About Flex Forms

Flex forms are a form type that provides flexible row and column management in Oracle Smart View for Office.

Data source types: Planning, Planning Modules, Financial Consolidation and Close, Tax Reporting

Flex forms retain all regular form properties and features, such as running business rules attached to the flex form. However, using flex forms, you can rearrange row and column members, and sort or move rows or columns. Modified row or column order is maintained on refresh and during submit. You can also filter data using Excel's filtering functionality. Dimension and member row cells and all data cells in a flex form are unprotected. Only the top left blank cells of a flex form are protected.

In the web interface, during form definition, administrators select Enable flex form on rows, Enable flex forms on columns, or both, under Smart View Options in the Layout tab to enable flex form-specific features.

In Smart View, the Sheet Info dialog displays the Sheet type for flex forms as "Flex form." Flex forms can be part of task lists and you can open them as flex forms from a task list.

Note:

Flex forms are used only in Smart View and not in the web interface.

Related Topics:

• Video

• Requirements

• Guidelines

Video

Your Goal	Watch This Video
Learn about how to enable and work with flex forms in Planning	Planning with Flex Forms in EPM Cloud Planning

Requirements

• Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud 20.04 or later

• Smart View 11.1.2.5.910 or later

• To modify both row and column members:

  • EPM Cloud 21.12 or later

  • Smart View 21.200 or later

Guidelines

See these guideline subtopics:

• General Guidelines

• Filtering and Sorting

• Smart Push

• Unsupported Features

General Guidelines

Following are guidelines for working with flex forms:

• You can modify both row and column members in flex forms.

• Any modification to a flex form will not be persisted between sessions.

  When a user modifies a flex form, the modified grid layout will only be persisted in the context of the current session. Reopening a flex form reverts the flex form layout to its original state.

• You may insert and delete rows and columns in a flex form using the Insert and Delete options on the right-click menu in Excel.

• When a flex form with a business rule or Groovy rule to add a new dimension member (member on-the-fly) is executed from the form, the new member will not appear on the flex form after a refresh. To see the new member on the flex form, you must relaunch the flex form from the Smart View Panel.

• You may delete rows and columns using the Delete key. However, when deleting rows or columns containing multiple dimensions, be sure to select all the dimension members in the row or column before pressing Delete.

  In the following example, there are three row dimensions on a flex form, Accounts, Market, and Year:

  D-Acc US Market FY18

  D-Acc US Market FY19

  D-Acc US Market FY20

  To remove the row for FY18 using the Delete key, be sure to select all three dimension members, D-Acc, US Market, and FY18 using the Ctrl key or Shift key, then press Delete.

• Copy and paste is limited to the scope of the form definition. Flex forms must adhere to the hierarchies as defined in the form. Therefore, you cannot have any flex form members that are not part of the defined row or column members of the form.

• Subtotaling calculation scripts and currency conversion calculation scripts will be generated and executed based on the original form definition.

• In the form definition, if Enable flex form for rows, Enable flex form for columns, or both, are selected, a flex form opened as a simple form can preserve comments in cells outside the form after refresh.

  However, when opened as a flex form:

  • If both the Enable flex form for rows and Enable flex form for columns options are selected, then comments are not preserved.

  • If only the Enable flex form for rows option is selected, then comments entered to the right of the form are preserved after refresh. Comments are not preserved if they are entered directly below the form.

  • If only the Enable flex form for columns option is selected, then comments entered below the form are preserved after refresh. Comments are not preserved if they are entered to the right of the form.

• When working with flex forms with multiple dimensions on rows or columns (when two or more dimensions with multiple members are placed on a row or columns):

  • By design, + and - for expand/collapse are not supported for flex forms. Instead, use the Expand/Collapse command on the right-click Smart View context menu.

  • During form definition, to place dimensions members on separate rows or columns, in Member Selection on the flex form, choose Place selection in separate rows or Place Selection in Separate Columns. See Selecting Members for Forms in Administering Planning.

• Users can select row or column members to add to a flex form using the Member Selection dialog box, available from the provider ribbon; for example, from the Planning ribbon. The Member Selection option is available only on flex forms, not on simple forms.

  Note:

  The Member Selection option is available in Smart View 21.100+.

  Use the Member Selection dialog to add row or column members to a flex form, similar to adding members to an ad hoc grid. The members you can add depend on the underlying form definition for the row or column dimensions:

  • If the Dimension Properties setting, Flex beyond form definition, is selected, users may select members outside those specified in the form definition. For example, suppose a form includes only the Computer Accessories members from the Product dimension. If Flex beyond form definition is selected for the Product dimension, then users may add other members from Product, such as Notebooks or Tablets, to the flex form. These members will be retained upon refresh. For more information, see the Flex beyond form definition property description below.

  • In the form definition of a flex form, if specific members are not part of a dimension, then, even though you may be able to select and add those members in the Member Selection dialog, those members will be removed upon refresh.

    Note:

    To add members outside the form definition, enable Flex beyond form definition on the applicable dimensions.

  Member Selection uses the default alias table defined at the application level. When members are inserted on the grid, the members are displayed as member names until a Refresh is performed, and then aliases are displayed corresponding to the application setting.

• Flex beyond form definition property

  During form definition, when the Flex beyond form definition property is applied to row or column dimensions in flex forms, Smart View users may enter members outside the form definition for dimensions within the row or column axis of the form. This allows flex form users to enter data for members that are not displayed on the flex form. Users must have access to the valid members that they enter.

  For example, using the Vision application, suppose the Product dimension is placed as a row dimension in a flex form. During form definition, only the Sentinal Standard Notebook and Sentinal Custom Notebook members in the Product dimension have been selected for display on the form. By enabling the Flex beyond form definition option for the Product dimension, Smart View users may enter other products from the Product dimension, such as Mouse or Keyboard, in the rows in the flex form. As long as they have access to those members, users can either add rows for additional members to the existing flex form or replace existing Product members with the Product members they require. To illustrate, note the following hierarchy:

  Product
     Notebooks  <<this hierarchy is displayed in flex form)
        Sentinal Standard Notebook
        Sentinal Custom Notebook
     Computer Accessories  <<this hierarchy is not displayed in flex form)
        Keyboard
        Mouse
  

  In a flex form with Flex beyond form definition disabled (not selected), users cannot add Computer Accessories or its descendants. Users can add Notebooks and its descendants.

  In a flex form with Flex beyond form definition enabled (selected), users can add Computer Accessories and its descendants as well as Notebooks and its descendants.

  During form definition, note the following when enabling the Flex beyond form definition property:

  • In Dimension Properties, the Flex beyond form definition option will only be visible if either the Enable flex form for rows or Enable flex form for columns option, or both, is selected in Smart View Options.

  • When there are multiple dimensions on the form rows, Oracle recommends that you select the Flex beyond form definition property for each applicable row or column dimension individually. You may use the Dimension Properties option, Apply to all row | column | page dimensions, to apply the Flex beyond form definition property to all dimensions; however, use with care as all other dimension property selections will also be applied to all other dimensions.

  See Designing Flex Forms in Administering Planning.

• When a user adds a member that is a parent or child of a member already present on a flex form and refreshes, the child member will be collapsed, even in cases where the Dimension property, Start expanded, is selected during form design. To the user, it may look like the child member was removed, but the child member can be viewed by expanding the parent using the Expand/Collapse commands on the Smart View context menu.

• When entering numeric member names or shared members on a flex form, enter a single quotation mark ( ' ) before the member name.

  For example, for a numeric member name, such as 4077, enter:

  '4077

  For shared members, enter member names in the format:

  '[Parent].[Shared Member]

  For example:

  '[Sales Director 2].[410]

  '[Default_Sales Director 2].[Default_International Sales]

• When a flex-enabled form is opened in an ad hoc mode, the row dimension indentation is lost on submitting data. Refreshing the data restores the indentation to normal.

• User variables, dynamic user variables or substitution variables are supported on flex form rows and columns. Users should change variables on the POV and perform a refresh for the rows and columns to update them to the new members.

• Excluded members may be entered on flex form rows or columns. Members that are excluded in the form definition can be entered on flex form rows and users are able to enter values and submit.

• In the form definition, when Enable flex form for rows, Enable flex form for columns or both are enabled, then the Segment properties Hide and Read-only are not supported for either rows or columns. Hide and Read-only are supported only in simple forms.

• The Suppress Missing Blocks, Suppress Missing Rows, and Suppress Missing Columns options defined in the web for a flex form are applied only when first opening the flex form in Smart View. Depending on the form definition, flex form users can enter members on columns or rows even though the suppression options are enabled in web form. Users can also enter data and submit data for the suppressed members.

  If the suppression options in the Smart View Options dialog, Data Options tab, for Suppress Missing Blocks, Suppress Missing Rows, and Suppress Missing Columns are selected, they are applied to the flex form. Users can uncheck these options in Smart View and then add members (by typing them on the sheet or using Member Selection), enter data, submit data, and refresh the flex form.

• An administrator can configure action menus to run business rules or open a flex form from a flex form. The action menu items are accessed from the right-click Smart View context menu. The action menu items may be defined to appear on the right-click menu anywhere on the flex form or when right-clicking, for example, in specific dimensions, members, rows, columns, or cells.

  Right-click menus that are available in the web application for the POV and Page dimensions are not available on flex forms in Smart View.

  In Administering Planning, for information on setting up action menu items for flex forms, see Administering Action Menus; for additional information on flex forms, see Designing Flex Forms.

• To retain modified members on a flex form after a POV or user variable change, you must enable the Flex Forms: Preserve Grid on POV and User Variable Changes option. In the Smart View ribbon, click Options, then select the Member Options tab, and then select the option, Flex Forms: Preserve Grid on POV and User Variable Changes. If this option is not selected, any added rows or columns in the flex form will be removed upon a POV or user variable change.

  After selecting the Flex Forms: Preserve Grid on POV and User Variable Changes option, add or delete members on the flex form grid, and click Refresh. Then change a POV member and click Refresh; or change a user variable and the flex form refreshes automatically. Your modified members are retained. You can now enter and submit data against the modified POV and user variables in any of the members in the flex form, including any newly-added members. Optionally, change the POV or any user variable again and refresh, and then continue entering data against the updated POV and user variables.

Filtering and Sorting

• Filtering does not disable Submit Data as it is only hiding certain rows. Sorting disables Submit Data as it changes member order in the column. After sorting you must refresh to submit data.

• To avoid undesirable sorting results, do not apply sorting to an entire column. Instead, select the grid members to sort, and then use Excel's Sort commands, Sort A to Z or Sort Z to A, or perform a custom sort.

• After applying a filter to a row or column dimension, and then applying a sort within the filter drop-down dialog, the sort indicator arrow appears on the filter button within the grid. However, after a Refresh, the sort indicator arrow on the filter button is no longer displayed.

Smart Push

• Smart Push is supported on flex forms.

• On a filtered flex form, Smart Push does not honor the context of the selected form.

Unsupported Features

• These form features are not supported for flex forms:

  • Segment Properties:

    • Hide

    • Read-only

    • Enable drop-down for dimensions (row dimension drop-downs member selectors)

    • Suppress hierarchy

    Note:

    After rows are rearranged or sorted, Segment properties will not be retained.

  • Spreading

  • Validation Rules

  • Row or column formulas

  • Using flex forms inside composite forms

  • Enabling Show Currency for the Entity dimension.

  • Data validation rules within forms are not supported when using flex forms. Instead, convert data validation rules to Groovy rules.

• Flex forms are not supported for Smart Forms.