Contents

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Preface

1 Overview of Oracle Discoverer 4i

1.1 Oracle Discoverer 4i and Oracle9i Application Server

1.2 The Discoverer 4i architecture

1.2.1 The three tier architecture of Discoverer 4i Plus

1.2.2 The n-tier architecture of Discoverer 4i Viewer

1.2.3 The Client tier (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.3.1 The Client tier and Discoverer Plus

1.2.3.2 The Client tier and Discoverer Viewer

1.2.4 The HTTP Server tier (Discoverer Viewer only)

1.2.4.1 What is a servlet?

1.2.4.2 What is a servlet engine?

1.2.4.3 What is the Discoverer 4i Viewer Servlet?

1.2.5 The Discoverer Services tier (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.5.1 The Discoverer Java Applet and HTML Pages (Discoverer Plus only)

1.2.5.2 The Session Component (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.5.3 The Locator Component (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.5.4 The Preferences Component (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.6 The Database Tier (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

1.2.7 Which server machines to install the Discoverer Services components on?

1.2.7.1 The HTTP Server machine

1.2.7.2 The Application Server machine(s)

1.2.7.2.1 The Master Discoverer Server machine

1.3 How Oracle Discoverer 4i works

1.3.1 The Oracle Discoverer 4i Plus process

1.3.2 The Oracle Discoverer 4i Viewer process

1.3.2.1 How the Discoverer 4i Viewer Servlet interprets the HTTP request

1.4 Scalability and load balancing

2 Running, Maintaining and Supporting Oracle Discoverer 4i

2.1 Running Discoverer 4i

2.1.1 Running Discoverer 4i Plus

2.1.2 Running Discoverer 4i Viewer

2.2 Using the Discoverer NT Service

2.2.1 What is an NT Service?

2.2.2 What is the Discoverer NT Service?

2.2.3 How does the Discoverer NT service start?

2.2.4 How to start and stop the Discoverer NT service manually

2.2.5 How to change the Discoverer NT service to manual startup

2.2.6 Seeing Service Errors

2.3 Registering and Unregistering Discoverer Services Components

2.3.1 To make sure the OAD is running and responding:

2.3.2 To see the registered components on one machine:

2.3.3 To see all the registered components on the network:

2.3.4 Registering and Unregistering Components from the Windows Start Menu

2.3.5 Registering and Unregistering from the Command Line

2.3.5.1 To Register the Preferences and Session components with the OAD

2.3.5.2 To Unregister the Preferences and Session components from the OAD

2.4 Editing the End User Preferences

2.4.1 What are the End User Preferences?

2.4.2 To set End User Preferences:

2.5 Shutting Down

2.5.1 Shutting Down Individual Servers

2.5.1.1 To Shut Down Individual Servers Gradually

2.5.1.2 To Shut Down Individual Servers Immediately

2.5.2 Shutting Down the Entire Discoverer System

2.5.2.1 To Shut Down the Discoverer System Gradually

2.5.2.2 To Shut Down the Discoverer System Immediately

2.6 Adding and Removing Server Machines

2.6.1 Adding an Additional Discoverer Server Machine

2.6.2 To Permanently Remove an Additional Discoverer Server machine

2.7 Utilizing the Discoverer 4i Viewer JavaScript Enhanced User Interface

2.8 Frequently Asked Questions

3 Installing Oracle Discoverer 4i on multiple machines

3.1 What are the differences between a default installation and a distributed installation of Oracle Discoverer 4i?

3.1.1 Default Installation of Oracle Discoverer 4i

3.1.2 Distributed Discoverer 4i Installation

3.2 Performing a distributed installation

3.2.1 Confirming connection to the default Master Discoverer Server machine

3.2.2 Confirming the name of the Master Discoverer Server machine

3.2.3 Installing Oracle Discoverer on Additional Discoverer Server machines

3.2.4 Editing the Discoverer Services pref.txt file (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

3.2.4.1 What is the pref.txt file?

3.2.4.2 Why edit the pref.txt file?

3.2.4.3 What is load balancing?

3.2.4.4 Examples of Load Balancing

3.2.4.5 How to edit the pref.txt file

3.2.5 Editing the tnsnames.ora file (Discoverer Plus and Viewer)

3.2.5.1 What is the tnsnames.ora file?

3.2.5.2 Why edit the tnsnames.ora file?

3.2.5.3 How to copy the tnsnames.ora file

3.2.5.4 How to edit the tnsnames.ora file

3.2.6 Editing the disco4iv.xml file (Discoverer Viewer only)

3.2.6.1 What is the disco4iv.xml file?

3.2.6.2 Why edit the disco4iv.xml file?

3.2.6.3 How to edit the disco4iv.xml file and what to change

3.2.7 Confirming connection to the Additional Discoverer Server

4 Using a URL to start Oracle Discoverer 4i Automatically

4.1 What is the format of the URL to start Discoverer 4i?

4.2 Discoverer 4i Plus URL arguments

4.3 Discoverer 4i Viewer URL arguments

5 Customizing Oracle Discoverer 4i Viewer

5.1 Using Oracle Discoverer 4i Viewer for Customized Web Applications

5.1.1 Customize the general appearance

5.1.2 Customize the application

5.1.3 How the HTML is produced

5.1.4 Steps to Generate the HTML needed to build a specific Discoverer Application

5.1.4.1 Step 1 Browser sends URL

5.1.4.2 Step 2 XML generation

5.1.4.3 Step 3 Apply XSL

5.1.4.4 Step 4 Generate HTML

5.2 Customization Examples

5.2.1 Files needed for customization

5.2.2 Quick Customization

5.2.2.1 Quick customization attributes

5.2.2.2 Quick customization steps

5.2.2.3 Example of editing the style.xsl file

5.2.3 Full Customization

5.2.3.1 Background

5.2.3.2 Prerequisites

5.2.3.3 File Structure

5.2.3.3.1 disco4iv.xsl

5.2.3.3.2 page_layouts.xsl

5.2.3.3.3 gui_components.xsl

5.2.3.3.4 style.xsl

5.2.3.3.5 functions.xsl

5.2.3.3.6 errors.xsl

5.2.3.3.7 scripts.xsl

5.2.3.3.8 render_table.xml

5.2.3.3.9 viewer_config.xml

5.2.3.4 Servlet Programming Interface

5.2.3.4.1 Receiving data from the Servlet

5.2.3.4.2 Sending data to the Servlet

5.2.3.5 Customizing Look and Feel - XML/XSL Example

5.2.3.5.1 Step 1 - The XML file

5.2.3.5.2 Step 2 - The XSL file

5.2.3.5.3 Step 3 - XML+XSL = HTML

5.2.3.5.4 Step 4 - Customize the XSL

5.2.4 Video Stores Demo - an example of an alternative user interface

5.2.4.1 What is installed

5.2.4.2 Set up steps

5.2.4.3 Set up Web Server

5.2.4.4 Run the Video Stores demo

5.2.4.5 Modify the video.xsl file

5.2.5 Other customization examples

5.2.5.1 Logging on automatically

5.2.5.1.1 Step 1: Add a new template to page_layouts.xsl

5.2.5.1.2 Step 2: Include username, password and database

5.2.5.1.3 Step 3: Modify disco4iv.xsl

5.2.6 Customization Summary

6 SSL Support in Oracle Discoverer

6.1 Getting more information

6.2 SSL and Discoverer

6.3 What is SSL and why should I use it?

6.4 How does SSL work?

6.5 About Public Key Encryption Technology

6.6 SSL authentication and certificates

6.7 What steps do I need to follow?

6.7.1 To configure SSL with Oracle Discoverer 4i Plus

6.7.2 To configure SSL with Oracle Discoverer 4i Viewer

6.8 Configuring Discoverer 4i Plus to use SSL

6.8.1 How does Discoverer 4i Plus support SSL?

6.8.2 How do I configure Visibroker Gatekeeper to use SSL?

6.8.3 Installing Visibroker Gatekeeper to work with SSL

6.8.4 Getting SSL certificates

6.8.4.1 Specifying the certificate information

6.8.4.2 Specifying private key passwords

6.8.4.3 Specifying output file name

6.8.4.4 Specifying key size

6.8.4.5 Using an S/MIME certificate chain

6.8.5 Installing SSL certificates

6.8.6 Installing the x509cert.jar file

6.8.7 Installing the required Dynamic Link Library files (DLLs)

6.8.8 Enabling SSL in Discoverer 4i Plus start pages

6.8.9 Using SSL inside firewalls

6.9 Configuring Discoverer 4i Viewer using HTTPS

6.9.1 Editing the httpd.conf file to set up HTTPS

6.9.2 Editing the disco4iv.xml file to set up HTTPS

6.9.3 Enabling SSL in Discoverer 4i Viewer

7 Configuring Discoverer 4i Plus for Firewall Support

7.1 Terminology

7.2 Getting More Information

7.3 Before you start

7.4 About Internet Firewalls

7.4.1 What is an Internet Firewall?

7.4.2 What is a Demilitarized Zone?

7.4.3 About secure ports

7.5 About Visibroker Gatekeeper

7.5.1 What is Visibroker Gatekeeper?

7.5.2 Why does Discoverer Plus need Visibroker Gatekeeper?

7.5.3 Required Visibroker Gatekeeper Versions

7.6 Choosing a Gatekeeper configuration for Discoverer

7.6.1 About firewall configurations

7.6.2 DMZ configuration examples

7.6.3 Which Gatekeeper configuration do I choose?

7.6.3.1 IIOP Proxying Configuration

7.6.3.2 HTTP Tunnelling Configuration

7.7 Using Visibroker Gatekeeper with an IIOP Proxying Configuration

7.7.1 Overview

7.7.2 Configuring Gatekeeper with no firewall separating Discoverer Services

7.7.3 Configuring Gatekeeper with Discoverer Server components behind an internal firewall

7.8 Using Visibroker with a HTTP Tunnelling Configuration

7.8.1 Overview

7.8.2 Configuring Gatekeeper with no firewall separating Discoverer Services

7.8.3 Configuring Gatekeeper with Discoverer server components behind an internal firewall

7.8.4 Persistent HTTP Connections

7.9 Configuring the Discoverer client

7.9.1 About the Discoverer client connection sequence

7.9.2 How to use a specific connection method

7.10 Configuring Visibroker Gatekeeper

7.10.1 Where to run Visibroker Gatekeeper

7.10.2 Running Visibroker Gatekeeper on the HTTP Server

7.10.3 Running Visibroker Gatekeeper on a different Server

7.10.4 Configuring the Visibroker Gatekeeper port

7.10.5 Changing the default Visibroker Gatekeeper port

7.10.6 Getting Log Information from Visibroker Gatekeeper

7.10.7 Configuring NAT devices to work in front of the Gatekeeper

A Oracle Discoverer and Oracle Applications

A.1 Specifying display of the Applications User Checkbox in the Discoverer 4i Viewer Connect Dialog

A.2 Specifying display of the Applications User Checkbox in the Discoverer 4i Plus
Connect Dialog

A.3 NT Registry Settings for Oracle Applications Users

B Discoverer 4i Viewer Configuration Files

B.1 Configuration settings in viewer_config.xml

B.2 Configuration settings in disco4iv.xml

C Discoverer 4i Registry Settings

C.1 Registry settings in pref.txt

C.2 Other Registry settings

C.3 Low Registry virtual memory quota

Index