Blog

A rundown of Insum’s presentations at Kscope21. This year we’re proud to be Bronze Sponsors and APEX track sponsors.

In this blog, Steven proposes a refactoring exercise. Look at the code. What changes does it need? Discuss it with him on Feuertips June 16.

In this blog for episode 12 of Feuertips, Steve shows us how to suppress row-level errors in Oracle Database.

Naming conventions are key to writing high-quality code. Steven explores what motivates conventions to clarify what works best for us and why.

On May 25, 2021, the Oracle APEX community lost its greatest champion, its fearless leader, its mentor, when Joel Kallman lost his battle with COVID-19. Joel touched the lives of so many of us at Insum, and we wanted to share a few thoughts about what he meant to us. [...]

In this episode: to manipulate in-program data in set-kinda ways, use nested tables. They have cool, set-oriented features.

The WITH keyword lets us use modular design with SQL and helps avoid redundant logic in SQL statements. Learn more in this Feuertips episoide

If you can’t always perform automated regression testing, you can build a simple test harness and, as much as possible, make sure your procedures are broken up into units that can be easily tested. See Steven’s example.

The execution of non-query DML can cause all sorts of SQL errors. Steven lays out guidelines in DML Handling code.

What should be in your exception handling section? Things pertaining to exception handling. What shouldn’t? Application code. Learn more.

Oracle APEX sometimes seems endlessly extensible. If you’re missing something from the vast array of native, declarative components, you’re likely to find it in the form of an Oracle APEX Plug-in. In this post, we curate a list of favourite plugins, as per some of Insum’s consultants.

A developer takes out “insurance” when they write code to “make sure” or “just in case”. This can be unnecessary & unproductive. See examples.

PL/SQL packages are great! But there is one package feature you shouldn’t use: Initialization. Your first inclination should be to avoid it. Steven Feuerstein explains why.

The Automatic Time Zone setting in APEX presents some significant challenges. Anton adresses the issues by bypassing this feature with an implementation of his own.

Steven discusses when it makes sense to choose a string-indexed associative array (one of the three types of PL/SQL collections)

Lazy can be a good developer characteristic or a terrible one depending on how and when applied. Steven and Marlyn look at examples of each.

Learn how to easily add rich animations to your Oracle APEX application for Waiting, Success and No Data Found.

Watch out for always using an IF statement, consider using a CASE expression, in SQL as well as PL/SQL, and then look for opportunities to use CASE statements as well.

I believe that in the years to come, most of the PL/SQL code that will be written, will be written for (and in) APEX applications. I am, therefore, very happy to join the Insum team for the next phase of my Oracle journey – in PL/SQL and APEX!

What digital solutions are available to enterprises to help survive the pandemic? Singapore Author Graham Ng provides an answer

2020 threw us all for a bit of a loop, didn't it?? I feel sorry for the folks who are tasked with end of year review posts. I mean... Where to start? As for me, I'm excited because I get to spend some time remembering all the great things that [...]

When it comes to migrating away from legacy Oracle Forms applications, there are many replacement options. And, it's no secret that Oracle APEX is becoming an increasingly recommended alternative to Oracle Forms. But why APEX? You would think they have little in common as Forms is client-server based and APEX [...]

It's Canadian Thanksgiving weekend. The year is 2020, which means a lot of us are scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up with things to be thankful for. It's been that sort of year. But lo and behold, the Oracle APEX team decided we needed a bit of [...]

What is Cloud Native? In the past few years, you might have heard the term "Cloud Native", circulating in the developers' sphere and might be wondering what it means. The cloud-native approach generally entails the use of cloud computing resources, for example, container-based application hosting, object storage, messaging, and orchestration [...]

Oracle Forms applications are the backbone of many organizations. They've evolved over time to fit the needs of order processing, shipping, finance, and more. They can be a model of efficiency.  Yet, Forms at its core is still Client-Server technology, and only partially adapted to today's web-based business reality. This [...]

Once in a while, we get to work on an Oracle Cloud Infrastructure implementation with a company that you can truly call “leading edge”. MinseSense is a Canadian data analytics company working in the mining industry. It helps its clients improve their ore extraction and recovery processes using a state-of-the-art [...]

In the 10th and final episode of this Insum Insider series, hosts Monty Latiolais and Michelle Skamene invite some of Insum’s top experts to present a list of top 10 APEX tips for developers. Definitely worth watching! The Insum InsiderAre you passionate about all things Oracle and Oracle APEX? So [...]

In episode seven of the Insum Insider, Oracle Cloud & DBA Practice Director Luc Demanche and Oracle ACE Adrian Png take a close look at Oracle’s Free Tier Offer, what it contains, its limitations, and its advantages. The Insum InsiderAre you passionate about all things Oracle and Oracle APEX? So [...]

In this blog post, we are going to explore how a 3rd party library can be added to Oracle APEX. In particular – we are going to look at how to integrate Google Material components to Oracle APEX. I’m going to assume you have an intermediate knowledge of APEX but […]

In our sixth Insum Insider episode, Oracle ACEs Sylvain Martel and Anton Nielsen lead a lively session on EBS extensions with APEX. The Insum InsiderAre you passionate about all things Oracle and Oracle APEX? So are we! We love connecting with other members of the community to share our knowledge, [...]

Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) covers most of the business processes an organization requires, but there are gaps in its capabilities.  For example, EBS data-entry screens can be daunting.  It takes a fair amount of training for new users to master their sequence of execution. An enterprise hiring part-time employees or […]

Despite the troubled times that we are living in these days because of the COVID-19 pandemic, lots of good and valuable news is coming to us from OATUG Forum Online, (which replaces the Collaborate 20 conference), as well as from announcements by the Oracle APEX team. Certification of Oracle 19.3C […]

Introducing covid19masks.info What happens when a motivated team of Oracle APEX specialists comes together on a Thursday evening? They decide to do something to help address the growing, urgent information management needs brought on by the COVID19 crisis, of course. That very weekend. In just two days, we developed, tested [...]

Don't settle for an APEX UI/UX  that is anything less than beautiful. This post is directed at developers and developer-adjacent people to whom this may be a novel (and refreshing) concept. I want to raise awareness for the aesthetic accomplishments of the APEX community in the hope that more people [...]

If you're looking to start learning about Oracle APEX, want to know where to go if you have questions or need support, or simply want to keep up with Oracle APEX news, you've come to right place! Our very own Jorge Rimblas and Jackie McIlroy put together a great presentation [...]

Fist bumps and elbow high-fives, friends. Things have certainly changed a lot in the past few days, haven't they? Just a week ago, we were all excitedly preparing for upcoming conferences, getting ready to work on new projects, looking forward to meeting new clients. Fast forward to today, and just [...]

Since Oracle Application Express (APEX)'s release as HTML DB in 2004, one question keeps coming up again and again: How suited is this platform for large-scale work? Is APEX built for the enterprise? Can it perform, scale and can it be extended? I'd like to address some of the most [...]

This video, released as part of Insum’s Fall 2019 Webinar Series,  is directed at APEX developers who are interested in Browser Test Automation. A prior knowledge of Cypress is not required or even expected: Shownotes Learn more about Cypress The best resource for learning about Cypress is the website itself. […]

Unless you were hiding under a rock somewhere during the last few weeks, you’ve surely heard about the new Oracle Autonomous Database Cloud Services. The official announcement was made during Oracle OpenWorld last September by Larry Ellison during his Keynote speech and it was all over the press. This is […]

As a Cloud and DBA Practice Director, I get this question regularly. It’s something almost all IT Directors and CIOs will ask me. All of them have been told repeatedly that they need to go to the cloud. But of course, since they are the ones who are ultimately responsible […]

Autonomous Database is Oracle’s flagship product. Does it hold promise for businesses currently using the Oracle database? Is it worth the upgrade? Will it make things better for those, like me, who administer Oracle Databases for a living? Oracle’s Autonomous Database launched about two years ago in 2 flavors. Oracle […]

Introduction If you have an interest in Browser Test Automation, you have probably heard about the rising popularity of  Cypress. I have enthusiastically joined the bandwagon after many years of being underwhelmed by Selenium. That being said, Cypress is a young tool compared to Selenium and there remain some open [...]

In my last blog, I talked about how you can to greatly improve E-business Suite’s User Interfaces with software customizations (I also provided some nice examples). Using Oracle APEX, the Oracle-built and supported application development platform, you can provide your E-Business Suite users with modern, intuitive applications while you enhance […]

Just as we were about to publish Power Ranking APEX 19 features March, we received official news from Oracle on the General Availability of Oracle APEX 19.1! There were a few moves within the rankings but most importantly REST-Enabled Forms actually strengthened its grip on the top spot. Where does [...]

Docker is a popular software delivery platform that packages and runs applications in “containers”. Docker containers have the necessary software dependencies pre-installed, run within an isolated operating system environment, and can be deployed on any host system where the Docker Engine can run. Typically, developers “pull” images from a Docker […]

When configuration changes are made to an ERP system, the focus is on making business processes execute properly so that business needs are satisfied accordingly. But, there is always a needed change or enhancement that an ERP cannot accommodate. Software customizations can address these unanswered needs. Fortunately, E-Business Suite users […]

Last year about this time we began a blog series power ranking the upcoming features associated with Application Express 18.1. The response was overwhelming. Mike Hichwa even admitted within the halls of Oracle the monthly power rankings provided bragging rights among the APEX Dev Team. With Application Express 19.1 New [...]

In my previous blog, the first of four in this series, I explained how Oracle APEX, Oracle’s Rapid Application Development (RAD) platform allows you to improve the E-Business Suite (EBS) business processes you and your users find inefficient. Because APEX is a RAD platform, it can help you do this […]

While starting off this new year (It's still January, isn't it?), I wanted to take the opportunity to offer you, our readers, my best wishes for 2019. Thanks for your interest in our work, your questions, and the conversations. I also wanted to give you a summary of the year [...]

Oracle E-Business Suite is the Enterprise Resource Planning system of choice for thousands of businesses. A well-rounded Oracle product, it performs just about every business function a medium to large business could require, and is notable for its strong procurement, accounts receivable, accounts payable, as well as MRP and inventory […]

Since its appearance in 2006, Cloud computing has been one of the most talked about subjects in IT. Just about everyone is now aware that adopting the Cloud can offer advantages such as cost savings and flexibility. However, the Cloud comes in many different forms and frankly, can be confusing [...]

Although Oracle Forms applications offer their end-users a web-browser interface, they aren't particularly web-friendly.  Indeed, most Forms developers will tell you that the Oracle Forms development platform is simply not suited for building web-based applications. And, as Forms applications still play a vital role in many companies, this has become [...]

Oracle SQL Developer is a much-appreciated tool for designing, building, documenting, managing and enhancing software systems. It’s also good for testing databases and deploying/administering Oracle Rest Data Services (ORDS). It's useful for APEX developers, too. It allows them to browse, import or export applications or pages, as well as modify [...]

This blog topic was inspired by Connor McDonald’s excellent YouTube video ‘Rock solid secure database connections’, in which he discusses 3 methods to stop exposing your passwords in your database connection strings: In the spirit of continuing the conversation, I'll contribute my $0.02 to his 3 methods. Also, I'll contribute [...]

In my previous blog (2 of 4 in this series) I explained how similar the web-based development platform called Oracle APEX is to Oracle Forms. These similarities give your Forms developers the confidence and efficiency that come with working in familiar territory.  This brings me to the business advantages of modernizing Oracle Forms […]

A PWA (Progressive Web App) is essentially a website that can act very much as an app does on a mobile phone or tablet. This is beyond simple responsive design, a technology that’s been almost universally adopted these past few years. Whereas responsive design adjusts the same information (desktop page) for [...]

In any company, one of IT’s primary responsibilities is to continually increase the profitability of the organization’s information. In that perspective, IT innovation is vital to the company’s future. Innovation is necessary for survival, and sometimes, custom software development is the fastest way to achieve what’s necessary. ERPs can’t do [...]

What’s the optimal technical solution for sending do-not-reply / marketing / notification / batch emails? Is it wiser to in-house or outsource the service? What are my options if I’m considering outsourcing? These questions are difficult and I don’t propose to answer any of them with much thoroughness. They are, […]

Background I recently did multiple upgrades on my Mac: the O/S to High Sierra, SQL Developer to 18.1, and then the JDK to bring it up to a level that SQL Dev requires. Naturally, I updated to the latest JDK, which is higher than SQL Dev 18.1 supports, but hey, [...]

If your company still uses Forms applications, is looking to modernize them, but have not yet found a realistic and reliable solution, then this blog will be well worth your time.   Forms and Reports Modernization is doable Forms modernization doesn’t have to be a huge all-at-once undertaking. There are [...]

We sometimes get questions about REST. “What is it exactly?” “How does it work?”. In its long form, "Representational State Transfer" doesn't make it easier to understand. Nor do the words usually associated with it, such as in “Should I have a REST API?” or “Should I have RESTful Services?”. And, [...]

Lack of time, lack of knowledge and too many preconceptions can hold back your business, especially when it comes to its technological evolution. Where does this problem come from? How can you solve it? Start by seeking out the facts.   These days, it’s getting harder to rely on newspapers, […]

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a complex combination of website qualities that combine to improve the site’s ranking by search engines. As we all should hope, the most important factor is content. The goal of search engines is to display the most relevant, compelling and current content to users. Accordingly, […]

Web services are an efficient means of providing access to web resources to a variety of clients. This access can be provided regardless of the client by relying on a standardized architecture to ensure interoperability and predictable behavior. REST  Currently, REST, or Representational State Transfer, is the most popular of […]

When it comes to extending applications in the Oracle E-Business Suite Environment, EBS Developers and their managers have been presented with some difficult options over the years. To understand where they are coming from, you must go back to the beginnings of EBS Development. Forms Development in E-Business Suite EBS […]

ICYMI (in case you missed it), Oracle is having a special live webcast on July 16, 2018. After several false expectations from the media, Oracle’s finally (probably) announcing the general availability of the Autonomous Blockchain service. I have been longing for the day! At Kscope18, I had the honour of […]

FINALLY! After months of anticipation, Oracle Application Express (APEX) version 18.1 has arrived! Taking a look at the new features included definitely makes it appear it’s been worth the wait. There really is something for everyone. Where does your favorite APEX 18.1 feature rank? Here is Power Ranking May. Biggest […]

If you’re just starting out in Oracle Application Express, know that Dynamic Actions can take your applications from basic to awesome very quickly. And, just like a lot of things in APEX, they aren’t that hard to learn or implement. So, What Do They Do? In a nutshell, they are […]

The ability to work collaboratively as a team is certainly one of the wonderful aspects of Application Express, Oracle’s rapid application development platform. Developers work on a shared server and update their changes in real time.

The Story of Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) is now playing out at the frontier of two worlds, inside your smartphone. Once upon a time, inside your smartphone,  the worlds of Web browsers and mobile apps were very different. It never really bothered you. It was just like that, and you went […]

Blockchain is a technology buzzword getting a lot of attention these days. At its core, this technology is a means for securing data in a distributed database. The data is de-centralized as opposed to all together in one place such as in a traditional database structure. Its design makes it […]

It’s quiet. Too quiet. And while I have no official word from Oracle, something tells me we’re getting close to announcing 18.1 as being generally available.

Many companies are now planning some kind of migration to the cloud for their Enterprise Resource Planning systems. This is because there are many advantages to getting your ERP on a Cloud infrastructure.

Extended support for Oracle Discoverer ended over a year and a half ago, in June 2017. Enterprises using this once premier ad hoc reporting software are hearing the clock tick louder than ever. This is because, without further upgrades or support, Discoverer could become prey to bugs, end up incompatible […]

It's tough for companies with Oracle Forms. They are often told they should replace this 30-year-old application development technology. But then, Oracle will tell you that the latest version of  Forms will easily integrate with almost any modern technology your enterprise requires. So where does that leave you? Should you [...]

These quickly digestible tips are to help you appreciate what a fabulous front-end development tool APEX Nitro is for Oracle Application Express (APEX), which is, of course, an awesome Rapid Application Development tool for Oracle Database users.

As of March 12, we now know rather than 5.2, the new version of APEX will be 18.1. March 12th also gave us Early Adopter 2 along with eight new enhancements. Where does your favorite APEX 18.1 feature rank? Biggest Mover Up: Oracle JET and jQuery Upgrades [ +2 ] Biggest […]

Is it possible that in this day and age, at an Ivy League University, an internal process can consist of a combination of Excel spreadsheets, paper forms, emails, and bits of SQL script? The short answer is yes. And, this kind of situation is more widespread than you may think. […]

So you have decided that you want to use Oracle Application Express (APEX) to build secure and scalable web-based software applications on top of an Oracle database. Cool. So, now what? How do you get your development team up and running on this highly productive and versatile platform? Insum’s APEX developer […]

Oracle Application Express (APEX) boasts hundreds of plugins, dozens of talented bloggers, and a thriving help forum. We’d like to release a tool that will help grow the community even further! Introducing Insum-APEX-Pro: A chrome extension that adds extra functionality to APEX Page Designer. To install, open this link and […]

On June 25th, 2017 at the ODTUG KScope general session in San Antonio, Vincent Morneau a long-time Insum employee was presented with the ODTUG innovation award for his development of an application called APEX Nitro. APEX Nitro streamlines the use of HTML, JavaScript and CSS when Programming within Oracle Application Express.  […]

New month. New leader. All in all some twelve features changed positions. Where does your favorite APEX 5.2 feature rank? Biggest Mover Up: REST Enabled SQL Support [ +4 ] Biggest Mover Down: New Create App Wizard [ -2 ] Previous Rankings: January 2018 Editor’s note: Each month, we’ll power rank […]

Recently I was working on a project that relied heavily on location data. It required entering addresses, over and over again. Country, state, street address, city, zip code, etc… I was thinking that there must be a better way. Turns out there is: Google Autocomplete! I am sure you have […]

Oracle APEX 5.2  may be considered a minor release, but it promises major functionality enhancements.  Which of these will move the needle? Each month, we’ll power rank the rumored enhancements ahead of Oracle APEX 5.2’s GA release. We’ll take the pulse of the APEX community, monitoring comments, talking to you all […]

The Security Assertion Markup Language 2.0 (SAML2) is an XML-based markup language and an open standard for identity and service providers to communicate authentication and authorization information.

What Do Breadboards, Lego-Style Innovation, and Oracle APEX Have in Common? Oracle APEX is purposely built for “combining components” to build solutions.

How DBAs Can Boost (or Kill) Innovation – when DBAs promote and encourage the use of high-productivity tools, innovation can flourish. When they don’t, it suffers.

Oracle APEX Version Control – Mitigate APEX’s version control constraints by using good development practices that work well with APEX.

Oracle APEX: Low Code, High Innovation – biggest benefit of low code platforms is increasing the number people who can delivering technical solutions.

Understand and master how to use slashes and semicolons in Oracle DDL Scripts. Terminate your SQL and PL/SQL statements properly.

Learn how to integrate statistical calculations or machine learning algorithms in your Oracle APEX application with R functions.

We’ve developed an EBS & APEX Up and Running Package designed specifically to help you quickly get started with developing EBS extensions using APEX.

Our top Oracle APEX minds highlight their favourite new features (IG, Theme Roller, new APIs) and share why you should upgrade to Oracle APEX 5.1.

Having done multiple conversions from Oracle Forms to Oracle APEX, I will answer questions that you should be asking before starting this project.

Making Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) a friendlier tool for consumers, designers, modelers and analysts with Oracle APEX.

Every software project carries some technical debt, however, Oracle APEX can minimize that initial debt load. Learn about how APEX helps you do so.

With Oracle APEX 5.0, you can pivot data within an Interactive Report and it’s quite easy. To accomplish this, go to Actions / Format / Pivot.

Using a modern application framework like Oracle APEX allows organizations to create Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) extensions like never before.

Our Oracle APEX methodology is composed of different elements related to all aspects of an APEX development project from architecture to project management.

Here are five common tasks that should be familiar with Discoverer users and explains how those same tasks are performed using Oracle APEX Interactive Reports.

Insum Solutions – Oracle APEX Printing Options. Decide between BI Publisher, JasperReports, PL/PDF, ORDS and APEX Office Print.

As part of our no-code to low-code show at the recent Oracle Developer Day Vancouver, we created a demo Oracle APEX application that uses both historical and live Open511 data from DriveBC. The application also allows any resident in the city to contribute events using any device.

If your organization is overly-dependant on spreadsheets, Oracle Application Express (APEX) is a free, fully supported, “no-code” solution that allows anyone to create a beautiful application that is multi-user, secure and mobile-ready.

When someone asks if an Oracle APEX application is secure, here are some of the aspects to that question that should probably be addressed.

For many users, new business requirements demand new solutions, and while Oracle Forms does a lot of things well, “new” isn’t really one of them.

There are a multitude of options available to replace the functionality of Discoverer, both from Oracle and third party vendors.

Oracle Forms and Reports has some significant limitations, especially when it comes to the user experience. Is it time to modernize?

Oracle APEX 5.0 is faster than 4.2; development in APEX 5.0 takes less time. Oracle APEX 5.0 looks better. You will stay supported.

Looking for options to extend EBS? We’ve compiled the top 5 reasons why organizations choose Oracle APEX when they need to build EBS Extensions

We dive into Security, Users/Developer Accounts, IDs and Interactive Reports, and RESTful Services.

An application Item, a page 0 item, or a substitution string? This workflow will help you determine which Oracle APEX Global Items to use.

With low-cost viewers and a VR framework, developers can easily create a ground-breaking experience for their APEX applications.

This article will cover how to automatically export and import Oracle APEX applications via scripts rather than a manual process.

The user experience during data entry can be improved by auto selecting the content of a text field before the user starts typing.

APEX is no-cost option to the database; it’s already included. APEX truly facilitates rapid application development.

2-speed IT is about reconciling the different technology goals between business units who want to focus on iterative innovation with rapid application evolution, and IT departments who are accountable for maintaining enterprise class SLAs and understandably want to focus on stability and reliability.

1. What is APEX? Oracle Application Express (APEX) is a Rapid Application Development framework for the Oracle database – rapid should be stressed. With basic SQL and PL/SQL skills, you can quickly create applications that add real value for businesses.