Monday 11 September 2017

PeopleTools 8.56- Classic Plus

Introduction:
With the new release of PeopleTools 8.56, Oracle has introduced many features which take the User Experience to whole new level and Classic Plus is one amongst them.

Not all the components/pages can be  converted to fluid and Oracle has come up with a new feature in PT 8.56 called Classic Plus (Classic+) which converts classic pages to Fluid ones and thus brings unified look and feel within PeopleSoft.       

Business Benefits:
  •  Improves end user experience exceptionally when the user switching between classic and fluid pages.

 Development Benefits:
  • Reduces amount of rework drastically as the page layout will adjust automatically in Classic Plus compared to changing the component property to fluid mode.

 Best Practices:
The following steps are recommended to make use of Classic+ feature for the application.
  •  Enable global Classic Plus setting in Branding System Options.
  • Enable “Apply Fluid like theme for Classic” in Style tab at component level.
  • Test the page layout and adjust whereever necessary.

 Development of Classis Plus:

Step 1: Enable global Classic Plus setting in Branding System Options.


Navigate through Navigator -> PeopleTools -> Portal -> Branding -> Branding System Options and select Theme Style Type as Fluid like theme for Classic under Classic Components sections and click on save as shown in the screenshot below.

Let us take an example of Personal Data page of converting from classic to fluid using Classic+ feature.

Personal Data page before enabling Classic plus:


Step 2: Open the component in application designer and enable Fluid like theme for Classic option under style tab and save the component as show below.



Personal Data page after enabling Classic plus:


Limitations:
  •  The feature is limited to look and feel only and the classic plus pages are not as responsive as Fluid pages.
  • Rework on some page layout adjustment may be required for complex pages as this feature changes the size of objects.
  •  Though it is a small and simple change, users will not be able to enable as it requires a customization at component level.
      Author: Lakshmi Deepak P
      Kovaion Consulting -PeopleSoft Practice
      Email: lakshmi.deepak@kovaion.com

Thursday 31 August 2017

PeopleTools 8.55 - Navigation Collection and Tile Wizard

PeopleTools 8.55 has added many features which made PeopleSoft more user friendly  and attractive in that Navigation Collection ad Tile wizard are the one of the exciting new features which prominently reduce the user time in navigation through various component pages and made the home page more attractive.

Navigation Collection:

Navigation collections provide an easy way to access the pages (contents stored in our portal registry) of PeopleSoft at one place.

Navigation Collection Features:


  • Various Content references or folder reference can be group together via a group of links.
  •  Links in navigation collection are pointer to a content reference or folder reference in the portal registry in actually, it does not store the contents of the content reference or folder reference.
  • They can be deployed to different users or groups of users easily as per users' business needs
  •  Reduces the time of searching through application pages where users can quickly click on commonly used links required to complete daily tasks in the Navigation Collection.
  • Whenever a link is clicked within a Navigation Collection, it redirected to a content reference or folder reference that is within the registry.

Creating Navigation Collection

Navigation: Main Menu à PeopleTools àPortalàPortal Utilitiesà Navigation Collections

Steps:

Follow the Steps for creating our new Navigation Collection.
Step 1: Navigate to Navigation Collection Component.


Step 2: Click on the Add Collection Link to create new Navigation Collection.



Step 3: Enter the Name and Description for your Navigation collection. 


Step 4: Click on Add Folder to add new subfolder into your navigation collection.


Step 5: Click on the Add link button to define of source page link for the navigation collection.

Step 6: Click on the Menu Prompt to Select the Source link and then navigate through the folders till source page.

Step 7: Click OK and your Navigation to the Link will be added.

Step 8: Similarly we can add number of sub folders and Link into your navigation collection. Then click on Save.

Step 9: Now go to Publish collection tab and then select the Checkbox Navigation Pagelet.

Step 10: Select the Pagelet category as PeopleSoft Application from the dropdown list and Click Save to publish your navigation Collection.

PeopleSoft Tiles

Aggregated blocks like (Tile) appears in collections, as you login into Fluid application pages including Home page are called Tiles.

Navigation Bar
PeopleSoft Tiles

Tiles Features:


  •     Tiles hold the information for end users.
  •     It enables an easy way to navigate around the system.
  •       Tiles give users direct access to targeted transactions.
  •    Tiles can be personalized based like which tile needs to be displayed to specific User, their Position...Etc.,
  •       Tiles can be secured by role and can be made mandatory or optional.

Tile Wizard for Tile Creation:

Creating new tiles and publishing can be done easy with help of this Tile Wizard of PeopleSoft 9.2. without having specific development tools or skills. We can have different data source for our Tiles.
Tile Wizard leads usthrough 5 Steps for creating and publishing new tile. Each step appears in a numbered path at the top of the page to indicate where we are in the tile creation process.

Data Source for Tile:


  •      Application Class
  •     Free Text 
  •       Navigation Collection
  •    OBIEE
  •       Pivot Grid       

Creating Tiles with Tile wizard:

Navigation:Main Menuà PeopleToolsàPortalà Tile Wizard.
Steps:
Navigate to Tile Wizard page and then click on Create New Tile button for creating new tile.


Step1: Tile Basic Information – Specifying tile information.
 Provide Name and Title for you Tile and then Click on Next



Step2: Data Source Information – specifying data source parameters when applicable.
Select the data source as Navigation Collection from the Dropdown list.


Click on the Collections Name Prompt  and then Select you Navigation Collection.


Then Select the Collection Type as Navigation Bar and the Click on Next.

Step3: Target Page Information – Selecting the target page and tile repository location
            Check for the details of target page is right and the click next.


We can add the security to our tile by mentioning the permission list and role.


Step4: Tile Display Properties – Specifying display properties.
  User can select the icon for your tile from the image prompt.


Step5:Review and Submit – Review and publishing the tile definition.

          Click on the publish button to publish your tile.
Now your Tile will be visible in the fluid home page under the selected parent folder navigation.


On clicking our Tile it will lead you to the links in your navigation collection.



Author: Neelufar Mohammed Esack
Kovaion Consulting-PeopleSoft Practice