This article is about how to run Oracle Forms apps in 64bit version of Firefox (preferred choice to run Forms based Web apps) in the latest version of that popular Web Browser.
Many large organizations for various reasons have to stick with some particular version of SW.
Oracle Retail Suite is one such example, as upgrading such large SW solutions is not only time consuming, but also has significant financial impact on company (not to mention certification matrix that you have to follow).
For that reasons, majority of large companies, are using Oracle Retail version 13 or older,
which means that business users are far below the current state of technology.
Even the newest version of Oracle Retail Suite (version 14 & 15) are still using Oracle Forms technology for main modules like RMS (Retail Merchandising System) or ReSA (Sales Audit).
Next version of Oracle Retail (v16), scheduled to be released during the 2017, should replace Oracle Forms modules with ADF technology framework and you will no longer need Java plugin to run it.
As Web Browser vendors like Mozilla, Google, Microsoft or Apple are mainly ignoring business users that still need to use old technologies.
Business users can eventually obtain some extended support for older versions or technologies (like NPAPI in this case), but this is still time limited solution.
In my case, after upgrading 64bit version of Firefox, I was no longer able to run Java plugin based apps (like popular Oracle Forms based apps), as Firefox is preventing usage of NPAPI (Netscape Plugin Application Programming Interface).
This action affected mainly Java plugin and Silverlight users, while Mozilla still maintaining limited plugin support for Adobe Flash.
You can read more about at the following link.
https://www.java.com/en/download/help/firefox_java.xml
In above article you can find several solutions like using 32bit version of Frefox 52 for customers with Extended Support Release acquired from Mozilla, or by using Internet Explorer on Windows or Safari on Macos.
Problem is that none of the suggested solutions is suitable for my case, where I’m running on Linux and still want to have many benefits that Firefox has when comparing it with other browsers like IE, Chrome etc.
To resolve the issue while not changing web browser, this is solution I suggest:
1. Open Firefox and enter the following into the Address bar: about:config
2. Click on button: I accept the risk!
3. Mouse right click anywhere inside the main window and follow the pop up menu —-> New —–> Boolean —> plugin.load_flash_only —-> false
4. Restart Firefox
After that you should be able to open Oracle Forms based apps without further issues.
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