Neeraj Sehgal - Experimenting with SOA

Sending attachment using Email Activity in BPEL 11g

2012-01-22T13:36:00.000-08:00

Sending an attachment using Email Activity (in SOA 11.1.1.5) is an easy task. All you have to do is drag and drop an email activity and double click on it. Assign the following parameters and the attachment will be sent along with the email.

Name- Name of the attachment as it should appear

MimeType- This MimeType is for attachment. Choose appropriate MimeType from here.

Value - Write what you would like to see in the attachment. Simply hard coding.

Well, sometimes the requirement may be to send some custom data, may be you fetched some data at runtime from the DB and would lke to send it as attachment. This isn't complex either, all you have to do is modify the ContentBody parameter as follows. You can do this successfully from the EmailParamsAssign Activity but don't forget to verify the same in the bpel source too.

Extending this a bit further, if you'd like to send some files (image,pdf,doc,xls,csv) that are already stored at some server location or you may have written them from your process, follow these steps.

1.) Set the appropriate MimeType for the file.

2.) Add the following line in the .bpel source under appropriate BodyPart.

3.) Add another copy operation in the bpel source to assign string('base64') to ContentEncoding in BodyPart[2].

4.) Modify the ContentBody parameter to read the file at runtime using ora:readFile() function as follows.

Key Points to Note:

The file location and name in ora:readFile() above are case-sensitive.
Specifying the correct MimeType is very important. If the MimeType is incorrect, either the mail won't go or you may get encrypted characters in the attached file.
file:/// (three slashes mean absolute path and two slashes mean relative path)

The above solution works with all the files. Should anyone need the working project, I can mail the same.

Inserting a New Line character in message using BPEL XSLT

2012-01-22T12:45:00.000-08:00

In a requirement, we were trying to format the data fetched from DB (in XML format in BPEL) into a String variable with a new line inserted after each record. So that the data belowwould appear in the String variable likeFollowing is the simple transformation to achieve the same.Key Points to Note:

The magic lies in the word 
 which serves as a new line character in XSLT (11g). In above case, it gets appended at the end of each record resulting in new line at the end of each record.
The function somehow doesn't work in SOA Suite 11.1.1.3 (BUG-13602524, thanks to my colleague Nivea for identifying this) but works in 11.1.1.4 and older versions.

How to pass JNDI name dynamically to an Adapter

2012-01-17T02:19:00.000-08:00

Recently, I've been trying configure an MQ adapter that could enqueue data of any structure into specified queue based on the specified JNDI, all passed dynamically at runtime. This post decsribes how you can pass the JNDI Name dynamically to an Adapter.

All you have to do is define a String variable (say myJndiName) that stores your JNDI name (eis/MQ/someThing...already configured on Weblogic) and pass this variable into Invoke Activity properties directly in the .bpel source.

Note that you'll not be able to find this property in the Invoke Activity > Properties tab.

And that's it. You can assign different values on the fly to the variable myJndiName and same adapter can enqueue in different JNDI locations. It also works for FTP and JMS adapters too.

How to pass the queue name dynamically to MQ Adapter

2011-10-07T08:38:00.000-07:00

Requirement: To pass the queue name dynamically to MQ Adapter from a variable

Use-case: I have a process that is required to enqueue the data in one of the two MQs at runtime based on certain condition using single MQ Adapter. So if the condition is true the data is to be enqueued in queue A else in queue B. However, the payload schema remains the same in both the queues. (using SOA Suite 11.1.1.3)

Solution: Use the jca.mq.ISpec.EnqueueMsgToQ property appearing in the Properties tab of Invoke Activity. Assign the value of the property to the variable name which contains the MQ name.

Passing Queue Name from a variable

Setting the value to this variable will allow you to set the queue name dynamically in the process or from outside the process.

Advantage: MQ Adapter can be loosely coupled and kept in a separate composite which can be called by any caller composite. Also a single MQ Adapter can be used for en-queuing to multiple queues.

Pass multiple parameters, dynamic query in Pure SQL in Database Adapter

2011-07-13T08:33:00.000-07:00

I came across a case in which I was required to pass the bind parameters values on the fly. The values of parameters were not fixed and hence I couldn't define all of them as the bind parameters. Hence in the search of the solution I wasted considerable time until I was directed to see this great solution. The solution was fantastic and I customized it further to make it work with SOA Suite11g. This can be further extended with Joins to do wonders as required.

Use Case : I want the salaries of all the employees whose first names I'd pass at run time. Hence it can be single name or n names coming as parameters. The very simple query, as it comes to our mind, would be

SELECT SALARY FROM EMPLOYEES WHERE F_NAME IN (?)
Where ? is the argument that is passed dynamically.

However, the same query doesn't work in DB adapter for any combination passed dynamically such as ('NEERAJ', 'JACOB') or "('NEERAJ', 'JACOB')" or 'NEERAJ', 'JACOB' for the adapter tries to interpret the incoming argument as a bind parameter and not SQL string.

Solution : If the parameters can be passed as a result of an inner query the problem can be solved. The following query uses CONNECT BY LEVEL clause to separate the individual parameter values separated by a : and represents them as individual result row.

SELECT SALARY FROM EMPLOYEES WHERE F_NAME

IN (WITH BIND_PARAM_LIST AS

(SELECT #val FROM dual)
SELECT SUBSTR(#val1, (decode(LEVEL, 1, 0, instr(#val2, ':', 1, LEVEL -1)) + 1), (decode(instr(#val3, ':', 1, LEVEL) -1, -1, LENGTH(#val4), instr(#val5, ':', 1, LEVEL) -1)) -(decode(LEVEL, 1, 0, instr(#val6, ':', 1, LEVEL -1)) + 1) + 1) a
FROM BIND_PARAM_LIST CONNECT BY LEVEL <=
(SELECT(LENGTH(#val7) -LENGTH(REPLACE(#val8, ':', NULL)))
FROM BIND_PARAM_LIST) + 1)

To understand the query one needs to be familiar with the CONNECT BY clause which is used for hierarchical queries. If you simply do

SELECT LEVEL FROM DUAL CONNECT BY LEVEL <=5, it prints 1 to 5 in each row like

LEVEL
=====
1
2
3
4
5

The same logic is being used in the above query to separate the various F_Names. It just sub-strings the incoming string NEERAJ:JACOB:ROBERT, : wise for each LEVEL to feed the result in the IN clause as

NEERAJ
JACOB
ROBERT

Usage : Just add this query in the DB Adapter. Be careful to use # instead of ? as in 11g the bind variable name can be defined as #bind_variable, in our case #val1, #val2 ... #val8. Also you'll have to assign the same input string to these multiple vals. The val variables get exposed as input parameters while assigning and can be assigned as 'NEERAJ:JACOB:ROBERT'(your parameter list). You can use any other separator too e.g. ; instead of : by customizing the query a bit.

Just deploy the project and it is done. The same thing can also be achieved by using query-database() function as described here.

Delete Data from MDS - Single Files

2011-06-27T10:00:00.000-07:00

In case an artefact is wrongly published into MDS, it can be deleted from the MDS using 2 ways.

Deleting the entire folder
Deleting the Selective Files

This post details about the latter.
A file can be deleted from the MDS using Weblogic Scripting Tool. However, in upgraded versions of AIA (11g PS3 onwards), this is available through UpdateMetaDataDP.xml also, very much the same way as we update the artefacts in MDS. To delete a file from MDS follow the following steps.

1. Run WLST command from <MW_HOME>/oracle_common/bin. Note there is same command available in Weblogic Server home directory too but MDS related commands can be accessed through wlst.sh/exe residing in oracle_common_home only

$ cd $MW_HOME/oracle_common/common/bin

$ wlst.sh

2. Type the connect command to connect to soa_server1 or WLS_SOA1 depending on where your soa-infra is running

$ connect('weblogic', 'welcome1', 't3://localhost:8001')

3. Once it is connected, delete The undesired file by typing the following command (Note the path starting from /apps)

$ deleteMetadata(application='soa-infra',server='soa_server1',docs='/apps/AIAMetaData/AIAComponents/ApplicationConnectorServiceLibrary/Generic.wsdl')

You can use asterisk(*) to specify more than one files e.g. to delete all files with names starting with Gen use
deleteMetadata(application='soa-infra',server='soa_server1',docs='/apps/AIAMetaData/AIAComponents/ApplicationConnectorServiceLibrary/Gen*.wsdl')
Exception:
You may get the following exception
MDS-91002: MDS Application runtime MBean for "soa-infra" is not available. "deleteMetadata" operation failure.

Solution:

Verify that your soa-infra is up and running and is on the same server to which you are connected through WLST.

Happy Learning...

Weblogic and MS SQL Configurations to run projects using SQL Server Connections

2011-05-10T14:43:00.000-07:00

Creating the SQL Server connection from Jdeveloper is easy. However, after the project is developed, it has to be deployed on the Weblogic Server, a JNDI needs to be created to connect to the MS SQL Server. Oracle has provided 2 default drivers for MS SQL Server.

*Oracle's MS SQL Server Driver (Type 4 XA) Versions:7.0, 2000, 2005, 2008
*Oracle's MS SQL Server Driver (Type 4) Versions:7.0, 2000, 2005, 2008

The difference between 2 drivers is that one is Transaction Aware and other one is not. There are other drivers also present but they would need specific jars to be placed in the server lib directory, but default drivers would work without any additional configuration on the Weblogic Server. Hence a JNDI to connect to MS SQL Server can be created using any of these drivers very much the same way as you create for Oracle Database.

However, following MS SQL Server configurations also need to be done to be able to connect to MS SQL Server from Weblogic Server.

Create the JTA Procedures

Follow the steps as given here.

Also if you are using the XA driver, you also need to enable XA Transactions on MS SQL Server. Follow the following steps for that.

Turn on support for XA transactions:

Go to Control Panel > Administrative tools > Component Services.
Expand the tree view to locate the computer where you want to turn on support for XA transactions: for example, Component Services > Computers > My Computer.
Right-click the computer name, then click Properties.
Click the MSDTC tab, and then click Security Configuration.
Under Security Settings, click the check box for XA Transactions to turn on this support. (Enable XA Transactions)
Click OK, and then click OK again.

Create a registry named-value:

Use Registry Editor and navigate to registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSDTC\XADLL.
Create a new registry named-value:
Name is the file name of the XA DLL (in the format dllname.dll).
Type is String (REG_SZ).
Value is the full path name (including the file name) of the DLL file. for example, C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQLServer\ MSSQL.1\ MSSQL\ Binn\ sqljdbc.dll.

Go to Control Panel ->Administrative tools->Services.

Start "Distributed Transaction Coordinator."

Please restart the server to make these changes take effect.

Note:
While making the JNDI for data sources on WLS Console, specify the value of property platformClassName as oracle.toplink.platform.database.SQLServerPlatform.

And that's all. Happy Development!

How to check the Email Notification History in SOA Suite 11g FMW Console

2011-04-05T02:57:00.000-07:00

Problem : I want to check email notification history in SOA Suite 11g FMW Console. When was an email sent, to whom and from whom and blaw blaw blaw.

Solution : Just go to FMW Console > Farm_Domain > User Messaging Service > Right Click usermessagingserver(soa_server1) > Message Status. It shows you the email notifications details. You can use the search criteria also to filter the data.

How to get XML output from the oraext:query-database() function

2011-04-05T02:40:00.000-07:00

oraext:query-database() is a wonderful function that can be used to

Fetch the data in the Assigns/Transformations on the fly without the use of DB Adapter
Can be used to run any Dynamic Custom SQL including variable IN parameters and GROUP BY clauses.

However, the output returned from this function is always a long string depending on the no.of resultant records. But we can always transform the same into XML format to traverse it in an easier way across the process.

1. While calling the function use the 2nd and 3rd parameters as true() rather than false(). It will ensure that ROWSET and ROW tags get generated in the resultant String.
2. Now create a schema with ROWSET as root element and ROW as unbounded repeating element. The best way to do this is to copy the resultant XML string into an XML file and use Schema from XML file option to create the schema. This will create the schema for which your resultant output string.
3. Now in the Assign activity use this function as follows to assign the result to Schema element just created in above step.
Note: I had my SQL query in the variable SqlQuery which is being referred here.

oraext:query-database(string(bpws:getVariableData('SqlQuery')), true(), true(), 'jdbc/DataSource')

And you get the result in the XML format in the DBResult variable!

How to connect to MS SQL Server through Jdeveloper 11.1.1.3

2011-03-03T04:55:00.000-08:00

To connect to MS SQL Server you need to follow the following steps.

Pre-requisite: You need to have a sqljdbc4.jar file placed in the jdev/lib/folder. It can be downloaded from this (1033\sqljdbc_3.0.1301.101_enu.tar.gz) path and extracted to get sqljdbc4.jar. Finally it needs to be at jdev/lib location.

1. Go to New Database Connection and create a Database Connection by providing all the required details. Remember to select SQLServer as Connection Type.

2. In the Library section click Browse and add the Library entry as shown below.

3. Click on Test and it says Success....

However, for the projects using MS SQL Server connection deployed on Weblogic server, some Weblogic and MS SQL Server configurations also need to be done that can be found here.

Validating incoming String of Date format using Regular Expression

2010-11-28T02:43:00.000-08:00

I was recently trying to restrict the format of the incoming variable so as to adhere it to the date format like 27-Nov-2010 04:17:37 PM. Well, this had to be pretty simple by using the xp20:matches function that can be used to match a string pattern against a regular expression. I used my function as

xp20:matches(bpws:getVariableData('inputVariable','payload','/ns3:PropertyDetails/ns3:PropertyValueToUpdate'), '^(0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.](Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)[- /.](19|20)\d\d (0[1-9]|1[012])[:](0[1-9]|[12345][0-9])[:](0[1-9]|[12345][0-9]) (AM|PM)$')

Ooops. This was not working and but telling me Internal Xpath Error. Well the reason was that getVariableData() function gets the data from the XML schema element in Object format rather than in String. Finally, all I did was that I used the string() function to convert the object from variable data and it worked without any issue.

xp20:matches(string(bpws:getVariableData('inputVariable','payload','/ns3:PropertyDetails/ns3:PropertyValueToUpdate')), '^(0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.](Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)[- /.](19|20)\d\d (0[1-9]|1[012])[:](0[1-9]|[12345][0-9])[:](0[1-9]|[12345][0-9]) (AM|PM)$')

Just a small learning…

Provider ABCS not able to read the data while transform, Default Part Name not correct

2010-11-27T13:53:00.000-08:00

I started working on AIA 3.0 with SOA 11.1.3.3 and developed a simple Worker interface that fetches the data from a table and transfers it to Provider ABCS.

But while running it, I faced the 2 errors.

The first error that I faced was at the time of compilation. Well, that was seemingly a bug which was worked around.

Later, when I was testing the process, it behaved strange in a way that the all records travelled till Provider ABCS Receive activity properly but did not get Transformed. The Transform activity payload looked empty as shown below.

<Invoke_WriteAllWorkersFile_InputVariable>

<XxbbIntgWorkersCollection />

</part>

</Invoke_WriteAllWorkersFile_InputVariable>

I tried various things for this. But later found that the problem was with Provider ABCS. While constructing the PABCS using service constructor, it created the SyncWorkerProvABCSImpl.WSDL (<ProjectName.WSDL>) message part as

<part name="SyncWorkerEBM"

element="eboebo:SyncWorkerListEBM"/>

</message>

However, looking at the transformation I noticed that actual data is coming into the part with name SyncWorkerListEBM instead of SyncWorkerEBM. Hence as my transform by default was trying to access the data from the SyncWorkerEBM part, it was not getting any data resulting in empty transformation output variable. I changed the above code as following and it worked like a charm.

<part name="SyncWorkerListEBM"

element="eboebo:SyncWorkerListEBM"/>

</message>

The same has been raised to Oracle but till they come up with something, we need not stop. Let’s be going…

Oracle Fusion Middleware Console not showing up properly : Screen Reader Setting

2010-08-10T10:32:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was looking at my friend’s FMW and it was not displaying the details properly. It showed something like below with radio buttons and partially visible table content.

Well, this is not any problem but just an accessibility option. The solution is pretty simple. To correct this, go to Oracle FMW Console > Setup > My Preferences Menu Item > Accessibility Menu Item > Uncheck I use a screen reader. This will solve the problem.

How to install AIA 3.0 from scratch? AIA 3.0 Installation : Important Tips and Tricks...

2010-07-28T23:19:00.000-07:00

Undoubtedly, it was a little challenge while trying to install AIA 3.0. Firstly the long Installation guide and very generic error descriptions leave you nothing but perplexed, secondly, my OS being MS Vista adds fuel to the fire. But, despite all the odds, what matters most is that AIA 3.0 runs successfully on my Laptop (Neeraj-PC). However, just to save the time of world's greatest developers, I'm writing this post to give some of the tips and tricks that I found while installing. Hope they find it useful.

Note: For OS other than Windows the commands will change accordingly.
Processor : Intel Core 2 Duo 2.00 GHz
RAM : 3 GB
OS : Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium (32 bits)

Below are the steps that I followed to install AIA

Install Oracle Database 11g (11.2.0.1.0)

Download the Oracle database installable as zip files and extract them to a single directory. Make sure when you start the installation, there is only one folder having all the contents of both the zips. The easy way is multi-select both the zips and say Extract to some folder.
Proceed with the steps. I chose Desktop Class, Enterprise Edition and did not install Loopback Adapter.
Proceed with the steps and after successful installation check the Enterprise Manager console using http://<host_name>:<port_number>/em as in my case http://Neeraj-PC:1158/em.

Create schemas using the Repository Creation Utility (rcu)

While creating the schemas, I gave all the schemas the same password. However, you can opt to give different passwords as desired.

Install Weblogic server 11g R1 (10.3.2)

Download the server installable and installation guide and follow the guide to install the WLS.

I installed using Sun JDK without any Loopback Adapter

Install Oracle SOA Suite (11.1.1.2.0)

Study the software and hardware requirements before installing and also gather the necessary supporting documents as Installation guide, Administration guides etc.
Follow the installation guide and install the WLS. After installation do not wonder if you are not able to see the soa_server1 folder under <Middleware>/user_projects/domains directory. It will come when you start your managed server first time using the startManagedWeblogic soa_server1.

Finally Installing the AIA 3.0

Go through the Hardware-Software requirements carefully and download the AIA installable from Oracle e-delivery website. Also download the following supporting documents from Oracle Support

Oracle Application Integration Architecture Foundation Pack 11g Release 1 (11.1.1.2.0): Installation Guide - [Doc No :E17949-01]
Known Issues and Workarounds for Oracle Application Integration Architecture Foundation Pack 11gR1 [Note ID : 1087180.1]

While following the installation guide and preparing for installation, pay attention to the steps mentioned below.
Configuring JVM Parameters - Instead of modifying the file setDomainEnv.cmd, make the change in the setSOADomainEnv.cmd as this file seems to override all the changes in the other domain files. Set the if condition as described. if "%PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE%"=="AMD64" ( set USER_MEM_ARGS=%PORT_MEM_ARGS%) else ( set USER_MEM_ARGS=-Xms1024m -Xmx1024m -XX:PermSize=512m XX:MaxPermSize=512m )
Enabling remote JDBC Connection - Make this argument as true in both .cmd and .sh files to avoid any confusions.
Setting up Timezone - Firstly verify the current timezone in the database from the sqlprompt(by running sqlplus.exe) using SELECT SESSIONTIMEZONE FROM DUAL;. Then you can set it to whatever you want using ALTER SESSION SET TIME_ZONE = ‘EST’;. Don’t close this sql prompt window till AIA installation is complete as it is maintained only for a session. Specify the same time zone in the weblogic managed server start too as given in the guide. Don’t specify any timezones like +5:30 to avoid any errors.
Configure your node manager properly and Start your SOA server using the Node Manager before installation. Learn How.
Go ahead with your AIA installation using the AIA Installer. While installation, at the time of Deployment Configuration step it will say sometimes as Failed due to Unable to reserve space in Heap. Click Retry. Close all open programs and make sure there is enough memory available as specified in the USER_MEM_ARGS. It should solve the error next time.
After the installation is successful, go to the WLS console and set the user permissions as shown below.

Verify the installation from the AIA Console http://<localhost:soa_server_port_number>/AIA

Starting Admin and Managed Servers using Node Manager and WLST

2010-06-30T21:43:00.000-07:00

Node Manager is a WebLogic Server utility, independent of domains, that enables you to start, shut down, and restart Administration Server and Managed Server instances from a remote location. You can further use the Node Manager to control Administration Server and Managed Server from a local location also as I used in my case. Below post explains how you can start your Admin and Managed servers from the Node Manager.

Note : I have used Windows Vista OS and Oracle Database 11.2. All the commands for Linux/Unix will change accordingly.

Please follow the following steps for the same.

1.) Firstly configure the Node Manager
2.) Verify the Node Manager
3.) Once you verify and complete the above steps, I recommend, stop and close everything open till now. Then follow the following steps.
Start your Node Manager using <Middleware_Home>\wlserver_10.3\server\bin\startNodeManager.cmd command from the command prompt.

Open a fresh command prompt window and run WLST.cmd from <Middleware_Home>\wlserver_10.3\common\bin\WLST.cmd.
Next task is to connect to the Node Manager using nmConnect(). In the WLST console window type nmConnect('weblogic','welcome1','neeraj-pc','5556','soa_domain').
Once connected to Node Manager the command prompt will change.
Now to start your Admin server type nmStart() e.g. nmStart('AdminServer')
To start your managed server type nmStart() e.g. nmStart('soa_server1')
If it gives the success notification, you are done. Also, you can verify the same from the Weblogic Console.

Part 2 : How to start the Node manager and Verify that it is running properly

2010-06-30T09:08:00.000-07:00

After the Node Manager is properly configured, you can start the Node Manager by following the below mentioned steps.

Open a new command window and go to <Middleware_Home>\wlserver_10.3\server\bin using cd command. Type startNodeManager and press Enter.
It starts your Node Manager and gives the output as shown in below image.

To verify if the Node Manager is running successfully, start your Admin Server if it is not Running and go to Weblogic Server Console.
Navigate to Environment --> Machines --> LocalMachine --> Monitoring Tab --> Node Manager Status. It should display Reachable. See below image.

Hence the Node Manager is running properly.

Part 1: How to configure the Node Manager to start Admin and Managed Servers

2010-06-30T09:07:00.000-07:00

Before you can use the Node Manager utility, you need to configure/verify the Node Manager.

For this start the Admin Server as usual by running the <Middleware_home>\user_projects\domains\soa_domain\startWebLogic.cmd.
Go to Weblogic Console and navigate to Machines-->LocalMachine-->Configuration Tab-->Node Manager Tab. Specify the ListenAddress (where Node Manager will run) and ListenPort as per you installation. By default the port is 5556. Be sure to provide the exact URL/Host name in ListenAddress as localhost will disallow starting the servers from remote location. See below image.

Go to <Middleware_home>\wlserver_10.3\common\nodemanager\nodemanager.properties. Set StartScriptEnabled=true.
Start WLST from <Middleware_home>\wlserver_10.3\common\bin\wlst.cmd in a separate command prompt window. You can double click on the wlst.cmd also to start WLST.
Once WLST starts, connect to Admin Server from the WLST console. To connect type the connect() command on the WLST console and press Enter. Accept defaults or provide inputs as required. Once it connects successfully, the WLST prompt will change to wls:/mydomain/serverConfig>.
Now type nmEnroll(<Middleware_home>\user_projects\domains\soa_domain). This command enrolls the current machine with the Node Manager and creates some properties file (nm_password.properties,SerializedSystemIni.dat).
If the message displays as "Successfully enrolled this machine with the domain directory at", Enrollment is successful.
Exit from the WLST console using the exit() command and shut down your Admin Server and Close the Browser Console window.
Node Manager is configured. Further, to start the Admin and Managed Servers from this Node Manager, refer to this post.

Client side Error Handling with validateRegExp on Decimal fields

2010-04-29T11:06:00.000-07:00

There are undoubtedly more than one ways of handling the errors gracefully for your ADF inputText component. One of which is at the Model Layer using Validation at the Entity Objects the details of which can be seen here.
However, in some of the cases where we have an editable table dropped on the page and we need to provide the validation on all its fields, some of which are decimals, the various ways would be to use the various validators and converters as described here. However, this post describes 2 ways to handle the errors on the Decimal fields.

Note : To demonstrate the use of Decimal fields I've created a column Weight in the Employees table. Further I've created an Employees Entity Object, View Object and Application Module.

I also created a jspx page to Create/Update an Employee

Using the Validate Double Range :
Drag the validateDoubleRange validator from the Component Pallette under the JSF Core Menu and rop it under the inputText component. Remove ConvertNumber if any present. Just specify the range here as shown below.

At run time whenever an error occurs it shows the result in the following format.

However, the limitations of using this approach are :

You can not customize the message.
The Error messages are displayed after Submitting the page which involves a server call.

Many times customers want client side validation messages in JavaScript alert boxes. The second approach demonstrates the same.

Using validateRegExp :
Validate Regular expression is a very efficient means to check for any format of the STRINGS. But unfortunately it can not be used for Numerical or Decimal data types. Even if you try to drop a validateRegExp validator under inputText, it works properly in case of errors but in case of correct value it throws an exception.

500 Internal Server Error
java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: 'value' is not of type java.lang.String. at oracle.adf.view.faces.validator.ValidatorUtils.assertIsString(ValidatorUtils.java:36) at oracle.adf.view.faces.validator.RegExpValidator.validate(RegExpValidator.java:103) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXEditableValue.validateValue(UIXEditableValue.java:378) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXEditableValue.validate(UIXEditableValue.java:206) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXEditableValue._executeValidate(UIXEditableValue.java:522) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXEditableValue.processValidators(UIXEditableValue.java:302) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.ChildLoop$Validate.process(ChildLoop.java:67) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.ChildLoop.runAlways(ChildLoop.java:39) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.ChildLoop.runAlways(ChildLoop.java:30) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXColumn.processValidators(UIXColumn.java:70) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.UIXCollection.processComponent(UIXCollection.java:822) at oracle.adf.view.faces.component.TableUtils$3.process(TableUtils.java:256) at ...

To remove this error, just change the data type of your attribute to String in the Entity Object as shown under. Please note the same Entity Object can be used for other View Objects also. Hence make sure that all the View Objects are in tact.

So everything is set. Just run the page now and see the output.

no cache policy header, USE_APPLICATION_VIEW_CACHE not working properly

2010-04-02T05:40:00.000-07:00

Problem :
When I try to open a dialog box from my page, I get the following error.

Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.config.AFCConfigFactory getConfig
INFO: ADF Config did not find the AFC config
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.config.AFCConfigFactory getConfig
SEVERE: Error in config : Cannot locate config file. Using default values
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.config.AFCConfigFactory getConfig
SEVERE: Error in config. Using default values
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.filter.PageCachingProcessor getResponseFromCache
INFO: page (__ADFv__) cache miss
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.filter.PageCachingProcessor isResponseCacheable
INFO: response not cacheable - no cache policy header
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.filter.PageCachingProcessor getResponseFromCache
INFO: page (PPAPListDialog.jspx) cache miss
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM aam.tooling.managedbeans.LoggedUserInfo
INFO: In Logged User Info Bean...
Apr 2, 2010 12:24:22 PM oracle.webcache.adf.filter.PageCachingProcessor isResponseCacheable
INFO: response not cacheable - no cache policy header

Due to this error, the following things happen.

I keep on getting the Row Currency Error on navigating time and again to my dialog pages.
I have an attachment dialog with command link to save the attachment on user's system. It often refers to the firstly clicked attachment always even when I have clicked on the different link this time.
It does not update the dialog view properly. Sometimes newly added rows do not get displayed there.

Solution :
After a long study it was clear that it has something to do with the cache. But I just wondered where. Finally it was USE_APPLICATION_VIEW_CACHE in the web.xml file. I set it to false and all the above mentioned errors went.
   <context-param>
   <param-name>oracle.adf.view.faces.USE_APPLICATION_VIEW_CACHE</param-name>
   <param-value>false</param-value>
   </context-param>

Although more information about USE_APPLICATION_VIEW_CACHE can be found here but there is no reference that I could make why this be causing problem in my application. But still if you face the same problem (probably when it's a day before the UAT as in my case), you can give a thought to apply this solution.

Can not start Jdeveloper : Unable to create instance of Java Virtual Machine

2010-02-26T04:18:00.000-08:00

I had not thought that Jdeveloper 10g may throw some error depending on my disk space even. When I tried to restart my Jdeveloper 10.1.3.3.41.57, it popped up an error message to me as shown below.

When Jdeveloper starts it tried to allocate some some heap size from the disk space. If that space is not avilable this error is popped up.

The same can be easily resolved by changing the AddVMOption parameter value to the desired value.

Location : JDEV_HOME\jdev\bin\jdev.conf
Parameter : AddVMOption
Value : <Any valid disk space value in MB>

#
# Set the maximum heap to 512M
#
AddVMOption -Xmx1024M

If you have lot of available disk space it is better to have this heap size around 1024 MB to accelerate the context switching of Jdeveloper.

Setting the current row of a view object with custom key programmatically

2010-01-31T06:23:00.000-08:00

I came across a use-case where I needed to set the key of a View Object manually through the backing bean. Usually setCurrentRowWithKey() or setCurrentRowWithKeyValue() can be used to set the current row of a view object. But What if you don't know the exact key but part of it and you want to create the key yourself and set the current Row programmtically. Well you can use the following function on click of a command button or customize it happily to put to any specific use...

   public String setNewRowKey() {
   // Get the iterator displayed on the Page
   FacesContext ctx = FacesContext.getCurrentInstance();
   Application app = ctx.getApplication();
   ValueBinding bind = app.createValueBinding("#{bindings}");
   DCIteratorBinding iter = ((DCBindingContainer) bind.getValue(ctx)).findIteratorBinding("DepartmentsEmployeeVOIterator");
   if (iter == null) {
   throw new RuntimeException("Iterator not found");
   }

   // Create the key manually. It requires providing all primary keys for all
   // the Entity Objects included in the View Object
   Object [] keyValues = new Object[2];
   keyValues[0] = null; // Any Department
   keyValues[1] = "114"; // Employee ID

   // find all the rows matching the above criteria using the RowSetIterator.
   // You can also use the same to find rows matching any key criteria.
   Row [] rows = iter.getRowSetIterator().findByKey(new Key(keyValues), -1);

   if (rows.length > 0) {
   // get the first row and its key and set current row of iterator with this key string
   iter.setCurrentRowWithKey(rows[0].getKey().toStringFormat(true));
   }

   return "navigation-rule";
   }

"AWT-EventQueue-0" java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException: 0

2010-01-19T08:48:00.000-08:00

While trying to run Application Module in Jdeveloper 10.1.3.3, I got the following error.
Exception in thread "AWT-EventQueue-0" java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException: 0
at oracle.sql.NUMBER._fromLnxFmt(NUMBER.java:3199)
at oracle.sql.NUMBER.toString(NUMBER.java:761)
at oracle.sql.NUMBER.stringValue(NUMBER.java:2090)
at oracle.jbo.domain.Number.toString(Number.java:390)
at javax.swing.table.DefaultTableCellRenderer.setValue(DefaultTableCellRenderer.java:298)
at javax.swing.table.DefaultTableCellRenderer.getTableCellRendererComponentDefaultTableCellRenderer.java:190)
at javax.swing.JTable.prepareRenderer(JTable.java:3924)
at javax.swing.plaf.basic.BasicTableUI.paintCell(BasicTableUI.java:2070)
at javax.swing.plaf.basic.BasicTableUI.paintCells(BasicTableUI.java:1972)
at javax.swing.plaf.basic.BasicTableUI.paint(BasicTableUI.java:1895)
at javax.swing.plaf.ComponentUI.update(ComponentUI.java:142)
at javax.swing.JComponent.paintComponent(JComponent.java:742)
at javax.swing.JComponent.paint(JComponent.java:1005)
at javax.swing.JComponent.paintWithOffscreenBuffer(JComponent.java:4963)
at javax.swing.JComponent.paintDoubleBuffered(JComponent.java:4916)
at javax.swing.JComponent._paintImmediately(JComponent.java:4859)
at javax.swing.JComponent.paintImmediately(JComponent.java:4666)
at javax.swing.RepaintManager.paintDirtyRegions(RepaintManager.java:451)
at javax.swing.SystemEventQueueUtilities$ComponentWorkRequest.run(SystemEventQueueUtilities.java:114)
at java.awt.event.InvocationEvent.dispatch(InvocationEvent.java:209)
at java.awt.EventQueue.dispatchEvent(EventQueue.java:461)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpOneEventForHierarchy(EventDispatchThread.java:242)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEventsForHierarchy(EventDispatchThread.java:163)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:157)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:149)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.run(EventDispatchThread.java:110)
BC4J Tester exit code(0)

As a basic human nature, I searched on the internet to find out that it was a bug as reported here.
http://forums.oracle.com/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=1617924?

But the same was fixed in Jdeveloper 10.1.3.3. Then why did it bug me now. It was then I realized that I had synchronized my Entity Object with the database. I opened one of my entity object and was wondering to see the Type of one of the attributes as String although it was a Number, something similar to this.

So I just modified all the Attribute types according to the ones in the database and hurrah it was working fine.

Clear values in Search form fields

2010-01-09T11:08:00.000-08:00

I have designed a Search form to search for specific records based on search criteria. But once I have searched I want to clear the criteria fields to conduct a fresh search. There are 3 ways

1. Reset the bind parameters of the view objects by calling them in the bean that can be found at the below links.
http://forums.oracle.com/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=2563498#2563498

http://forums.oracle.com/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=1579998#1579998

http://radio.weblogs.com/0118231/2006/11/21.html

2. Use ResetButton to reset the form parameters. But it will reset the form fields’ values to the previous search criteria parameters.

3. The third way originates from the user experience. According to my experience users are least concerned about the VO bind parameters being refreshed or not, but what they actually want is to clear the form instantly and preferably with no server call that means on the client-side itself. The reason for the same is that all countries/clients/users do not have very fast internet as to virtually diminish the time taken to reset the form. Hence this method came up to clear the search form using Java Script. This way might not be suitable for all the situations and also does not replace the other two mentioned above but still it is very much efficient and helpful to provide the end-users pleasant experience.

All you have to do is follow the below 3 steps and it is done.

Change your search form to <af:form> instead of <h:form>. After this the form looks like this.

<af:form id="searchForm">
<af:panelPage title="Clear Search Form Parameters Example">
<af:panelForm>

<af:inputText id="firstName" value="#{bindings.TheFirstName.inputValue}" label="#{bindings.TheFirstName.label}" required="#{bindings.TheFirstName.mandatory}" columns="#{bindings.TheFirstName.displayWidth}">

<af:validator binding="#{bindings.TheFirstName.validator}"/>

</af:inputText>

<af:inputText id="salary" value="#{bindings.TheSalary.inputValue}" label="#{bindings.TheSalary.label}" required="#{bindings.TheSalary.mandatory}" columns="#{bindings.TheSalary.displayWidth}">

<af:validator binding="#{bindings.TheSalary.validator}"/>

</af:inputText>

Create a Clear CommandButton as shown below and set the onClick property as clearAllFormFields() function.

<af:panelButtonBar>
<af:commandButton actionListener="#{bindings.ExecuteWithParams.execute}" text="Search" disabled="#{!bindings.ExecuteWithParams.enabled}"/>
<af:commandButton text="Clear" onclick="return clearAllFormFields();"/>
</af:panelButtonBar>

Now add the scriptlet function in the jspx page as shown below.

   document.forms["searchForm"].elements["firstName"].value="";
   if(document.forms["searchForm"].elements["salary"] != undefined)
   document.forms["searchForm"].elements["salary"].value="";
   return false;
   }

</script>

And it is done. Now just test run the page.

af:selectOneChoice : get the combo box value for static and dynamic list

2009-12-07T08:58:00.000-08:00

I have seen very common requirement to process the value selected in the Single Selection Combo Box at run time. Following example tells how to get this value at runtime in the backing bean for static list and dynamic list.

1. Static List

Static list allows to add a fixed list of user defined values. The following image shows the static list created on the Department Id.

Following steps show how to get the value from this list at runtime.

Define the valueChangeListener Property of the DepartmentId field to some method of a bean. e.g. SelectOneChoiceValueGetter:getSelectOneChoiceValue(ValueChangeEvent valueChangeEvent)
Now go to the above value change listener method and add the following code

public void getSelectOneChoiceValue(ValueChangeEvent valueChangeEvent) {
        // take the selectOneChoice object from the valueChangeEvenet
        CoreSelectOneChoice selectOneChoice = (CoreSelectOneChoice)valueChangeEvent.getSource();
        
        //get the LOV items list object
        List selectOnechoiceItemList = selectOneChoice.getChildren();

        //traverse the list and get all the children items
        for (int i = 0; i < selectOnechoiceItemList.size(); i++) {
            if (selectOnechoiceItemList.get(i) instanceof CoreSelectItem) {
                //get list item
                CoreSelectItem csi = (CoreSelectItem)selectOnechoiceItemList.get(i);
                
                // get the new value selected and type cast it into actual class
                oracle.jbo.domain.Number num = (Number)valueChangeEvent.getNewValue();

                //check if the list value is similar to the new selected value
                if ((((String)csi.getValue()).equals(num.toString()))) {
                    System.out.println("Item Label :" + csi.getLabel());
                    System.out.println("Item Value :" + csi.getValue());

                    // here is your value. store it or print it
                }
            }
        }
    }

2. Dynamic List

Dynamic list is created when  the number of values to be shown in the list box are not fixed. e.g. a new department can be added in an organisation in future and hence the newly added department is expected to appear in the list box at run time. In this case we create a dynamic list where the vales of the list box come at runtime from some master source. Following image shows the dynamic list created for the Department Id.

In the page definition file following code gets added.

<list id="EmployeesView1DepartmentId" IterBinding="EmployeesView1Iterator" StaticList="false" ListOperMode="0" ListIter="DepartmentsViewIterator">
<AttrNames><Item Value="DepartmentId"/></AttrNames>
<ListAttrNames>
<Item Value="DepartmentId"/>
</ListAttrNames>
<ListDisplayAttrNames>
<Item Value="DepartmentName"/>
</ListDisplayAttrNames>
</list>

Following steps show how to get the value of a dynamic list at run time.

As defined earlier for static list, define the valueChangeListener Property of the DepartmentId field to some method of a bean. e.g. DynamicListValueGetter:getDynamicListValue(ValueChangeEvent valueChangeEvent)
Now go to the above value change listener method and add the following code

Note : You should have the bindings set as the managed Property in the Managed Bean.

public void getDynamicListValue(ValueChangeEvent valueChangeEvent) {
// get the bindings to the current page components
BindingContainer bindings = getBindings();

try {
//get the control binding to the id of the List as written in the Page Definition file
JUCtrlListBinding listBinding = (JUCtrlListBinding)bindings.get("EmployeesView1DepartmentId");

// as this is a value change listener method, so the list binding contains the OLD value of the combo box and not the NEW one.
//The new value is available there in the valueChangeEvent as the index. So point the list binding to current selected index first
listBinding.setSelectedIndex(Integer.parseInt(valueChangeEvent.getNewValue().toString()));

// Now receive the selected row of the list binding
Row selectedValue = (Row) listBinding.getSelectedValue();

//from this row you can get the desired attributes
System.out.println( "Item Label :" + selectedValue.getAttribute("DepartmentName"));
System.out.println("Item Value :" + selectedValue.getAttribute("DepartmentId"));
}
catch (Exception ex)
{ex.printStackTrace();}
}

When you run the page and select an item from the combo box, the label and value of selected item are displayed in the Jdeveloper Console. Once you have got the values you can do whatever you want.