Action Links - Browser Script

Question

Hi All,
This has been a long process. I just wanted to use Action Links to open an external webpage based on a URL field that is stored in our data warehouse. The problem (based on my findings) is that external webpages can only be launched from OBIEE with a fixed part of the URL and then a query string section that follows the ? symbol. This is great if you are looking to launch a url with a query string (ie. google, cnn, etc.) but it doesn't help you if your url has no question mark.
My first solution was to build a redirect asp page. I would point the URL to this asp page with the real URL positioned after the question mark. The asp page would strip out the query string from the end of the url and then launch that webpage. This works great but it relies on an asp page being stored somewhere on a server (by IT). I would rather take advantage of the out of the box action link functionality using OBIEE solely. So I started looking at browser scripts. I am so close but can't get the last bit to work.
I have a function that looks like this:
USERSCRIPT.Show_URL = function popitup(url){
var url = c
alert(url);
My only issue is that this shows a comma at the beginning of the c variable. The c variable comes from the USERSCRIPT.parameter function sample that is in the USERSCRIPT.js file. Any ideas why there is a comma before my url? I tried using the replace function to get rid of it but it keeps erroring out saying 'Object doesn't support this property or method'.
Much Appreciated,
Mike

Answer 1

I finally got this to work on my own with a bit of work.
I borrowed some of the code for the displayparameters ootb function in the USERSRIPTS.js file but changed the variable that they have in the alert function from c to a. I then swapped out the alert function for the window.open function. This code now opens the url in my cell regardless of whether or not there is a ? in the url which in my case, there was not. I have set the parameter 1 to be the column value of the URL field.
USERSCRIPT.Launch_URL=function(b){var c="";for(args in b){var d=args;var a=b[d];c+=""+d+""+a;c+="\n"};window.open(a,'name')};
USERSCRIPT.Launch_URL.publish={parameters : []};
Perhaps this will save someone else some time.
Mike
PS Oracle could have save me a lot of work by just allowing variables to be passed into web page url's without the requirement of a question mark. Easy nice enhancement they should incorporate into next release.
Edited by: user8030589 on May 24, 2013 10:48 AM
Edited by: user8030589 on May 24, 2013 10:49 AM