File Upload Improvements in Apex 5.1

Warning: this is based on the Apex 5.1 Early Adopter and details may change.

The standard File Upload item type is getting a nice little upgrade in Apex 5.1. By simply changing attributes on the item, you can allow users to select multiple files (from a single directory) at the same time.

In addition, you can now restrict the type of file they may choose, according to the MIME type of the file, e.g. image/jpg. This file type restriction can use a wildcard, e.g. image/*, and can have multiple patterns separated by commas, e.g. image/png,application/pdf.

Normally, to access the file that was uploaded you would query APEX_APPLICATION_TEMP_FILES with a predicate like name = :P1_FILE_ITEM. If multiple files are allowed, however, the item will be set to a comma-delimited list of names, so the suggested code to get the files is:

declare
  arr apex_global.vc_arr2;
begin
  arr := apex_util.string_to_table(:P1_MULTIPLE_FILES);
  for i in 1..arr.count loop
    select t.whatever
    into   your_variable
    from   apex_application_temp_files t
    where  t.name = arr(i);
  end loop;
end;

You can play with a simple demo here: https://apexea.oracle.com/pls/apex/f?p=UPLOAD_DEMO&cs=JK64 (login as demo / demodemo).

If you want to support drag-and-drop, image copy&paste, load large files asynchronously, or restrict the maximum file size that may be uploaded, you will probably want to consider a plugin instead, like Daniel Hochleitner’s DropZone.