Practical Dynamic Actions Intro

Jorge Rimblas

Jorge Rimblas

Senior APEX Consultant

@rimblas

rimblas.com/blog

  • Oracle DB since 1995
  • APEX since it was HTMLDB in 2004
  • Always involved in web technologies
  • jrimblas in OTN Forums
  • Contributor to
    "Expert Oracle Application Express, 2nd Edition"
    with "Themes & Templates" chapter

Custom Development, Cloud, Forms Modernization,
EBS Extensions

Consulting, Coaching, and Team Augmentation

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Committed to APEX Innovation & Best Practices

Internationally recognized staff that includes Oracle ACEs

Agenda

  • Browser events

  • Dynamic Action Structure

  • Demos

  • AJAX

  • Advanced Dynamic Actions

Background

Your static web pages are "alive"

Ok, maybe not "alive", but they are not just static.

JavaScript can affect the structure

(this means changing the HTML)

With

JavaScript can affect the look

(this means changing the CSS and Styles)

With

Definitions

Client Side

Client Side

Server Side

Dynamic Actions are all about

Client Side

"                "

Events

activities

Browser Events

Click

Change

Key Press

Page Load

Scroll

Resize

Any Browser Event

Custom Events!

Browser Events

4.2

5.0

19.1

APEX

4.2

APEX

5.x

APEX

19.x

Actions

Component Actions

  • Hide/Show
  • Disable/Enable
  • Clear
  • Set Value
  • etc...

Style Actions

  • Set Class
  • Remove Class
  • Set Style

Navigation Actions

  • Submit Page
  • Cancel Dialog
  • Close Dialog

Since APEX 5

Notification Actions

  • Alert
  • Confirm

"Other" Actions

  • Execute JavaScript Code 
  • Execute PL/SQL Code
  • Plugins
  • etc...

More about this later

Anatomy of a Dynamic Action

When event

What to do?

What to do?

When True

When False

[Optional Client Side Condition]

[Affected Elements]

[Affected Elements]

When event

True Actions

False Actions

When True

When False

[Optional Client Side Condition]

Anatomy of a Dynamic Action

APEX view

Event/When?

When will the Dynamic Action execute?

  • On click

  • On item (data) change

  • On Focus

  • On Page Load

  • On (any) browser event

  • etc

Where?

Where will the event happen?

Where?

Where will the event happen?

  • Item(s)

  • Button

  • Region

  • Column(s)

  • jQuery Selector

  • JavaScript Expression

APEX 5.1

4.2

5.x

18.x|19.x

Hide

&

Show

Demo:

Two Buttons to Hide/Show

P11

 

Builder Tabs

p20

p20

With No Dynamic Actions

  • Show Text Item "Enter User"
  • Hide List Item "Select User"
  • Show "Switch to Select User" Button
  • Hide "Switch to Enter User" Button
  • Show List Item "Select User"
  • Hide Text Item "Enter User"
  • Show "Switch to Enter User" Button
  • Hide "Switch to Select User" Button

Disable & Enable

Sometimes a good alternative to Hide & Show

Hide

& Show

Demo:

•Conditional•

P25

Condition

Structure

Condition Detail

 

Condition

Several Condition Options

 

Set Value

Demo:

P30

  • Often used as part of several True Actions.
  • Often used to set a hidden item
    • Hidden Item needs: "Value Protected" = No
$s("{ITEM}", "{VALUE}");


// Set to today
$s("P30_LOG_DATE", "&P30_TODAY.");


// Clear date
$s("P30_LOG_DATE", "");

Set Value with JavaScript; API $s

Uppercase Code

Demo:

Key Release

p40

Event

Set Value action

Name to Uppercase Code

this.triggeringElement.value
       .toUpperCase()
            .replace(/\s+/g, '_')
                  .substring(0, 20);
  1. Get value of the triggeringElement
  2. Make it uppercase
  3. Globally Replace spaces (\s) with "_"
  4. Only return the first 20 characters

Change

& Refresh

Demo:

p110

Don't forget:

Page Items to Submit

Inspect Submission

P110_DEPTNO is sent

APEX 4.2

APEX 5.0

P110_DEPTNO is sent

APEX 5.1 - 19.1

and beyond...

AJAX

asynchronous JavaScript and XML

 

group of interrelated Web development techniques used on the client-side to create asynchronous Web applications

 

Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajax_(programming)

 

Client Side

Server Side

AJAX

JavaScript

SQL

PL/SQL

 AJAX

Demo:

Multiple Actions

It's easy!

p215

Two Different DA

  1. Assign Role

  2. Remove Role

Assign Role

  1. Event: On Button Click
  2. Insert new role
  3. Refresh Role Dropdown
  4. Refresh Report
insert into app_user_roles
 ( username
 , role_key)
values
 ( :P215_USERNAME
 , :P215_ROLE_KEY);

Remove Role

  1. Event: On .deleteRow Click
  2. Delete role
  3. Refresh Role Dropdown
  4. Refresh Report
delete
  from app_user_roles
 where id = :P215_UR_ID;

Remove Role

  1. Event: On .deleteRow Click
  2. Ask for Confirmation
  3. Use "Set Value" to save ID of clicked row
  4. Delete role
  5. Give Confirmation
  6. Refresh Role Dropdown
  7. Refresh Report

Get the ID value

this.triggeringElement.getAttribute("data-id");
this.triggeringElement.dataset.id

Get the ID value

this.triggeringElement.dataset.id

Dataset / Data Attributes

// data-id="{value}"
this.triggeringElement.dataset.id


// data-active="YES"
this.triggeringElement.dataset.active


// data-selected="YES"
this.triggeringElement.dataset.selected


// data-lineID="123"
this.triggeringElement.dataset.lineID


// data-rownum="2"
this.triggeringElement.dataset.rownum

Event Scope

  • Static

  • Dynamic

  • Once

  • Static

  • Dynamic

  • Once

Advanced Dynamic Actions

this.triggeringElement

this.browserEvent

this.data

Built-in JavaScript Objects

triggeringElement

 

Available inside the DA JavaScript

var el = this.triggeringElement;

var $el = $(this.triggeringElement);

Name to Uppercase Code

this.triggeringElement.value
       .toUpperCase()
            .replace(/\s+/g, '_')
                  .substring(0, 20);
  1. Value of the triggeringElement
  2. Make it uppercase
  3. Globally Replace spaces (\s) with "_"
  4. Only return the first 20 characters

Complex Page

APEX 4.2

Complex Page

APEX 5.0, 5.1

APEX 18.x, 19.1

Resources

Sample Dynamic Actions

Use Code INS20 for a $100 discount

Q&A

Practical Dynamic Actions

Jorge Rimblas

@rimblas

rimblas.com/blog