Oracle Priority Service Infogram This Week: APEX, Migration, Ports and Thoughts, JRuby, EBS, Siebel, Exadata, DBA, MOS, PeopleSoft, Linux

APEX

Dimitri Gielis' blog brings us a series on new APEX features, ending in this one on APEXBlogs v2 - Search.

A quick review from Marc Sewtz on one of the new APEX 4.0 books out: Oracle APEX 4.0 Cookbook.

Migration

Not geese, though they are on the move, but an OS/RDBMS: Migrating from IBM AIX/DB2 Power systems to Oracle Technologies .

Ports and Thoughts

Here's a useful article on ports in OBIEE: OBIEE 11g Managing Ports over at Senthilkumar Rajendran's Blog, and a somewhat off the wall thought of my own.

I've always found a lot of complications arising in enterprising computing from the seemingly innocuous items like ports and firewall settings and I think we've almost reached the technology turning point where games meet business and business benefits. By this I mean 3D virtualization of technical processes. Some realms, like architecture and engineering, make heavy use of computer generated virtualizations in applications like CAD. But IT itself could benefit from a virtualized version of our servers, networks and processes.

Imagine, for instance, that you can see the ports in this article as 'real' ports with plugs in them in an immersive environment like that of an online world. Then think of the possibilities if you extend that model to more complex items. Imagine, for instance, that you have a database running on a server and all the processes are visible as avatars. You can actually see the optimizer carrying out sorts (and immediately understand why a query is insanely slow). You can see that the file system is nearing full because of some error logs because you can see an avatar tossing the errors into a translucent barrel representing the storage mount point. Perhaps when the barrel is full the avatar will start clanging its metallic head on the side of the barrel to get your attention. The list goes on and on.

Computer power, graphics and interfaces are close to the point at which such systems could be practically implemented. Not only will this mean that you will be able to visualize these processes. You will be inside there with your own avatar and directly intervene and investigate. It may be a hard sell to management on this kind of a game environment (especially if they find the sys admins are generating bogus processes just so they can kill-9 them with laser pistols), but once such a system is in place the secondary benefits will be seen. The primary benefit is opening system and database management to a much larger pool of people. Just as there are more DBAs able to manage a DB using a graphic interface like OEM than the 'old school' command line DBA, there will be a scale of magnitude larger pool of people able to control technical processes using avatars in an immersive environment. Consider the next generation of technicians which is hitting the server rooms now. They are as comfortable in a video game as the old command line guys are programming a VCR (and yes, that's why command line DBAs are scary, they actually can program VCRs. But the VCR is very nearly gone, so they need to update their skill-set to something difficult in our modern technological world. Navigating hideously long LOVs comes to mind). Ok, off the soapbox for the week. If you are working on a system to control technical systems using avatars in a metaverse, please let me know. I'd love to publish more on the subject here.

JRuby

Interested in JRuby? Are you an Oracle type? Want to put the two together. Here you go: Using JRuby with Oracle Database .

EBS

From Oracle Application APPSLab: Should I Implement a Shared Appl Top? And if so How?

Siebel

Siebel Essentials informs us that there is a new certification available: Siebel CRM 8 Business Analyst.

Exadata

Kevin Closson uses a sneaky introduction to move into a useful posting on Exadata: Exadata Database Machine: The Data Sheets Are Inaccurate!

DBA

A back to basics item from the Momen Blog that is not really basic and is in fact a potential massive time saver: Massive Deletes Vs Truncating Partitions.

MOS

I've mentioned the HTML version of MOS here before, and list it on the links area of the blog, but I was happy to see that Jonathan Lewis also took note of it. You can't do everything in it, but if you just need to do searching and working with your SRs day to day it's fine, and it's faster than Flash.

PeopleSoft

Oracle Introduces Oracle’s PeopleSoft Mobile Inventory Management.

Linux

An introduction to Linux Performance Monitoring and Tuning over at The Geek Stuff.