What's the difference between Page Composer and Application Composer?

Page Composer is a web-based tool you can use to modify user interface (UI) pages and components for all products designated for use with Page Composer.

Page Composer uses two different modes of Design View. The first mode, Design View: Standard mode, is selected by default in all the pages when opening a page with Page Composer with the Design button selected. The second mode, Design View: Direct Selection mode, is activated when you click the Select tab for the UI page you want to modify. Direct Selection mode is available when you modify pages, but not when you personalize a dashboard page. With the Design View: Direct Selection mode, you can select and edit UI elements such as form fields and table columns. In Direct Selection mode, the UI components that you can select become apparent when you move your cursor over them. The UI components that you can select are highlighted and can be edited.

The following table describes how you can use each mode of Page Composer to modify dashboard pages and other select pages (such as the Partner Public Profile page, Partner Landing page, Partner Registration, Customer Snapshot, and Customer Overview - Analysis tab), and modify transactional pages (all other non-dashboard pages).

Use Cases	Design View - Standard mode	Design View - Direct Selection mode	Page Type
Add content (Business Intelligence reports, portlets such as Calendar)	Yes	No	Dashboard and other select pages
Delete region	Yes	No	Dashboard and other select pages
Move region	Yes	No	Dashboard and other select pages
Change page layout (for example, change a two column layout to three column layout)	Yes	No	Dashboard and other select pages
Default region state (open or close)	Yes	No	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Manage save queries (create and edit)	Yes	No	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Hide or show field	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Change field label	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Make field required or not	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Make field read-only or updatable	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Reorder fields in a Form	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Reorder table columns	Yes	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Hide or show table columns	Yes	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Set table column width with the mouse	Yes	No	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Set table column width and minimum width in percent or pixels	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)
Sort column or not	No	Yes	Transactional pages (all non-dashboard pages)

Application Composer also lets you make UI changes at run time. However, the types of UI changes that you can make using Application Composer are quite different. Specifically, your primary focus when using Application Composer is to make actual object model changes. For example, you can create a new business object and related fields, and then create new application pages where that object and its fields are exposed to users.

The following table describes some of the primary differences between Page Composer and Application Composer. For example, using Application Composer, you can't access the Resource Catalog to add new content to a page.

Task	Available in Page Composer (site, job role, external or internal level)?	Available in Application Composer (site level only)?
Make object model extensions and expose your changes by creating or modifying work area pages	No	Yes
Reorder subtabs	No	Yes
Modify dashboard pages	Yes	No
Add content from the Resource Catalog	Yes	No
Simple field changes (show, hide, make read only, make required)	Yes (WYSIWYG - what you see is what you get)	Yes (non-WYSIWYG)
View results of changes immediately	Yes, in the Page Composer design interface	Yes, in the application that you're making changes to