Re: Oracle Portal (WebDB) Question, Help!

Firstly, I'll explain what WebdB really is. You mention that it is tightly integrated with Oracle. This is true because what WEBDB is is a schema that is stored in the Oracle database. When you install Webdb it adds tables, packages and other objects to the database under the webdb schema. There is also a webdb listener which allows you to call packages through a browser. These packages are PL/SQL which are used to generate Webpages using the PL/SQL web toolkit. What happens is that the package generates WebPages on the fly, accessing the database as it needs to.

Webdb is quite powerful in the way that It manages users. It places some of the database user management concepts into a web environment so that users can be managed using the databases security model.

If using webdb, you aren't going to be using java or ASP. Webdb itself is quite limited (at version 2.2) with what it could do. What I found was it was fine for creating Basic forms with 1:1 relationships to a table or simple multitable relationships. The wizards made it very quick and easy to create froms and reports but you had little control in the layout. What I found myself doing was writing PL/SQL packages to generate the type of forms and reports we required. This worked pretty well. Webdb will allow you to write and store javascript functions in the database which can then be called by other pages. I often used basic webdb pages as wrappers and called pl/sql procedures in the middle of them Web db uses <Oracle></Oracle> tags and you can embed PLSQL directly between the tags. I think that Webdb itself has quite a lot of shortcomings but being able to write csutom PL/SQL packages is actually quite powerfull. The production version of Webdb 3 is due out soon. I've only had a small play with the beta and the portal aspects seem a bit limited but I have heard that there has been many changes since then so I will be interested to see what is included.

I hope this helps.

regards

Paul

In article <8q5f0m$o3l$1_at_nnrp1.deja.com>,   dejatype_at_my-deja.com wrote:
> I have a few questions about the position of Oracle Portal (WebDB) in
> the overall picture of website development tools. I am familiar with
 the
> tools and technologies like MS IIS, MS FrontPage, CGI, Active/Java
> server pages, MS Visual InterDev, etc etc. Where does Oracle Portal
 fit
> into all this?
> 1. Does it become the primary web site development tool?
> 2. Can it handle all aspects of web [pages] creation?
> 3. If not, what are it's short comings?
> 4. Since it is so tightly integrated with Oracle, does it mean the
> developers don't have to worry about Java/Active server pages and/or
> servelts?
>
> I would very much appreciate your help with this.
> Thanks and Regards,
> Mike.
>
> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Before you buy.
>

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy. Received on Mon Sep 18 2000 - 19:01:26 CDT