Form Personalisation

You can also refer the article given by Anil Passi. You can also refer the User Guide for the Complete reference. Also See Chapter 28[Page 735] in the Developer’s Guide.




Primarily there are two methods of extending Oracle Forms, and these are

CUSTOM.pll

FORMS Personalization



USE OF CUSTOM.PLL

Custom Library is used to customize and allows extension of oracle applications without changing the Oracle Application’s Code. The CUSTOM library is an Oracle Forms PL/SQL library.

If a company is opting for Oracle Applications, they will purchase the whole package. It will be common for all the industries. So, customization is required to suit that company.



Where it is Saved?

CUSTOM library is located in the AU_TOP/resource directory. CUSTOM.PLL file is stored in the AU[Application Utility] Top. The CUSTOM.PLX is also saved in the same path. If You are customizing the CUSTOM.PLL by copying it and pasting in other drives, the PLX file will also generated in the same path. Then You have to copy and paste it in the AU top.

D:\oracle\prodappl\au\11.5.0\resource\CUSTOM.PLL



Name : CUSTOM.pll, CUSTOM.plx

Path : D:\oracle\prodappl\au\11.5.0\resource



During execution of Oracle Applications first it will look for the ‘.PLX’ file, if it not found then it will search for ‘.PLL’ file.



We can also add custom packages to ‘custom.pll’. But we have to follow the naming conversion. The new package’s name should start with character that comes after ‘C’. (Usually start with ‘USER_’).



We can attach libraries to the custom package. We cannot attach APPCORE package, because CUSTOM is already attached to it (If we attach it will create recursion). But we can attach the following packages.



APPCORE2 : APP_ITEM_PROPERTY2

APP_DATE

APP_SPECIAL2



FNDSQF : FNDSQF provides Oracle Applications routines for function security (for opening forms), flexfields, and other utility routines. It’s a PLL attached to the CUSTOM.PLL file.



FND_FUNCTION : To call oracle forms



FND_MESSAGE : To display messages



Some of the common scenario where CUSTOM.pll can be used are:-

1. Enabling/Disabling the fields

2. Changing the List of Values in a LOV field at runtime.

3. Defaulting values

4. Additional record level validations

5. Navigation to other screens.

6. Enabling Special Menu





How and why does CUSTOM.pll work?

Every form in Oracle Apps is created using something called as TEMPLATE.fmb. But some of the modules like HRMS have their own HR Specific Templates[HRTEMPLT.fmb]. These template files have form level triggers that make call to CUSTOM.pll. The triggers that can be trapped using CUSTOM.pll in HRMS screen can be different than those which can be trapped for other module.



Commonly used events that are trapped using CUSTOM.pll are:-

ZOOM

WHEN-NEW-FORM-INSTANCE

WHEN-NEW-BLOCK-INSTANCE

WHEN-NEW-RECORD-INSTANCE

WHEN-NEW-ITEM-INSTANCE

WHEN-VALIDATE-RECORD





NOTE

Whenever You open the CUSTOM.PLL file, it is better to go to that path and open. If You double-click this, it will ask some option, navigate there also the same path.



DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PROGRAM UNITS AND ATTACHED LIBRARIES

Attached Libraries can be used across the libraries.

Program Units can be used for that particular Form Only.



CUSTOM Package

The CUSTOM package contains the following functions and procedure:

• CUSTOM.ZOOM_AVAILABLE

• CUSTOM.STYLE

• CUSTOM.EVENT



Note that this method may not be available in the future version of Oracle Applications.