ClariFit From/To Date Picker Plug-in Moved to OraOpenSource

This article is for people looking for help with the ClariFit From/To Date Picker.

I'm currently in the process of updating some of the plugins I created for ClariFit to support APEX 5.0. As part of these changes some additional things are happening, mainly listing the plugins in the new apex.world site and moving the plugins ownership over to OraOpenSource.

The first plugin that has been moved/updated is the ClariFit From/To Date Picker. The plugin is now called OraOpenSource From/To Date Picker and is hosted here. To help with backwards compatibility the plugin's internal name has remained the same. This means that upgrades will be seamless.

Please post all bugs and enhancement requests on the project's issue page.


The next plugin that will be updated is the ClariFit Dialog (to be called OraOpenSource Dialog). It is currently being tested and will be officially released pending any major bugs. If you'd like any other ClariFit plugins updated to APEX 5.0 please leave a comment and I'll look into it.

ClariFit From To Date Picker 1.0.1 Update

I've updated the ClariFit From To Date Picker APEX Plugin. There was a small bug in the initial version that caused rendering issues in IE.

The initial post about the plugin can be found here and the demo here.

Thanks to Marc B and Joni V for finding the issue.

Malicious Code in APEX Plugins - Feedback

My previous post about Malicious Code in APEX Plugins identified the possibility of harmful code in plugins (if you haven't read it please read the post before continuing). Several people had some excellent feedback which they included in the comments section. This post summarizes their comments and provides my thoughts on them.

Oracle Maintaining Plugin Repository

The idea is for Oracle to host something similar to Apple's App Store so that all code must pass a set of standards etc. I don't work for Oracle so I can't comment on this too much and I think it's a good idea. That being said the current community plugin repository, apex-plugin.com, has an approval process before plugins are released.

Wrapped PL/SQL and Licensed Plugins

Some plugins have wrapped PL/SQL source code and obfuscated/minimized JavaScript (JS) code. Plugin developers may need to wrap their PL/SQL code since their plugins are licensed. They may also minimize their JS files for performance issues. When you use these plugins the company that developed it can help determine its legitimacy (more on this in the next section). Just because it's wrapped doesn't mean you should not install it. They're other ways to validate that it is safe to use.

Trusted Developers and Organizations

They're some companies and developers within the APEX community that are well known and trusted. These companies specialize in APEX and would never write malicious code. For example I would never hesitate to install a plugin from organizations such as (but not limited to) ClariFit, Apex Evangelists, APEX Freelancer, Skill Builders, and Sumneva.

Scalability and Upgrades

Scott Spendolini made a great comment about the scalability of plugins and upgrades. I think this has to be examined on a case by case basis. If you're using a plugin on a small application that doesn't get a lot of hits then it may be a moot point. If your application gets millions of hits a day and you use a poorly optimized plugin then maybe you need to modify it to fit your needs. When looking at the source code you may not only be looking for malicious code but also techniques to improve performance for your specific needs. If the plugin has wrapped PL/SQL you can try to contact the developer/company to address your specific needs.

Like all software, plugins may need to be upgraded as APEX evolves (and it's 3rd party add-ons like jQuery). If the plugin is open source you can easily modify the code or email the developer with a change request. I've had several people email me about bugs and feature enhancements for plugins and was able to implement them in future versions.

APEX Plugin: Simple Modal

I just published another plugin called Simple Modal: http://www.apex-plugin.com/oracle-apex-plugins/dynamic-action-plugin/simple-modal.html

This plugin allows you to use any region(s) (or DOM object) in your APEX application as a modal window.

When developing this plugin I learned a few more things that may be useful when developing plugins:

- Scope Creep: When developing a plugin you can make it do a lot of things. This may lead you to try and include extra unnecessary functionality. Try to remember the goal you're trying to achieve, or more importantly, what you're developers will try to achieve with the plugin.

- Instrumentation: I'm a big fan of Tom Kyte and really like the emphasis he puts on Code Instrumentation. You may want to add some debug information in your JavaScript code to help you understand what is going on. As part of this plugin I included a logger package which is essentially a wrapper for console but will work in all browsers. I'll write about this in another post and include the final copy for general use.

APEX 4.0 Interactive Reports - Customize Wait Display

Over a year ago I wrote about how to customize the APEX IR wait logo (http://www.talkapex.com/2009/04/apex-interactive-reports-customize-wait_28.html). If you read that post you'll notice it's quite lengthy and can be intimidating if you're new to JavaScript.

With APEX 4.0 this is a lot easier to do since they're plugins to declaratively add this functionality. This post will go over how to customize the APEX IR Wait logo in APEX 4.0. You can try a demo here: http://apex.oracle.com/pls/apex/f?p=20195:3200

- Create an IR report region

    SELECT e.*, SUM (e.sal) OVER () test
      FROM emp e
CONNECT BY LEVEL <= 5

- Install Plugin

- Download the Simple Modal plugin: http://www.apex-plugin.com/oracle-apex-plugins/dynamic-action-plugin/simple-modal.html
- Shared Components / Plug-ins / Import
- They're 2 plugins included in the zip file. Import both of them (Show and Close)

- Create Show Dynamic Action

- RClick on the IR region and click "Create Dynamic Action:
- Advanced
- Name: Show IR Wait
- Next
- Event: Before Refresh
- Selection Type: DOM Object
- DOM Object: apexir_WORKSHEET_REGION
- Note: We're using the DOM object and not the region since we can port this example to Page 0 and it will apply to all your IRs
- Next
- Action: Select Simple Modal - Show
- You can modify some of the plugin attributes here if you'd like
- Next
- Selection Type: DOM Object
- DOM Object: apexir_LOADER
- Create

- Create Close Dynamic Action

- RClick on the IR region and click "Create Dynamic Action:
- Advanced
- Name: Close IR Wait
- Event: After Refresh
- Selection Type: DOM Object
- DOM Object: apexir_WORKSHEET_REGION
- Next
- Action: Select Simple Modal - Close
- Create

Now when you run the IR it'll make the screen modal while it's reloading the data. If you want to run on all IRs then you can add this dynamic action to Page 0.

If you run the demo in a console-enabled browser (Firefox, Chrome, Safari) you'll notice that the plugin includes some additional debug information. I'll be posting the logging JavaScript package that was used in the plugin soon.

APEX Plugin: Syntax Highlighter

I finally got around to developing my first APEX Plugin!

To summarize this plugin is a code syntax highlighter based on http://alexgorbatchev.com/SyntaxHighlighter/.
. This is the same syntax highlighter for code samples on this site. You can download it here: http://www.apex-plugin.com/oracle-apex-plugins/item-plugin/syntax-highlighter.html.


Since this was my first APEX plugin that I created I thought I'd give some pointers to help others writing their first plugin:

- Decide on a feature you want to add. This can be harder said than done. If you're new to JavaScript etc, then you may want to create an example in a html file so that you can reference it later on.

- Keep it simple. Chose a simple feature to add. If you decide to add something very complex you may just get lost.

- Put your PL/SQL code in a package/function so that you can develop using a 3rd party tool such as Toad or SQL Developer. This will allow you to quickly debug your code. Once it's working you can extract it and put it inline with your plugin

- Look at other examples. View other plugins and see how they were built etc.