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Segment Naming Conventions

The flexfield view generator will use your segment name as a column name and change all spaces and special characters to underscores ( _ ). You should begin your segment name with a letter and avoid using special characters such as +, -, ., !, @, ', or # as segment names. You should ensure that none of the segment names in your flexfield are the same once the flexfield view generator has changed all spaces and special characters to underscores ( _ ). You should also ensure that none of the segment names in your flexfield result in the same names as other column names in the code combinations table for the flexfield. For example, the name DESCRIPTION often appears as a column name, so you should avoid naming your segment "Description" (it is not case-sensitive). You should not use a non-alphabetic character as the first character of your segment name, since the first character of a database object name (that is, your view column name) must be a letter. For example, a segment name of "# of dependents" becomes "__of_dependents", which is an illegal column name.

If two or more segment names map to identical view column names, the flexfield view generator will not be able to create your view (it will fail with a "Duplicate Column" error), except in the case of segments belonging to different contexts in a descriptive flexfield. The view generator uses underscores ( _ ) to replace all characters in the segment name that are other than alphanumeric characters and underscores. The segment names in a structure should not be identical after correction for non-alphanumeric characters. For example, the names "Segment 1's Name" and "Segment_1_s_Name" would be the same once the space and apostrophe become underscores ( _ ).

You should avoid using segment names that become SQL reserved words such as NUMBER or DEFAULT.

For descriptive flexfields, the context prompt is used as the view column name for the context column, so you should not create a segment name that results in the same name as the context prompt.

Keep these conventions in mind while naming flexfield segments using the (Key or Descriptive) Flexfield Segments windows. See: Key Flexfield Segments, Descriptive Flexfield Segments.

Key Flexfields

The segment names in a structure and any qualifier names in the flexfield should not be identical after correction for non-alphanumeric characters.

Since the key flexfield view includes non-flexfield columns, your segment names should not match any other non-flexfield column in the code combination table. For example, a segment named DESCRIPTION and a non-flexfield column by the same name in the code combination table will conflict in the view. If there is a column named "CONCATENATED_SEGMENTS" or "ROW_ID" in the code combination table, the table column by this name would not be included in the view since these names would conflict (the view generator creates the view columns as usual).

Descriptive Flexfields

The context prompt is used as the view column name for the context column, so the context prompt should not appear as a segment name. The global segment names should be unique. That is, other global segments and context sensitive segments should not have identical view column names.

See Also

Overview of Reporting on Flexfields Data

Overview of Flexfield Views

Creating a Flexfield View

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