What is a direct access URL (path aliasing)?

A direct access URL is an easy to read URL that users can enter to get to a specific item, document, page, category, or perspective.

Direct access URLs for pages

Say you have a page group called myportal. Within that page group you have a page called mypage and that page has a subpage called mysubpage. If you navigate to mysubpage, the URL in your browser's Location field will look something like the following:

http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/portal/page?_pageid=93,38903&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL

This is a rather complicated URL to pass on to another user, so instead, you can give the user the page's direct access URL, which will look something like the following:

http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mypage/mysubpage

A direct access URL for a page is formed as follows:

http://<hostname>:<portnumber>/pls/<dad>/url/page/<pagegroupname>/<objectname>

where:

• hostname is the machine on which Oracle9iAS Portal is installed.

• portnumber is the port number used to access Oracle9iAS Portal

• pls is the virtual path and indicates that the request is for a PL/SQL procedure which alerts the Oracle HTTP Server to reroute the request to mod_plsql.

• dad is the Database Access Descriptor (DAD) used for your Oracle9iAS Portal installation. The DAD contains information on how to connect to the database.

• url indicates that the URL is a direct access URL to a page (this is the path alias specified in the DAD).

  Note: url is the default path alias, but your portal administrator could have changed it to something else.

• page indicates that the object is a page.

• pagegroupname is the name of the page group that owns the object.

• objectname is the name of the object.

Examples:

• To access the root page of a page group called myportal:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal

  Note: The name of the root page of a page group is the same as the name of the page group.

• To access a page called mypage at the top level of the myportal page group:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mypage

• To access a page called mysubpage, which is a sub-page of mypage:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mypage/mysubpage

• You can also use direct access URLs to access categories and perspectives. For example:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mycategory

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mycategory/mysubcategory

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/myperspective

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/myperspective/mysubperspective

• You can also use direct access URLs to access page templates and navigation pages. For example:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mytemplate

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/page/myportal/mynavigationpage

Note: Because direct access URLs are based on object names, if the name of an object changes, any links that use the old name will no longer work.

Direct access URLs for documents

You can also provide direct access URLs to documents in your portal. Direct access URLs for documents are slightly different:

http://<hostname>:<portnumber>/pls/<dad>/docs/page/<pagegroupname>/<page>/<documentname>

where:

• docs indicates that the URL is a direct access URL to a document (this is the document path specified in the DAD).

  Note: docs is the default document path, but your portal administrator could have changed it to something else.

• documentname is the name of the document.

Examples:

• To access a document called mydocument.txt that is on the mypage page of the myportal page group:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/docs/page/myportal/mypage/mydocument.txt

• To access a document called myotherdocument.txt that is on the mysubpage page of the myportal page group:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/docs/page/myportal/mypage/mysubpage/myotherdocument.txt

Note: Because direct access URLs for documents are based on the document file names, if the file name changes, any links that use the old file name will no longer work.

Durable links for items

Document names are much more likely to change than page or category names, which can lead to broken links. To solve this issue, you can use durable links. A durable link uses the item's globally unique id (GUID) to identify it. The item's GUID will not change, so you can safely use durable links without fear of them breaking if an item's document name.

A durable link is formed as follows:

http://<hostname>:<portnumber>/pls/<dad>/url/ITEM/<GUID>

where:

• ITEM indicates that the URL is a durable link.

• GUID is the GUID of the item. You can find out an item's GUID by right-clicking the item and choosing Copy Location (Internet Explorer) or Copy Link Location (Netscape).

You can also use durable links to access a specific version of an item by putting the version number after a slash at the end of the URL.

You can use durable links to access items of Simple File, Simple Text, and Simple PL/SQL item types, and items of custom types based on those item types.

Examples:

• If the GUID of the My Document text item is A47D41ECA23648A9E030007F0100118A, the durable link URL is:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/ITEM/A47D41ECA23648A9E030007F0100118A

• To access version 2 of the My Document text item:

  http://mymachine.mycompany.com:5000/pls/portal/url/ITEM/A47D41ECA23648A9E030007F0100118A/2

Notes

• For more information about configuring DADs for direct access URLs, see the Oracle HTTP Server Administration Guide on Oracle Technology Network.

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