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Infernal is the ninth book in the Repairman Jack series by F. Paul Wilson.

Another family tragedy has the effect of reuniting Jack with his brother Tom, the judge. It turns out Tom is not as squeaky clean has he appears and needs Jack’s help for something less than legal. As you can probably guess by now, it all turns sinister and mystical…

I’ve definitely become desensitized to the darkness now. Every time a new character is introduced, pretty much my first thought is, “I wonder how they will die?” It’s a bit like watching Star Trek and knowing the security officer (in the red top) you’ve never seen before is the one that’s going to eat lead/laser…

Cheers

Tim…

Infernal… was first posted on May 16, 2012 at 9:02 am.
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It's been a few weeks and hopefully everyone is fully recovered.  Here are a few presentations that really stood out.  No offense to any not mentioned, there were too many to attend and describe here.

Adam Crigger of Preferred Strategies presented "Using Oracle BI Publisher for JD Edwards Operations and Financial Reporting" He unveiled some fabulous layouts he built using BI Publisher 11.1.1.6 on top of JD Edwards EnterpriseOne data.

John Peters of JRP JR, Inc showed us some very useful tips when modifying data templates in E-Business Suite in his presentation, "Adding Data Elements to BI Publisher Documents" He outlined very clearly the different types of data sources and best practices for updating the seeded E-Business Suite data extracts.

In her presentation, "Using Oracle BI Publisher to E-mail Customer ACH Payment Confirmations" Kristina Boone of MediaNews Group went over the step-by-step procedure she followed to create custom payment confirmations using an RTF template in BI Publisher. She then showed how to configure her JD Edwards EnterpriseOne system to run it. Great Stuff!

Glen T. Ryen, from Prisio Technologies presented "Oracle Payments in Release 12 – Take It To the Bank!" on Thursday to a nearly SRO crowd - impressive for get away day.  Those who stayed for this presentation were well rewarded.  Perfect balance between Functional and Technical and it gave enough detail and pointers to go deeper.  Several of the attendees around me commented that it was exactly what they were looking for.

I see that the Collaborate site is no longer hosting the presentations and white papers - bummer.  I'm told that the user groups - OAUG, Quest and IOUG will be making those available to members on their sites in a few weeks.  Please check with your user group or the presenter if you're interested in the material.

New features are always good to have in JDeveloper - but missing new features, this is something really new :-) It looks like documentation is released faster than actual functionality. If you read What's New in This Guide in Release 11.1.2.2.0 document, it provides new documentation section about how to setup security for ADF Methods (see Chapter 35). There are nice step by step instructions available in Chapter 35, how to enable security for ADF Methods. This guide says you need to have command component to execute ADF Method, also ADF Security must be enabled. Finally documentation says - "The Resource Grants page of the overview editor displays all methods that your application defines.". Well, may be I'm missing some magic check-box, but methods are not listed in the overview editor. I will be really happy, if its just me - and there is hidden check-box that enables this functionality.

Download test case application - ADFMethodSecurity.zip.

Documentation steps are pretty straightforward - see highlighted stament, it says methods will be shown automatically:


I have defined custom method inside AM implementation:


Custom ADF Method is exposed in Data Control:


Its all good for Web page - it is visible is security overview:


But not so good for ADF Method - its not visible (even Source Project selection is disabled), as supposed to be per documentation:


This is really powerful and required feature, sadly its missing - I hope it will be available with next release of JDev.

Contributions by Angela Golla, Infogram Contributor
Advisor WebcastsDid you know that Oracle offers a wide array of webconference training across Oracle's product line.  Check out the current schedule and access past webconferences at Note:740966.1. 

After a hectic month or so, I’m finally getting around to reading.

I’ve been meaning to share this thoughtful piece from Scott Porad, CTO of Cheezburger (squee!), that does an excellent job encapsulating some reasons why software is so difficult.

His main points, or rather, those made by his friend are:

1. Software is entirely hand-made, and compounding this, software is distributed at very large scale. Looking back through history, machine-made goods have always replaced hand-made goods to account for large scale distribution. Software isn’t there, yet.

2. Software production lacks standards. Think about software projects, and you’ll find a variety of methods, e.g. waterfall, agile. However, even within an established method for running a software project, there is variance from team to team, even within the same company.

3. Everyone has an opinion on how long a project should take, an anomaly for producing goods that require high levels of experience and skill from the people doing the work. Project estimation is hard.

Scott’s second point about standards is similar to one that nags me, titles. Software uses titles like engineer and architect, but these jobs don’t require the same levels of certification and training that their namesakes do.

So, while it makes sense to use titles that mirror physical construction, this isn’t really a fair comparison.

I’ve noodled the reasons behind why software is both difficult and misunderstood for years, and this is the best encapsulation I’ve read to date. Even so, I’d add a few other points.

4. Everyone uses software, at home, at work, on the go, and software usually requires substantial learning investment. This tends to make everyone feel like an expert, and it tends to trivialize the effort required to produce this or that small tweak.

This is a scaling problem for  producers of software, e.g. every time Facebook makes a chance, revolt ensues. It’s exceptionally difficult to make changes to software because of the investment in relearning. Plus, software is highly emotional to the end user, making the effect of changes impossible to estimate.

5. Software relies on hardware, which is an older, more mature production model. Therefore, hardware tends to advance more quickly than software can keep up, and replacements cannot be assumed. So, when software is produced, it must account for old hardware and new hardware, which compounds the all other problems.

I’m sure there are other points too. This is a good starting point, and I’m interested to know your thoughts, given that most of you are close to the problem.

Find the comments.Possibly Related Posts:

• Testing is Tough
• Musings on IT, Side Projects and Users
• I’m Smart, I Don’t Read or Write Anymore
• Why It Just Works
• On Product Management

The call for papers for the UKOUG 2012 conference ends in less than three short weeks!  If you were planning on going to the conference (and even if not) - you should consider submitting a paper.

I've been a long time supporter of all of the user groups and their conferences and I can attest to the quality of the UKOUG event.  The conference is chock full of technical talks with hundreds of sessions to choose from.  There is something for everyone there.
If you've never presented before, don't let that deter you from submitting a paper.  No one knows the anxiety that public speaking can bring better than I - I've written about it before. You'll find the conference to be an entirely different experience on the other side of the podium.  In addition to the experience of presenting, the networking and exposure that comes with being a speaker won't hurt you at all.  Whether you are a DBA or developer - having good public speaking skills is a necessity today - and using the conference as a way to build those skills is a great way to start.
Additionally - what you have to say is important and relevant to the user community as a whole.  A good conference needs a lot of speakers, from many diverse disciplines, with diverse backgrounds - the more speakers the merrier.  Don't think you don't have anything to offer - everyone does.  And don't feel that your topic wouldn't be interesting to someone else - it will be.  There are a lot of people out there trying to do some of the same things you've done and they'd love to hear how you did it.
That is one of the things about user groups I really like - they bring together a lot of people doing similar things - but in a different way.  You'll learn something new - and they will too.  
The UKOUG is one of the larger and well run conferences out there - don't be afraid to talk.  Challenge yourself to get up there and just do it.  You won't be sorry (ok, maybe in the minutes leading up to it you will be - but you'll get over that :) ) 
Hope to see you there - and don't chicken out!

If you are an instructional designer with an eye for technologies like ADF, or if you are an ADF enthusiast and excel at creatively producing technical content, then ADF Product Management would like to hear from you. We’re looking for a curriculum developer to join our ADF Curriculum team, which is tasked with ensuring that [...]

I had a chance to talk to several Oracle Database Appliance users at the annual Collaborate 2012 conference last month in Las Vegas. And a common theme in this discussions, as well as discussions with Pythian clients, is an interest in using the ODA as a large-scale consolidation platform. ODA offers all the benefits of [...]

Oracle Unified Method 5 Essentials (1Z0-568) exam tests partners who are skilled in Oracle’s all inclusive methodology. The certification covers the core features the Oracle Unified Method suite, including but not limited to, Focus Areas, Use Cases, and Requirements Gathering. The certification proves a baseline of the consultant’s knowledge and allows the implementation team to work as a cohesive team from day 1. The exam targets the intermediate-level implementation team member. Up to date training and field experience are recommended.

Oracle Unified Method 5 Certified Implementation Specialist, The Oracle Unified Method Certified Implementation Specialist Certification identifies professionals who are skilled in Oracle’s all inclusive methodology. The certification covers the core features the Oracle Unified Method suite, including but not limited to, Focus Areas, Uses Cases, and Requirements Gathering. The certification proves a baseline of the consultant’s knowledge and allows the implementation team to work as a cohesive team from day 1. Up-to-date training and field experience are highly recommended.

This certification is available to all candidates but is geared toward members of the Oracle Partner Network who are focused on selling and implementing this technology. OPN Members earning this certification will be recognized as OPN Certified Specialists, which helps their companies qualify for the Oracle Unified Method Specialization.

http://www.oracle.com/partners/en/knowledge-zone/applications/oum-exam-426119.html

Configurable Dimensionality:

‘Configurable dimensionality’ is the significant update to this version. We can probably say that this is the long awaited and biggest change that developers made to HFM.

So what is ‘Configurable dimensions’ is all about? There had always been a need for HFM customers to go beyond the four Custom dimensions, which are provided by default for their business needs. For e.g. they worked by stuffing two different details like Balance Sheet movements and Products details into a single Custom dimension. This was being addressed by Oracle in this release. Now, the users can have as many custom dimensions as required for their implementation. Let us see how this can be done starting by creating a new classic application.

Creating application:

Desktop Client: Many existing functions are cut down in Win32 client. Now, it has only Profile Manager and Metadata manager, rest all functions are available via Web including Create Application task. Profile Manager is used to define the application profile (.per). It can be installed in any machine since it can only be used in offline mode and has no dependency on HFM server component.

In addition to defining Year, Periods and Frequencies, we can now define the number of Custom dimensions as a part of the application profile. So basically, when you create application using this profile file, all these custom dimensions are created. The size (Small, Medium or Large) for a custom dimension must be determined depending on the number of members its hierarchy contains. Custom1&2 by default, are Large size.  As shown in the screenshot, we’ve created a total of 6 Custom dimensions.

Login to the Workspace to use this profile and create the application. As you can see, web server URL need not be provided.

I’ve loaded some sample metadata and data for few periods. !CUSTOM_ORDER section is introduced which specifies the order in which the custom dimensions are displayed. This has to be specified in the metadata load file.

.app

.xml

Now, let’s skip the complexities and move the data up the Value dimension. At this point, I’m eager to see the application database structure.

Sub-cube Architecture:

Financial Management stores its data in database blocks called subcubes rather than in records. Subcube contains Page and Subcube dimensions. The Page dimensions are Scenario, Year, Entity, Value and the Subcube dimensions contain all the members of ICP, Account, View and Custom dimensions (in our case 6 custom dimensions). So typically, for a single Page dimension intersection, if we have 100 accounts and 10 valid members for each Custom dimension and all intersections are populated, then it would be 100000000 records.

HFM stores all this data for these dimensions in three tables:

• DCE (Currency Subcube)

Stores Entity and Parent Currency values and their adjustments.

• DCN (Parent Subcube)

Stores remaining value dimension members

• DCT (Journal Transactions)

Stores Journal Transactions and when posted, they are transferred to DCE (<Entity Currency Adjs>/<Parent Currency Adjs>) or DCN ([Parent      Adjs]/[Contribution Adjs])

In the below table, DPx_INPUT and DPx_INPUTTRANSTYPE are repeating fields for each period that the application contains. The columns are numbered from zero so for 12 periods, the column names will be DP0_INPUT to DP11_INPUT and DP0_INPUTTRANSTYPE to DP11_INPUTTRANSTYPE.

Compared to the older versions, the column structure almost remains the same. Interestingly, if you’ve noticed, in older versions, there are four LCUSTOMx columns one for each custom dimension. In this version, I anticipated that for each extra custom we add to the application, there would be a new column added to these tables like LCUSTOM5 etc. But the structure doesn’t even contain LCUSTOM3 & LCUSTOM4 and it is tempting to know how data for other Custom dimensions are identified. We are working to find out the same and any comments from the readers are really appreciated.

The supporting products for HFM viz. Financial Reporting, FDM, Application Upgrade Utility and existing HFM rule functions were also being updated to support HFM’s Configurable Dimensionality. Although we have the flexibility of adding any number of custom dimensions, time taken for calculations, consolidation and other performance issues need to be considered and application should be designed accordingly.

 

UI Enhancements:

The new User Interface for HFM is definitely a notable update when compared to the earlier version.  It is easier to navigate and includes some special features as well. This is an outcome of migrating EPM components like HFM and Planning to Oracle’s ADF (Application Development Framework).

Let’s take a look at all these UI enhancements –

Multiple applications in Workspace:

Different HFM applications can be opened at the same time.

Multiple modules in an application:

Different HFM application modules in each application can be opened simultaneously.

POV enhancements:

There are significant changes to the way we select dimensions to Rows and Columns. We can relate this approach to Hyperion Financial Reporting wherein we ‘drag and drop’ dimensions to Rows and Columns in dimension layout. This approach is simpler and made common to both data grids and data forms. We can also add dimensions manually in data forms.

Data grid enhancements:

Again, we can relate the creation of data grids to how we create the reports in Financial Reporting. In HFR, we create/design the report and run the report to view it. Similarly, we have Grid designer and Grid Viewer in data grids.

Grid Designer

 

 

Grid Viewer

 

Display options were docked to the right hand side thus decreasing the time wasted on navigation.

Another new feature is the indication of cell colors at the bottom of the Grid Viewer. This will be very helpful to the business users and they don’t need to reach support or documentation to understand the Cell Colors.

Data form enhancements:

Member selection process is pretty much similar to what we do in data grids. And there exists designer and viewer in data forms too. Export to/Import from Excel options were disabled.

Designer

Viewer

 

Favorite members in Member selection:

Frequently used members can be selected and saved as favorites. These are available across other modules of the application as well.

Loads and Extracts page:

Load and Extract tasks like Security, Metadata, Member Lists and Rules are consolidated in one single page.

Journals Module Enhancements:

Journal tasks functionality is pretty much same but with major changes in UI again. Journal reports module exists both as a separate task and as a part of Manage Journals (opens in a new window when clicked).

Intercompany transactions module is not available and will be included in the upcoming patch – 11.1.2.2.101. It might take some time for the old version users to get used to navigating the new interface. Hope we can leverage from these ADF features. There are other enhancements to the HFM Win 32 client and Custom dimension configuration, which will be covered in a different post.

All

As some of you know previously active-active installations of Oracle Webcenter portal isnt supported out of the box till now!. There are many reasons, some of which are database related and some of them are simply due to the amount of moving parts there are.. However fear not a fantastic white paper has just been released explaining all the steps and how to get it all working in a supported fashion

Read the document and enjoy your new Highly Available Infrastrucutre

See here 

I think the results we got so far may surprise you. At lease those doesn’t seems to be the results +Alex Gorbachev and +Kevin Closson expected to see. You can find the first related blog post over here. It will give you the necessary context for further reading. Just to recap: +Kevin Closson says “Orion may [...]

NOTE: This is a copy of my yesterday’s G+ post. You can find the original over here. As I am going to continue writing about our ongoing IO testing efforts under this blog I decided to provide the first post here to give readers a bit more context. Status – Work in progress. We are [...]

A common question that gets asked is does Oracle access the index itself or the parent table during an index rebuild to extract the necessary data for the index ? Thought it might be worth a blog post to discuss. Now if the index is currently in an UNUSABLE state, then Oracle clearly can’t use the existing [...]

Governor Brown today announced the need for an additional $8B in cuts to state spending, on top of some $15B of cuts over the last three years. These cuts will slash funding for education, health care for children, welfare programs, etc.


And California is not alone. Many states face drastic shortfalls in their budgets, massive underfunding of pensions, and so on.


And it's just going to keep on getting worse.


So what's a governor to do? It seems to me that in a sane, rational, compassionate society, one in which we recognize the importance - above everything else - of ensuring all our children are healthy, are fed, are educated, are thriving, the first thing we do is identify those who have extracted millions, probably billions of tax dollars, and siphoned them off to their pockets.

If I were governor....I would have my staff analyze who in my state has been getting rich off of the state budget. Sure, lots of the money, maybe most of it, goes to directly paying for services to the poor. But I am beyond certain that there is a cadre of well connected businesspeople who have bribed and cajoled and "contributed" their way to legislators' hearts and pocketbooks over the years. 


I would identify these people and with maximum transparency possible publish the flow of state funds to their commercial enterprises, and sum up the total amount that these very wealthy people have taken out of the system - in effect, taken from the mouths, stomachs, bodies and minds of our most vulnerable.

I would then call on all of these people and their companies to renegotiate any contracts with the state to cut profits to a bare minimum - not lose money, but not make tons of money off of the public either. If they don't like the terms, I am sure we could find others who will do it.


And I would encourage citizens of my state to bring pressure to bear. In effect, these people need to be shamed (they should feel ashamed, but I doubt they do) into doing the right thing.

The money reclaimed from this effort would almost certainly not take care of the deficits. Women, children, the working poor, many of those in the middle class right on the edge, will still pay with their very health and quality of life. But at least they wouldn't be doing that while the fat cats continued to meet in their country clubs, whine about "welfare queens" and then use their illicit gains from public works contracts to fund their own extravagant life styles.

by Fábio Souza & Eduardo Rodrigues Introduction We know. It’s been a looooooong time again. But once you read this post, we are quite sure you’ll be happy we took the time to write it. And it’s also...

This is a summary only. Please, visit the blog for full content and more.

by Fábio Souza & Eduardo Rodrigues Introduction We know. It’s been a looooooong time again. But once you read this post, we are quite sure you’ll be happy we took the time to write it. And it’s also...

This is a summary only. Please, visit the blog for full content and more.

 

 

Last week Oracle released Fusion Applications (FA) 11g R1 Update 3 (11.1.4). I am going to cover new features in FA version 11.1.4 for Administrators in my upcoming posts .

• For now download Oracle Fusion Apps 11.1.4 from eDelivery
• Documentation of Fusion Apps 11.1.4 is available here

 

Contact Us If you are looking for Fusion Applications Installation, Implementation or Training.

Previous in series Related Posts for Fusion Apps

1. Oracle Fusion Applications Overview
2. Oracle Fusion Application for Apps DBAs – Concepts
3. Install Oracle Fusion Applications in 10 Steps
4. Oracle Fusion Applications : Provisioning Framework Overview
5. Oracle Fusion Applications : Provisioning Framework Installation
6. Provision Transaction Database for Oracle Fusion Applications
7. Create Fusion Applications Schema using RCU : fusion & otbi
8. Fusion Application 11.1.1.5.1 is now available
9. Fusion Apps Installation : Database Provisioning Failed during listener start
10. Fusion Applications : 128 GB memory and 500 GB Disk space : Are you ready
11. Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5.1 Part I – Install Identity and Access Management (OID/OAM/OIM) 11g
12. Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5.1 Installation Part II – Configure Oracle Internet Directory
13. Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5.1 Installation Part III – Configure Policy and Identity Store
14. Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5.1 Installation Part IV – Extend WebLogic Domain to include OIM/OAM and configure OIM
15. Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5.1 Installation Part V – Integrate OIM with OAM
16. Oracle Fusion Application 11.1.3 is now available
17. Oracle Fusion Applications 11.1.3 Installation Experience
18. FA Installation Error : runProvisioning-preverify FAPROV-00298 make sure password FUSION_RUNTIME schema password is valid
19. FA Installation Error 2 – List of failed Validation in OIM OAM_Validation: Cannot perform OAM Validation as null
20. Identity & Access Management configuration for Oracle Fusion Applications – Part I
21. Oracle FA Installation Error 3: private-preverify-free-space The file system only has 190113 MB, but 204800 MB is needed
22. Oracle Fusion Applications (FA) 11g R1 PS3 (11.1.4) is now available

If you haven’t read it already, you’ll find many excellent posts related to leadership. Dan McCarthy has assembled contributions from 27 different blogs into one post, providing a brief description of each. All of the contributions are high-quality and provide valuable insight, advice, and challenges to everyone, but you might be tight on time, so these descriptions help you spot that ones that seem most relevant to you and your organization.

If you’re really short on time, here are a few that I found particularly interesting:

• Art Petty’s The Cruel, Bitter And Crushing Taste of Dump Truck Feedback does a great job pointing out the danger and damage that can be done in withholding feedback until performance review time. He also prescribes things that both managers as well as employees can do to correct this terrible practice.
• Sharlyn Lauby makes a great case for What Creates a High Performing Organization. While I am admittedly biased in that I already think that continuously sharing information is one of the key contributors to superior organization performance, Sharlyn brings together a nice set of succinct facts and arguments that solidify that position.
• Chris Edmonds presents an intriguing concept in Out-of-the-Box Thinking About Corporate Culture. The specific approach to work itself that was covered might not be for everyone, but it certainly shows how every organization has within its power to rethink how their culture and how work gets done interact and can either support, or undermine, each other.
• Carol Morrison doesn’t just go over old ground with Executive Leadership: Trending Toward Trouble. It’s easy to get discouraged and cynical about how bad the examples from recent headlines have been about executive leadership, but Carol offers fresh and inspiring examples of what some organizations have been doing to address the issue.

 There’s a diverse set of ideas, opinions, and findings presented in this Carnival. Who knows, you may discover a blog you never knew before that you’ll want to follow.