New Apex Blog

Read and monitor Oracle related blogs and news sources, all in one place.

my_pkg.get_label(:P1_VALUE)REPLACE(:P1_EMAIL_LIST, ':', '<br>')
It's an annual tradition, so also this year we'll organize an APEX Meetup at the 4th Street Bar & Deli on the Tuesday (7.30 PM) during Oracle Open World.
<!-- START: Hyphenator Plugin -->
<style type="text/css">
.hyph {
/* WIDTH Parameter wird erst ueber Spalte definiert */
display:block;
/* DISPLAY:BLOCK ist immer zwingend erforderlich */
overflow:hidden; float:left;
/* Schneidet alles Sichtbare über der max. Groesse ab, dadurch entstehen keine Fehler beim verkleinern, IE6 Fehlverhalten */
white-space:normal;
/* Darf niemals: white-space:nowrap als Einstellung in einer Tabelle haben */
word-wrap: break-word;z-index:999;
/* Fuer IE6 */
}
</style>
<script type="text/javascript" src="/i/Hyphenator/Hyphenator.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="/i/Hyphenator/jquery.hyphenator.min.js"></script>
<!-- ENDE: Hyphenator Plugin -->
<!-- Column Heading Template -->
<th ... style="white-space:normal;z-index:999;word-wrap: break-word;">#COLUMN_HEADER#</th>
<!-- Column Template 1 -->
<td ... style="white-space:normal;z-index:999;word-wrap: break-word;">#COLUMN_VALUE#</td>
<!-- Column Heading: -->
<span class="hyph" style="width:50px;text-decoration: underline;">Anwendungsname</span>
<!-- HTML Expression -->
<span class="hyph" style="width:50px;">#NAME#</span>

Anonymous Pro is a fixed-width font developed specifically for developers by Mark Simonson. Best of all - it's free under the Open Font License.
From it's home page: "Characters that could be mistaken for one another (O, 0, I, l, 1, etc.) have distinct shapes to make them easier to tell apart in the context of source code."
I installed it on my Mac and set SQL Developer's default font to it, and the text is a little crisper than Courier, my previous default.
Anyone else have a favorite "coding" font?
![]() |
| Image by Jesper Rønn-Jensen under Creative Commons License. |
select deptno, dname from deptModify the DNAME-column in the report:
this.triggeringElement.id.replace('departmentName','');
declare
l_ret varchar2(32000);
begin
for r in (select dep.*
from dept dep
where dep.deptno = :p5_deptno)
loop
l_ret := 'HTML formatted return value for <b>'|| r.dname ||'</b> located in <i>'|| upper(r.loc) ||'</i>.';
end loop;
return l_ret;
end;
Over 4 years ago I wrote a blog post about software that helps you to compare two Oracle schemas. That post is accessed a lot and I still get questions about it, so I decided to write a follow up on that post as things change over time.









On October 27th and 28th the combined OPP (Oracle PL/SQL Programming) and APEXposed conference is coming to Europe. To Brussels to be exact. I have had the privilege to attend these conferences since the first one in 2005. The nice thing about this conference is that it is the only conference (at least that I know of) that is totally focused on PL/SQL. Three tracks with all kinds of ideas of what you can do in PL/SQL. From using collections (been around since Oracle 7) to Edition Based Redefinition (Oracle 11Gr2).
If there is a slot in the agenda that has nothing you like, you are welcome to switch to the APEXposed conference to see if there is something you like.
I know I am a big fan of PL/SQL since it has nothing to do with building a front-end but more with getting the job done, using as less resources as possible and applying the best techniques available in the version I am working with.
I am not much of a visual developer. But using APEX, even I can make nice applications that are easy to build and even look nice.
Shameless plug: I will also be doing a presentation on my favorite tool PL/SQL Developer. If you attend the conference, I hope you will come and see this.
Jeff Smith offers up some excellent advice for those traveling to OOW 2010.
As a more-than-I-can-count-time attendee of OOW, here's a few additions to his list:
Spent a few minutes yesterday building my schedule for OOW. Lots of sessions, and unfortunately, some of the good ones are already booked. That didn't matter, as there were plenty more to choose from.
There's not a whole lot of APEX sessions this year - or at least ones that I have not already seen. Thus, I'm going to focus more on other database technologies, such as security & performance. Lots of sessions under that category.
My only gripe is that the Schedule Builder UI needs a major overhaul. First off, you need a 30" monitor just to view all of the content on one screen - especially when you have the Advanced Search option enabled. Also, I kept getting a "Search Timeout" error when I tried to search for sessions. The only way to resolve this is to log out and log back in again. Such basic functionality for a database conference should NEVER break, at least in my opinion...
The Schedule Builder also tries to use a lot of Ajax-type controls; lots of popup boxes and asynchronous stuff going on. Maybe it works better in IE, but in Safari, it's a bit clunky.
This is part of the danger of using jQuery or similar Ajax-based technologies - without thorough testing on multiple browsers, the user experience may vary greatly. This can often be mitigated when building applications that are used internally, as most organizations can lock down which browsers are allowed. However, this is obviously not the case on the public Internet.
While the Advanced Search is more sophisticated and allows you to search by day, for instance, there is no Google-like interface to search all fields for a specific string. There are two text fields - Speaker/Company & Free Text - that each search different parts of the content. But if you're searching for a string, the system will AND these two fields together, producing a different set of results than you may expect.
It seems like too much attention was paid to adding features vs. thinking of a logical design for this site. Some common things - such as the aforementioned Google-like search, a weekly view of the agenda, and a map of where each session takes place - all seem to be left out.
Hopefully this tool will be enhanced for future events and be made simpler and better at the same time.

ApEx 4.0.1 is available for download, if you are running ApEx 4.0 then I suggest you upgrade as soon as possible.
- If you are already running ApEx 4.0 then download the patch from Oracle support, look for patch nr 9976149.
- If you are still running and older version then 4.0 then download ApEx from apex.oracle.com.
The new version nr of APEX is 4.0.1.00.03.
