How do I tell if a role is valid?

Just a quick post in response to a question on the OTN forums today – if I have a role, how do I know whether it’s valid or not?

The quickest way to do it (I think!) would be just to check the end date – if the end date is set, and we’re past that point in time, then the role is invalid.  BUT – what if there is more to it than that?  What if Oracle modifies the product so that the end date field isn’t the only thing that needs to be tested?

The way that I recommend doing the check (and I’ve recently written some code around this very subject!) is to use the standard WF_DIRECTORY API to fetch me the information about the role.  If the role is invalid, then there won’t be any data returned; if the rolw is valid, then you get data back.

And here’s the code:

DECLARE
  l_display_name      WF_ROLES.display_name%TYPE;
  l_email_address     WF_ROLES.email_address%TYPE;
  l_notification_pref WF_ROLES.notification_preference%TYPE;
  l_language          WF_ROLES.language%TYPE;
  l_territory         WF_ROLES.territory%TYPE;
  l_module            VARCHAR2(100);
  l_role              WF_ROLES.name%TYPE := '&role';
BEGIN

  WF_DIRECTORY.getRoleInfo ( role                    => l_role
                           , display_name            => l_display_name
                           , email_address           => l_email_address
                           , notification_preference => l_notification_pref
                           , language                => l_language
                           , territory               => l_territory );

  IF l_display_name IS NULL THEN
    dbms_output.put_line('Role is invalid');
  ELSE
    dbms_output.put_line('Role is valid');
  END IF;

END;
/

It can be downloaded here.

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