The System Client-Idle event monitors for end-user activity, on the client tier within the running Oracle Forms application. This event can be enabled in one of two ways. One way to enable this event, is for an administrator to set the applet parameter idleTimeout to a whole number. This will represent the time in seconds to wait before raising this event. To use this applet parameter, it must first be added to the appropriate Forms template base.htm file and formsweb.cfg.

This event can also be enabled/disabled programmatically using a new argument added to SET_APPLICATION_PROPERTY, CLIENT_IDLE_TIME. As with the applet parameter, the value of CLIENT_IDLE_TIME is represented in whole seconds. Refer to the Form Builder Help for more details on how to use this in PL/SQL.

Following are some limitations:

• Client-Idle will be ignored while the client applet is waiting on a response from the server or if a modal dialog is open (e.g. Alert, File Open dialog, etc). However, if the server responds immediately before the idle time has lapsed, the event may be raised. Although this condition should be rare, developers should consider this when developing the application. Adjusting the idle time programmatically may be necessary to avoid this condition when it is expected that the server may take an extended period to complete its task.

  Client-Idle events can be fired if the FORMS_ON_MODAL_DETECT_IDLE environment variable is set to 1 (TRUE). When set to TRUE, the Client-Idle event executes immediately after the blocked condition is released and any previously executing trigger(s) completes processing. This does not apply to custom Java Beans that expose modal Java dialogs or any other blocked condition not originating from native Forms.

• Although the amount of idle time is set in seconds, the application may not react until the next exchange with the server. This is caused by either Heartbeat or MaxEventWait.