Texas Technocrat

OAUG Collaborate 2012

I am at the airport waiting for my flight back to Dallas so I thought I would write down a few of my thoughts on Collaborate 2012. The conference was well attended with over 6,000 attendees. This is a good sign for both the economy and those working in the Oracle space. The conference was held at The Mandalay Bay. The two other hotels in the area were the Luxor and Excalibur. I stayed in the Luxor and travel to Mandalay Bay was easy via a connected walkway. I was a little disappointed by the lack of wireless connectivity. There were a couple of designated areas where wireless was available but it was not pervasive throughout the conference area. The conference did provide a mobile app that was very handy. To make the most use of the app, you needed to build your schedule online or with the app. But it was very convenient to use your phone to walk around with your schedule. The food was good but typical conference faire.

The topic that seemed to generate the most interest was Release 12. From personal observation, it appears that most organizations are well underway in their Release 12 projects. It seemed that only a quarter of organizations have not started their Release 12 projects at all. The main audience for this conference is the functional users, implementers, light technical developers and project managers. I describe light technical as those individuals who only support Oracle Applications and do not perform DBA work. I was really surprised at the number of JD Edwards presentations and users. I wonder if the economy has caused some organizations to downsize their ERP systems to choose JD Edwards over the full Oracle Applications suite. Or perhaps their user community is active.

As mentioned above, the most popular topics revolved around some aspect of Release 12. I am only partially involved in our Release 12 project and I have attended many, many Release 12 sessions so I was only marginally interested in those topics. I did focus on project management topics and a couple stood out. One session was presented by a psychologist. His presentation was on how to handle difficult people. Another presentation was on Nebraska's Furniture Mart's first use of the Agile methodology for project management. I am planning to research this methodology for possible use at Garland ISD. The relatively few technical presentations had a heavy OBIEE flavor.

I presented a paper as well concerning my project management experience in Iraq. I think the presentation went well but I might have missed my target audience based on some feedback I received after the presentation. The Iraq conflict is so far from most people's understanding that it is difficult for most people to grasp the concepts or language of the Federal government. I think I will have a bit more success in an audience of project managers, defense contractors and federal employees.

Overall, I felt I gained quite a bit of new knowledge and information from the conference. I believe I would send technical resources, especially DBA's, to Oracle Open World. I believe that there is a much more technical focus. I am transitioning in my career so this will probably be the last Collaborate I attend for a while. I need to get more connected with the Microsoft community so I am looking forward to attending Tech Ed in 2013.

Finishing LINUX

I transferred to our Technology Department to become a full time project manager. I wanted to close out the post I started last month concerning our LINUX conversion. Running Oracle products on Oracle Enterprise LINUX is definitely the way to go. Prior to the upgrade in September 2011, we were stopping and starting the Forms services 2-3 times a week. We have only had one unscheduled production outage since September 2011. The operating system is a very stable platform for Oracle products and has saved us several man hours a week as well as providing a more stable platform for our users.

However, nothing is free and everything comes with a price. The first issue we ran into concerned printers and fonts. We had some printers and some font issues in some reports. Unfortunately, it was difficult to identify the problem printers and reports beforehand. We caught most of the reports in testing but a few popped up after go live.

Another issue that we had was regarding our interfaces. A decision was made to go for one more testing cycle. Unfortunately, that took development resources away from interface work and meant that a few interfaces were not ready for the cutover date. We worked around some of these issues by manually placing files in the appropriate inbound and outbound folders. We had security issues involving the security keys on our system. The file permissions in LINUX are quite different and that additional security created some issues as well. One of our vendor's applications would not work on LINUX so we had to maintain a Windows server running a WS FTP client. Overall, the interface issues were minor but annoying and detracted from an otherwise successful project.

The final issue we had concerned the learning LINUX. We had developers with a hard time running Oracle Forms and Reports in a LINUX environment. Everyone experienced a moderate learning curve working with the LINUX security model and Secure FTP/Shell technologies. Our systems administrators are primarily Windows Administrators so installing back up agents and ILO access hit snags. We are getting better at understanding LINUX but the overall knowledge base is not as robust as our Windows knowledge.

LINUX to Windows Project

Our DBA transferred this past summer and I found myself performing the unexpected role as interim DBA. We were in the middle of converting our Oracle Applications suite from Windows to Oracle Enterprise LINUX. Luckily, we has a great consultant to do all of the heavy lifting. The project was a success but we have had a few minor bumps along the way. Anyone that has worked with both Windows and LINUX will know what the major issues will be. I was planning to develop this topic as a presentation to an Oracle User’s Group but the lack of Oracle/Windows organizations does not make this topic popular.

The three major areas that required effort were interfaces, printers and security. I will cover each of these areas in future posts.

Overall, the project was a success and we have only had one outage since our October 2011 conversion date. I am a strong Microsoft advocate but I believe this was defiantly the right move. I don’t believe that Oracle or Microsoft was to blame for the instability but it was the interaction of the two. I would compare this phenomenon to a bad drug interaction. Specific drugs behave differently if combined with one another. We experienced a similar issue when we tried to run Oracle on Windows.

Oracle Release 12 Vision Install

A fellow DBA and myself just recently completed a Release 12 installation. I started it and quickly ran into issues with the forms server. I then punted the project over to him to have a second opinion and to ensure that I did not make any mistakes. I am an interim/backup DBA so I thought a more specialized resource might have better luck.

Fortunately for me, but unfortunately for the team, he ran into the same issue. We were installing the Vision test instance on a new server with Oracle Enterprise LINUX. On the surface, this would appear to be a slam dunk. But it did not turn out that way all. After some significant assistance from an Oracle support representative, my Oracle peer was able to get the Vision instance up and running.

The problem is that the LINUX Team and Applications Team do not appear to be cooperating with each another. Apparently, the Release 12 installation requires an older version of Motif than what Oracle Enterprise LINUX contains. According to our support rep, we can only run the base 12.1.1 with IE 7. That seems a bit odd since Internet Explorer is currently on version 9 and 10 is approaching beta. We were assured that patching to a higher version of Release 12 will support future versions of IE.

So let this be a warning to anyone installing Oracle Applications Release 12 on OEL. It can be done but I was a disappointed that the installation process is broken and needs a considerable amount of work to get it working. I had higher expectations since this is a flagship product.

Monster....From the Other Side

We are recruiting for an Oracle DBA and I was able to see Monster from the employer side. I have to admit that I was a bit surprised in a couple of areas. The first item I noticed is a bit humorous. Why would someone apply for a job from another state if they would not relocate? I know people work remotely due to our virtual world, but it seems a bit of a reach to believe someone would hire a permanent employee without ever meeting them.

When we placed the ad, we were presented with an option to receive a list of "spotlight candidates". This might be a good tip for someone who wants a competitive advantage. Another thing I noticed was that employers pay for every little item. A basic listing is economical but if an employer wants to search resumes, that costs extra. What does this mean to the job seeker? Many companies are probably not going to pay for the extra search feature. If a candidate believes that just posting a resume will attract attention, they are missing the majority of offers on Monster. Monster will send e-mails to candidates for saved searches. But, the employer pays for this service, resulting in a small sample of job openings.

A final item I noticed was the poor quality of the resumes. I was surprised at both at the layout and the content. From my perspective, most resumes seemed to lack details, especially quantifiable details. Resumes with specific, quantifiable information seemed to have more credibility. I picked up this skill in the Navy by writing performance reports. We had a very limited space to squeeze in language that would make or break our chances for promotion. Just like a performance report, I would recommend that everyone choose your words wisely when preparing a resume.

 

 

Project Management Symposium Thoughts

I recently attended a Project Management Symposium hosted by the University of Texas at Dallas. The keynote speakers were concerned with large construction projects; the LBJ Expressway, Panama Canal and UTD building initiatives. I am not sure that software project management has too much in common with large building projects but it was still an excellent conference. I did have a couple of key points that I would like to discuss. 

The first major take away is the importance of communication. I often find that the vast majority of business professionals are terrible communicators. It's not that they don't understand grammar, although many do have difficulty with basic tenets of the English language. My point is that that most professionals don't know how to communicate effectively.  They often use the wrong medium to send the wrong message to the wrong people. Many times I see an inflammatory e-mail sent to a large number of people that should have been communicated by phone, or better yet, face to face. Their original message becomes lost in the inflammatory e-mail. Unfortunately, these messages are circulated around another dozen times. Additionally, I have seen minor issues escalate to major confrontations when both parties avoid communication and use e-mail to express their discontent. The symposium had a couple of excellent sessions on social media and how to use it for project management. Another breakout session discussed communication media amoung the generations. According to the speaker, ggeneration X & Y are internet natives while the Baby Boomers and Silent Generation are not naturally comfortable with electronic media. This observation can change the way in which communication is handled. 

The other major item that caused me to ponder is the role of the deidcated vs. part time role of the project manager. I see this topic appear from time to time on the LinkedIn discussions. The project management community promotes the use of the dedicated project manager in organizations. In a perfect world, I totally agree. However, most organizations seem to lump project management in with department managers or with senior technical leads. We had an excellent session on the role of the technical or hybrid project manager. It was a hotly discussed item as to whether a technical staff member can perform project management duties. In my experience, the answer is yes. In fact, I believe that project management occurs at many levels of an organization. The part-time project management phenomenon occurs for two major reasons; organizations are not aware of the projectized strcture and project management skills are often an assumed skill set (much like written and verbal communication skills). As with most assumptions, these are often wrong and can lead to disastrous consequences.

I am a big fan of PMI and I believe that both full-time and part-time/hybrid project managers should invest training time and dollars in the PMI program. At the very least, PMI provides a common structure and lnguage on "how to get things done".        

iPad 2 Impressions

I have finally gone and done it....

After years of disparging Apple and holding firm against the cult of Apple, I have given in. Actually, I am only willing to partially to offer a mea culpa. My mother in law has an iPad and my daughter immediately confiscated the device on site. I knew it was just a matter of time before I caved in. This weekend we purchased an iPad 2.

What I like:The interface is simply stunning. Books, magazines and multi-media are available at a touch. The apps interface make accessing information so much easier. The games are cute, colorful and lite. The size is about the same as a legal pad. To me, this is the future of user interfaces. There are apps to do almost anything you want to do. Granted programming and heavy media editing won't be done on the iPad, but that is not its purpose.

What I don't like:Apple has a very tight ecosystem. It is easy to notice which companies Apple does not get along with. There is no Zune, Adobe Acrobat, MS Office, Flash, Bing Maps or anything else related to Microsoft or Adobe. I understand the MacBooks allow these applications but not iPhones or iPads. I want to import and export files but that is not possible unless there is an associated application. I am waiting for more complex games. Shenandoah Studio is going to fill that gap. They are converting some of my favorite board games.

Cool Apps: I have only had the iPad for a few days but I have found a few apps I really like. The DirecTV app is a great remote control. I played a great trick on the family when I started discretley started changing channeles with the iPad. I had to stop when my wife was ready to call the DirectTV repairman. The Civil War Today app is remarkable. I am following the Civil War day by day through diaries, newspapers, photos and maps. Wired Magazine is a treat as well. My paper copies were starting to pile up in the office. For some reason, reading on the iPad is so much more interactive and fun.

I really like the iPad. I like it so much that I have found myself wanting more applications for the iPad. This is the future of user interface and should be a model for all developers.

 

Historical Use of GIS

I noticed a post one of my Yahoo groups concerning the use of GIS in historical projects. I am a bit of an amateur historian so I found this NY Times article particualrly interesting. Last year, I visited the Revolutionary War battlefield at Monmouth, New Jersey. A member of the local historical society gave us a personal tour of the area. During lunch, we had a lengthy discussion concerning the use of GIS to recreate the battlefield since most of it was covered by the ever present urban sprawl. This battle would benefit significantly from this technology since the battle was strung out across the British column.  



Vertex Converison from Windows to LINUX

 

The Oracle Applications conversion from Windows to LINUX is still moving along, a bit slower than anyone anticipated. There are three main issues that remain to be fixed. Actually, make that two remaining issues. We were able to fix the Vertex tax issue. Vertex is a tax engine that is an integral part of Oracle Payroll. This is not a major issue for a school district since our employees typically live in a small geographic area. However, Oracle Payroll must have these tables in order to work correctly. The primary Oracle support note for Quantum/Vertex is 224273.1. Our migration DBA ran into issues when installing the patch. He fixed the patch with a combination of upgrading to 11.2.0.2, applied two database patches (10149223 and 10229719) and re-ran the adctxprv.sql script. The SGA was apparently too large as well, this one seems a bit strange to me. But the product installed and that hurdle was overcome.

The next issue we ran into involved the configuration. I suspect that few Oracle shops are on Windows so speicifc conversion issues are not usally documented. By reviewing the Vertex stack on Windows and LINUX, it appeared that Windows placed its execution code in %PAY_TOP%\vendor\quantum\utils while LINUX placed the code in a differnt folder: $PAY_TOP/vendor/quantum/lib. The Vertex stack of folders was archived and moved becuase the concurrent program Quantum Program Update does not update the existing Vertex/Quantum folders. Once the folders were clean, the program worked its magic. I was able to run the Quantum Data Update with June 2011 tax information. Our Payroll Analyst confirmed that everything was working fine by executing a successful Payroll run.

We have two remaining issues: RightFax and check printing through AcuPrint.  

Considerations for Migrating Oracle from Windows to LINUX

It's been a busy couple of weeks. We are moving from Windows to LINUX for our Oracle Applications Server and 10g Database. We are also upgrading the database to 11g. Since this is a one-time process, we have contracted a DBA to perform the conversion. There are several reasons for this migration and I discussed a few of them on an earlier post from October, 2010 which provides some light on the subject.

During the conversion planning phase, we identified three main areas of concern. The first area is interfaces. We know that the directory locations will change. The juxtaposition of the forward and backward slashes between Windows and LINUX is also problematic. If an interface was written to use a database directory or the path was parameterized, then the interface should not have any issues. The primary area of concern is when a developer hard codes a directory path, such as E:\Data. We were also looking to standardize the location of the interface code. Most of the code is location on the database but some SQL code exists on the application server as well. The reason for this is that we outsourced most of the interface development during the implementation. We did not have standards during the first year of implementation. We will move any SQL on the application server to the database.

The second area of concern is our auxiliary third party applications. We use RightFax for Purchas Orders and Secure Check. Vertex is used to calculate taxes. We are concerned that some of these applications may not perform correctly. We also use Discoverer and EIS for BI.

The final area of concentration is regarding reports. Since we have been on Windows, we have had the benefit of a rich user interface. It's been a while since I have worked in a UNIX environment but I have memories (and nightmares) of managing fonts on UNIX. Approximately, half of our custom reports have been converted to BI Publisher. I anticipate fewer issues with these reports as opposed to the Reports 6i objects.

Last week, our DBA consultant released the environment for us to start testing and development. Here is a brief analysis of what is broken and what survived the conversion process:

Discoverer 4i: The Desktop version is fine, but the Viewer and Plus versions do not work.

Vertex: The conversion process did not change the dlls and exe files.

EIS: No issues.

Interfaces: We have a total of 59 interfaces. 7 appear to have a hard coded directory path that will need to be changed.

Procurement Punch Outs: We are having issues with the certificate and path locations.

Reports: We initially had an issue with the Oracle Report Toolkit. This was quickly repaired and all reports seem to be operating correctly.

Printers: All of the network printers had to be re-installed and the network path changed.

We discovered that our bank's cash reconciliation program only works on Windows.

We have more work to do next week to create server directories in preparation for interface testing. From a management/development standpoint, the most significant LOE has been in the interface area. I will save that for another post.