Application Engine Plug-ins

PeopleTools provides a feature where in we can alter the SQL or PeopleCode actions of any Application Engine program, without customizing the delivered AE program. The configured plug-in action is executed at runtime. This effectively allows us to modify the code without actually customizing or re-designing the Application Engine program.

Configure the selected SQL or PeopleCode action of the Application Engine program by adding new SQL, PeopleCode, or both and/or by replacing the existing SQL or PeopleCode action through PIA in the AE Action Plugin page (PeopleTools, Application Engine).

Note: You can add or replace only SQL and PeopleCode actions in the Application Engine program. Only sections with steps having SQL or PeopleCode actions of the Application Engine program, which you plan to configure, will be displayed in PIA. This feature is not designed to add new sections or steps to an existing Application Engine program.

Actions belonging to the same step of the same section of the Application Engine program can have multiple plug-in actions defined. The plug-in action type does not have to match the action type that is selected for configuration. You can re-use the same SQL or PeopleCode plug-in action multiple times for different Application Engine programs.

The Application Engine action that is being configured cannot be used as a plug-in to configure another Application Engine program. Also, you cannot define a plug-in for the Application Engine action that is already been used as a plug-in.

For example, if Application Engine program A action Y is configured to use Application Engine program B action X as a plug-in, then Application Engine program A action Y cannot be used as a plug-in for any other Application Engine program. Also, you cannot configure a plug-in for Application Engine program B action X.

For the following test I am running PT 8.58.05, HCM 9.2 on PUM 35.

So AEMINITEST is my delivered program and then I created another standard AE program called as N_PLUGIN. My custom AE just has one step with action as peoplecode under MAIN. I have enbled disable restart under object properties of my custom AE.

In my custom peoplecode action I have the following code.

The delivered AE AEMINITEST has 2 steps under MAIN, first one is a SQL and then second one is peoplecode. I added a line of text to the peoplecode to understand the flow (obvisously this is not necessary).

Next logged into PIA and navigated to PeopleTools > Application Engine > AE Action Plugin and pulled up AEMINITEST.

I tried the following 4 tests.

1. Run my peoplecode action after AEMINITEST's peoplecode 

Value of variable TEST in AEMINITEST is 2 (0,0)

Value of variable TEST in N_PLUGIN is 20 (0,0)
Application Engine program AEMINITEST ended normally

Here I tried if I can display the value of the variable in my N_PLUGIN prgram which is set in the parent AEMINITEST program. This would work only if the variable is declared as global or component, not as local or if its auto declared. Similarly values from AET records could possibly be shared.   

2. Run my peoplecode action before AEMINITEST's peoplecode

Value of variable TEST in N_PLUGIN is 20 (0,0)

Value of variable TEST in AEMINITEST is 2 (0,0)
Application Engine program AEMINITEST ended normally

3. Run my peoplecode action replacing AEMINITEST's peoplecode

Value of variable TEST in N_PLUGIN is 20 (0,0)
Application Engine program AEMINITEST ended normally

4. Replace AEMINITEST's SQL with my peoplecode action

Value of variable TEST in N_PLUGIN is 20 (0,0)

Value of variable TEST in AEMINITEST is 2 (0,0)
Application Engine program AEMINITEST ended normally

So this is a great feature and will definitely assist when customizing Application Engine programs.

XML Parser

XML related API has been around for some time now in PeopleSoft and this post is not discussing anything new. Just something that I wanted to pen down for future reference. 

So recently I have been working on a requirement where in I have to parse out a XML response and fetch data values in order to process them further. In this case the same tag element names repeat throughout the XML message and there are multiple levels in the message. The requirement was to traverse each "item" tag and fetch the value for "key" and "value" tags.

Format of the XML message is as shown below.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <root> <level1> <level2> <level3> <item> <key>FieldName1</key> <value>Value1</value> <type>String</type> </item> <item> <key>FieldName2</key> <value>Value2</value> <type>Date</type> </item> <item> <key>FieldName3</key> <value>Value3</value> <type>Number</type> </item> </level3> </level2> </level1> </root>



Wrote two methods, first one is way longer than the second one.
For both methods I am passing the "field_name_value" and getting back the &fieldvalue value.


Method one - longer.


Local XmlDoc &NewHireXMLDoc;
Local XmlNode &root, &level1, &level2, &level3, &item;
Local number &z, &y, &x, &w, &v;
Local string &sResp, &fieldvalue;
Local boolean &bRet;


rem &sResp is the XML message in string form;
   
&NewHireXMLDoc = CreateXmlDoc();
&bRet = &NewHireXMLDoc.ParseXmlString(&sResp);

&rootNode = &NewHireXMLDoc.DocumentElement;

For &z = 1 To &rootNode.ChildNodeCount
   If &root.GetChildNode(&z).NodeName = "level1" Then
      &level1= &root.GetChildNode(&z);
      For &y = 1 To &level1.ChildNodeCount
         If &level1.GetChildNode(&y).NodeName = "level2" Then
            &level2= &level1.GetChildNode(&y);
            For &x = 1 To &level2.ChildNodeCount
               If &level2.GetChildNode(&x).NodeName = "level3" Then
                  &level3 = &level2.GetChildNode(&x);
                  For &w = 1 To &level3.ChildNodeCount
                     If &level3.GetChildNode(&w).NodeName = "item" Then
                        &item = &level3.GetChildNode(&w);
                        For &v = 1 To &item.ChildNodeCount
                           If &item.GetChildNode(&v).NodeName = "key" And
                                 &item.GetChildNode(&v).NodeValue = "field_name_value" Then
                              &fieldvalue = &item.GetChildNode(&v + 1).NodeValue;
                              &v = &v + 1;
                           End-If;
                       End-For;
                     End-If;
                  End-For;
               End-If;
            End-For;
         End-If;
      End-For;
   End-If;
End-For;



Method two - shorter

Local XmlDoc &NewHireXMLDoc;
Local string &sResp, &fieldvalue;
Local boolean &bRet;

Local array of XmlNode &items;
Local number &y, &z;

rem &sResp is the XML message in string form;
   
&NewHireXMLDoc = CreateXmlDoc();
&bRet = &NewHireXMLDoc.ParseXmlString(&sResp);


&items = &NewHireXMLDoc.DocumentElement.FindNodes("level1/level2/level3/item");
   
   For &z = 1 To &items.Len
      For &y = 1 To &items [&z].ChildNodeCount
         
         If &items [&z].GetChildNode(&y).NodeName = "key" And
               &items [&z].GetChildNode(&y).NodeValue = "field_name_value" Then
            &fieldvalue = &items [&z].GetChildNode(&y + 1).NodeValue;
            Break;
         End-If;
      End-For;

   End-For;

Event Mapping (managing customizations)

Event Mapping is a PeopleSoft delivered framework that helps applications and customers adapt PeopleSoft to meet their business needs with minimum upgrade impact. It introduces business logic as a configuration instead of customization. Event mapping allows the user to develop reusable code and artifacts and ensures that the customer’s code will not be overwritten by PeopleSoft delivered code during an upgrade.

Following is what I have tried in PeopleTools 8.56.07 and 8.57.08 on HCM 9.2 (PUM 31 and beyond). For this POC I am going to call my custom application package peoplecode on SavePostChange event on the DEPARTMENT_TBL component to perform something like sending out a notification. In the absence of the event mapping functionality I would have written this code in SavePostChange event of the DEPARTMENT_TBL component thus customizing the delivered object.

So, step one is to build the application package peoplecode. Import of PT_RCF:ServiceInterface is the key. The class name can be anything but the method name has to be "Execute".

import PT_RCF:ServiceInterface;

class FoundationDataNotify extends PT_RCF:ServiceInterface
   method Execute();
end-class;

method Execute
   /+ Extends/implements PT_RCF:ServiceInterface.execute +/

   /* custom logic to send out notification goes here */
end-method;
  
Once the package is developed navigate to PeopleTools > Portal > Related Content Service > Define Related Content Service. Create a new definition and select "URL Type" as application class and then provide the package details. For this POC I selected "Public Access" under security options. Save the service definition.

Then navigate to PeopleTools > Portal > Related Content Service > Manage Related Content Service, Event Mapping tab. Click on the "Map Application Classes to Component Events" link and then navigate the portal tree to find the component on which this event would be based on or associated with. In my case it would be the department table component located under Set Up HCM > Foundation Tables > Organization > Departments.

Under "Component Level Event Mapping" section, select "enable" check-box, event name would be SavePostChange and select the Service ID created in the earlier step. Set sequence number to 1 and processing sequence as "Post Process". Save the page and that is it. 

Navigate to the department component make a change and save the page and verify that the custom application package peoplecode fires.


The PeopleCode Editor provides an Event Mapping button in the dynamic Application Designer toolbar. For an application developer, the Event Mapping button is a visual indicator of custom PeopleCode programs mapped to events of a component, component page, component record, or component record field. This button is not available for page level event mapping.

So opened component peoplecode of component DEPARTMENT_TBL and clicked on the button to produce the following output.

Right-clicking on the application package code and selecting "Event Mapping References" in the pop-up menu as shown below should display the component but that did not work.

"Event Mapping References" tab is empty as shown below.

So I guess this might work in future releases or maybe I don't have something configured correctly for this to work.

Drop Zones

Configurable drop zones allow us to add fields to delivered fluid pages without customizing the component or fluid page definition. Our custom fields are displayed and processed along with fields from the main fluid page definition and any nested fluid subpages.

Following is what I tried in PeopleTools 8.56.07, HCM database on PUM 31.

The goal was to display Job Family information on the ESS additional info page.

1. Created a new fluid page based on the PSL_APPS_CONTENT template

2. The fluid page type is set as sub-page

3. Inserted a group-box, and on the group box properties, fluid tab, set group box type as "Container" and added style class  psc_padding-0em. Took default values for rest of the properties of the group box.

4. In this group box added two fields, first one is job family which is display control field and invisible and the second one is a related display field as shown below

That is it as far as development in application designer is concerned.

5. Via PIA navigate to PeopleTools > Portal > Configure Drop Zones

6. Pull up delivered ESS Additional Information page and select which drop zone to be used. So in my example the job family information will be displayed after highest education level info.

7. Save the configuration and verify the results by navigating to the Fluid ESS page.