Can we find a table that is used in a set of FMBs without opening it individually in Oracle Forms?

Question

I am using both Oracle Forms version 11g and 12c.

Is it possible to find a table for e.g table1 used in the Oracle Forms application screens including LOV's without opening each FMB individually and searching in it.

Totally there are around 50-75 FMBs in the application.

Thanks

Answer 1

While Forms was a new software product, back then in its 3.0 version (or even lower), you could choose whether you'll keep the form source

• in the database or
  • in that case, you could have written a query which selects data from the data dictionary and - hopefully - extract tables' names
• in file system
  • file extension was .INP (not .FMB) and it was a textual file; it means that you could even create a form using text editor! Nobody probably did that, but hey - you could have done it.

.FMB is no longer textual file. Yes, you can open it it a text editor (such as Notepad++) and search for e.g. FROM (because any table used in form's PL/SQL units or LoVs is part of a SELECT statement which requires the FROM keyword) and get something like this:

Yes, you'll get "duplicates" if any table is referenced more than once.

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Another option is to write a program which will parse the .FMB file and extract tables' names (I can't help with that, though).