Interactive Report Download Button only for a certain Authorization Role

Interactive Report

Interactive Report Download Button only for a certain Authorization Role

Von Tobias Arnhold → 4.27.2017

The Interactive Report has this great download feature where you can export everything you can see.
Anyway there are circumstances where the customer doesn't want that feature open for everyone.

In APEX you can only choose if you want the download button or not.

Even so APEX can't do it out of the box. There is a way to make your application able to do it.

Since APEX 5 you can't download when the "Download" is disabled. If you try an almost empty page occurs. Ok that means the "Download" functionality must be activated an I have to disable it manually.

You need to focus on three steps:
 1. Add an authorization scheme.
 2. Hide the download button in the front end. (Visualization)
 3. Disable the download functionality in the back end. (Security)

1. Add an authorization scheme
The authorization scheme will handle the rights that only the correct person is allowed to download from the Interactive Report.
I my case I call it "ROLE_DOWNLOAD" and it works like that:
Type: PL/SQL Function Returning Boolean 
Function Body: return security_pkg.has_role(:APP_USER,'ROLE_DOWNLOAD');
Validate: Once per session

2. Hide the download button
Add a static report id

Add a new "Dynamic Action" on "Click".
jQuery Selector: #STATIC_REPORT_ID_actions_button
Event Scope: Dynamic
Security > Authorization: {Not ROLE_DOWNLOAD}

Add some Javascript to remove the button:
$('#STATIC_REPORT_ID_actions_menu .icon-irr-download').parent().parent().parent().remove();

3. Disable the download functionality
When APEX is exporting something from an "Interactive Report" itjust does a simple redirect on the same page and adds a REQUEST for the specific download type. In my case it is the request "CSV" I want to block.

Add a "Branch" executed "Before Header":

And to disable the download I just redirect on the same page without any request. The trick is to add the right PL/SQL Condition. In this example check for the request and the authorization scheme.

Code:
:REQUEST = 'CSV' and APEX_UTIL.PUBLIC_CHECK_AUTHORIZATION('ROLE_DOWNLOAD') = false

 
In my mind this is simple and secure and shows how flexible APEX really is.

An introduction into the APEX 5.1 Layout View

Universal Theme

An introduction into the APEX 5.1 Layout View

Von Tobias Arnhold → 4.04.2017

Many of you are still using the old "Component View" but the "Page Designer" introduced in APEX 5 made the developer life much easier.

The top 5 most time saving abilities for me are:
 1. Easy access on all page elements (without any page refresh)
 2. Copy&Paste of items, regions, dynamic actions, ... 
 3. Drag&Drop moving of items and regions
 4. Multi edit of items
 5. Since APEX 5.1: The ability to customize your own personal Page Designer View

The functionality "Layout" introduced in APEX 5 was not in my focus and as I remember I had some issues with it. So I just ignored it.

In APEX 5.1 I started a rerun on it using the "Universal Theme" and I must say it is a real help when you create a complex form page with a lot of page items. It feels different in APEX 5.1 and works almost flawless.

To get in touch with it I prepared a little example for you to help understanding the feature and may get inspired to use it, too.
We start with a page including 16 page items which should be visualized on 3 rows. Some of them are conditional and they are from different types (Text Field, Radio Group, Select List, Textarea).

All items are now displayed one below the other.

What do I aim for in the first step?
1. All items should have the label set to be "above". (Do not use the region template option for that)
2. I want to edit 8 page items split on two rows
3. Items 1-3 per row should be displayed over 2 columns
4. Item size must be adjusted

In between I made a Dynamic Action to make the "detail group" item conditional based on "Organization" if it is null or not.

I did the same for the category selector but I needed some Javascript code to make it right.


Code:

apex.item( "P9_CAT1_NAME_A" ).hide();
apex.item( "P9_CAT1_NAME_B" ).hide();
apex.item( "P9_CAT2_NAME" ).hide();
apex.item( "P9_CAT3_NAME" ).hide();
apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V1" ).hide(); 
apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V2" ).hide(); 
apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V3" ).hide();    

if ( $v("P9_CATEGORY_SELECTOR") == '1' ) {
    apex.item( "P9_CAT1_NAME_A" ).show();
    apex.item( "P9_CAT1_NAME_B" ).show();     
}
if ( $v("P9_CATEGORY_SELECTOR") == '2' ) {
    apex.item( "P9_CAT2_NAME" ).show();  
}

if ( $v("P9_CATEGORY_SELECTOR") == '3' ) {
    apex.item( "P9_CAT3_NAME" ).show();  
}
if ( $v("P9_CATEGORY_SELECTOR") == '4' ) {
    apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V1" ).show();
    apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V2" ).show();   
    apex.item( "P9_CAT4_NAME_V3" ).show();       
}

In my final move I finished the page by adjusting the other items.

The page looked like that:


But as always it could be a little bit better and luckily I used APEX. I just had to make a little change on it:

That's it. Hope you will give the "Layout"-View a chance to proof itself. :)


Info:
In case your Page Designer mentions problems in applying some multi update settings. Just refresh the page and try again.