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Oracle® Application Server Forms and Reports Services Installation Guide 10g Release 2 (10.1.2) for Linux x86 B19314-02 |
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# 2 Introduction to Forms and Reports Services

Oracle Application Server Forms and Reports Services enables you to install and configure Forms and Reports Services without the need to install and configure the entire Oracle Application Server. This is called a standalone installation of Forms and Reports Services. You can also configure the standalone Forms and Reports Services instance to use the Oracle Identity Management and Oracle Application Server Metadata Repository services of an Oracle Application Server Infrastructure.

Forms and Reports Services standalone installation is best suited for users who want to upgrade Forms and Reports applications to the Grid environment in two phases. In phase one, they move to the Grid environment by upgrading their client/server-based Forms and Reports applications to Web-based applications. In phase two, users can then choose to use the services offered by an existing OracleAS Infrastructure installation.

This chapter includes the following topics:

- Restrictions with This Installation Type

- Available Features with This Installation Type

## 2.1 Restrictions with This Installation Type

Once you configure Forms and Reports Services to use the services of an OracleAS Infrastructure, you cannot reverse this configuration.

## 2.2 Available Features with This Installation Type

When you install Forms and Reports Services, you will have access to these features:

- Oracle Application Server Forms Services

- Oracle Application Server Reports Services

- Oracle HTTP Server

- Oracle Application Server Web Cache

- Oracle Application Server Containers for J2EE

- Oracle Enterprise Manager

- Oracle Process and Management Notification

- Distributed Configuration Management

### 2.2.1 Oracle Application Server Forms Services

Oracle Application Server Forms Services deploys Oracle Forms with database access to Java clients in a Web environment. OracleAS Forms Services automatically optimizes class downloads, network traffic, and interactions with the Oracle database. Forms applications are automatically load-balanced across multiple servers; thus, they can easily scale to service any number of requests.

### 2.2.2 Oracle Application Server Reports Services

Oracle Application Server Reports Services provides an easy-to-use, scalable, and manageable solution for high-quality enterprise reporting and publishing. Using Oracle Reports, you can publish data generated by multiple sources in various formats (paper layout, Web, or data interchange format). This provides flexibility in the presentation of data. OracleAS Reports Services is part of Oracle Application Server.

### 2.2.3 Oracle HTTP Server

Oracle HTTP Server, built on Apache Web server technology, is the Web server that Oracle Application Server uses. It offers scalability, stability, speed, and extensibility. It also supports Java servlets, Java Server Pages (JSPs), Perl, PL/SQL, and CGI applications.

### 2.2.4 Oracle Application Server Web Cache

Oracle Application Server Web Cache is a server-accelerator caching service that improves the performance, scalability, and availability of frequently used Oracle E-business Web sites that run on the Oracle platform. By storing frequently accessed URLs in virtual memory, Oracle Application Server Web Cache eliminates the need to repeatedly process requests for those URLs on the Web server. It also caches both static and dynamically generated HTTP content from one or more applications Web servers.

### 2.2.5 Oracle Application Server Containers for J2EE

Oracle Application Server Containers for J2EE (OC4J) is a complete set of J2EE containers written entirely in Java that execute on the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) of the standard Java Development Kit (JDK).

### 2.2.6 Oracle Enterprise Manager

Oracle Enterprise Manager Application Server Control (henceforth referred to as Application Server Control) provides you with Web-based management tools that you need to monitor, administer, and configure multiple Oracle Application Server instances and its components. By default, Application Server Control is installed with every instance of Oracle Application Server. You can deploy applications, manage security, and create and manage Oracle Application Server clusters.

Application Server Control consists of the following:

- The Enterprise Manager home pages you use to manage Oracle Application Server and its components. These Web pages provide you with a high-level view of your Oracle Application Server environment. From these pages you can drill down for more detailed information on administration, configuration, and performance monitoring. These pages also let you administer Oracle Application Server, its components, and deployed applications.

- The underlying software technologies that keep track of your Oracle Application Server instances and components. These technologies automatically perform the necessary management tasks. For example, these technologies discover the components of each Oracle Application Server instance, gather and process performance data, and provide access to application configuration information.

### 2.2.7 Oracle Process and Management Notification

Oracle Process and Management Notification (OPMN) provides process control and monitoring services for Oracle Application Server instances and their components such as Forms and Reports Services. It gathers component status information and distributes the information to the relevant components. Application Server Control uses OPMN for such tasks as starting and stopping the components of your Oracle Application Server instance.

### 2.2.8 Distributed Configuration Management

Distributed Configuration Management (DCM) manages configurations among Oracle Application Server instances with a common Oracle Application Server Metadata Repository. It enables cluster-wide deployment of Oracle Application Server; thus, enabling you to deploy an application to one instance and have it automatically propagated to the entire cluster. You can also make a single host or instance configuration change to one instance and have it propagated across all instances in the cluster. Application Server Control uses DCM to make configuration changes and to propagate configuration changes and deployed applications across the cluster.