17 Configuring End User Personalization

This chapter describes how you can make pages in your Oracle Fusion application personalizable by the end user. Note that mobile applications cannot be personalized by the end user.

This chapter contains the following sections:

Section 17.1, "About Configuring End User Personalization"
Section 17.2, "Allowing Pages to be Personalized by End Users in Oracle Composer"
Section 17.3, "Configuring End User Personalization for Components"

17.1 About Configuring End User Personalization

Oracle Fusion applications allow end users to personalize certain pages using the Personalize menu. End users can set preferences, edit the current page, and reset the page to the default.

You can control what pages in an application can be personalized, including any new pages you may create.

Tip:

If you created a page using CRM Composer, then that page is personalizable by default.

Note:

For a list of pages that end users can personalize, refer to the product-specific documentation.

Figure 17-1 shows the Personalize menu available in all Oracle Fusion Applications.

Figure 17-1 Personalization Menu in Oracle Fusion Applications

When end users choose the Edit Current Page menu item, Oracle Composer is launched. From here, they can change certain aspects of the page, such as moving or deleting components. Figure 17-2 shows the Partner Profile application home page in Oracle Composer, ready for the end user to personalize.

Figure 17-2 Home Page Ready for Personalization

Along with using Oracle Composer to personalize pages, end users can change certain aspects of components, and then have those changes saved so that they remain each time the user logs into the application. For example, end users can change the width of columns in many of the tables in Oracle Fusion applications. However, by default, when they change the width, that new width size is only saved for the current session. You can configure that column so that when the user changes the width size, it will remain at that size whenever the user logs back into the application. For more information about configuring persistence, see "Chapter 35 Allowing User Customizations at Runtime" of the Oracle Fusion Middleware Fusion Developer's Guide for Oracle Application Development Framework.

17.1.1 Before You Begin Allowing Pages or Components to be Personalized

Before you configure pages to be personalizable, you should be familiar with the Oracle Fusion application architecture that enables customization, as described in Chapter 1, "Customizing and Extending Oracle Fusion Applications." You should also understand the typical workflows for working with customizations, as described in Chapter 2, "Understanding the Customization Development Lifecycle."

You will also need to do the following:

Install JDeveloper and set up your development environment. For more information, see "Chapter 2 Setting Up Your Development Environment" of the Oracle Fusion Applications Developer's Guide.
Create a customization application workspace. For more information, see Chapter 10, "Using JDeveloper for Customizations."
Launch JDeveloper in the Oracle Fusion Applications Administrator Customization role.
Select a layer value. When customizing application artifacts in JDeveloper, you first need to select the layer and layer value to work in. You use the Customization Context window to make this selection. For more information about customization layers, see Section 1.2, "Understanding Customization Layers.""

17.2 Allowing Pages to be Personalized by End Users in Oracle Composer

You use JDeveloper to set certain attributes that allow a page to be personalized.

Task: Enable or Disable Personalization on Existing Standard Pages

Many pages in Oracle Fusion applications allow personalization by default. You can either disable it or enable it using the isPersonalizableInComposer property on a page. Set it to true to allow personalizations, set it to false to disallow personalizations. For instructions, see the "Preparing your Page for End-User Personalizations" section of the Oracle Fusion Applications Developer's Guide.

Task: Enable Oracle Composer Personalization on Custom Pages

In order for end users to be able to use Oracle Composer to personalize custom pages, you'll need to enable your pages to work with Oracle Composer by doing the following:

Set the isPersonalizableInComposer property to true.

For instructions, see the "Preparing your Page for End-User Personalizations" section of the Oracle Fusion Applications Developer's Guide.

Note:
If a page is currently available for personalizations, and you don't want it to be, change the value to false.
Create a corresponding page definition file, if one does not exist.

For instructions, see the "Ensuring Customizable Pages Have Page Definitions" section of the Oracle Fusion Applications Developer's Guide.
Use Oracle WebCenter components that define areas that can be customizable.

For instructions, see the "Making a JSPX Document Editable at Runtime" section of the Oracle Fusion Applications Developer's Guide.

17.3 Configuring End User Personalization for Components

Certain attribute values that affect how an ADF Faces component displays can be persisted to the MDS repository. Application-wide component attribute persistence to the MDS repository is controlled by configuration in the adf-config.xml file. However, customizing this file is not allowed, as doing so is not upgrade-safe. Instead, you can override the application-wide persistence at the page level by setting the persist and dontPersist attributes for component instances.

For example, by default, table column attribute values are not persisted. But you can configure a column in a table so that when the user changes the width, reorders columns, or selects a column, those changes will still be in effect when the user logs back into the application, by adding those attributes to the value of the persist attribute on the column component. For more information about what attribute values can be persisted, see the "Introduction to Allowing User Customizations" section of the Oracle Fusion Middleware Fusion Developer's Guide for Oracle Application Development Framework.

Note:

You cannot change the settings in the adf-config.xml file, as these changes will be overwritten anytime you apply a patch or an upgrade. Therefore, you must change the values on the individual components on a page.

Task: Persist Attribute Values on JSPX Pages

You need to add the attributes you want to persist to the persist attribute on the component. For more information, see the "Controlling User Customizations in Individual JSF Pages" section of the Oracle Fusion Middleware Fusion Developer's Guide for Oracle Application Development Framework. You can set this attribute using Oracle Composer. For more information about setting attributes on components, see Section 3.3, "Editing Component Properties in Oracle Composer."