Alerts in Oracle Application

Oracle Alert facilitates the flow of information within your organization by letting you create entities called alerts to monitor your business information and to notify you of the information you want. You can define one of two types of alerts: an event alert or a periodic alert.

Event Alert:

An event alert immediately notifies you of activity in your database as it occurs. When you create an event alert, you specify the following:

• A database event that you want to monitor, that is, an insert and/or an update to a specific database table.

• A SQL Select statement that retrieves specific database information as a result of the database event.

• Actions that you want Oracle Alert to perform as a result of the database event. An action can entail sending someone an electronic mail message, running a concurrent program, running an operating script, or running a SQL statement script. You include all the actions you want Oracle Alert to perform, in an action set.

Periodic Alert:

A periodic alert, on the other hand, checks the database for information according to a schedule you define. In a periodic alert specify the following:

• A SQL Select statement that retrieves specific database information.

• The frequency that you want the periodic alert to run the SQL statement.

• Actions that  Oracle Alert to perform once it runs the SQL statement. An action can entail sending the retrieved information to someone in an electronic mail message, running a concurrent program, running an operating script, or running a SQL statement script. We include all the actions we want Oracle Alert to perform, in an action set.

Navigation in Oracle Apps to define an alert:

Go to “Alert Manager” Responsibility
Alert >> Define

Transfer Alert from one instance/database to other:

Go to “Alert Manager” Responsibility
Alert >> Define
Go to “Tools” Menu on top
Click on “Transfer Alert”
Enter source and destination fields and click Transfer.

How to define an periodic alert:

1. Go to Alert Manager > Alert > Define.
2. Select the ‘Periodic’ Tab.
3. Enter the name of the application that owns the alert in the Application field.
4. Name the alert (up to 50 characters), and give it a meaningful description (up to 240 characters).
5. Check Enabled to enable your periodic alert.
6. Set the frequency for the periodic alert to any of the following:

• On Demand
• On Day of the Month
• On Day of the Week
• Every N Calendar Days
• Every Day
• Every Other Day
• Every N Business Days
• Every Business Day
• Every Other Business Day

Enter a SQL Select statement that retrieves all the data your alert needs to perform the actions you plan to define. Your periodic alert Select statement must include an INTO clause that contains one output for each column selected by your Select statement.

Here is an example of a periodic alert Select statement that looks for users who have not changed their passwords within the number of days specified by the value in :THRESHOLD_DAYS.:

SELECT user_name,
password_date,
:THRESHOLD_DAYS
INTO &USER,
&LASTDATE,
&NUMDAYS
FROM fnd_user
WHERE sysdate = NVL(password_date,
sysdate) + :THRESHOLD_DAYS
ORDER BY user_name

Although Oracle Alert does not support PL/SQL statements as the alert SQL statement definition, you can create a PL/SQL packaged function that contains PL/SQL logic and enter a SQL Select statement that calls that packaged function.

You can verify the accuracy and effectiveness of your Select statement. Choose Verify to parse your Select statement and display the result in a Note window.

Choose Run to execute the Select statement in one of your application’s Oracle IDs, and display the number of rows returned in a Note window.

Once you are satisfied with the SQL statement, save your work.

Specifying Alert Details:

Once you define an event or periodic alert in the Alerts window, you need to display to the Alert Details window to complete the alert definition. The Alert Details window includes information such as which Application installations you want the alert to run against, what default values you want your inputs variables to use, and what additional characteristics you want your output variables to have.

Creating Alert Actions:

After you define your alert you need to create the actions you want your alert to perform. There are four types of actions you can create:

• message actions

• concurrent program actions

• operating script actions

• SQL statement script actions

Choose Actions

Enter a name (up to 80 characters) and description (up to 240 characters) for your alert action.

Select a level for your action: Detail, Summary, or No Exception.

Choose Action Details to display the Action Details window.

Select the type of action you want to create in the Action Type field

Creating an Event Alert:

Specify the name of the application and the database table that you want Oracle Alert to monitor.

Note: You cannot use a view as the event table for your alert.

Check After Insert and/or After Update if you want to run your event alert when an application user inserts and/or updates a row in the database table.

Specify a value in the Keep _ Days field to indicate the number of days of exceptions, actions, and response actions history you want to keep for this alert.

Specify a value in the End Date field if you want to disable your alert by a certain date.

Important Alert Tables:

• ALR_ALERTS
• ALR_ACTIONS
• ALR_ACTION_SETS
• ALR_ACTION_SET_INPUTS
• ALR_ACTION_SET_OUTPUTS
• ALR_ACTION_SET_MEMBERS
• ALR_ALERT_CHECKS
• ALR_ALERT_INPUTS
• ALR_ALERT_OUTPUTS
• ALR_ACTION_SET_CHECKS
• ALR_RESPONSE_SETS
• ALR_RESPONSE_ACTIONS
• ALR_VALID_RESONSES

Oracle Alert uses the following internal views:

•  ALR_ALERT_ACTIONS_VIEW
•  ALR_ALERT_HISTORY_VIEW
•  ALR_CHECK_ACTION_HISTORY_VIEW
•  ALR_INSTALLATIONS_VIEW
•  ALR_PERIODIC_ALERTS_VIEW
•  ALR_RESPONSE_ACTIONS_VIEW
•  ALR_SCHEDULED_PROGRAMS
•  ALR_VARIABLES_AND_OUTPUTS