Business logic in PL/SQL?

Hello,
I am designing a 3-tier, web-based intranet application for my client. It's going to be a WebSphere portal app with Struts, running on Oracle 8.1.7.
One of the requirements is to implement the business logic in the back-end (PL/SQL), not in Java (although that is what I'm used to do). The reason probably has something to do with fear of performance issues ("the more code runs in Oracle, the faster") and resource planning ("more people here know Oracle better than Java").
This unusual (?) choice in my humble opinion leaves me with two major issues; how to cache database results and how to perform the O/R mapping.
I know how to use CallableStatements and JDBC, but I'd really like to avoid such a solution now we have EJB 2.1 and Hibernate and everything. And without caching as done by any sensible app server I fear performance issues.
Does anyone know a tool that can perhaps generate Java code and performs the O/R mapping? Or a tool that avoids me having to implement up to a hundred (!) CallableStatements and ResultSet-To-JavaBean mappings. I've seen Apache's commons-dbutils that seems to do this.
Does anyone have experience implementing business logic in PL/SQL and calling procedures from Java? Is performance really an issue here?
Thanks in advance for any input,
regards,
Bram Rooijmans

This unusual (?) choice in my humble opinion leaves me
with two major issues; In non-trivial applications excluding all business logic from the database is usually an architecture or design bug. Businesses do use the database directly due to legacy, tools, comfort level, etc. And in those cases the data still needs to be consistent. Not to mention that for some business logic the database can be orders of magnitude faster in running it versus external logic.
On the other hand I would consider it a bug as well if someone told me that all the business logic must be in the database and no where else. (At the very least I would suspect and question their definition of business logic in that case.)
I know how to use CallableStatements and JDBC, but I'd really like to avoid such a solution now...How are you going to implement any non-trivial business logic in oracle without using stored procs?
Does anyone have experience implementing business logic in PL/SQL and
calling procedures from Java? Not sure of the question. Certainly I have implemented business logic in PL/SQL. And many people have used stored procs via java.
Is performance really an issue here?No idea. That is a dependency of your system, not of java/databases in general.
I have seen java only solutions that even with scalling take hours to do operations that could be done in much less time using the database itself.
I have seen requirements which would have taken hours even in the database and changing the requirements meant it took less than 2 minutes. (It had nothing to do with java nor the database.)
I have seen code implementations which took significant database processing time where the entire solution could have been done without the database at all.
I have seen solutions where, due to business requirements, the same business logic was implemented in different languages and in slightly different ways in each. Implementing the logic in stored procs meant that all of the systems that used it now would be using the same rules. In that case it is possible that the solution was actually slower. But if it was it was not noticed and the consistency was much more important.

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Will there be a kind of sophisticated support to use ADF BC in combination with database-kept logic?
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Many other clients do have similar applications built in Forms and PL/SQL and would be glad to hear about a path of direction.
I've read the technical article 'understanding the ADF BC state management feature' which you have contributed to. One current limitation is pointed out there: Using PL/SQL with ADF BC limits ADF AM pooling to 'restricted level' which reduces scalability.
Are you aware of additional main problems/tasks to solve when using PL/SQL heavily with ADF BC, which we have to think about?
Thank you for any response.
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My main problem is two 'concurrent' areas holding state in an application system based on DB-stored PL/SQL-logic in combination with ADF BC.
For a new System everything can be made ok:
Sure, it is possible to build a new system with the business logic included in ADF BC only. All long-living state will be handled in the BC layer ( including support for UnitsOfWork longer than the webside short HTTP-requests and HTTP-sessions and longer than the database transactions.
For an old system these problems arise:
1. DB data changes not reflected in BC layer:
Our PL/SQL-logic changes data in tables without notifying the ADF BC layer (and its cache). To keep the data in ADF BC entity objects identical to the changed database content a synchronization is needed. BC does not know which part of the application data has been changed because it has not initiated the changes through its entity objects. Therefore a full refresh is needed. In a Forms4GL environment the behavior is similar: We do frequently requeries of all relevant (base)tables after calling database stored logic to be sure to get the changed data to display and to operate on it.
-> Reengineering of the PL/SQL-logic to make the ADF BC layer aware of the changes is a big effort (notifying BC about any change)
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Our PL/SQL-logic in some areas makes use of lengthy database transactions. The technical DB-transaction is similar to the UnitOfWork. If we call this existing logic from ADF BC, database state is produced which will not be DB-committed in the same cycle.
This reduces scalability of ADF BC AM pooling.
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Has anybody used Oracle Application Development Framework's Business Components (ADF BC)? What are the disadvantages and issues that you faced? Can anyone compare PL/SQL with ADF BC?
Would like to know the advantages and dis-advantages of both the technologies(PL/SQL and ADF BC).
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Hi,
Not sure what exactly you are looking for.
But let me explain so that you can get some idea of their working and ofcourse difference.
ADF BC which are nothing but the Entity Objects (EO) and View Objects (VO) which are the Java representation of the DB.
EO is like database table and is a 1-o-1 representation of the underline database table as a Java class file.
VO is like database view and is always based upon some custom SQL or combination of one or more EOs.
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Hi All,
For a new development in ADF 11g , where we should put our business logic: In ADF BC or in PLSQL?
What if we write all the bussiness logic in plsql? Because if tomorrow ADF goes(which I know is not ging to happen soon), we can expose pl/sql as web services, and new UI technology can use it. And we will not struggle on migration, as we are struggling today from Forms to ADF.That's what my manager says......
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We have a team with mixed skill sets, so consequently some of our business logic is in ADF/BC and some is in PL/SQL.
Having some in PL/SQL allows my project manager to divide and conquer the work to be done on an adf project easier than I can train the pl/sql guy to be an adf guy...supposedly.
Also our project manager is also a techy with a primarily pl/sql orientation.
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I have been to many presentation's of Paul Dorsey's BRIM product. Paul is absolutely certain that you and your manager are doing good when you put business logic in the database. Paul goes even further. I respect him and his arguments are sound.
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Rick,
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Hello everyone!
I am relatively new to Oracle Apps and interested in learning and joining this community.
I was trying to figure out how is the Business Logic programmed in E-Business Suite. Is it just PL/SQL or is it BC4J? Is there anyone who could help me answer this question or point me in the right direction (I went through the documentation very quickly (it is rather large so it was only "briefly") and could not find anything that would answer my question exactly)
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Just to expand on Bala's answer, it depends on how your application is architected.
If you have a Forms based application, then your Business Logic (BL) resides in PLSQL. The forms tier performs the basic validation and partial BL execution and passes the data to the handlers in the database to perform the DMLs and initiate required Business Process.
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If you are designing a new application to be based on OA Fwk, it is strongly recommended that you go with your BL as much as on the middle tier.
So it all depends... :)
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Dear Ramana,
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Hi,
Is it possible to do Logical Operations in SQL decode function
like
'>'
'<'
'>='
'<='
'<>'
not in
in
not null
is null
eg...
select col1 ,order_by,decode ( col1 , > 10 , 0 , 1)
from tab;
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Edited by: user780731 on Apr 30, 2009 12:07 AM
Edited by: user780731 on Apr 30, 2009 12:07 AM
Edited by: user780731 on Apr 30, 2009 12:08 AM
Edited by: user780731 on Apr 30, 2009 12:08 AM
Edited by: user780731 on Apr 30, 2009 12:09 AM

example:
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Amalesh,
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Regards,
Erik

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Hi Dilip
I have gone through your post and I think that the info provided by yu is not sufficent to answer yur question exactly but i would suggest yu the following solutions :-
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Business logic in PL/SQL?

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