14

Info Zones

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Switch Gears

Web
Server

Application
Server

DB

Up to now, we've been discussing

MO's and BO's and business rules
(i.e., the backend)

It's now time to move to the front end...

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

The Anatomy Of All Pages

The action bar contains buttons that allow you to update the
database and navigate to transactions

These 4 elements
Area
appear onDisplay
every
page

The menu bar allows you to

Object
navigate to other pages

This area contains the portal /The

maintenance
objectzones
dashboard contains
(note, the Dashboard can
be
turned
off
allow you to perform common
/ query
that youvethat
requested
by setting up user preferences
tasks and navigate to other
accordingly (or by clicking its "bar"))
transactions

The status bar contains informational messages

about what the system just did

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Older MO's = Object Maintenance

Newer MO's = Portal Maintenance

Older MO's are added, changed and deleted using a

dialog that we refer to as object maintenance. The
object maintenance pages are intentionally generic so
they can be used in many verticals and locales (you
used many object maintenance pages as you worked
on business objects in the earlier sections)

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Newer MO's have their business

objects maintained in portals

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Why Evolve?
The reasons for the evolution to portal maintenance are:
Portals can be easily changed and extended by an implementation
team (object maintenance transactions cannot be changed without
significant effort)
Portals are meant to maintain BO's whereas object maintenance
transactions maintain MO's (and MO's are, by definition, generic)

What this means:

A new MO will NOT have an object maintenance transaction
developed
Rather, a portal will be created for each MO that is capable of
maintaining all of its BO's
The UI will be a little inconsistent for a few releases

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Portal Have Zones

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Portals Contain Zones

This portal contains 3 zones

There is no limit to the number of zones that

can appear on a portal

New zones are added to a portal by setting

up meta-data (of course)

Application security can restrict access to

specific zones on a portal

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Different Types Of Zones

Info zones contain

grids of information
related to the object
being displayed in a
portal

Map zones contain display-only

information about a specific
instance of a BO

Idiosyncratic zones are those that

don't fit into the 2 major categories
We'll describe info zones next
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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

All Info Zones Have a Similar Layout

The menu button displays a
menu with a variety of tools

The results area

contains the list of
information; you
control the
maximum height
when you set up
the zone

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Commonly used business

processes can be initiated

The title bar shows the zones title

and the Collapse/ Expand button

The collapse/
expand button
minimizes /
maximizes the
zone
Commonly used zone features
can be initiated

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Explorer Zones

Common Features

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Virtually Every Thing Is Configurable

This section will demonstrate common features of info
zones
Most of the features that you'll see are controlled by metadata (naturally)
It's only in the next chapter when you'll be exposed to the zone
meta-data

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Menu Button Reset Zone

Clicking the Reset

Zone item returns the
zone to its default
configuration (typically
only needed if the user
has dragged columns
or used filters after the
zone is built)

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Menu Button Print Zone

Clicking the Print Zone

item prints the zone's
contents

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Menu Button Download To Excel

Click the Export to Excel will download

the contents of the grid to Excel (note,
this item's existence is configurable)

Note, you can download more rows to

Excel than appear in the zone (so as
to improve performance of the zone)

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

You Can Download Additional Columns

The columns on the left contain
the columns in the report

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The columns on the right contain all columns

defined in the zone's parameters, i.e., you can
download more info than appears in the report

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Zone Help

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Zone Help
Clicking the Help Icon exposes
the zone's help text

Help text is defined when the

zone is configured
HTML and cascading style sheets can be
used to define colors, formatting, and URLs in
the help text

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Description Area

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Info Zone Frequently Describe What They Are Showing

This indicates that these are the

adjustment types linked to the
approval profile referenced in the
description line

You can also configure the zone to

not show the description bar (in this
example, because we are displaying
all approval profiles, it didn't make
sense to have a description bar)

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

End-User Filters

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Info Zones Can Have End-User Filters

Clicking this button toggles the filter area's visibility

This zone has been configured to allow an end-user to filter the

results (youll get to experiment with user filters in the next
exercise)
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14
Configurable Info Zones

A Variety of Columns

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Many Different Types of Columns Can Be Shown

Notice the strings, currency amounts,
dates (and there other types not
illustrated below)

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You Can Control The Maximum Width Of Each Colum

Notice how some of the columns have a

maximum width

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Colorful Columns
You can apply different colors (background and
foreground) to different rows and columns

The colors highlight different types of activity (and

they were implemented via zone configuration, i.e.,
you have control over the colors)

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HTML In String Columns

You can concatenate HTML commands in columns

The bold was implemented with HTML

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

A Variety of Sources

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Many Different Sources

From a column in an
SQL statement

From a formula (this particular

example is sophisticated as it's a
running total)

From a service that converts

flag values to languagesensitive descriptions

From a foreign key reference

And you'll see a few more during the upcoming exercises

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

BO, BS and SS Columns

This column was retrieved via a

call to a service script as it
doesn't reside on the database
(except in a CLOB)

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Hyperlinks, BPA Launching and Broadcasting

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Columns Can Have Hyperlinks To Other Portals and

Pages

This hyperlink navigates to the

Person Maintenance page

This hyperlink
navigates to the
Property portal

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Rows Can Have Different Hyperlink Destinations

This zone has been configured to display different types of rows

and each type navigates to a different page

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Hyperlinks To Launch BPA Scripts

Rather than hyperlink to a portal or maintenance page,
you can configure columns to initiate a BPA script

Clicking this icon will launch a

BPA script to guide the user
through the bill reprint process
(we'll be discussing BPA scripts
in a later chapter)

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Broadcasting Key Values To Other Zones

The broadcast tower indicates that the

row's unique identifier (e.g., the Bill Id)
will be broadcast to other zones on the
portal if you click the icon

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Dragging and Dropping

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Dragging and Dropping

You can drag column headings
left / right or into the discard bin

The blue buttons are already in

the report, the others can be
dragged into the report

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

The Drag and Drop Area Is Configurable

The zones configuration controls if the drag and drop
palette is initially closed, open or disabled

If its disabled, the drag and drop button does

not appear and the column headings appear
flat (notice that the drag and drop button
doesn't appear in this example)

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Columns Have A Default Sort Order

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Ascending and Descending Order

Columns can be configured to be
shown in ascending or descending
order
Users can click outside of the
heading to resort by this column

Resorting by clicking can also be

disabled

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

14
Configurable Info Zones

Work Lists

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Work Lists
You can configure columns with hyperlinks to be work listable
This allows a user to populate the Work List dashboard zone with the
entire column
Once populated, the Work List entries can be clicked to "work" on an
entry
The Work List stays populated until the user indicates they want to
overlay the work list by clicking a different column's icon
If the user clicks on the work list icon, all of
the rows will be moved into the work list

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Working The List

When a user clicks on a work list entry in the dashboard, the system
will do whatever it would have done if they'd clicked on the hyperlink
in the zone
Remember that a hyperlinked column can:
Navigate to another portal
Kick off a BPA script

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

This column was

configured to transfer to
the adjustment type
main page

Ticking Off
When a user clicks on a work list entry, the system ticks
off that they've worked on it (this feature is mostly so
users know that they've at least looked at something)

This means that they've

looked at 2 of the
adjustment types

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Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.

Team Walk Through (90 Minutes)

Examine a customized control central
Break up into teams and follow the instructions in the workbook

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Review Questions

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14 - 46

Copyright 2009, Oracle. All rights reserved.