Want to create a custom form in Oracle Apps? Don’t know where and how to start? Before designing, you need to setup oracle forms development environment on your desktop.
In this article, I will cover how to set up forms development environment.
Introduction
Oracle Apps is a complete ERP suite with business applications like Distribution, Finance, Order Management, Purchasing and many others. Oracle forms developer is a major GUI tool to develop the user interface. Though Oracle is moving to OAF, ADF and other technologies like the cloud but still, form builder is used for development.
You may have observed that look and feel across all forms is consistent across Oracle Apps. Your custom form should also follow the same standards so that it does not look alien when registered with Oracle Apps.
Let’s see how to do that.
Pre-Requisite
This tutorial assumes basic working knowledge of Oracle Forms Builder, FTP process and Windows Operating System.
Software/Tools
- Oracle Developer Suite 10G (10.1.2.0.2)
- Oracle E-Business Suite ( Apps 11i or R12)
- WinSCP/FileZilla
Download and Install Oracle Developer Suite 10g (10.1.2.0.2)
Oracle forms builder is part of Oracle Developer Suite 10G. It is available as a download on Oracle site. Open this link to download it. It is available for Windows, Linux, Mac operating system.
Select respective depending on operating system and install it.
It is a wizard-driven installation. Just click on the downloaded setup.exe file. It starts oracle universal installer which does a quick pre-requisite check and starts the installation. Refer to this step by step installation guide.
Setup forms development environment
Oracle Apps provides starting point as TEMPLATE.fmb and APPSTAND.fmb module.
APPSTAND.fmb:- It contains a collection of standard objects like triggers, canvas, windows, blocks, LOV. All these objects have the fixed property defined like width, height and color wherever applicable. This is basically a template of all object type. All other form inherited these objects from APPSTAND.fmb to have common characteristic and behavior.
TEMPLATE.fmb:- It is a starting point for any custom form development. It is a child of APPSTAND.fmb i.e, it inherits all properties from APPSTAND.fmb. You need to create a copy of this form to start new development.
This inheritance is important here, if while developing any custom form if it breaks your form behavior would change. Each child form checks these dependencies in $AU_TOP/forms/US and $AU_TOP/resource/US. There is an equivalent path in windows env forms_path. All parent objects should be there in form_path.
How to check forms_path on Windows?
Navigate to run and type regedit.
It opens registry editor as shown above. You can search the registry to get forms path. Click on edit and find button and search for FORMS_PATH as shown below.
Note: Please do not change any value. It may stop working on windows.
It finds the variable. Just double-click on it to see the values. You can see my forms path.
All dependent objects should be under this path C:\DevSuiteHome_1\forms.
Copy TEMPLATE.fmb and APPSTAND.fmb
Download TEMPLATE.fmb, APPSTAND.fmb from $AU_TOP/forms/US path and PLL mentioned below from $AU_TOP/resource path using any FTP client like WinSCP or Filezilla. Copy all these files to your development environment forms path shown above paragraph.
PLLs are basically common PL/SQL libraries which provide common functionality flexfield utilities, currency, etc. PLL files for your reference in Oracle Apps R12.
| PLL Name | Description | |
| 1 | APPCORE.pll | Application Standards, toolbar |
| 2 | VERT.pll | Specific industry features |
| 3 | GLOBE.pll | Global or regional features |
| 4 | JA.pll | Asia/Pacific features |
| 5 | JE.pll | Europe/Middle East/Africa features |
| 6 | JL.pll | Latin America Code |
| 7 | CUSTOM.pll | Customizations of standard forms |
| 8 | FNDSQF.pll | Flexfields, Profiles, Currency, Concurrent Request Submission, Record History, Message Dictionary |
| 9 | APPDAYPK.pll | Calendar |
| 10 | APPFLDR.pll | Packages for Folder Blocks |
| 11 | FV.pll | Federal Financials |
| 12 | HRKPI.pll | Human Resources Knowledge Provider |
| 13 | GHR.pll | Global Human Resources |
| 14 | GMS.pll | Encumbrances |
| 15 | IGILUTIL.pll | International Public Sector |
| 16 | IGILUTIL2.pl | International Public Secto |
| 17 | PSAC.pll | Public Sector Applications |
| 18 | PQH_GEN.pll | Public Sector Human Resources |
| 19 | PSA.pll | Public Sector Applications |
| 20 | PSB.pll | Public Sector Budgeting |
| 21 | OPM.pll | Process Manufacturing |
| 22 | APPCORE2.pll | Application standards (for CUSTOM.pll) |
| 23 | VERT1.pll | |
| 24 | VERT2.pll | |
| 25 | VERT3.pll | |
| 26 | VERT4.pll | |
| 27 | VERT5.pll | |
| 28 | IGI_CBC.pll | |
| 29 | IGI_CC.pll | |
| 30 | IGI_CIS.pll | |
| 31 | IGI_DOS.pll | |
| 32 | IGI_EXP.pll | |
| 33 | IGI_IAC.pll | |
| 34 | IGI_MHC.pll | |
| 35 | IGI_SIA.pll | |
| 36 | IGI_STP.pll | |
| 37 | FNDMOAC | |
Attach PLL to Template.fmb
Open form builder and open TEMPLATE.fmb file and attach each library. You will get an error like missing libraries. Click each library and attach to the forms builder one by one. There are minimum 36 libraries you need to attach.
