New Features in Oracle Visual Builder Studio

Here's an overview of new features and enhancements added recently to Oracle Visual Builder Studio (VB Studio).

Topics:

• Release 22.07 - June 2022
• Release 22.04.2 - April 2022
• Release 22.04 - March 2022
• Release 22.01 - December 2021
• Release 21.10.2 - October 2021
• Release 21.10 - August 2021

As soon as new and changed features become available, VB Studio instances are upgraded in the data centers where Oracle Cloud services are hosted. You don’t need to request an upgrade to be able to use the new features—they come to you automatically.

Release 22.07 - June 2022

Some new Visual Builder Studio features can’t be used until you’ve upgraded your Visual Builder Runtime and/or Server to 22.07. See 22.07 Feature Dependencies for more information.

Area	Feature	Description
DevOps	Docker Deployment VM management	An administrator can now view disk usage for Docker VMs and free up disk space by removing images and containers that are no longer needed. See Manage Docker VM Resources. An administrator can also assign projects to a Docker deployment VM when creating a Docker deployment VM. See Add Your First Docker Deployment VM and Add Docker Deployment VMs.
	Environment enhancements	Health indicators The Environments page has a new column that displays the response time. Timeouts as well as indicators for the health of the connection are also shown. See Define Your Environments and Manage an Environment. All infrastructure services The Infrastructure Services button in the Environment page's Instances tab now displays all infrastructure services, including Oracle Integration, OIC Gen 2, JCS, and OCI resources such as Compute, Storage, and databases. See Set Up an Environment. Schema name A new Schema column in the Deployments tab under the Environments page displays the schemas used by a visual application's business objects. See View a Deployed Visual Application.
	NPM sorting	The NPM Browse page now supports sorting artifacts by name, size, and last updated date. Sorting by size and date makes it much easier to quickly identify larger and less frequently used artifacts. This can help you determine which artifacts to retain and which to discard. See Browse and Search Packages in Your Project's NPM Registry.
	Pipeline logs	SCM Poll logs for pipelines that have commit or polling trigger action items now enable users to track how pipelines were triggered and what jobs were run. See Examine Pipeline Logs with Commit or SCM Polling Trigger Action Items.
Identity/Access Control	Token-based authentication	Token-based authentication is now available at the VB Studio level, so the same personal access token can be used for Git, Maven, and NPM. Users can select and set the expiration date, specify which projects are protected, and select the permissions for each token. Token management is done from one place, under User Preferences. Set Up Token-Based Authentication.
Visual Applications	Custom actions	In addition to VB Studio's palette of built-in actions, you can now define and implement your own actions. A custom action is implemented with JavaScript and uses metadata to define input and output parameters. Once defined, you use your custom action in action chains just the way you'd use a built-in action. See Custom Actions.
	New Flow Diagram view	When working with flows in the Diagram view, a new Flow Diagram now displays navigational relationships between pages in the flow. The Flow Diagram, different from the standard Diagram view, provides an interactive view that allows you to focus on navigation between pages in the flow, something quite useful when working with complex apps that contain many pages. This view See View a Flow's Navigation in Diagram View. You can also use this view to create pages and actions chains when you want to build workflows from scratch, just by dragging pages and actions from the Components palette and dropping them into the diagram. A subset of built-in actions (as well as custom actions) are available in the Components palette for you to use in your workflow. See Add Pages and Action Chains to a Flow in Diagram View.
	Fragment enhancements	Existing fragments in Components palette When adding an existing fragment to a page, you can now drag and drop the fragment directly from the Components palette onto the canvas, where previously you had to drop a fragment container before selecting the fragment. This way, a fragment container configured with the selected fragment is automatically created for you. As a part of this update, we've also changed the fragment's Structure view, so you'll see the fragment's name, rather than a generic fragment container, for easier identification. See Create and Add a Fragment to a Page. Fragment metadata To provide a richer experience when using fragments, we've introduced metadata settings that enable a developer to better describe their fragments. As a fragment developer, you use this metadata: To surface a fragment in the right context and filter it out where it isn't suitable (for example, to tag a fragment as formTemplate and make it available only to users working with dynamic form templates). See Used For in Manage Fragment Settings. To associate a fragment with icons that display anywhere the fragment is surfaced (for example, when the fragment appears in the Components palette in the Page Designer or the Layout editor). See Icon in Manage Fragment Settings. To control how fragment parameters are to be used inside a fragment by providing the information that VB Studio requires to suitably generate metadata and expressions when the fragment is used in a component. This information can be specified in the Binding Type property that appears anytime a variable or constant parameter in a fragment is marked as enabled or required. See details about Binding Type in Pass Data Between a Page and Its Fragment.
	Components palette enhancements	Show Categories and Show Alphabetically options We've added two new options to give you more control over how components display in the Components palette. If you want to view a flat list of all components, you can choose to deselect the Show Categories option, enabled by default to show components in categories. If you keep the default, you can choose to view components in alphabetical order or a predefined order (as before). See The Components Palette. New category for existing fragments A new Fragments category in the Components palette now displays all existing fragments. To control which fragments show in the palette, you can change a fragment's Used For metadata in the Settings editor. By default, all fragments use the pageContent tag and show in the Components palette. See Manage Fragment Settings.
	Structure view enhancements	Shading to highlight visible components in Structure view Sometimes, the Structure view might be overwhelmed with information, including components that are not visible on the page at the moment. We've now added shading to the Structure view to indicate which components on the page are currently visible; those not visible fade into the background to provide better context about what part of the page the Structure view represents. To further trim background information, you can select a new Show Visible Components Only option. This way, your view only displays nodes of components visible on the page. Show Empty Slots is now Show Slots The Show Slots option (previously Show Empty Slots) now displays the location of empty as well as occupied slots. You can also right-click a slot and use a new Insert Component option to drop a component directly into a slot. See The Structure View.
	Changed requirements for Apache Cordovo custom plug-in	As part of maintenance for the deprecated but still supported Cordova custom plug-in, we've updated the minimum version of Cordova and iOS required to build hybrid mobile apps. For details, refer to the readme.md file bundled with the Cordova Project Source file in the Custom Plugins tab of your mobile application’s Settings editor. See Add a Custom Plugin to Your Mobile Application.
	Business object enhancements	Database schemas used in different app phases You can now view the names of database schemas associated with a particular phase of an app's lifecycle (Development, Shared, and Live). If you are using your own Oracle database, this information can help you access data using other tools for import or export, or access the tables for your own purposes. See View Database Schemas Used in an Application's Lifecycle. App profiles to switch schemas for business objects based on existing DB tables and views When you use your own database schema, you can now associate application profiles with different phases of your application, to switch the schema that your app connects to during its lifecycle. For example, you might use a particular schema during the development phase, but switch to another one for testing or production. See Switch Schemas Used During an App's Lifecycle. Schema validation for business objects based on existing DB tables and views For business objects based on existing DB tables and views, we've added validation to make sure a field's metadata is compatible with the corresponding table/view column. If there's a discrepancy, you'll see validation messages around the UI component as well as in audits. See Create a Business Object Based on a DB Table or View.
	Enhancements for Services and Backends	Declarative support for Transforms Transforms can now be defined directly at the backend and server levels, allowing all endpoints coming from that server or backend to inherit that transform function. You can also override the transform at the endpoint level. With this update, Transforms has also moved from its own tab to an area in the Overview tab for backends, service connections, and some endpoints. See Add Transforms. Form-Data and Binary payload support for Service endpoint testing You can do much more with the Endpoints Test tab under Services. POST, PATCH, and PUT REST APIs with application/octet-stream and multipart/form-data formats can be tested from the Service Connection Test tab. In addition, you can download binary data or save textual data in the response body. If the response body doesn't contain text, a message indicates that it contains binary data. See Test Service Connection Responses.
Dynamic Components	Dynamic form enhancements	You can now configure form field properties so that fields are displayed as multi-line text areas instead of the default single-line text field. You can set the number of rows of text area to display, and the max number of rows to which a text area can grow. See Set a Field to Display as a Text Area in a Form .
Application Extensions	Extensions versus classic application extensions	If you’ve ever created an application extension to customize the way an Oracle Cloud Application looks and behaves at runtime, you’ll notice some big changes in 22.07. For starters, many Oracle Cloud Applications have been re-architected as individual App UIs, which are independent units of pages and page flows based on the Redwood theme. You can still configure an Oracle-created App UI to meet your business needs, but the big news is that you can now use VB Studio to create your own App UIs, and deploy them right alongside Oracle apps in your Oracle Cloud Applications instance. In other words, you can now use the same tools that Oracle uses—namely, VB Studio and JET—to build robust applications that are managed as part of the same Oracle Cloud Applications ecosystem as the App UIs produced by Oracle. Note: You can create a new App UI only if your Oracle Cloud Applications instance is running 22B or later. If you don’t see App UI in the Designer’s navigator, you’re likely still working with an older version of an Oracle Cloud Application. In that case you should continue to refer to Using Visual Builder Studio with Classic Application Extensions. If you’re working in the new App UI world, however, Extending Oracle Cloud Applications with Visual Builder Studio contains everything you need to know. You may want to start with The Basics, just to get oriented.
	Authentication for extensions	The OAuth 2.0 User Assertion authentication type cannot be used with extensions (this doesn't apply to classic application extensions). You must select either None or Oracle Cloud Account for authentication. See Configure Authentication Types for Service Connections and Backends.
	Support for fragments	Fragments are now supported in extensions (this doesn't apply to classic application extensions): Create fragments in your extension, and add fragments from your extension's dependencies to pages and components in your extension. See Add a Fragment From a Dependency. Extend fragments directly in your extension. You can now configure elements the fragment developer has made extendable, allowing you to override constants, access fragment events and actions, and components defined in fragments, such as Dynamic Containers in Fragments. You can also configure the fragments defined in dynamic components in your extension's dependencies, so you can now Extend a Fragment in a Dynamic Container and Extend a Fragment in a Dynamic Form or Table.
	Support for action chain tests	You can now run tests on action chains in extensions.

22.07 Feature Dependencies

This release of VB Studio uses Oracle JET 12.0.x libraries and components. We recommend that you upgrade your VB Studio applications to this latest JET version, as well as to the 22.07 Visual Builder Runtime, to take advantage of the full spectrum of 22.07 features. Among JET 12's many new features is the ability to show dynamic status indicators to your tab bar headers with new icons, badges, and metadata. There's also a new oj-message-banner component that you can use to render brief, semi-permanent messages that communicate information in the context of the current page or actions in progress, without blocking interaction on that page. To see a list of what's new in JET 12.0.x, go to the JET Release Notes and select v12.0.0.

Some VB Studio features also require the latest version of the Visual Builder server, which hosts your apps, business objects, and database, and provides the REST service proxy. You'll get the latest server version automatically when Oracle upgrades your Visual Builder or Oracle Integration server based on the upgrade window you chose for your instance.

Here are the features that require the 22.07 VB Runtime/Server:

Feature	Description	Runtime	Server
Custom actions	In addition to VB Studio's palette of built-in actions, you can now use JavaScript to define and implement your own actions. Custom actions can be defined at a web or mobile app-level and you use them in action chains just the way you'd use built-in actions. See Custom Actions.	✓
Fragments	Existing fragments in Components palette When adding an existing fragment to a page, you can now drag and drop the fragment directly from the Components palette onto the canvas, where previously you had to drop a fragment container before selecting the fragment. This way, a fragment container configured with the selected fragment is automatically created for you. As a part of this update, we've also changed the fragment's Structure view, so you'll see the fragment's name, rather than a generic fragment container, for easier identification. See Create and Add a Fragment to a Page. Fragment metadata To provide a richer experience when using fragments, we've introduced metadata settings that enable a developer to better describe their fragments. As a fragment developer, you use this metadata: To surface a fragment in the right context and filter it out where it isn't suitable (for example, to tag a fragment as formTemplate and make it available only to users working with dynamic form templates). See Used For in Manage Fragment Settings. To associate a fragment with icons that display anywhere the fragment is surfaced (for example, when the fragment appears in the Components palette in the Page Designer or the Layout editor). See Icon in Manage Fragment Settings. To control how fragment parameters are to be used inside a fragment by providing the information that VB Studio requires to suitably generate metadata and expressions when the fragment is used in a component. This information can be specified in the Binding Type property that appears anytime a variable or constant parameter in a fragment is marked as enabled or required. See details about Binding Type in Pass Data Between a Page and Its Fragment.	✓
Business object enhancements	Database schemas used in different app phases You can now view the names of database schemas associated with a particular phase of an app's lifecycle (Development, Shared, and Live). If you are using your own Oracle database, this information can help you access data using other tools for import or export, or access the tables for your own purposes. See View Database Schemas Used in an Application's Lifecycle. App profiles to switch schemas for business objects based on existing DB tables and views When you use your own database schema, you can now associate application profiles with different phases of your application, to switch the schema that your app connects to during its lifecycle. For example, you might use a particular schema during the development phase, but switch to another one for testing or production. See Switch Schemas Used During an App's Lifecycle. Schema validation for business objects based on existing DB tables and views For business objects based on existing DB tables and views, we've added validation to make sure a field's metadata is compatible with the corresponding table/view column. If there's a discrepancy, you'll see validation messages around the UI component as well as in audits. See Create a Business Object Based on a DB Table or View.		✓

You can upgrade to the latest JET and Visual Builder Runtime versions from your visual application's Settings editor. See Manage Runtime Dependencies for Visual Applications.

Release 22.04.2 - April 2022

Area	Feature	Description
DevOps	Docker deployment VMs and Docker executors	VB Studio now supports Docker executors that run in a Docker deployment VM, an OCI VM compute instance dedicated to running builds of your organization's jobs. A Docker image created from a Build executor template or imported from an external Docker registry defines the operating system and software packages used for running builds on a Docker executor. To run builds in Docker executors, you add Docker deployment VMs. Then, when a job's build is triggered, VB Studio starts a Docker deployment VM, creates a Docker executor in it, and deploys the job's Docker image to it. This is quite economical, since a Docker deployment VM costs you only when it is active, is running a build in a Docker executor, or preparing itself to run builds. See Docker Images and Docker Deployment VMs and Docker Executors. Set Up VB Studio to Run Builds on Docker Executors explains how to add your first Docker deployment VM, migrate your existing VM executors to Docker, and create and manage Docker images and Docker deployment VMs.
Visual Applications	Custom app URLs for web PWAs	If you use custom URLs for your apps, those URLs can now be used to access web apps that are deployed as Progressive Web Apps (PWAs). No additional configuration is required to support custom URLs for PWAs. To set up the custom URL, see Specify a Custom App URL. To enable PWA support for web apps, see Enable Progressive Web App Support.

Release 22.04 - March 2022

Some new Visual Builder Studio features can’t be used until you’ve upgraded your Visual Builder Runtime and/or Server to 22.04. See 22.04 Feature Dependencies for more information.

Area	Feature	Description
DevOps	Branch protections	VB Studio supports using wildcards for the branch name when setting branch protections, so all branches that match the same glob pattern will follow the same rules. See Protect a Branch and Set Review and Merge Restrictions on a Repository Branch. The Glob Pattern Reference provides information about constructing patterns for matching branch names.
	Pipeline triggers	In the last release, VB Studio added the ability to use trigger jobs in pipelines and, in this release, adds more flexibility by letting you define trigger actions in YAML, so you can implement trigger behaviors without the associated costs of using jobs. Although this functionality is restricted to YAML, you can use the Pipeline Designer to see the execution flow at a glance. See Define and Use Triggers in YAML. When you execute a trigger job to start a pipeline, the log now shows the entire pipeline including the start and end of the trigger job within the context of the pipeline. Previously, the pipeline log showed the pipeline starting after the trigger job had completed. See Logs for Pipelines Manually Started by a Trigger Job. Allow pipelines to only be automatically start on triggers. The first job in the pipeline after Start is a trigger only if it is the only job triggered by Start. Either the entire pipeline will automatically start, or only those parts of the pipeline where trigger jobs have explicitly been added will automatically start. See Control How a Pipeline Is Automatically Started.
	Reserved public IP addresses for Build executors	Reserved public IP addresses can now be assigned to VM build executors. This is a useful option if your build executor requires a fixed external IP address for allow lists. With this option, you can create a reserved public IP address in the compartment dedicated to VB Studio resources, then assign it to a build executor when you create one. This way, whenever a build runs on the executor, the build executor will always have the same IP address, which can then be used in external allow lists. See Add and Manage VM Build Executors.
	Build parameters	Input parameters and Input List parameters can be added to build jobs as pre-build tasks and, when done, can be exported to downstream jobs as post-build tasks. See Add or Export Parameters and Parameter Lists.
Visual Applications	Responsive web app templates	New web app templates are now enhanced for responsive design. Available in three navigational styles, these templates adjust to various screen sizes and provide better support for responsive layouts and progressive web apps. See Create a New Web App. Common elements for these web apps, such as the header, footer, and navigation items, are defined in fragments, enabling you to reuse each piece in the web app's root page as well as other pages. You can also customize these elements however you want to create your own look and feel. See Edit the App Header and Footer. Note: Web apps created with version 22.01 or earlier will not be affected. These apps will maintain their original look and feel even after you upgrade them to 22.04.
	Fragment improvements	Dynamic containers are now supported in fragments, so you can define sections of a page in containers that you want to display based on conditions. You use dynamic containers in a fragment the same way you'd use them in a page. You can also create input parameters for a fragment right from the Properties pane of the fragment container on the page where the fragment is used. See Create a Fragment.
	Background processing of action chain tests	Action chain tests now run in the background, even when you are not actively working on your application. If you are, tests impacted by your changes (for example, if you added a new variable or changed an existing function) are scheduled to run again. This way, your test results stay up-to-date even as you develop your application, helping you detect bugs earlier and maintain your tests more easily. See Manage All Tests in a Visual Application.
	Properties pane improvements	Custom properties in Properties pane It's now possible to view, edit, or add custom properties for a component via its Properties pane, in the All tab. Custom properties are those not defined in component metadata, for example, data-* attributes, and can be added by clicking + next to General Attributes in the All tab. Slot value in Properties pane You can now change the slot used by a component inside a parent component's slot via the Properties pane, in the General and All tabs. You can change the slot value to move, for example, a button's icon from the startIcon slot to the endIcon slot. This way, you can modify the slots of dropped components without accessing the HTML code. See The Properties Pane.
	JavaScript editor changes	ES6 syntax for JavaScript in web apps For new JS files in web apps, we now generate the ECMAScript 6 (ES6) syntax with class declarations. Previously, this syntax was used only for JS files in mobile apps. ES6 syntax is supported wherever you generate declarative JS or directly author JS. For example, you can use ES6 syntax to build expressions for rule set conditions or variables. Code snippets for common JS structures We've also enhanced the JavaScript editor to offer code snippets for common JS structures, such as "for" loops and conditional statements. For example, typing in the JavaScript editor will show you options to select different "for" loop formats. Selecting one will populate the structure and allow easy navigation of the cursor to the relevant areas. See Work with JavaScript.
	Custom page for locked app	When an application is locked for maintenance, VB Studio displays a default "Application Locked" screen when someone tries to access the locked app. You now have the option of creating a custom page to display to your users, instead of the default. See Create a Custom Lock Page.
	Dynamic layout enhancements	Dynamic components in Components palette by default Dynamic components, such as tables, forms, and containers, are now present by default in the Components palette. Previously, you had to install these components from your environment's Component Exchange before you could use them in your application. Now, dragging and dropping them from the Dynamic Components section of the Components palette onto the canvas automatically installs them to the application and brings up the Layouts tab in the navigator. See How to Create Layouts With Dynamic Components. Option to preview a dynamic component's layout When you define multiple layouts, you now have the option of selecting any layout in a dynamic component's Properties pane to preview the layout as it would appear on a page, even if those conditions are not met. You no longer need to run the page and ensure the conditions are met at runtime to check how the layout renders. See Preview Different Layouts. Enhanced support for dynamic container templates Dynamic container templates, which let you lay out sections in a dynamic container however you want rather than just vertically, now support dynamic containers as well as fragments. See Change a Dynamic Container's Layout.
	Business object enhancements	Create business objects based on existing tables and views in an Oracle database If you use an external database like DBaaS or Autonomous Transaction Processing (ATP) with your environment's Visual Builder instance, you can now use your own DB schema and create business objects based on existing tables and views. These business objects, in general, are the same as native business objects, but there are restrictions. See Switch to Your Own Schema for Business Objects. Mark your own ID column when importing business objects When you import spreadsheets and CSV files to create business objects, you can now use your own column as the primary key field, instead of the system-generated id field. This option is available only for non-blank data containing numeric fields. See Create Business Objects from a File. Validation of a business object field's properties The Field Name of a Business Object's field is now underlined in red on the Fields tab to indicate errors that affect not only the Field Name property, but also any properties on that specific field. See Edit Business Object Fields.
	Server variables for server connections	Server variables are now automatically created when you enter a valid URI template expression in a server instance URL. When your server URL is defined, for example, as https://restcountries.com/{version}, we create version as a server variable for you. All your server variables are listed under a new Server Variables section in the Servers editor, where you can manage them to set a default value (required by the OpenAPI3 specification) or to add an enumerated list. See Add Server Variables for Service Connections. A new Server Variables tab has also been added to the Test tab of the Endpoints editor, allowing you to set the server variable value when testing an endpoint.
Dynamic components	Dynamic layout enhancements	We've improved how you edit sections (formerly templates) in dynamic containers. So you can now edit sections directly in the Page Designer, rather than in the Template editor. Because of this, you can see the components rendered on the page as you work with the container. See Configure a Dynamic Container.
	Condition builder changes	The condition builder in the Rule Sets editor now groups fields for selection under Fields, Responsive, User, and so on, making it easier for you to select from the drop-down list. We've also changed the list of user roles that show by default for Oracle Cloud Applications, so the drop-down lists the available Job and Abstract roles, but you'll need to manually enter Duty roles in the Value field. See Determine What's Displayed at Runtime.
	New User Assistance Density property	The Properties pane for forms and fields in layouts contains a new property that allows you to set how a field's user assistance text (messages, help text, hints and so on) are displayed in forms. See Set How User Assistance is Rendered in a Layout.

22.04 Feature Dependencies

This release of VB Studio uses Oracle JET 11.1.x libraries and components. We recommend that you upgrade your VB Studio applications to this latest JET version, as well as to the 22.04 Visual Builder Runtime, to take advantage of the full spectrum of 22.04 features. To see what's new in JET 11.1.x, go to the JET Release Notes and select v11.1.0.

Some features also require the latest version of the Visual Builder server, which hosts your apps, business objects, and database, and provides the REST service proxy. You'll get the latest server version automatically when Oracle upgrades your Visual Builder or Oracle Integration server based on the upgrade window you chose for your instance.

Here are the features that require the 22.04 VB Runtime/Server:

Feature	Description	Runtime	Server
Fragment improvements	Dynamic containers are now supported in fragments, so you can define sections of a page in containers that you want to display based on conditions. Dynamic containers can be used in a fragment the same way you'd use them in a page. See Create a Fragment. You can also create input parameters for a fragment right from the Properties pane of the fragment container on the page where the fragment is used. See Pass Data Between a Page and Its Fragment for a sample scenario.	✓
Business object enhancements	Create business objects based on existing tables and views in an Oracle database If you use an external database like DBaaS or Autonomous Transaction Processing (ATP) with your environment's Visual Builder instance, you can now use your own DB schema and create business objects based on existing tables and views. These business objects, in general, are the same as native business objects, but there are restrictions. See Switch to Your Own Schema for Business Objects. Mark your own ID column when importing business objects When you import spreadsheets and CSV files to create business objects, you can now use your own column as the primary key field, instead of the system-generated id field. This option is available only for non-blank data containing numeric fields. See Create Business Objects from a File.		✓

You can upgrade to the latest JET and Visual Builder Runtime versions from your visual application's Settings editor. See Manage Runtime Dependencies for Visual Applications.

Release 22.01 - December 2021

Some new Visual Builder Studio features can’t be used until you’ve upgraded your Visual Builder Runtime and/or Server to 22.01. See 22.01 Feature Dependencies for more information.

Area	Feature	Description
DevOps	Build support for Integration packages	VB Studio now provides Oracle Integration developers with a way to use builds and pipelines to automate the deployment of Integration packages (collections of artifacts) between development, test, and production environments. This automation can be accomplished by taking advantage of three new Oracle Integration build steps (Import Package, Export Package, Delete Package) to move Integration packages between environments. See Import and Export Oracle Integration Artifacts and Packages Between Environments.
	SSH configuration	The SSH documentation for Builds has been updated to include proxy configuration information for command-line tools. See step 9 in Access an Oracle Cloud Service Using SSH.
	Build APIs to get YAML definitions	This release adds two new Build APIs to return YAML definitions: /v1/yaml/jobs/{jobName} /v1/yaml/pipelines/{pipelineName} Both APIs use the GET method to return YAML definitions for existing named jobs and pipelines, respectively. In addition, /v1/yaml/pipelines has an option to provide the YAML definition in either structured or graph format. See Get a job's configuration and Get a pipeline's configuration in REST API for Oracle Visual Builder Studio.
	SonarQube	There are now two ways to perform a SonarQube analysis on Node.JS projects: If the project being built is a Maven project, the Sonar Scanner Maven plug-in can be directed, by using the -Dsonar.sources parameter, to include the Javascript files for analysis. If the project is a Visual Builder Project that is purely Javascript, the sonar-scanner command line tool must be installed to do the analysis. This can be done in a Unix Shell Build step and, again, the Javascript sources must be explicitly specified in the command line with the -Dsonar.sources parameter. See Create a Sonarqube Analysis Report for a VB Studio Project with Javascript Sources.
Identity/Access Control	Private projects	As an Organization Administrator, if required, you can now restrict all users from creating a shared project or sharing a private one. Once this restriction is set, only you and other organization administrators can create a shared project or share a private project. See Restrict Sharing a Project to Organization Administrators Only.
	Token-based authentication for private NPM Registry	You can now use token-based authentication to log in to VB Studio's built-in NPM registry. You can still use basic authentication to log in too. See Configure Your Connection to the Project's NPM Registry and read about the npm login and npm logout commands in Use the NPM Command Line with the Project's NPM Registry.
Visual Applications	Fragments	If you've wanted to break up complex pages in your web app into parts that are easier to work with, fragments is for you. A fragment encapsulates a page's section in its own HTML, JSON, and JavaScript files and provides modular pieces of UI with logic components that you can reuse across pages in your application. Because of its modularity, it also improves performance and makes for easier organization and code management. See Work With Fragments.
	Support for JET's Stable theme	When customizing a Redwood-themed application, you can now use the Stable base theme to override only what you want to change, where previously you might have had to override all variables directly in the Redwood base theme. The Stable theme (introduced in JET 11.0.0) is meant to be as stable as possible; as a result, you can override the variables you want to change while inheriting all other updates to the Redwood theme. See Customize the Redwood Theme for a Web Application.
	Dynamic UI enhancements	We've made a bunch of updates to enhance UIs based on dynamic components. When you add a dynamic component (table, form, or container), you'll notice that the Dynamic UIs tab in the Navigator is now called Layouts. Other significant enhancements include: BaseComponentContextType In addition to ComponentContextType parameters which let you augment a dynamic layout with values provided by your application, you can now define BaseComponentContexType parameters to define values at the service level. Much like component context parameters, base component context parameters become part of the $componentContext system variable and can be used anywhere in the dynamic layout (for example, in a layout's conditions and expressions). See Define Custom Contexts for Components in a Layout. Suggested and required fields We've made some updates to improve user experience when working with a dynamic layout's Fields palette. A new Suggested Fields section now emphasizes fields that might be important or relevant to include in the layout. Further, when you create a new layout within the Rule Sets editor, fields that are marked as required are automatically added to the layout. See Create a Layout for a Dynamic Table or Form. Converter and validator improvements Adding a validator or converter to a field in a dynamic layout now selects a default based on the field type. For example, if you were adding a converter to an ID field, the Number converter is selected for you by default, because ID is a number field. To simplify configuration, only the most commonly used options are displayed for your selection. We've also added support for an expression validator to check whether a field's value matches a pattern defined by a regular expression and an expression converter that converts the field's value to a regular expression for evaluation. See Add Converters and Validators to Fields. Column sorting and sizing in dynamic tables When a field is added to a dynamic table, you can now use several properties to control sorting and sizing for the field's column. These properties are available in the Properties pane when you select a field in a dynamic table's layout. See Configure How Columns Render in a Dynamic Table's Layout. Container templates for dynamic containers Sections created by templates in a dynamic container, by default, stack vertically on top of each other. You can now use container templates to change this layout, for example, to show sections in a row. See Change a Dynamic Container's Layout.
	Encoding format when importing business objects as a file	When creating business objects from a file, you can specify a variety of encoding formats for the imported file via a new Character Encoding field. If a value isn't specified or if the specified value is not valid, UTF-8 is used as the default. See Create Business Objects from a File.
	Backends and service connections	New Backends button on Service Instances page in Environments When your environment includes a Visual Builder or an Oracle Integration instance, there's a new Backends button at the top of the Service Instances tab. Clicking this button brings up VB Studio's catalog editor, which can be used to create and edit custom backends that all visual applications and application extensions in your environment can access. The backend name, description, and type can be defined, as can several server attributes (description, instance URL, custom and secure headers, authentication options for logged in users/anonymous users, and connection type). See Edit VB Studio Custom Backends from the Environments Page. Server authentication options renamed The server authentication type descriptions have been updated and two types were renamed: "Propagate Current User Identity" is now "Delegate Authentication" "OAuth 2.0 Resource Owner" is now "OAuth 2.0 Resource Owner Password Credentials" See Identity Propagation Authentication Mechanisms. List of service connections for a backend Any service connections defined for a backend now display on the backend's Overview tab (below the + Service Connection button). Dynamic service connections are automatically shown. Static service connections are shown when the Load more related connections link is selected. See Manage Backends in Your Visual Application. New flow to replace endpoint definitions for static Integrations connections For static Integrations service connections, you can now use the Replace button in the Endpoints tab to replace all endpoint definitions without manually creating a new connection and deleting the old one. See Edit Service Endpoints for a Static Service Connection.
	Enumerated type	It's now possible to create an enumerated custom type in the Types editor to define a list of values, usually for variables that have a small set of possible values. See Create a Custom Enumeration Type.
	Improvements for action chain tests	Action chain tests, accessible through the Tests tab at the bottom of an application's window, now include some usability improvements. Instead of showing a full list of tests, this tab shows failed tests alone to highlight items that require you to take action. Test results are also cached across browser sessions now to improve performance. See Test Action Chains.
	Page Designer enhancements	Data palette Where you might use components to design a page, you can now use data sources—via a brand new Data palette in the Page Designer—to design your page. Just as you'd drag and drop components from the Components palette, you drag and drop data sources (say, an Employee object's endpoints) and choose from a suggested list of components tailored to best display your data. See The Data Palette. Panel placement and breadcrumbs You can now reposition the Components, Data, Structure, and Properties panels within the Page Designer to customize the canvas for your convenience. With the introduction of the Data palette, the Structure view has been placed, by default, in the bottom left corner of the canvas, but you can change this up however you want. We've also added breadcrumbs in a separate bar at the bottom of the canvas to help you navigate a selected component's hierarchy. See The Page Designer Toolbar. New Insert Component option In addition to the standard drag-and-drop from the Components palette, you can now add components using an new Insert Component option. This option is available when you right-click on the canvas and in Structure view (where it's most useful to position a component in complex layouts). See The Structure View.
	Other Designer updates	Properties pane in the Diagram view We've added a Properties pane to an application's Diagram view, so you can view more details about an application's pages and sub-flows in a central location. See Use the Diagram View. Support for optional chaining operators When referring to optional object properties, you can now use optional chaining operators (?.) in JavaScript syntax without it being flagged by audits. These operators, supported in standalone .js files as well as in HTML/JSON file expressions, make it simpler to access the values of deeply nested properties and return an undefined value instead of an error when the reference or function doesn't exist. For example, [[ $page.variables.customerObj.address?.street3 ]] would return undefined if street3 does not exist in the address property. See Optional Chaining in developer documentation.
Application Extensions	Support for base component context parameters	The Fields editor in your layout now has a Parameters tab that displays a list of the parameters in the base component context that you can use in the layout. See Use Application and Page Parameters in a Layout.
	Sizing and sorting dynamic table columns	When editing the layout for a dynamic table, you can now edit table properties to configure the width of each column in the table, and if the table is sortable by any of the fields. Configure How Columns Are Rendered in a Dynamic Table Layout.
	Emphasis on required and custom fields in the Layout editor	In a rule set's layout editor, the Fields palette now contains a Suggested Fields section that lists fields that might be important or relevant to include in the layout. Fields that have been marked as required are now added automatically when you create a new layout.
	Improved support for field converters and validators	Support for adding validators and converters to fields in a dynamic layout has been improved to make adding them easier. A suggested validator or converter type is now automatically selected for you based on the field type. We've also added support for an expression validator to check whether a field's value matches a pattern defined by a regular expression and an expression converter that converts the field's value to a regular expression for evaluation. See Add Converters and Validators to Fields.
	Improved visibility of unpublishable sandboxes	When selecting a sandbox for a new workspace, or when switching the sandbox used with a workspace, sandboxes that are "unpublishable" and now clearly indicated. You'll also see a note in the Current Sandbox column in the Workspaces page if any of the sandboxes you're using with your workspaces are unpublishable.
Git	File exceptions for tracking	When a project contains files you don't want to track in Git, you can now use the Ignore option in the Git panel to exclude a file from being tracked. Previously, you might have had to deselect the file every time you made a commit. See File-Management Operations.

22.01 Feature Dependencies

This release of VB Studio uses Oracle JET 11.0.x libraries and components. We recommend that you upgrade your VB Studio applications to this latest JET version, as well as to the 22.01 Visual Builder Runtime, to take advantage of the full spectrum of 22.01 features. A key feature in JET 11.0.0 is the new Stable theme, which aims to minimize changes bleeding into a custom theme. There's also support for frozen columns in an oj-table, an enhancement to ensure duplicate rows don't show in oj-select-single, and Redwood color changes for data visualization components. To see everything that's new, see the JET 11.0.0 Release Notes.

Some features also require the latest version of the Visual Builder server, which hosts your apps, business objects, and database, and provides the REST service proxy. You'll get the latest server version automatically when Oracle upgrades your Visual Builder or Oracle Integration server based on the upgrade window you chose for your instance.

Here are the features that require the 22.01 VB Runtime/Server:

Feature	Description	Runtime	Server
Fragments	If you've wanted to break up complex pages in your web app into parts that are easier to work with, fragments is for you. A fragment encapsulates a page's section in its own HTML, JSON, and JavaScript files and provides modular pieces of UI with logic components that you can reuse across pages in your application. Because of its modularity, it also improves performance and makes for easier organization and code management. See Work With Fragments.	✓
Create business objects based on existing tables and views in an Oracle database	If you use an external database like DBaaS or Autonomous Transaction Processing (ATP) with your environment's Visual Builder instance, you can now use your own DB schema and create business objects based on existing tables and views. These business objects, in general, are the same as native business objects, but there are restrictions. See Switch to Your Own Schema for Business Objects.		✓

You can upgrade to the latest JET and Visual Builder Runtime versions from your visual application's Settings editor. See Manage Runtime Dependencies for Visual Applications.

Release 21.10.2 - October 2021

Area	Feature	Description
Visual Applications	New format required for Android apps	Starting in August 2021, Google requires that all new applications uploaded to Google Play use the Android App Bundle (.AAB) format. To create an .AAB file for your Android app, see Build an Android App Bundle for Google Play. You can continue to upload updated versions of your existing apps in the .APK format.

Release 21.10 - August 2021

Some new Visual Builder Studio features can’t be used until you’ve upgraded your Visual Builder Runtime and/or Server to 21.10. See 21.10 Feature Dependencies for more information.

Area	Feature	Description
DevOps	Build options to export and import Oracle Integration archives	You can now take advantage of VB Studio's CI/CD capabilities to automate export and import of Integration artifacts when you want to share code between different Oracle Integration instances. See Import and Export Oracle Integration Artifacts Between Environments.
	New UI for Build VM management	The Build VM tab on the Organization page—now renamed the VM Build Executors tab—has been redesigned to improve build executor management. See Add and Manage VM Build Executors. Alongside this update, we've introduced some terms for better consistency throughout the product and documentation: Old term: Build VM New term: VM Build Executor Old term: VM template New term: Build executor template Old term: Free VM New term: Free build executor See What Are Build Executors and Build Executor Templates?
	Improved tooling for MRs with large numbers of diffs	Improved filtering and additional views allow reviewers to better respond to Merge Requests that have large numbers of diffs through the UI without having to use external tools. See View Commits and Changed Files.
	Updated software bundles	New software bundles are available. See Software for Build Executor Templates.
Identity/Access Control	Group support for protected jobs	Support for adding VB Studio and IDCS groups to protected jobs has been added in the Build Administration UI. Previously, only individual users could be added. See Configure a Job's Privacy Setting.
	Local VB Studio groups	VB Studio enables non-administrative project members with read/write roles to create local VB Studio groups. Previously, only organization administrators could create VB Studio groups (and create/import IDCS groups). Non-administrative group members can manage local groups they've created (add/remove members, delete the group, add the group to or remove the group from a project), but cannot modify VB Studio groups created by administrators. See Manage Local VB Studio Groups.
	Automatic sync with imported IDCS groups	Automatic synchronization of imported IDCS groups allows IDCS group membership changes made by the IDCS administrator externally to be seen in VB Studio within a few minutes. No action is required on the VB Studio side. See Manage Project Users and Groups.
Visual Applications	PWA support for web apps	We've extended our PWA capabilities to support web apps, in addition to mobile apps. This option allows you to create responsive web apps that your users can add to their mobile devices as mobile apps. To enable PWA support for a web app, you use the new PWA tab in a web app's Settings editor. We also provide an offline fallback page that you can display to users when your PWA-enabled app isn't connected to the Internet. The default offlinePage.html uses a Redwood-theme template, but you can customize it to suit your requirements. See Configure Progressive Web App Support.
	Page flow enhancements	Revamped page flow diagram The Page Flow tab, used to display an application's structure at the application and flow levels, has been revamped to use the Redwood design language. Now called Diagram, this view provides a hierarchical view of an application's flows and pages within a flow. It also allows you to view default pages, navigation flows, and more. See Use the Diagram View. Nested flows shows only when flows exist We've streamlined the Navigator view for a web or mobile app so that the nested flows node shows only when a flow is created. To create a new flow, you'll now need to click + next to the application node. To create a subflow, you click + next to an existing flow. See Create a Page Flow.
	Redwood icon gallery	Visual apps that use the Redwood theme now leverage Redwood's comprehensive icon library and are available to you right from an app's icon gallery. As a part of this update, we added the icon's stylesheet to an app's imports, so you'll always see the latest Redwood icons when new versions of the icon font are released. You access the icon gallery as usual, say when you add an icon to a page or a navigation list component. See Add an icon component to a page.
	Action chain enhancements	Action chains in separate JSON files To optimize performance and reduce Git merge conflicts, we've moved an action chain's source from the artifact JSON to its own JSON file. While action chains created with version 21.10 will use separate JSON files by default, you have the option of migrating action chains created in earlier versions. See Create an Action Chain and Migrate an Action Chain. Deprecated actions We've deprecated two built-in actions: The takePhotoAction is deprecated for web apps while the transformChartDataAction is deprecated for both web and mobile apps. It's now possible to view actions that have been deprecated in a release by selecting the Show Deprecated menu option in the Actions palette. See Built-in Actions. Any action chains that use the previously deprecated navigateToPageAction action will be automatically migrated to the new navigateAction when you upgrade your app to version 21.10.
	Data provider enhancements	We've added some design-time options that you can configure from a built-in data provider's properties on the Variables tab: Text Filter Attributes and Fetch by Offset for SDPs For Service Data Provider (SDP) type variables, you can now configure the Text Filter Attributes field when you want user-specified text to filter results shown in a list component like Select Single. See Filter Component Data by Text. This field was previously added to an Array Data Provider variable's properties. We've also added Fetch by Offset to the list of Fetch Capabilities to provide random access for endpoints that support querying using a specified offset. Sort Comparators for ADPs For Array Data Provider (ADP) type variables, you can configure the Sort Comparators field to specify your own comparators for sorting.
	Business object updates	New Groovy timeout override When you use Groovy code for business logic, you can now override the default Groovy timeout if you think your script's processing time will overrun the default duration. You can change this setting via the Timeout Override option when you use Groovy expressions to define formula fields, default values, and business rules. See Override the Default Timeout for Groovy Scripts. New Create options to add formulas and aggregate functions to fields You can now create aggregate and formula fields directly from a business object's Fields page. Previously you had to create a field, then edit it to add a formula or an aggregation function. See Add a Field for Aggregating Data and Add a Formula to a Field. Fields display in diagrams changed We've changed how fields display by default in business object diagrams. They now show by attribute names, rather than display labels, to match what you'll use in REST API calls or Groovy code. You can still view fields by their display labels by turning off the Show Field Names option. See Work with the Business Object Diagrammer.
	Other Designer updates	New debug mode for preview You can now troubleshoot runtime issues with your application using a new Debug Preview option that uses the debug variants of the Visual Builder runtime and Oracle JET libraries. See Preview an App in Debug Mode. Changed default for Page Designer screen setting Fit to Canvas, the option that resizes the canvas to always take up all available space between the left and right panes in the Page Designer, is now the default screen option. See The Page Designer Toolbar.
Application Extensions	Improved support for polymorphic objects	A filter for polymorphic objects was added to the layout editor that can help you see which fields are defined by each discriminator sub-type. See Work with Polymorphic Objects in a Layout. Additional support for polymorphic objects was also added to the rule set editor. When a rule condition specifies a discriminator sub-type value, that value is used to filter the object's fields when you open the rule's associated layout in the editor.
	Rule conditions display list of values	The condition builder in the Rule Sets editor now displays a drop-down list of valid values for a field when the values are specified in the service definition. See Determine What's Displayed at Runtime.
	Added listenable vbBeforeEnter and vbBeforeExit events	You can now create event listeners for the vbBeforeEnter and vbBeforeExit lifecycle events in an extension page. See Create Event Listeners for Events.
	Support for fields with component context	For app extensions that define a component context for a dynamic component, you can now use variables defined in the component context in a component's rule set conditions and expressions. See Use Application Variables in a Layout.
	Before deploying an app extension to production, your team members may want to deploy and test it on other Oracle Cloud Applications development and test instances. If you're looking to publish an app extension to multiple dev and test environments, see Set Up the Project to Deploy to Other Development and Test Instances for details on how to configure your project to deploy the app extension to other Oracle Cloud Applications instances.
Git	Stash or unstash changes	You can now temporarily stash uncommitted changes in your workspace and revert to a clean working copy based off a branch's last commit. This option lets you switch context to work on something else when your changes can't be committed yet, then unstash them when you're ready to pick up where you left off. Look for the Stash and Unstash options in your workspace's Git menu. See Stash Your Changes.
	Other enhancements	View diff of changed files You can now view the diff of changed files when you want to compare data in your repository with another data source. You can compare changes in your workspace with your last commit in the current branch (Compare with HEAD), or compare a file against a revision, a branch, or between two revisions (Compare with Revision). Comparable to the git diff command, both options show for changed files in the Git Panel. See File Management Commands. Select files to add When you use the Git All link in the Git Panel to add files, you can now select the files you want to add or add all files. See File Management Commands.

21.10 Feature Dependencies

This release of VB Studio uses Oracle JET 10.1.x libraries and components. We recommend that you upgrade your VB Studio applications to this latest JET version, as well as to the 21.10 Visual Builder Runtime, to take advantage of the full spectrum of 21.10 features. For example, JET 10.1.0 provides chroming options for buttons out of the box, including a new one called danger, to help you draw a user's attention to important actions on your UI. To see everything that's new in JET 10.1.0, see the Release Notes.

Some features also require the latest version of the Visual Builder server, which hosts your apps, business objects, and database, and provides the REST service proxy. You'll get the latest server version automatically when Oracle upgrades your Visual Builder or Oracle Integration server based on the upgrade window you chose for your instance.

Here are the features that require the 21.10 VB Runtime/Server:

Feature	Description	Runtime	Server
PWA support for web apps	To help you build apps that scale from desktop to tablet to mobile, we've expanded our PWA capabilities to web apps, in addition to mobile apps. To enable PWA support for a web app, you now use the new PWA tab in a web app's Settings editor. See Configure Progressive Web App Support. We also provide a default offline page that you can display to users when your PWA-enabled app isn't connected to the Internet. The default offline page is based on a responsive Redwood page template, but you can customize it to suit your requirements.	✓
Action chains in separate JSON files	To optimize performance and reduce Git merge conflicts, we've moved an action chain's source from the artifact JSON to its own JSON file. While action chains created with version 21.10 will use separate JSON files by default, you have the option of migrating action chains created in earlier versions. See Create an Action Chain and Migrate an Action Chain.	✓
Deprecated actions	We've deprecated two built-in actions: The takePhotoAction action is deprecated for web apps while the transformChartDataAction is deprecated for both web and mobile apps. It's now possible to view actions that have been deprecated in a release by selecting the Show Deprecated menu option in the Actions palette. See Built-in Actions.	✓
New Groovy timeout override	When you use Groovy code for business logic, you can now override the default Groovy timeout if you think your script's processing time will overrun the default duration. You can change this setting via the Timeout Override option when you use Groovy expressions to define formula fields, default values, and business rules. See Override the Default Timeout for Groovy Scripts.		✓

You can upgrade to the latest JET and Visual Builder Runtime versions from your visual application's Settings editor. See Manage Runtime Dependencies for Visual Applications.

New Features in Oracle Visual Builder Add-in for Excel

The version of Oracle Visual Builder Add-in for Excel bundled in VB Studio 22.07 is 3.0. To see what's new in this release, go to the add-in's documentation page and click 3.0.0.

Supported Browsers

VB Studio supports most modern HTML5–compliant browsers.

VB Studio complies with the Oracle Software Web Browser Support Policy and supports the latest version of the browser available, and in the case of Safari, one previous major release. Oracle support is available for all platforms that the browser vendor supports. For mobile device operating systems, Oracle provides support only for the most recent browser delivered by the device operating system.

The following table describes the platforms supported by the Visual Builder runtime:

Operating System	Chrome	Firefox	Microsoft Browser	Safari
Android	Supported*	Not Supported	N/A	N/A
iOS	Not Supported	Not Supported	N/A	Supported
Mac OS X	Supported	Supported	N/A	Supported
Windows	Supported	Supported	Supported	Not Supported

* Chrome for Android only, not native Android browser

JavaScript must be enabled for all browsers.

Note:

The Visual Builder Studio Designer is supported by the Chrome browser running on Mac OS X and Windows. Other browsers and platforms are not supported.

Note:

Visual Builder runtime has deprecated the use of Internet Explorer 11. Users who try to access a deployed Visual Builder application from Internet Explorer will now see a deprecation warning. In addition, Oracle Support will no longer address issues pertaining to Internet Explorer 11.

Deprecated Features

Take note of features that have been deprecated and are no longer supported in VB Studio:

Area	Feature	Description	Release
DevOps	Deprecated versions of software packages for Build executor templates	The Docker 1, Java 7, Node.js 10 and 12, Python3 3.6, SQLcl 19, and Oracle ATG 11 versions of software packages used in Build executor templates are no longer available in 22.07. See Software for Build Executor Templates for the latest supported packages.	22.07 - May 2022
		The Docker 1, Java 7, Node.js 10 and 12, Python3 3.6, SQLcl 19, and Oracle ATG 11 versions of software packages used in Build executor templates have been deprecated since 22.04. These versions aren't available for Build executor templates in this release of VB Studio (22.07). Where possible, users are encouraged to move to later versions of these bundles: Docker 1 to Docker 20 Java 7 to Java 8 Node.js 10 and Node.js 12 to Node.js 14 Python3 3.6 to Python3 3.7 SQLcl 19 to the latest SQLcl version See Software for Build Executor Templates.	22.04 - February 2022
	OL6 for Build executors deprecated	Existing Build executor templates that were created for Oracle Linux 6 (OL6) will be migrated automatically to use Oracle Linux 7 (OL7). The following software, which only runs on OL6 in those templates, will also be migrated: Docker 1 will be migrated to OL7 and Docker 20 Node.js 10 will be migrated to OL7 and Node.js 14	22.07 - May 2022
		Support for running Build executors on Oracle Linux 6 (OL6) has been deprecated since 22.04.	22.04 - February 2022
	Forms 12.2.1.3 support dropped	Build executor templates support for Oracle Forms 12.2.1.3.0 has been dropped. Templates that included Forms 12.2.1.3.0 have been automatically migrated to use Forms 12.2.1.4.0 instead.	22.04 - February 2022
	SSH tunnel for JCS deployment support dropped	Support for using the SSH tunnel protocol in build steps for deployments to an Oracle Java Cloud Service (JCS) instance has been dropped. The Oracle WebLogic RESTful Management Interface protocol is now the only supported protocol for JCS deployments.	22.04 - February 2022
	Wercker support dropped	Support for using Wercker in the VB Studio build system has been dropped. The Wercker build step is no longer available and should be replaced with VB Studio pipelines in your job configurations. OCI recommends using VB Studio pipelines while they develop their own OCI CI/CD services.	21.07 - April 2021
	OCI Classic OCI accounts	VB Studio no longer offers an option to create OCI Classic OCI accounts in new organizations. The OCI Classic option is also no longer visible when setting up the OCI Connection in VB Studio.	21.07 - April 2021
	Oracle ACCS deployment	VB Studio no longer supports deployment to Oracle Application Container Cloud Service (ACCS). An ACCS service instance can't be added to an environment and ACCS deployment can no longer be configured from the Oracle Deployment build step.	21.04 - February 2021
	OSN webhook	VB Studio dropped webhook support for Oracle Social Network (OSN), after the service was decommissioned.	21.04 - February 2021
Visual Applications	Support for Alta theme ending	Apps created on VB Studio version 20.07 or earlier were created with Oracle JET's Alta theme as the base theme. The Alta theme was deprecated in JET 10 and will not be supported beyond JET 12. To be able to publish new versions of an Alta-based app beyond July 2023 (when JET 12 reaches End of Life), you must transition your app to use the Redwood theme. To check the theme used by your web or mobile application, navigate to your application's Settings editor and look for the Theme field. If Theme is set to Alta, we encourage you to take time to redesign your app using the Redwood theme before support for the Alta theme ends. Starting with 22.04, we'll remind you to do this every time you stage or publish Alta-themed apps.	Planned for 23.01
	Select One component dropped from Components palette	The Select One (oj-select-one) component, deprecated since JET 8.1.0, has been removed from the Components palette and is visible only if you select the Show Deprecated option. Switch instead to Select Single (oj-select-single).	22.04 - February 2022
	Oracle SaaS R13 Light Theme deprecated	The Oracle SaaS R13 Light Theme application template has been deprecated, although we will continue to support it until version 22.01 reaches End of Life (EOL). See Updating an Oracle SaaS application template for more information.	22.01 - December 2021
	Migration support for deprecated navigateToPageAction	When you upgrade your app to version 21.10, any existing action chains that use navigateToPageAction (deprecated in 21.07) are automatically migrated to navigateAction (introduced in 21.07).	21.10 - August 2021
	Hybrid mobile apps and Apache Cordova custom plugin	In recognition of the increased adoption of the Progressive Web App (PWA) approach for building apps that scale from desktop to tablet to mobile, Oracle is focusing on expanding our PWA capabilities and will correspondingly de-invest in the mobile hybrid solution offered in Visual Builder and VB Studio. As a result, the use of build configurations to build native .ipa and .apk files for distribution to iOS and Android devices—as well as the Cordova custom plugin option—are being deprecated, although they won't be removed from the products for a minimum of two years (April 2023). We will continue to deliver bug fixes for both native builds as well as PWA until native build reaches End of Life (EOL).	21.07 - April 2021
	Internet Explorer 11	Visual Builder runtime has deprecated the use of Internet Explorer 11. Users who try to access a deployed Visual Builder application from Internet Explorer will now see a deprecation warning.	19.4.3 - August 2020
		Oracle Support will no longer address issues pertaining to Internet Explorer 11.	21.04 - February 2021

Upgrade Policy

When you create a new visual app, VB Studio automatically sets your runtime dependencies to the latest Visual Builder Runtime and JET versions. If you’ve already an app, however, it’s up to you to decide when to upgrade, as long as you do so within a certain time period. As a general rule, VB Studio supports applications built on the current Runtime Version, as well as the two previous versions. So for 22.07, for example, VB Studio supports not only the 22.04 Runtime Version, but also apps built with 22.04 and 22.01. Once 22.10 comes out, however, support for the 22.01 Runtime Version will drop off, so we'll ask you to upgrade those apps before you can work on them in VB Studio. If you choose not to upgrade at that time, you run the risk that newer browser versions will break your app. You also won’t be able to take advantage of any important security and performance improvements. For all of these reasons, we encourage you to build time into your development cycle to keep abreast of current changes, and to make sure you upgrade your app (you should version it first) before support for your current runtime version expires.

Getting Oriented

VB Studio brings you all the functionality previously available with Oracle Developer Cloud Service. You also get the ability to build web and mobile applications in the Visual Builder Designer, as well as to extend certain Oracle Cloud Applications to customize the UI for your business needs.

VB Studio offers end-to-end functionality for your development team, from planning releases and managing development backlog, to hosting source code in Git, to designing, building, testing, and deploying cloud-native applications to your Oracle Cloud Applications and Oracle Cloud instances.

For Former Developer Cloud Service Users

If you were a Developer Cloud Service user, the following table will help you understand the primary differences between Developer Cloud Service and VB Studio:

How Developer Cloud Service and VB Studio Differ?	Find out more:
You don’t need to migrate your Developer Cloud Service projects. A VB Studio instance replaces your Developer Cloud Service instance, and you can continue to use your existing projects and corresponding DevCS features just as they are, without any impact to you.	Using Oracle Developer Cloud Service has been restructured and rewritten for VB Studio and is now called Managing Your Development Process with Visual Builder Studio. If you’re an administrator, you’ll want to check out Administering Visual Builder Studio as well.
VB Studio comes equipped with the Designer, a graphical user interface that enables you to develop web and mobile apps using components from the Oracle JavaScript Extension Toolkit (JET). To test these applications, or to release them for production, you must deploy the apps to a separate Visual Builder instance, which serves as the runtime environment. Of course, you can still use VB Studio to build apps with a third-party IDE or code editor and use VB Studio as the code repository, just as you did with DevCS. You can also use VB Studio to test, deploy, and maintain those apps throughout their lifecycles—nothing’s changed there.	Building Web and Mobile Applications explains how to use the VB Studio Designer to build web and mobile apps.
If you purchased Oracle Cloud Applications subscriptions that have front ends built with JET components, you can also use the VB Studio Designer to extend those apps to customize them for your business needs.	See Extending Oracle Cloud Applications.
Developer Cloud Service used tags to associate service instances with environments. In VB Studio, you’ll need to add service instances again to environments, because the service instances associated with the environments were removed as part of the upgrade. The environments themselves were not removed, just the service instances associated with them.	For information about how to add a service instance to an environment, see Manage an Environment.

For Former Visual Builder Users

In VB Studio, you still use the Designer to create your visual applications, but the infrastructure surrounding that process has changed significantly, as described here:

How Visual Builder and VB Studio Differ?	Find out more:
In VB Studio, you and your team belong to an organization. Within that organization are projects, which help to organize the work for a given endeavor. A project contains a Git repository, where your source code is stored, along with build jobs that package up your app’s artifacts and deploy them to the target environment. Each project also contains tools to help you manage your visual application’s lifecycle, like an Agile board, issue tracker, team wikis, and more.	What Is Oracle Visual Builder Studio?
Whereas Visual Builder used to contain the runtime environment where you could test and deploy your visual applications, VB Studio requires you to have a separate Visual Builder instance to serve as your runtime environment, and to establish communication between the two services. VB Studio manages the runtime environment instances that serve as your development, test, and production environments in the Environments page. Within the Environments page, you can view the status of the various service instances that have been added to your environment.	If you’re an administrator, see Set Up VB Studio for Developing Visual Applications to find out how to hook up your runtime to VB Studio. If you’re an app developer, see Share, Publish, and Deploy Visual Applications.
Your work in the Designer now takes place in a workspace, which is an entirely private area within a project that only you can access. The workspace brings together everything you need to build your visual app: a private branch within the Git repository and a VB Studio environment that points to your Visual Builder runtime instance.	If you’re an app developer, see Create Visual Applications in VB Studio.
If you want others to collaborate with you in developing your project's apps, your project owner will need to add them to the project and you’ll need to commit your workspace to a branch in a Git repository that is shared with these project members. To facilitate collaboration, the Designer in VB Studio includes built-in support for Git with a Git menu in the toolbar that accesses the Git commands you’re likely to use most frequently (Pull and Push, for example). There's also a new navigator tab (Git Panel) that provides a view to uncommitted changes in your workspace, and tools to resolve issues when your changes conflict with other changes in the Git repository branch that you want to commit to.	If you're a project owner, see Add and Manage Project Users. If you're an app developer, see Manage Your Visual Applications With Git.
In Visual Builder, the Stage and Publish actions were key parts of your development cycle. In VB Studio, however, you use Share to share your application with others for testing purposes, and Publish to push your changes from your local Git repository to the master branch of your remote repository (that is, the project's version) and deploy it to the Visual Builder runtime environment.	If you’re an app developer, see Share a Visual Application and Manage Deployed Visual Applications.
For business objects, VB Studio maintains one database schema per workspace. As a best practice, we recommend that you use the same workspace and branch to create and edit business objects in a visual application.	See Work with Business Objects.
VB Studio provides the following options to manage your visual application’s business object data: Menu options to import and export data. You access these options from the Visual Applications tab for the deployed visual application in the Environments page Build jobs to import and export business object data	See Manage Business Object Data During Development.
You can use the visual applications you built in Visual Builder within VB Studio by importing them, then performing a few post-import tasks.	See Learn About Migrating to Oracle Visual Builder Studio.
VB Studio manages connections to backend services differently to Visual Builder, where a Visual Builder administrator added these services to the Tenant Settings page. In VB Studio, the steps to create a connection depend on the backend service. If your visual applications need to access REST services from an Oracle Cloud Applications catalog, you add the Oracle Cloud Applications instance to the runtime environment. If the Visual Builder instance that you use in your environment is provided by Oracle Integration, visual applications in VB Studio inherit the catalog of Integration and Process backend services.	See Manage Backend Services in Your Visual Application.
The grunt-vb-build NPM package includes tasks to build visual applications that you develop in VB Studio and deploy to a Visual Builder runtime instance: The vb-process-local task processes the sources of the visual application that you cloned from VB Studio’s Git repository to your local Git repository for usage in the Visual Builder runtime instance. The vb-process-local task replaces variables and placeholders in index.html, downloads libraries from the Component Exchange, and so on. The archive that the vb-process-local task produces does not include absolute links to the Visual Builder runtime instance. The vb-credentials task transfers the credentials (service connection information and mobile build configurations) from secure storage in VB Studio to the target Visual Builder runtime instance. The vb-deploy task deploys the environment-independent artifact that the vb-process-local task produced to the target Visual Builder runtime instance and inserts environment-specific information, such as URLs and Oracle Identity Cloud Service information. The vb-deploy task also produces native mobile packages, if your visual application includes mobile applications.	If you want to use the Grunt tasks described here to build and deploy a visual application to a Visual Builder runtime instance, see Build and Deploy Your Application.
Although you’ll now do almost all the administration tasks for your visual applications in VB Studio, someone with administrator privileges for the Visual Builder runtime needs to sign in to the Visual Builder runtime to do certain tasks. Examples include configuration changes to connect your Visual Builder runtime to an Oracle DB instance with more space, or to configure a custom domain if users access an application deployed on the Visual Builder runtime from a custom app URL.	If you’re a Visual Builder runtime administrator, sign in to the Visual Builder runtime to complete the following tasks, that are described in . Access Instance Settings Configure Security Options for Applications Set Page Messages for Access Denied Errors Allow Other Domains Access to Services Switch to Your Own Oracle DB Instance Reset an Expired Password or ATP Wallet for Your Oracle DB Instance Manage Self-signed Certificates Configure Support for a Custom Domain

Extending Oracle Cloud Applications

If Oracle built your Oracle Cloud Application using Oracle JET, you can extend that app to customize it for your business needs. You can also create your own pages and page flows based on the Redwood theme, and deploy them alongside Oracle apps in your Oracle Cloud Applications instance.

To find out if you have such an app, see if you have an Edit Page in Visual Builder option in your Oracle Cloud Application’s edit menu. If you do, click it to jump over to VB Studio and start creating your extension. To help you along the way, have a look at What Do You Want to Do in VB Studio?.

Like everything built in VB Studio, the source code for your extension is stored within a project’s Git repository, and you work on your own branch of that repo in the context of your own private workspace.

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Title and Copyright Information

Oracle Cloud What's New in Oracle Visual Builder Studio, 22.07

F56024-01

June 2022

Copyright © 2020, 2022, Oracle and/or its affiliates. 

Primary Author: Oracle Corporation