply run a one-to-one query. To return "return the values that are not VALID" you simply need an unmatched query, again, search for info, it's widely documented.
There is custom field "Lock Flag" in Account BC, namely in S_ORG_EXT_X table. This field is made available in Opportunity BC using join to above table. The join specification is as follows: Opportunity.Account Id = Account.Id. Account Id is always populated when creating new opportunity. The requirement is that for newly created records in Opportunity BC if "Lock Flag" is equal to 'Y', then we should not allow to create the record and we should show custom error message.
My initial proposal was to use a Runtime Event that is calling Data Validation Manager business service where validation rule is evaluated and error message shown. Assuming that we have to decide whether to write record or not, the logic should be placed in PreWriteRecord event handler as long as WriteRecord have row already commited to database.
The main problem was how to determine if it is new record or updated one. We have WriteRecordNew and WriteRecordUpdated runtime events but they are fired after record is actually written so it doesn't prevent user from saving record. My next approach was to use eScript: write custom code in BusComp_PreWriteRecord server script and call BC's method IsNewRecordPending to determine if it is new record, then check the flag and show error message if needed.
But unfortunately I am faced with another problem. That joined field "Lock Flag" is not populated for newly created opportunity records. Remember we are talking about BC Opportunity and field is placed in S_ORG_EXT_X table. When we create new opportunity we pick account that it belongs to. So it reproduceable: OpportunityBC.GetFieldValue("Lock Flag") returns null for newly created record and returns correct value for the records that was saved previously. For newly created opportunities we have to re-query BC to see "Lock Flag" populated. I have found several documents including Oracle's recomendation to use PreDefaultValue property if we want to display joined field value immediately after record creation. The most suitable expression that I've found was Parent: BCName.FieldName but it is not the case, because active BO is Opportunity and Opportunity BC is the primary one.
Thanks for your patience if you read up to here and finally come my questions:
Is there any way to handle PreWrite event and determine if it is new record or not, without using eScript and BC.IsNewRecordPending method?
How to get value of joined field for newly created record especially in PreWriteRecord event handler?
It is Siebel 8.1
UPDATE: I have found an answer for the first part of my question. Now it seems so simple to me that I am wondering how I haven't done it initially. Here is the solution.
Create Runtime Event triggered on PreWriteRecord. Specify call to Data Validation Manager business service.
In DVM create a ruleset and a rule where condition is
NOT(BCHasRows("Opportunity", "Opportunity", "[Id]='"+[Id]+"'", "AllView"))
That's it. We are searching for record wth the same Row Id. If it is new record there should't be anything in database yet (remember that we are in PreWriteRecord handler) and function returns FALSE. If we are updating some row then we get TRUE. Reversing result with NOT we make DVM raise an error for new records.
As for second part of my question credits goes to #RanjithR who proposed to use PickMap to populate joined field (see below). I have checked that method and it works fine at least when you have appropriate PickMap.
We Siebel developers have used scripting to correctly determine if record is new. One non scripting way you could try is to use RuntimeEvents to set a profileattribute during the BusComp NewRecord event, then check that in the PreWrite event to see if the record is new. However, there is always a chance that user might undo a record, those scenarios are tricky.
Another option, try invokine the BC Method:IsNewRecordPending from RunTime event. I havent tried this.
For the second part of the query, I think you could easily solve your problem using a PickMap.
On Opportunity BC, when your pick Account, just add one more pickmap to pick the Locked flag from Account and set it to the corresponding field on Opportunity BC. When the user picks the Account, he will also pick the lock flag, and your script will work in PreWriteRecord.
May I suggest another solution, again, I haven't tried it.
When new records are created, the field ModificationNumber will be set to 0. Every time you modify it, the ModificationNumber will increment by 1.
Set a DataValidationManager ruleset, trigger it from PreSetFieldValue event of Account field on Opportunity BC. Check for the LockFlag = Y AND (ModificationNumber IS NULL OR ModificationNumber = 0)) and throw error. DVM should throw error when new records are created.
Again, best practices say don't use the ModNumbers. You could set a ProfileAttribute to signal NewRecord, then use that attribute in the DVM. But please remember to clear the value of ProfileAttribute in WriteRecord and UndoRecord.
Let us know how it went !
What tool is used to view the Key Triggers? Is it the Oracle Terminal for Windows?
do_key('commit_form'); fires which trigger and where?
(we do not have all the tools and we want to convert, the DB is not even restored at this point) but I am assigned to figure it out. :)
We do not have even a .res (resource) file, and I am guessing this is used for mapping form fields to database columns?
do_key('commit_form'); would fire the KEY-COMMIT trigger, if there is one. If there isn't one, it will just do the default action of that trigger, which is a commit.
Any key triggers would be in the form itself, most likely at the form level, and you would view the triggers using Oracle's Forms Builder.
The form field to database column mapping is also within the form. The block properties will indicate which table or view, and the field properties will tell you which column. In my experience, the fields and the columns usually have the same name, although that is not strictly necessary.