Getting tab name or tab id or tab label at runtime

Question

Hi All,
I think the answer is "no" but I'm going to ask anyway just in case I missed something.
I am designing some authorization schemes for my application. The context behind the design is this:
1. Two-level tabs application.
2. Access is stored in a table where an assignment between a level 2 tab is assigned to a user (well, it's really assigned to groups of users but that's not that important for this question). The level 2 tab is assigned via a select-list LOV defined as:
select
tab_label d,
tab_id r
from apex_application_tabs
where application_id = :APP_ID
and workspace = :OWNER
order by 1
So I store the TAB_ID of the 2nd level tab and it's assigned to groups of users.
So what I'd like is this at runtime:
1. For page-level security, I read the Apex data dictionary and pass APP_PAGE_ID to a function that reads the page number. I traverse the tab hierarchy in APEX_APPLICATION_TABS to see if the APP_PAGE_ID resides in TAB_PAGE or TAB_ALSO_CURRENT_FOR_PAGES to get the TAB_ID. Then I check my own assignment table to see if that TAB_ID is accessible to the user. If so, return TRUE, else, return FALSE. This is working wonderfully and isn't a problem...at runtime if I navigate to a page that is on a 2nd level tab and I don't have access to the page, the security scheme errors (correctly).
2. For tab-level security, I want that at the parent tab level that if the user has access to one or more of the 2nd level child tabs, display the parent tab.
3. For tab-level security, if the user is on a parent tab (because he/she has access to at least one child tab), only show the child tabs to which they have access.
Now the problem(s). The thing is that the user sees the tabs before they navigate to them (#2 and #3 I don't have working right now) and I want to hide them if they don't have access.
For example, let's say my parent tabs are A, B, and C. Child tabs are A1, A2, A3 underneath A. B1, B2, B3 underneath B. C1, C2, and C3 underneath C.
Let's say everything in A and underneath A (so A1, A2, and A3) are available to anyone who has a login to the application. No problem there.
Then, let's say most or all users have access to B1 but fewer users have access to B2 and B3. What I want is that if anything from B is available to a user, show parent tab B. If the user clicks on parent tab B, then show B1, B2, and B3 but only show the tabs to which they have access (so if they have access to B1 and B2 but not B3, do not display B3).
Then, let's say C is a very powerful administrative tab and very few people have access to it. I want to not-show C at all for people who do not have any access to C1, C2, or C3.
The problem I have at runtime is that I cannot find a way for a tab to pass information about itself when the tab is about to paint (or not-paint). The only variable or substitution string at runtime that I can find to reference about a tab is "CURRENT_PARENT_TAB_TEXT". However this gives me only information about the parent tab's text of the parent tab that has focus right now; each parent tab cannot pass it's own info until I navigate there. I need to get that information w/o navigating to the tab first so that I can determine to show/hide the tab. Does that make sense? In other words, at runtime, I log into the system and let's say I'm not very powerful and should only be on tabs A1, A2, and A3 under A. I log in, I land on A1, and I can see A2 and A3 (good), but also I can see parent tabs B and C poking up there too. CURRENT_PARENT_TAB_TEXT does not resolve to B or C (it currently resolves to A) until I actually try to click on B or C. I need to hide B or C before the user clicks.
Yes I can do it if I hard-code the name of the tab in a security boolean function, but I would have to have as many authorization schemes as I have tabs. This is why I want just one tab-level scheme where I pass the tab name or ID at runtime dynamically but I can't seem to reference it.
Over in the template for two-level tabls I see #TAB_LABEL#, #TAB_NAME#, #TAB_ID#, and #TAB_LINK#. These don't seem to be available to PL/SQL to pass at runtime to a PL/SQL function. If they could, this would be my answer.
Any other options or am I stuck on this one?
BTW...we are on version 3.2 of Apex and going to version 4 soon. If something is available in 4 for this that helps, I can do it then.
Ideas? Thanks!

Answer 1

Hey gti_matt,
Did you end up getting anywhere with this?
I'm in the same boat atm...
Thanks,
Dan