Configure the Workbook (Post-install)

Follow these steps to configure your Workbook connection to your E-Business instances.

Set up the List of Instances

There are two options available to set up your list of E-Business instances within the Wizard.

A. Enter Instance(s) Manually

  1. Obtain the ProductName.xlsm file from the product zip file and open it in Excel.

  2. To edit the list of instances, the display option on the Setup ribbon must be set to ‘Show at Start-up’.

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  3. Click on the ‘About’ icon image30 on the product ribbon and the Login page will open.

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  4. Click on the Instance …​ button on the Login page to open the Configuration form.

    If the …​ button is missing on the Login page, this is because the Setup Ribbon has been hidden by your Administrator.
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  5. Enter an environment name that describes the database you are connecting to (this will display in the Instance List on the login page).

  6. Enter a URL:

Release 11i

To find the URL for Release 11i instances, login in to Oracle E-Business Suite as a System Administrator and find the ‘Applications Web Agent’ profile option at the site level. Copy and paste this value into the Configuration form.

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Release 12

To find the URL for Release 12 instances, login in to Oracle E-Business Suite as a System Administrator and find the ‘Apps Servlet Agent’ Profile Option at the site level. Copy and paste this value into the Configuration form.

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Repeat for each instance/database that you need to connect to. Then click on ‘Close’.

The Instance list is stored in the workbook, so the workbook MUST be saved or any setup you do here will be lost.

B. Automatically Import your Connection Instance List into Wizards

Only Wizards with Common Code version 201.7 and above contain the functionality to automatically import your URL connections from an “ini” file stored in your roaming profile, if no URL’s are currently saved in the Wizard.

To use this functionality a More4apps directory and INI file needs to be added to your roaming directory. Instructions on how to do this is shown in the Installation Instructions below.

When logging in the Wizard checks if there are already Oracle EBS login URLs saved in the workbook, if none are found, and a configuration settings file (More4appsMore4apps.ini) is found in the client’s standard roaming directory, the Wizard will display a prompt as per the image below:

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If “Yes” is selected:

  • The ‘Instance’ Listbox is populated with URLs from the INI file.

  • The message box closes.

If “No” is selected:

  • The message box closes and the Wizard Login form remains open.

The automatic importing of URL connections co-exists with current functionality and is not intended as a replacement. Connection URLs can still be entered manually from the Login screen and imported from other workbooks using the setup ribbon options.

Installation Requirements for Network Administrators

Windows uses the Roaming folder for application specific data, such as custom dictionaries, which are machine independent and should roam with the user profile. The directory is: Users\username\App\DataRoaming

The Wizards will attempt to locate the URL connections file in a “More4apps” directory in the roaming profile directory.

Create More4apps Directory and File

A short demonstration video can be found here: Configuring More4apps Connections

Step 1 Add a sub folder to the Roaming directory named “More4apps”.

Step 2 Using Notepad create your own text file named “More4apps.ini” in this directory, containing the following information in the top two lines of the file:

[INSTANCE_LIST]
Example, https://machine.domain.com:8000/OA_HTML

Step 3 Add your own URL connection lines to the file after the above data, as per the examples below where the text before the comma is an alias for the server and the text after the comma is the URL from the appropriate Oracle EBS profile:

My Oracle EBS R11i,https://myR11server.mybusiness.com:8000/pls/vis1
My Oracle EBS R12.1.3,https://myR12server.mybusiness.com:8000/OA_HTML

Step 4 Check the file contains data similar to the example below:

[INSTANCE_LIST]
Example,https://machine.domain.com:8000/pls/finprod
My Oracle EBS R11i,https://myR11server.mybusiness.com:8000/pls/vis1
My Oracle EBS R12.1.3,https://myR12server.mybusiness.com:8000/OA_HTML

Step 5 Save the file to this location:

Users\username\App\DataRoaming\More4apps\More4apps.ini

Important Notes:

  • The “[INSTANCE_LIST]” heading row is required in the file.

  • The first line under “[INSTANCE_LIST]” is an example and cannot be connected to so must be replaced.

  • The Wizard will only display and use the first nine URLs in the INI file.

  • Only one comma per line in the file should exist as this separates the name of the Instance from the connection URL.

  • List each instance on a separate line.

  • Ensure when creating and amending the file, the filename remains as “More4apps.ini” and doesn’t get a “txt” extension or the file will not be found.

  • Information from this file will be imported and not checked for accuracy. More4apps accepts no responsibility for the data entered in the More4apps.ini file.

  • If the More4apps.ini file contains unexpected data this will be imported into the URL form and the user will need to manually correct it.

  • To remove an entry from the More4apps.ini file, either delete the line, ensuring no blank lines remain in the file, or prefix the line with a semi-colon to effectively ignore the record.

Example INI file:

[INSTANCE_LIST]
Example,https://machine.domain.com:8000/pls/finprod
Punga VIS2 11.5.10, https://punga.mycompany.com:8001/pls/vis2
Rimu VIS1 12.0.6, https://rimu.mycompany.com:8000/OA_HTML
Pohutukawa VIS6 12.1.1,https://pohutukawa.mycompany.com:8000/OA_HTML
Titoki VIS7 115.10, https://titoki.mycompany.com:8000/pls/vis7
Matai VIS1 11.5.9, https://matai.mycompany.com:8000/pls/vis1
Kahikatea VIS8 12.1.3, https://kahikatea.mycompany.com:8000/OA_HTML
Kauri 11i, https://kauri.mycompany.com:8000/pls/vis1
Rata VIS9 12.1.3, https://rata.mycompany.com:8000/OA_HTML
Totara VIS3 11.5.10, https://totara.mycompany.com:8000/pls/vis3
Instance names and URLs can be copied from the “Set your HTTP Addresses” form into your INI file using standard copy/paste functionality (per field).

Copy Instances between Workbooks

The following functionality enables you to set up an instance list that can be imported into other More4apps workbooks, and distribute to your end users.

To copy your list of instances between workbooks (from ‘Workbook A’ to ‘Workbook B’), follow these steps:

  1. Open Workbook A and check the Instance List is set up correctly.

    Click on the […] button to view the list of instances.

  2. Open a Blank Workbook:

    Office Button > New > Blank Workbook

  3. Click on the ‘Export URL’ icon image36 on the Setup Ribbon.

    Your instance definitions will have been copied into cell A1.

    Save this workbook (e.g. Instance List.xls), you may want to use it in the future.

    Close Workbook A, but keep ‘Instance List.xls’ open.

  4. Open Workbook B, but switch back to the ‘Instance List.xls’ so that it is the current workbook.

  5. Click on the ‘Import Login Configuration’ icon image37 on the Setup Ribbon.

You should receive the message ‘Login configuration settings imported from current workbook’.

Now you will have the new list of instances available in ‘Workbook B’. You can continue to open other workbooks and import the Instance List using the ‘Instance List.xls’ that you created.