Oracle has added UPK’s for PeopleTools 8.52 Reporting Tools besides the already available UPK’s for PeopleTools 8.51 Reporting Tools and Test Framework. Available for download on Oracle Software Delivery Cloud (formally known as eDelivery).

Some while ago I was asked to import departments from a Non-PeopleSoft system and to generate the department tree for these departments. As usual you start off by looking for Vanilla solutions. What I have understood, is that the department tree is usually created manually and using the TreeManager utility TreeMover they are copied across environments. So PeopleSoft has a Vanilla solution for importing and creating department trees. However, after examining the TreeMover, which is a powerfull tool I have to admit, it is a feasible solution only if already a department tree is created manually.

Why do I say this?

PSQuery is an online PeopleTools functionality heavily used by business analysts and key users to gain information from the PeopleSoft application without the need of development or database SQL knowledge. The biggest con of PSQuery is that you end up with one static list of data, which is usually exported to Excel for further enhancement and analysis.

From PeopleTools 8.50, you now have the ability to create more in-depth analyses and productivity using drilling URLs.

When you build a query using Query Manager, you can define drilling URLs that are associated with this query using the expression option. These settings are saved into the database, along with prompt, criteria, and so on, as part of the metadata for this query. When you execute this query through Query Manager or Query Viewer, the query results page shows results as links, which you can click to be redirected to a different page in a new browser. You can create URLs for:

• Other PSQuery, for more in-depth information about a subject, actual drilldown functionality
• PIA Component, direct link to components where the keys for the search page of the component are extracted from the selected columns in the query
• External URL, non PeopleSoft URLs, for example Vendor sites
• Attachment URL, direct link to an attachment that is stored in the database or file system
• Free Format URL, any type of URL you want to construct, can be used for example to deep link to other non-PeopleSoft applications

So how does one create a drilling URL?

On 28 October PeopleTools 8.52 is presented as generally available download via eDelivery. PeopleTools 8.52 is certified to upgrades for 8.9 and later applications. Release notes for PeopleTools 8.52 can be found here.

For a quick overview of this Tools release see previous post.

PeopleTools PeopleBooks is also available via this link.

With PeopleTools you have the ability to create pagelets using the Pagelet Wizard. Pagelet Wizard pagelets, also known to the rest of the world as portlets, are small pages that provide display-only snapshots of applicable content which can be placed on the PeopleSoft Homepage. With the Pagelet Wizard you can create a variety of pagelets:

• HTML
• IB Connector
• Integration Broker
• Navigation Collections
• OBIEE Report
• PeopleSoft Query
• Rowset
• Search record
• URL

This post describes how you can get more control in formatting and setting up your HTML pagelets.