Designer 2000 Questions

1. We would like to make use of Oracle's CG_REF_CODES table (i.e., domains) for some simple code lookups, rather than creating lots of separate little tables each with its own maintenance screen. We understand, however, that it may be very difficult to retrieve the descriptions of any codes in that table. For example, if we had an entry for employee type (part time, full time, seasonal, etc.) in the CG_REF_CODES table, and employee type was carried on the employee table, could we show the actual description on a report? Is there something like a DESCRIPTION() function for domain values? Also, on a scale of 1 to 10, how difficult is it to rotate into a production area new values that are placed into the CG_REF_CODES table? Our repository is only in the development area, so we'd make changes there and rotate them into production only as needed. Is that a trivial exercise, or a complex one? If the latter, are we better off sticking with separate tables for codes that users can access through a screen and are displayed on other modules as explicitly-specified look-up tables?
2. We want to format the on-screen display of values from a look-up table. For example, given an employee ID, we would like to display a concatenation of the first name, middle initial, and last name of that employee with one space between each element. The base table has a foreign key into the employee table, which is included as a look-up table in the module. Is it possible to format a value from a look-up table before displaying it on a screen? Can some internal screen variable within a buffer be constructed from the concatenation or truncation of certain fields, and then displayed? We are trying to do this from within Designer/2000. Can it be done using that tool? If not, can it be done from within Developer/2000's Forms Designer?

TIA. Received on Wed Jan 22 1997 - 00:00:00 CET