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• Silverlight Cream for June 01, 2010 -- #874

  - by Dave Campbell

  In this Issue: Michael Washington, Alan Beasley and Michael Washington, Miroslav Miroslavov, Max Paulousky, Teresa and Ronald Burger, Laurent Duveau, Tim Heuer, Jeff Brand, Mike Snow, and John Papa. Shoutouts: To pay homage to the Advanced Options button in Expression Blend, Adam Kinney posted: Expression Blend Advanced Options square wallpaper SilverLaw stood his drag and drop ripple on it's head for this one: Silver Soccer - A Case Study for the Flexible Surface Effect (Silverlight 4) From SilverlightCream.com: Expression Blend DataStore - A Powerful Tool For Designers Michael Washington dug into the documentation and with some Microsoft assistance has figured out how to use the SetDataStoreAction in SketchFlow... good tutorial and a game to demonstrate it's use. Windows Phone 7 View Model Style Video Player Alan Beasley and Michael Washington teamed up again to produce a ViewModel-Style Video Player for WP7 ... very nice interface I might add... very detailed tutorial and all the code... oh, and did you notice it uses MVVMLight... on WP7? ... just thought I'd mention that :) Navigation in 3D world of 2D objects In part 7 of the CompleteIT code explenation, Miroslav Miroslavov is discussing some of the very cool animation they did... 3D, moving camera... cool stuff! Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for Silverlight Applications. Part 2 Max Paulousky has part 2 of his Silverlight 4 and SEO series up. In part 2 he's discussing sitemaps and html content providing. He also has good links showing where to submit your sitemaps and information. Mousin’ down the PathListBox Teresa and Ronald Burger (not sure which) has a post up about the PathListBox and how they drew the path that they ended up using, and the code used to enable animation. Dynamically apply and change Theme with the Silverlight Toolkit We've all had fun playing with themes, but Laurent Duveau has an example up of letting your users change the theme at run-time. Microsoft Translator client library for Silverlight Tim Heuer has been playing with the Microsoft Translator for Silverlight and he has a "Works on My Machine" license on what he's making available .. but considering his access to resources... I'd say go for it :) Custom Per-Page Transitions in Windows Phone 7 Jeff Brand has a follow-on to his other WP7 post about page transitions and is now discussing per-page transitions Silverlight Tip of the Day #26 – Changing the Startup Class Mike Snow's latest 'tip' is a little more involved than a tip ... changing the startup class and actually removing (in his example), the page and app classes... code and xaml! I've seen this before but never explained as clean... fun stuff. Behaviors in Blend 4 (Silverlight TV #30) Episode 30 of Silverlight TV (now a tag at Silverlight Cream) finds John Papa talking to Adam Kinney about Behaviors in Blend 4... not only using them but creating a custom one. Stay in the 'Light! Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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• Today's Links (6/30/2011)

  - by Bob Rhubart

  James Gosling Says He Doesn't Care About Java But here's the rest of the story: "What I really care about is the Java Virtual Machine as a concept," says Gosling, "because that is the thing that ties it all together; it's the thing that makes Java the language possible; it's the thing that makes things work on all kinds of different platforms; and it makes all kinds of languages able to coexist." Virtual Developer Day: SOA Accelerate Your Development with Oracle SOA Suite. Learn how in this FREE on-line workshop with Hands-on labs July 12th 9 am to 1:30 PM PST" July 12th 9 am to 1:30 PM PST Podcast: Toronto Architect Day Panel Discussion Part 3 (of 4) is now available, in which the panel (including Oracle ACE Director Cary Millsap and InfoQ editor and co-founder Floyd Marinescu) discusses public vs private cloud as the best strategy for small businesses and start-ups. WebLogic Weekly for June 27th, 2011 | James Bayer Bayer shares the latest resources for those with WebLogic on the brain. Griffiths Waite at Oracle Open World | Mark Simpson Oracle ACE Director Mark Simpson share information on the presentations he's scheduled to give at Oracle OpenWorld San Francisco 2011. Kscope Solid Service Bus Implementations Peter Paul van de Beek's Kscope11 presentation "is aimed at supporting architects and especially developers to choose the right integration infrastructure for a job." Migration To Java EE 6 With Spring 3 - ...Could Become "Interesting" | Adam Bien "Put simply, big data implies datasets so large they can't normally be processed using a standard transactional database," says David Dorf. "The term 'noSQL' is often used in this context as well." Book Review: "Designing With the Mind In Mind" | Abhinav Agarwal According to Abhinav Agarwal, Jeff Johnson's new book is about "the theory of how the mind perceives information, of how humans understand what they read, and how our eyes are attuned to paying attention to not just what's happening in front of us but also at the periphery of our vision." BPM 11g Advanced Workshop | Martien van den Akker Martien van den Akker shares his thoughts on both the workshop he recently attended and on the Oracle BPM 11g product. Fusion Applications - What You Need To Know: Product Families | Floyd Teter "Fusion Applications are organized into seven groups of related products called Product Families," observes Oracle ACE Director Floyd Teter. "While the product features are organized according to the Business Process Model and can cross the boundaries of product families, the product family groupings are an easy way to wrap your mind around Fusion Apps." Grid Control: Refreshing Weblogic Domains | Dave Best Dave Best shares tips for avoiding problems when using grid control to centrally manage/monitor your environment. Webcast: Oracle to Announce Datanomic Integration Plans The combination of Datanomic technology and the previous acquisition of Silver Creek Systems will deliver a complete, integrated and best-of-breed solution for Data Quality. Learn about Oracle’s strategy and product plans and how the new products acquired from Datanomic will impact your organization. July 19, 2011, 8:00am PT / 11:00am ET. Speakers include Michael Weingartner (Vice President, Product Development, Oracle), Martin Boyd (Senior Director, Product Strategy, Oracle), and Dain Hansen (Director, Product Marketing, Fusion Middleware, Oracle).

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• Visual Studio Extensions

  - by Scott Dorman

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/sdorman/archive/2013/10/18/visual-studio-extensions.aspxAs a product, Visual Studio has been around for a long time. In fact, it’s been 18 years since the first Visual Studio product was launched. In that time, there have been some major changes but perhaps the most important (or at least influential) changes for the course of the product have been in the last few years. While we can argue over what was and wasn’t an important change or what has and hasn’t changed, I want to talk about what I think is the single most important change Microsoft has made to Visual Studio. Specifically, I’m referring to the Visual Studio Gallery (first introduced in Visual Studio 2010) and the ability for third-parties to easily write extensions which can add new functionality to Visual Studio or even change existing functionality. I know Visual Studio had this ability before the Gallery existed, but it was expensive (both from a financial and development resource) perspective for a company or individual to write such an extension. The Visual Studio Gallery changed all of that. As of today, there are over 4000 items in the Gallery. Microsoft itself has over 100 items in the Gallery and more are added all of the time. Why is this such an important feature? Simply put, it allows third-parties (companies such as JetBrains, Telerik, Red Gate, Devart, and DevExpress, just to name a few) to provide enhanced developer productivity experiences directly within the product by providing new functionality or changing existing functionality. However, there is an even more important function that it serves. It also allows Microsoft to do the same. By providing extensions which add new functionality or change existing functionality, Microsoft is not only able to rapidly innovate on new features and changes but to also get those changes into the hands of developers world-wide for feedback. The end result is that these extensions become very robust and often end up becoming part of a later product release. An excellent example of this is the new CodeLens feature of Visual Studio 2013. This is, perhaps, the single most important developer productivity enhancement released in the last decade and already has huge potential. As you can see, out of the box CodeLens supports showing you information about references, unit tests and TFS history.   Fortunately, CodeLens is also accessible to Visual Studio extensions, and Microsoft DevLabs has already written such an extension to show code “health.” This extension shows different code metrics to help make sure your code is maintainable. At this point, you may have already asked yourself, “With over 4000 extensions, how do I find ones that are good?” That’s a really good question. Fortunately, the Visual Studio Gallery has a ratings system in place, which definitely helps but that’s still a lot of extensions to look through. To that end, here is my personal list of favorite extensions. This is something I started back when Visual Studio 2010 was first released, but so much has changed since then that I thought it would be good to provide an updated list for Visual Studio 2013. These are extensions that I have installed and use on a regular basis as a developer that I find indispensible. This list is in no particular order. NuGet Package Manager for Visual Studio 2013 Microsoft CodeLens Code Health Indicator Visual Studio Spell Checker Indent Guides Web Essentials 2013 VSCommands for Visual Studio 2013 Productivity Power Tools (right now this is only for Visual Studio 2012, but it should be updated to support Visual Studio 2013.) Everyone has their own set of favorites, so mine is probably not going to match yours. If there is an extension that you really like, feel free to leave me a comment!

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• Join our Marketing Intelligence Team in Dublin!

  - by jessica.ebbelaar

  Do you want to work with the brightest minds in the industry? Want to be part of a global team that’s changing the way the world does business? Then Oracle is the place for YOU. Join now as a Marketing Intelligence Representative. You will have the opportunity to develop within the role through working alongside the Business Development, Sales and Marketing teams within Oracle. The Marketing Intelligence Group is viewed as a true talent pool for the Business Development and Sales Teams. Oracle offers a structured training programme for Marketing Intelligence Representatives and Business Development Consultants including our approved sales certified training methodology along with regular product training. Miriam started her career as a Marketing Intelligence Representative six years ago, and shares what she has learned and how her career is progressing. My Career Path at Oracle: June 2005 – October 2005: Profiler in the Marketing Intelligence Team November 2005 - October 2006: Team Leader for MIT November 2006 - February 2008: Business Development Consultant Iberia March 2008 - December 2010: Lead Management Specialist Currently: Sales Program Manager for Iberia & Benelux What did you learn from your role in the Market Intelligence Team Being a Profiler helped me to understand how an organisation works, from the beginning to the end. It is like being in University but being paid! The three key things I learnt in this role are: Knowledge of customers: You are on the phone with over 70 customers daily. Not only does this give you an overview of the IT infrastructure of the customers companies but also how to manage their questions and rejections. Essentially you are learning how to convert their pain and complaints into business opportunities. Knowledge of Oracle: As a Profiler you get an excellent overview of how Oracle works internally, from Marketing to Sales, without forgetting the Operations Team. Knowledge about yourself: As a Profiler I learnt how to work outside of my comfort zone, there is a new challenge almost every day but Oracle are there to support you every step of the way. Oracle really invests in developing the MIT Team and as a Profiler you can expect product and sales training on a monthly basis. How did you progress from MIT to Business Development Group (BDG)? I made sure that my manager knew from the very beginning that I was keen to progress at Oracle and I was set very clear objectives to help me reach my goal.  My manager was very supportive and ensured I received all the training I needed. After I became a Team Leader of Profiling, I moved to an Iberia BDG position. How you feel your experience in MI has helped you in your current role? I truly believe that the MI position gives you a great overview of Oracle and this has really helped me in my current position.  I am the Sales Program Manager for IBERIA & Benelux and in my campaigns I need to target the right companies and the right job specs.  My time in the Market Intelligence team really helped me to understand how to focus and target my campaigns so I know I don’t miss any business opportunities! How would you sum up your Oracle experience? Oracle is a big organisation with big opportunities. With the right skills and with the great training programs that Oracle offer, the only limit is you! If you have any questions related to this article feel free to contact [email protected] You can find all our job opportunities via http://campus.oracle.com. Tags van Technorati: Marketing Intelligence,Benelux,Iberia,Profiler,Business Development,Sales Representatives,BDG,Business Development Group,opportunities,Oracle

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• SQL analytical mash-ups deliver real-time WOW! for big data

  - by KLaker

  One of the overlooked capabilities of SQL as an analysis engine, because we all just take it for granted, is that you can mix and match analytical features to create some amazing mash-ups. As we move into the exciting world of big data these mash-ups can really deliver those "wow, I never knew that" moments. While Java is an incredibly flexible and powerful framework for managing big data there are some significant challenges in using Java and MapReduce to drive your analysis to create these "wow" discoveries. One of these "wow" moments was demonstrated at this year's OpenWorld during Andy Mendelsohn's general keynote session.  Here is the scenario - we are looking for fraudulent activities in our big data stream and in this case we identifying potentially fraudulent activities by looking for specific patterns. We using geospatial tagging of each transaction so we can create a real-time fraud-map for our business users. Where we start to move towards a "wow" moment is to extend this basic use of spatial and pattern matching, as shown in the above dashboard screen, to incorporate spatial analytics within the SQL pattern matching clause. This will allow us to compute the distance between transactions. Apologies for the quality of this screenshot….hopefully below you see where we have extended our SQL pattern matching clause to use location of each transaction and to calculate the distance between each transaction: This allows us to compare the time of the last transaction with the time of the current transaction and see if the distance between the two points is possible given the time frame. Obviously if I buy something in Florida from my favourite bike store (may be a new carbon saddle for my Trek) and then 5 minutes later the system sees my credit card details being used in Arizona there is high probability that this transaction in Arizona is actually fraudulent (I am fast on my Trek but not that fast!) and we can flag this up in real-time on our dashboard: In this post I have used the term "real-time" a couple of times and this is an important point and one of the key reasons why SQL really is the only language to use if you want to analyse  big data. One of the most important questions that comes up in every big data project is: how do we do analysis? Many enlightened customers are now realising that using Java-MapReduce to deliver analysis does not result in "wow" moments. These "wow" moments only come with SQL because it is offers a much richer environment, it is simpler to use and it is faster - which makes it possible to deliver real-time "Wow!". Below is a slide from Andy's session showing the results of a comparison of Java-MapReduce vs. SQL pattern matching to deliver our "wow" moment during our live demo.  You can watch our analytical mash-up "Wow" demo that compares the power of 12c SQL pattern matching + spatial analytics vs. Java-MapReduce  here: You can get more information about SQL Pattern Matching on our SQL Analytics home page on OTN, see here http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/bi-datawarehousing/sql-analytics-index-1984365.html.  You can get more information about our spatial analytics here: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database-options/spatialandgraph/overview/index.html If you would like to watch the full Database 12c OOW presentation see here: http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/2686974264001

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• Windows Phone 7 Series - Tools and Resources

  - by TechTwaddle

  Unless you've been living in the caves of Lascaux for the past couple of days, you probably know what's happening in the world of Windows Phone. Microsoft unveiled the developer tools required to develop applications and games for Windows Phone 7 at MIX10 a couple of days back. Silverlight and XNA being the major frameworks, no big surprise there. And the best news of all is that all the development tools are free! So if you are planning to develop apps for Windows Phone 7, read on. The first place, or more appropriately hub, for you is the Windows Phone Developer Portal. It has most of the information you need to get you started. Now there is a ton of information available at other places too. In this post, I take time to put all the information that I found useful at one place, and I'll keep updating this as and when I find new stuff.   Setting up the development environment 1. Install Windows Phone Developer Tools CTP (Community Technology Preview) This will install Visual Studio 2010 Express, Silverlight, XNA framework and emulator for Windows Phone 7. It also installs a few support tools. 2. Expression Blend 4 for Windows Phone:     - Install Expression Blend 4 beta     - Install Expression Blend Add-in Preview for Windows Phone     - Install Expression Blend SDK Preview for Windows Phone Installing the above tools should set your machine up for development. I installed the tools on my Windows Vista SP1 machine and the process went smoothly without running into any major hitch. Note that the tools won't install on Windows XP, read the release notes of the CTP. Resources and Documentation 1. Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Series Developer Training Kit 2. Programming Windows Phone 7 Series by Charles Petzold. Contains few chapters only. Gives a good preview. 3. MSDN documentation for Windows Phone 7 Development 4. A sample chapter from Learning Windows Phone Programming [PDF] by Yochay Kiriaty and Jaime Rodriguez. Complete book will be available at a later time. 5. Windows Phone 7 Developer Forum - where you can ask questions and problems you run into and the experts are there to help you. 6. For Silverlight visit silverlight.net and for XNA game development, the XNA Creators Club is the place to go, also make sure you follow Michael Klutcher's and Shawn Hargreaves' blog. 7. And finally the MIX'10 website. Most of the sessions will be available for download later (some are already available). Click on the Windows Phone tag to get all the session details and downloads.   If you are completely new to Silverlight and XNA (like me), and C# makes some sense to you then I suggest you go through the Developer Training Kit. It gives a good start and ramps you up pretty quickly.

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• Why would Copying a Large Image to the Clipboard Freeze a Computer?

  - by Akemi Iwaya

  Sometimes, something really odd happens when using our computers that makes no sense at all…such as copying a simple image to the clipboard and the computer freezing up because of it. An image is an image, right? Today’s SuperUser post has the answer to a puzzled reader’s dilemna. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. Original image courtesy of Wikimedia. The Question SuperUser reader Joban Dhillon wants to know why copying an image to the clipboard on his computer freezes it up: I was messing around with some height map images and found this one: (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/15/Srtm_ramp2.world.21600×10800.jpg) The image is 21,600*10,800 pixels in size. When I right click and select “Copy Image” in my browser (I am using Google Chrome), it slows down my computer until it freezes. After that I must restart. I am curious about why this happens. I presume it is the size of the image, although it is only about 6 MB when saved to my computer. I am also using Windows 8.1 Why would a simple image freeze Joban’s computer up after copying it to the clipboard? The Answer SuperUser contributor Mokubai has the answer for us: “Copy Image” is copying the raw image data, rather than the image file itself, to your clipboard. The raw image data will be 21,600 x 10,800 x 3 (24 bit image) = 699,840,000 bytes of data. That is approximately 700 MB of data your browser is trying to copy to the clipboard. JPEG compresses the raw data using a lossy algorithm and can get pretty good compression. Hence the compressed file is only 6 MB. The reason it makes your computer slow is that it is probably filling your memory up with at least the 700 MB of image data that your browser is using to show you the image, another 700 MB (along with whatever overhead the clipboard incurs) to store it on the clipboard, and a not insignificant amount of processing power to convert the image into a format that can be stored on the clipboard. Chances are that if you have less than 4 GB of physical RAM, then those copies of the image data are forcing your computer to page memory out to the swap file in an attempt to fulfil both memory demands at the same time. This will cause programs and disk access to be sluggish as they use the disk and try to use the data that may have just been paged out. In short: Do not use the clipboard for huge images unless you have a lot of memory and a bit of time to spare. Like pretty graphs? This is what happens when I load that image in Google Chrome, then copy it to the clipboard on my machine with 12 GB of RAM: It starts off at the lower point using 2.8 GB of RAM, loading the image punches it up to 3.6 GB (approximately the 700 MB), then copying it to the clipboard spikes way up there at 6.3 GB of RAM before settling back down at the 4.5-ish you would expect to see for a program and two copies of a rather large image. That is a whopping 3.7 GB of image data being worked on at the peak, which is probably the initial image, a reserved quantity for the clipboard, and perhaps a couple of conversion buffers. That is enough to bring any machine with less than 8 GB of RAM to its knees. Strangely, doing the same thing in Firefox just copies the image file rather than the image data (without the scary memory surge). Have something to add to the explanation? Sound off in the comments. Want to read more answers from other tech-savvy Stack Exchange users? Check out the full discussion thread here.

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• Sharing configuration settings between Windows Azure roles

  - by theo.spears

  If you are working on a medium-large Windows Azure project it's likely it will involve more than one role, for example separate web and worker roles. Unfortunately although all the windows azure configuration settings are stored in a single cscfg file, there is no way to share configuration settings between multiple roles. This means you have to duplicate common settings like connection strings across all your roles. There is an open Connect issue about this topic, but Microsoft have not said when they will fix it. In the mean time I've put together a dirty dirty hack cunning workaround that creates a fake role containing your shared configuration settings, and copies it to all roles as part of the build process. Here's how you set it up: 1. Download the zip file attached to this post, and unzip it into the folder containing your Azure project (not your solution folder). 2. Edit your csdef and cscfg files to include the placeholder project ServiceDefinition.csdef<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceDefinition name="AzureSpendNotifier" http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition%22"http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition"> <WorkerRole name="GLOBAL"> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="ExampleSetting" /> </ConfigurationSettings> </WorkerRole> <WorkerRole name="MyWorker"> <ConfigurationSettings> </ConfigurationSettings> </WorkerRole> <WebRole name="MyWeb"> <Sites> <Site name="Web"> <Bindings> <Binding name="WebEndpoint" endpointName="WebEndpoint" /> </Bindings> </Site> </Sites> <ConfigurationSettings> </ConfigurationSettings> </WebRole> </ServiceDefinition> ServiceConfiguration.cscfg<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="AzureSpendNotifier" xmlns=http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration osFamily="1" osVersion="*"> <Role name="GLOBAL"> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="ExampleSetting" value="Hello World" /> </ConfigurationSettings> <Instances count="1" /> </Role> <Role name="MyWorker"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> <Role name="MyWeb"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration> It is important that all your roles contain a ConfigurationSettings entry in both cscfg and csdef files, even if it's empty- otherwise the shared configuration settings will not be inserted. 3. Open your azure deployment (.ccproj) project in notepad, and add the highlighted line below: ... <Import Project="$(CloudExtensionsDir)Microsoft.CloudService.targets" /> <Import Project="globalsettings/globalsettings.targets" /> </Project> It is important you add this below the Microsoft.CloudService.targets import line, as it replaces some of the rules defined in that file. Visual studio will prompt you to reload the project, say yes. At this point you will have a new Azure role called 'GLOBAL' with settings you can edit through the visual studio properties panel as normal. This role will never be deployed, but any settings you add to it will be copied to all your other roles when deployed or tested locally within visual studio.

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• Cutting Subscriber Churn with Media Intelligence

  - by Oracle M&E

  There's lots of talk in media and entertainment companies about using "big data".  But it's often hard to see through the hype and understand how big data brings benefits in the real world.  How about being able to predict with 92% accuracy which subscribers intend to cancel their subscription - and put in place a renewal strategy to dramatically reduce that churn?  That's what Belgian media company De Persgroep has achieved with Oracle's Media Intelligence solution.  "One of the areas in which we're able to achieve beautiful results using big data is the churn prediction," De Persgroep's CIO Luc Verbist explains in a new Oracle video.  "Based on all the data that we collect on websites and all your behavior, payment behavior and so on, we're able to make a prediction model, which, with an accuracy of 92 percent, is able to predict that you probably won't renew your newspaper, anymore. So our approach to renewal is completely different to the people in that segment than towards the other people. And this has brought us a lot of value and a lot of customers who didn't stop their newspaper where else they would have done so." De Persgroep is using Oracle's Big Data Appliance, along with software from Oracle partner NGDATA to build up a detailed "DNA profile" of each individual customer, based on every interaction, in real time.  This means that any change in behavior - a drop in content consumption, a late subscription payment, a negative social media comment - is captured.  Applying advanced data modeling techniques automatically converts those raw interactions into data with real business meaning - like that customer's risk of churning. The very same data profile - comprising hundreds if individual dimensions - can simultaneously drive targeted marketing campaigns - informing audience about new content that's most relevant and encouraging them to subscribe.  It can power content recommendations and personalization right in the content sites and apps. And it can link directly into digital advertising networks via platforms like Oracle's BlueKai data management platform (DMP), to drive increased advertising CPMs. Using Oracle's Media Intelligence solution enables this across De Persgroep's business - comprising eight newspapers and 25 magazines published in Belgium and The Netherlands, and digital properties including websites with 6m daily unique visitors, along with TV and radio stations. "The company strategy is in fact a customer-centric strategy, so we want to get a 360-view about our customers, about our prospects. And the big data project helped us to achieve that goal," says Verbist. Using Oracle's Big Data Appliance to underpin the solution created huge savings.   "The selection of the Big Data Appliance was quite easy.  It was very quick to install, very easy to install, as well. And it was far cheaper than building our own Hadoop cluster. So it was in fact a non-brainer," Verbist explains. Applying Media Intelligence approach has yielded incredible results for De Persgroep, including: Improved products - with a new understanding of how readers are consuming print and digital content across the day Improved customer segmentation - driving a 6X improvement in customer prospecting and acquisition when contacting a specific segment Having the project up and running in three months And that has led to competitive benefits for De Persgroep, as Luc Verbist explains: "one of the results we saw since we started using big data is that we're able to increase the gap between we as the market leader, and the second [by] more than 20 percent."

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• Oracle Social Network Developer Challenge: Fishbowl Solutions

  - by Kellsey Ruppel

  Originally posted by Jake Kuramoto on The Apps Lab blog. Today, I give you the final entry in the Oracle Social Network Developer Challenge, held last week during OpenWorld. This one comes from Friend of the ‘Lab and Fishbowl Solutions (@fishbowle20) hacker, John Sim (@jrsim_uix), whom you might remember from his XBox Kinect demo at COLLABORATE 12 (presentation slides and abstract) hacks and other exploits with WebCenter. We put this challenge together specifically for developers like John, who like to experiment with new tools and push the envelope of what’s possible and build cool things, and as you can see from his entry John did just that, mashing together Google Maps and Oracle Social Network into a mobile app built with PhoneGap that uses the device’s camera and GPS to keep teams on the move in touch. He calls it a Mobile GeoTagging Solution, but I think Avengers Assemble! would have equally descriptive, given that was obviously his inspiration. Here’s his description of the mobile app: My proposed solution was to design and simplify GeoLocation mapping, and automate updates for users and teams on the move; who don’t have access to a laptop or want to take their ipads out – but allow them to make quick updates to OSN and upload photos taken from their mobile device – there and then. As part of this; the plan was to include a rules engine that could be configured by the user to allow the device to automatically update and post messages when they arrived at a set location(s). Inspiration for this came from on{x} – automate your life. Unfortunately, John didn’t make it to the conference to show off his hard work in person, but luckily, he had a colleague from Fishbowl and a video to showcase his work.    Here are some shots of John’s mobile app for your viewing pleasure: John’s thinking is sound. Geolocation is usually relegated to consumer use cases, thanks to services like foursquare, but distributed teams working on projects out in the world definitely need a way to stay in contact. Consider a construction job. Different contractors all converge on a single location, and time is money. Rather than calling or texting each other and risking a distracted driving accident, an app like John’s allows everyone on the job to see exactly where the other contractors are. Using his GPS rules, they could easily be notified about how close each is to the site, definitely useful when you have a flooring contractor sitting idle, waiting for an electrician to finish the wiring. The best part is that the project manager or general contractor could stay updated on all the action (or inaction) using Oracle Social Network, either sitting at a desk using the browser app or desktop client or on the go, using one of the native mobile apps built for Oracle Social Network. I can see this being used by insurance adjusters too, and really any team that, erm, assembles at a given spot. Of course, it’s also useful for meeting at the pub after the day’s work is done. Beyond people, this solution could also be implemented for physical objects that are in route to a destination. Say you’re a customer waiting on rail shipment or a package delivery. You could track your valuable’s whereabouts easily as they report their progress via checkins. If they deviated from the GPS rules, you’d be notified. You might even be able to get a picture into Oracle Social Network with some light hacking. Thanks to John and his colleagues at Fishbowl for participating in our challenge. We hope everyone had a good experience. Make sure to check out John’s blog post on his work and the experience using Oracle Social Network. Although this is the final, official entry we had, tomorrow, I’ll show you the work of someone who finished code, but wasn’t able to make the judging event. Stay tuned.

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• Oracle is #1 in Life Sciences!

  - by Michael Snow

  Guest post today by: John Klinke, Senior Principal Product Manager, Oracle WebCenter Content 12.00 Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";} Based on the announcement last week at EMC World about Documentum for Life Sciences, it looks like EMC is starting to have regrets about pulling out of the life sciences space over the last few years. Certainly their content management customers and partners in life sciences have noticed their retreat. Many of them are now talking to us about WebCenter Content since they’ve seen the writing on the wall regarding Documentum’s decline, including falling revenue, shrinking investment, departure of key executives, and EMC’s auditing of existing customers. While EMC has been neglecting the life sciences industry over the last few years, Oracle has been increasing its investment and commitment by providing best-of-breed solutions to enable pharmaceutical, medical device, biotech and CRO companies to improve productivity and drive innovation. As a result, according to IDC Health Insights, Oracle is #1 in life sciences. From research and development through clinical development and manufacturing to sales and marketing, Oracle provides the solutions that life sciences companies depend on to accelerate R&D, expedite clinical trials, and speed time to market. Specifically for Oracle WebCenter, our life sciences business is booming thanks to our comprehensive offerings led by Oracle WebCenter Content, our 21 CFR Part 11 compliant enterprise content management platform. Unlike Documentum, WebCenter Content is all about keeping the cost of ownership low - through simplicity, flexibility, and out-of-the-box integrations. WebCenter Content is a single, comprehensive ECM platform that can handle all your content management needs, from controlled documents to digital asset management, records management and document imaging and capture. And it is much more flexible, letting you do configuration changes instead of customizations to meet your business needs. It also saves you money by being pre-integrated with the rest of the Oracle Fusion Middleware technology stack and with leading enterprise applications like Siebel (including Siebel CTMS), Primavera, E-Business Suite, JD Edwards and PeopleSoft. So if you think EMC’s announcement last week was too little and too late, I’m happy to report that Oracle is here to help. Back in October, we announced our Move Off Documentum offer, which provides a 100% trade-in credit for your Documentum licenses when you purchase Oracle WebCenter, and the good news is, this offer is still available for a limited time. So stop maintaining Documentum and start innovating with Oracle WebCenter. For more details see www.oracle.com/moveoff/documentum.

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• Strange Happenings

  - by MOSSLover

  There are weeks we go about our life thinking nothing is going to change nothing will happen.  Then there are other weeks a billion things happen at once.  Friday started off very weird for me.  I flew into Atlanta and I met some cool people for another SharePoint event.  I had some good conversations.  Saturday then hit me and my virtual machine bombed in my presentation after the auto updater ran.  I was writing code on the board and describing everything in notepad.  I would say as presentations go it was the best and the worst presentation all wrapped into one.  The next day I was in Baltimore and I hung out with my aunt which was relatively uneventful and great.  Then Monday hit and half my presentations failed or succeeded and my screen freezes so I start describing the code.  I was on top of my game until Monday night.  On top of the world.  I'm exhausted I get into Raleigh and one of the craziest stories of my life happens.  So my boss has been renting cars through Priceline this week I got a different company than the other weeks. The company gives me a Ford Focus and I plug in the coordinates on my IPhone where I want go.  I head out and then I get to the destination hotel (or I thought I did). I go inside it's the wrong hotel the other one is a few miles away.  I walk outside hop into the car and it sounds like a gunshot.  Nothing is starting...Am I doing something wrong?  No I'm not the car is completely dead in the water.  I call the rental car facility and they tell me to call roadside they are closing for the night.  Roadside says they can't give me a new car but they can get me a jump then I have to take it up with the facility.  They send me a tow truck to give me a jump the guy can't jump the car.  He tells me this vehicle was towed about an hour ago.  He shows me a copy of a slip from when he towed it.  We also notice the rental car company left one of there price scanning guns in the vehicle.  I call up roadside and now they are interested in getting me a car because I need to be onsite tomorrow.  They get the manager of the facility on the phone he apologizes profusely and he says he'll be there in 10 minutes.  About 30 minutes pass and him plus another dude show up with a Ford Escape leather interior.  At this point I hand him the gun tell him someone left it in the vehicle and that I'm not so happy with them.  I ask them to comp my rental they can't due to Priceline, however if I call him again this week he can get me a voucher.  It's about 2 am and I'm ready to get to the hotel I don't make it in the next morning until 10 am.  I would say this was a crazy week all forms of technology are trying to tell me something.  What I have no idea, but we'll see the outcome soon.  I feel so weird tons of change is about to happen.  I don't know if it's good or bad.  I think this week is some form of omen.

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• SQLAuthority News – Stay Connected and Social Media

  - by pinaldave

  I think I have finally gotten back my faith in social media. If you are following my blog I am sure you are aware of my views on social media – SQLAuthority News – Social Media Confusion – Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn and Me. I was not happy about how social media was evolving. Whenever I go to Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook, I noticed the same updates everywhere. I just thought I was wasting my time doing the same thing everywhere. I strongly believe that there is no dictator on internet. Nobody has authority over others, everybody can express their ideas as long as it is not violating others privacy and it is not morally wrong. I have decided that instead of trying to improve the world, I should change myself and adjust my needs. Here are few things I have done to relieve my social media confusion. Twitter I un-followed people who were taking up my time with too many updates. I un-followed people who hardly updated at all. I did not follow anybody else’s list, as I have no control over who other people follow. I follow not only serious SQL people but some fun stuff as well. I removed all my friends who were on Facebook and repeating the same updates on Twitter. I engage with them on Facebook. I followed people who are very conversational on Twitter. I let anybody follow me. I update all my blog posts through at least five tweets online. I decided to re-tweet at least five of my favorite tweets of the day, this way I force myself to remain active in the community. Follow me on Twitter! LinkedIn I updated my career and professional info on LinkedIn. I keep my LinkedIn profile updated with my latest jobs and career news. I let anybody connect with me on LinkedIn. I specify my email address in my profile, keeping it easy for those who want to add me. I read all the profile related updates of my connections – it is very valuable to know who is where and what changes are happening. I do not add my personal tweets or comments in LinkedIn profile. I just keep it professional. Link with me at LinkedIn Facebook I use Facebook only for personal friends. I visit all of my friends at regular intervals and make sure that they are really my friends. I often remove my friends from my Twitter list who are sending duplicate updates. I upload my family photos as well as family updates on Facebook, making sure that only my approved friends are able to read my updates. I keep my Facebook very personal and I often chat with my friends on Facebook chat. I am no longer confused about social media and I think I am using it appropriately. As I said, one cannot decide for others how to use social media, you can only decide for yourself. I have finally found my peace with social media. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: About Me, Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• ArchBeat Link-o-Rama Top 10 for September 9-15, 2012

  - by Bob Rhubart

  The Top 10 most-viewed items shared on the OTN ArchBeat Facebook page for the week of September 9-15, 2017. 15 Lessons from 15 Years as a Software Architect | Ingo Rammer In this presentation from the GOTO Conference in Copenhagen, Ingo Rammer shares 15 tips regarding people, complexity and technology that he learned doing software architecture for 15 years. Attend OTN Architect Day – by Architects, for Architects – October 25 You won't need 3D glasses to take in these live presentations (8 sessions, two tracks) on Cloud computing, SOA, and engineered systems. And the ticket price is: Zero. Nothing. Absolutely free. Register now for Oracle Technology Network Architect Day in Los Angeles. Thursday October 25, 2012, 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Sofitel Los Angeles , 8555 Beverly Boulevard , Los Angeles, CA 90048. Cloud API and service designers, stop thinking small | Cloud Computing - InfoWorld "The focus must shift away from fine-grained APIs that provide some type of primitive service, such as pushing data to a block of storage or perhaps making a request to a cloud-rooted database," says InfoWorld's David Linthicum. "To go beyond primitives, you must understand how these services should be used in a much larger architectural context. In other words, you need to understand how businesses will employ these services to form real workplace solutions—inside and outside the enterprise." Adding a runtime picker to a taskflow parameter in WebCenter | Yannick Ongena Oracle ACE Yannick Ongena shows how to create an Oracle WebCenter popup to allow users to "select items or do more complex things." Oracle IAM 11g R2 docs are now available "One of the great things about the new doc set is the inclusion of ePub files," says Fusion Middleware A-Team blogger Chris Johnson. "This means that if you have an iPad you can load up the doc library onto that and read the docs on the couch." Setting up a local Yum Server using the Exalogic ZFS Storage Appliance | Donald A concise technical post from the man named Donald. What's New in Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.2? | The Fat Bloke Sings "One of the trends we've seen is that as the average host platform becomes more powerful, our users are consistently running more and more vm's," says The Fat Bloke. "Some of our users have large libraries of vm's of various vintages, whilst others have groups of vm's that are run together as an assembly of the various tiers in a multi-tiered software solution, for example, a database tier, middleware tier, and front-ends." The new VirtualBox release, a year in the making, addresses the needs of these users, he explains. Configuring Oracle Business Intelligence 11g MDS XML Source Control Management with Git Version Control | Christian Screen Oracle ACE Christian Screen developed this tutorial for those interested in learning how to configure the Oracle Business Intelligence 11g (11.1.1.6) metadata repository for development using the new MDS XML source control management functionality. Identity and Access Management at Oracle Open World 2012 | Brian Eidelman Fusion Middleware A-Team blogger Brian Eideleman highlights three Oracle Openworld sessions that will put Identity and Access Management in the spotlight, and shares a link to the "Focus On: Identity Management" document, a comprehensive listing of Openworld activities also dealing with IM. Starting and stopping WebLogic automatically using Upstart | Chris Johnson "In Ubuntu, RedHat and Oracle Linux there's a new flavor of init called Upstart that all the kids are using," says Oracle Fusion Middleware A-Team member Chris Johnson. "It's the new hotness when it comes to making programs into daemons and wiring them to start and stop at appropriate times." Thought for the Day "The purpose of software engineering is to control complexity, not to create it." — Pamela Zave Source: SoftwareQuotes.com

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• Social Technology and the Potential for Organic Business Networks

  - by Michael Snow

  Guest Blog Post by:  Michael Fauscette, IDCThere has been a lot of discussion around the topic of social business, or social enterprise, over the last few years. The concept of applying emerging technologies from the social Web, combined with changes in processes and culture, has the potential to provide benefits across the enterprise over a wide range of operations impacting employees, customers, partners and suppliers. Companies are using social tools to build out enterprise social networks that provide, among other things, a people-centric collaborative and knowledge sharing work environment which over time can breakdown organizational silos. On the outside of the business, social technology is adding new ways to support customers, market to prospects and customers, and even support the sales process. We’re also seeing new ways of connecting partners to the business that increases collaboration and innovation. All of the new "connectivity" is, I think, leading businesses to a business model built around the concept of the network or ecosystem instead of the old "stand-by-yourself" approach. So, if you think about businesses as networks in the context of all of the other technical and cultural change factors that we're seeing in the new information economy, you can start to see that there’s a lot of potential for co-innovation and collaboration that was very difficult to arrange before. This networked business model, or what I've started to call “organic business networks,” is the business model of the information economy.The word “organic” could be confusing, but when I use it in this context, I’m thinking it has similar traits to organic computing. Organic computing is a computing system that is self-optimizing, self-healing, self-configuring, and self-protecting. More broadly, organic models are generally patterns and methods found in living systems used as a metaphor for non-living systems.Applying an organic model, organic business networks are networks that represent the interconnectedness of the emerging information business environment. Organic business networks connect people, data/information, content, and IT systems in a flexible, self-optimizing, self-healing, self-configuring, and self-protecting system. People are the primary nodes of the network, but the other nodes — data, content, and applications/systems — are no less important.A business built around the organic business network business model would incorporate the characteristics of a social business, but go beyond the basics—i.e., use social business as the operational paradigm, but also use organic business networks as the mode of operating the business. The two concepts complement each other: social business is the “what,” and the organic business network is the “how.”An organic business network lets the business work go outside of traditional organizational boundaries and become the continuously adapting implementation of an optimized business strategy. Value creation can move to the optimal point in the network, depending on strategic influencers such as the economy, market dynamics, customer behavior, prospect behavior, partner behavior and needs, supply-chain dynamics, predictive business outcomes, etc.An organic business network driven company is the antithesis of a hierarchical, rigid, reactive, process-constrained, and siloed organization. Instead, the business can adapt to changing conditions, leverage assets effectively, and thrive in a hyper-connected, global competitive, information-driven environment.To hear more on this topic – I’ll be presenting in the next webcast of the Oracle Social Business Thought Leader Webcast Series - “Organic Business Networks: Doing Business in a Hyper-Connected World” this coming Thursday, June 21, 2012, 10:00 AM PDT – Register here

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• How to Waste Your Marketing Budget

  - by Mike Stiles

  Philosophers have long said if you find out where a man’s money is, you’ll know where his heart is. Find out where money in a marketing budget is allocated, and you’ll know how adaptive and ready that company is for the near future. Marketing spends are an investment. Not unlike buying stock, the money is placed in areas the marketer feels will yield the highest return. Good stock pickers know the lay of the land, the sectors, the companies, and trends. Likewise, good marketers should know the media available to them, their audience, what they like & want, what they want their marketing to achieve…and trends. So what are they doing? And how are they doing? A recent eTail report shows nearly half of retailers planned on focusing on SEO, SEM, and site research technologies in the coming months. On the surface, that’s smart. You want people to find you. And you’re willing to let the SEO tail wag the dog and dictate the quality (or lack thereof) of your content such as blogs to make that happen. So search is prioritized well ahead of social, multi-channel initiatives, email, even mobile - despite the undisputed explosive growth and adoption of it by the public. 13% of retailers plan to focus on online video in the next 3 months. 29% said they’d look at it in 6 months. Buying SEO trickery is easy. Attracting and holding an audience with wanted, relevant content…that’s the hard part. So marketers continue to kick the content can down the road. Pretty risky since content can draw and bind customers to you. Asked to look a year ahead, retailers started thinking about CRM systems, customer segmentation, and loyalty, (again well ahead of online video, social and site personalization). What these investors are missing is social is spreading across every function of the enterprise and will be a part of CRM, personalization, loyalty programs, etc. They’re using social for engagement but not for PR, customer service, and sales. Mistake. Allocations are being made seemingly blind to the trends. Even more peculiar are the results of an analysis Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins made. She looked at how much time people spend with media types and how marketers are investing in those media. 26% of media consumption is online, marketers spend 22% of their ad budgets there. 10% of media time is spent with mobile, but marketers are spending 1% of their ad budgets there. 7% of media time is spent with print, but (get this) marketers spend 25% of their ad budgets there. It’s like being on Superman’s Bizarro World. Mary adds that of the online spending, most goes to search while spends on content, even ad content, stayed flat. Stock pickers know to buy low and sell high. It means peering with info in hand into the likely future of a stock and making the investment in it before it peaks. Either marketers aren’t believing the data and trends they’re seeing, or they can’t convince higher-ups to acknowledge change and adjust their portfolios accordingly. Follow @mikestilesImage via stock.xchng

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• 2014 Conferences - JFokus, JavaLand & GeeCon!

  - by Heather VanCura

  There has been a delay in publishing these past event summaries from early 2014--JFokus in February, JavaLand in March, and GeeCon in May. As we plan for Devoxx UK next week, I found these summaries that did not make it past 'draft' stage.  We had some great successes with the first three events of 2014, a Java developer conference trifecta! Participation topics included Java, the JCP program overall and the Adopt-a-JSR programs.   First up in February was JFokus in Stockholm. The energy and talent in Stockholm is amazing and the conference organizers do a stellar job running it and welcoming the speakers of this event.  I enjoyed the city walk and speaker dinner, as well as many opportunities to interact with conference speakers and attendees, both during and after the conference hours. Reza Rehman invited me to speak during his Java EE 7 lab session about the Adopt-a-JSR program, and I gave a quickie session on the JCP and Adopt-a-JSR.  There was also a late night Birds of a Feather (BoF) session held jointly with Cecelia Borg, Martijn Verburg and Reza Rehman.  This was an interactive conversation with a focus on the Java EE community survey results and encouraging more community participation and collaboration in Java development.  The Java 8 keynote by Georges Saab and Mark Reinhold was also very entertaining,  I was sorry to miss FOSDEM happening the previous weekend this year in Brussels, but I hope to attend in 2015.  Favorite take home gift -- Lambdas cap! In March, the inaugural version of the JavaLand conference happened inside Phantasialand, an amusement park in Germany. Markus Eisele suggested having an Early Adopters area at the conference, which I was keen to implement. In 2013 at Devoxx Belgium we held some activities in the Hackergaren area around Lambdas and Java EE 7, so this was a great opportunity to expand on a more interactive conference format and Andreas Badelt from the program committee helped in the planning for this area.  Daniel Bryant and Mani Sarkar from the London Java Community led some general Adopt-a-JSR discussions and AdoptOpen JDK activities.  JCP Spec Leads, Anatole Tresch from Credit Suisse, leading JSR 354, Money & Currency API, and Ed Burns from Oracle, leading JSR 344, JavaServer Faces 2.2, attended to engage with conference attendees on their JSRs.  Favorite - Stephen Chin's roller coaster video. In May, GeeCon in Krakow was anther awesome conference!  The conference organizers were warm and welcoming and I enjoyed time getting to know the other speakers at the event. There was a JCP and Adopt-a-JSR participation session as well as a moderated panel session on Early Adopters.  We had an amazing panel -- Daniel Bryant, Arun Gupta, Tomasz Borek , and Peter Lawrey. The panel discussed the Adopt-a-JSR and Adopt OpenJDK program, and how the participants work together to get involved and contribute to both the Java SE and Java EE platforms.  If was an interesting discussion and sparked some new ideas on how Java User Groups in Poland and around the world can contribute in a significant and meaningful way to create better and more practical Java standards today and in the future.  Favorite take home gift - GeeCon mug!   These were some of the highlights of the events--looking forward to Devoxx UK next week.  I will publish these details tomorrow!

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• #iPad at One Week: A Great Device Made with a Heavy Hand

  - by andrewbrust

  I have now had my iPad for a little over a week. In that time, Apple introduced the world to its iPhone OS 4 (and the SDK agreement’s draconian new section 3.3.1), HP introduced is Slate, and Microsoft got ready to launch Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4.0. And through it all I have used my iPad. I've used it for email, calendar, controlling my Sonos, and writing an essay. I've used it for getting on TripIt and Twitter, and surfing the Web. I've used it for online banking, and online ordering and delivery of food. And the verdict? Honestly? I think it's a great device and I thoroughly enjoy using it. The screen is bright and vibrant. I am surprisingly fast and accurate when I type on it. The touch screen's responsiveness is nearly flawless. The software, including a number of third party applications, include pleasing animations and use of color that make it fun to get work done. And speaking of work, the Exchange integration is, dare I say it, robust. Not as full-featured as on a PC or Windows Mobile device, but still offering core functionality and, so far at least, without bugs. The UI is intuitive, not just to me, but also to my 5 1/2 year old, and also to my nearly-3-year-old son. They picked it up and, with just just a few pointers from me, they almost immediately knew what to do, whether they were looking at photos (and swiping/flicking along as they did so), using a drawing program, playing a game, or watching YouTube videos. The younger of the two of them even tried to get up on a chair and grab the thing today. He dropped it, from about 4 feet off the ground. And it's still fine. (Meanwhile, I'll be keeping it on a higher shelf.) I cannot fully describe yet what makes this form factor and this product so appealing. Maybe it's that it's an always-on device. Maybe it's just being able to hold such a nice, relatively large display so close. Maybe it's the design sensibility, that seems to pervade throughout the app ecosystem. Or maybe it's that one's fingers, and not pens or mice, are the software's preferred input device. Whatever the attraction, it's strong. And no matter how much I tend to root for Microsoft and against Apple, Cupertino has, in my mind, scored big, Can Microsoft compete? Yes, but not with the Windows 7 standard UI (nor with individual OEMs’ own UIs on top). I hope Microsoft builds a variant of the Windows Phone 7 specifically for tablet devices. And I hope they make it clear that all developers, and programming languages, are welcome to the platform. Once that’s established, the OEMs have to build great hardware with fast, responsive touch screens, under Microsoft's watchful eye. That may be the hardest part of getting this right. No matter what, Microsoft's got a fight on its hands. I don't know if it can count on winning that fight, either. But Silverlight and Live Tiles could certainly help. And so can treating developers like adults.  Apple seems intent on treating their devs like kids, and then giving the kids a curfew.  For that, dev-friendly Microsoft may one day give thanks.

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• OEG11gR2 integration with OES11gR2 Authorization with condition

  - by pgoutin

  Introduction This OES use-case has been defined originally by Subbu Devulapalli (http://accessmanagement.wordpress.com/).  Based on this OES museum use-case, I have developed the OEG11gR2 policy able to deal with the OES authorization with condition. From an OEG point of view, the way to deal with OES condition is to provide with the OES request some Environmental / Context Attributes.   Museum Use-Case  All painting in the museum have security sensors, an alarm goes off when a person comes too close a painting. The employee designated for maintenance needs to use their ID and disable the alarm before maintenance. You are the Security Administrator for the museum and you have been tasked with creating authorization policies to manage authorization for different paintings. Your first task is to understand how paintings are organized. Asking around, you are surprised to see that there isno formal process in place, so you need to start from scratch. the museum tracks the following attributes for each painting 1. Name of the work 2. Painter 3. Condition (good/poor) 4. Cost You compile the list of paintings  Name of Painting  Painter  Paint Condition  Cost  Mona Lisa  Leonardo da Vinci  Good  100  Magi  Leonardo da Vinci  Poor  40  Starry Night  Vincent Van Gogh  Poor  75  Still Life  Vincent Van Gogh  Good  25 Being a software geek who doesn’t (yet) understand art, you feel that price(or insurance price) of a painting is the most important criteria. So you feel that based on years-of-experience employees can be tasked with maintaining different paintings. You decide that paintings worth over 50 cost should be only handled by employees with over 20 years of experience and employees with less than 10 years of experience should not handle any painting. Lets us start with policy modeling. All paintings have a common set of attributes and actions, so it will be good to have them under a single Resource Type. Based on this resource type we will create the actual resources. So our high level model is: 1) Resource Type: Painting which has action manage and the following four attributes a) Name of the work b) Painter c) Condition (good/poor) d) Cost 2) To keep things simple lets use painting name for Resource name (in real world you will try to use some identifier which is unique, because in future we may end up with more than one painting which has the same name.) 3) Create Resources based on the previous table 4) Create an identity attribute Experience (Integer) 5) Create the following authorization policies a) Allow employees with over 20 years experience to access all paintings b) Allow employees with 10 – 20 years of experience to access painting which cost less than 50 c) Deny access to all paintings for employees with less than 10 year of experience OES Authorization Configuration We do need to create 2 authorization policies with specific conditions a) Allow employees with over 20 years experience to access all paintings b) Allow employees with 10 – 20 years of experience to access painting which cost less than 50 c) Deny access to all paintings for employees with less than 10 year of experience We don’t need an explicit policy for Deny access to all paintings for employees with less than 10 year of experience, because Oracle Entitlements Server will automatically deny if there is no matching policy. OEG Policy The OEG policy looks like the following The 11g Authorization filter configuration is similar to :  The ${PAINTING_NAME} and ${USER_EXPERIENCE} variables are initialized by the "Retrieve from the HTTP header" filters for testing purpose. That's to say, under Service Explorer, we need to provide 2 attributes "Experience" & "Painting" following the OES 11g Authorization filter described above.

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• Multitenant Design for SQL Azure: White Paper Available

  - by Herve Roggero

  Cloud computing is about scaling out all your application tiers, from web application to the database layer. In fact, the whole promise of Azure is to pay for just what you need. You need more IIS servers? No problemo... just spin another web server. You expect to double your storage needs for Azure Tables? No problemo; you are covered there too... just pay for your storage needs. But what about the database tier, SQL Azure? How do you add new databases easily, and transparently, so that your application simply uses more of SQL Azure if its needs to? Without changing a single line of code? And what if you need to scale back down? Welcome to the world of database scalability. There are many terms that describe database scalability, including data federation, multitenant designs, and even NoSQL depending on the technical solution you are implementing.  Because SQL Azure is a transactional database system, NoSQL is not really an option. However data federation and multitenant designs offer some very interesting scalability options that are worth considering. Data federation, a feature of SQL Azure that will be offered in the future, offers very interesting capabilities available natively on the SQL Azure platform. More to come in a few weeks... Multitenant designs on the other hand are design practices and technologies designed to help you reach flexible scalability options not available otherwise. The first incarnation of such a method was made available on CodePlex as an open source project (http://enzosqlshard.codeplex.com).  This project was an attempt to provide a sharding library for educational purposes.  All that sounds really cool... and really esoteric... almost a form of database "voodoo"... However after being on multiple Azure projects I am starting to see a real need. Customers want to be able to free themselves from the database tier, so that if they have 10 new customers tomorrow, all they need to do is add 2 more SQL Azure instances. It's that simple. How you achieve this, and suggested application design guidelines, are available in a white paper I just published.  The white paper offers two primary sections. The first section describes the business and technical problem at hand, and how to classify it according to specific design patterns. For example, I discuss compressed shards through schema separation. The second section offers a method for addressing the needs of a multitenant design using a new library, the big bother of the codeplex project mentioned previously (that I created earlier this year), complete with management interface and such. A Beta of this platform will be made available within weeks; as soon as the documentation will be ready.   I would like to ask you to drop me a quick email at [email protected] if you are going to download the white paper. It's not required, but it would help me get in touch with you for feedback.  You can download this white paper here:   http://www.bluesyntax.net/files/EnzoFramework.pdf . Thank you, and I am looking for feedback, thoughts and implementation opportunities.

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• How the number of indexes built on a table can impact performances?

  - by Davide Mauri

  We all know that putting too many indexes (I’m talking of non-clustered index only, of course) on table may produce performance problems due to the overhead that each index bring to all insert/update/delete operations on that table. But how much? I mean, we all agree – I think – that, generally speaking, having many indexes on a table is “bad”. But how bad it can be? How much the performance will degrade? And on a concurrent system how much this situation can also hurts SELECT performances? If SQL Server take more time to update a row on a table due to the amount of indexes it also has to update, this also means that locks will be held for more time, slowing down the perceived performance of all queries involved. I was quite curious to measure this, also because when teaching it’s by far more impressive and effective to show to attended a chart with the measured impact, so that they can really “feel” what it means! To do the tests, I’ve create a script that creates a table (that has a clustered index on the primary key which is an identity column) , loads 1000 rows into the table (inserting 1000 row using only one insert, instead of issuing 1000 insert of one row, in order to minimize the overhead needed to handle the transaction, that would have otherwise ), and measures the time taken to do it. The process is then repeated 16 times, each time adding a new index on the table, using columns from table in a round-robin fashion. Test are done against different row sizes, so that it’s possible to check if performance changes depending on row size. The result are interesting, although expected. This is the chart showing how much time it takes to insert 1000 on a table that has from 0 to 16 non-clustered indexes. Each test has been run 20 times in order to have an average value. The value has been cleaned from outliers value due to unpredictable performance fluctuations due to machine activity. The test shows that in a  table with a row size of 80 bytes, 1000 rows can be inserted in 9,05 msec if no indexes are present on the table, and the value grows up to 88 (!!!) msec when you have 16 indexes on it This means a impact on performance of 975%. That’s *huge*! Now, what happens if we have a bigger row size? Say that we have a table with a row size of 1520 byte. Here’s the data, from 0 to 16 indexes on that table: In this case we need near 22 msec to insert 1000 in a table with no indexes, but we need more that 500msec if the table has 16 active indexes! Now we’re talking of a 2410% impact on performance! Now we can have a tangible idea of what’s the impact of having (too?) many indexes on a table and also how the size of a row also impact performances. That’s why the golden rule of OLTP databases “few indexes, but good” is so true! (And in fact last week I saw a database with tables with 1700bytes row size and 23 (!!!) indexes on them!) This also means that a too heavy denormalization is really not a good idea (we’re always talking about OLTP systems, keep it in mind), since the performance get worse with the increase of the row size. So, be careful out there, and keep in mind the “equilibrium” is the key world of a database professional: equilibrium between read and write performance, between normalization and denormalization, between to few and too may indexes. PS Tests are done on a VMWare Workstation 7 VM with 2 CPU and 4 GB of Memory. Host machine is a Dell Precsioni M6500 with i7 Extreme X920 Quad-Core HT 2.0Ghz and 16Gb of RAM. Database is stored on a SSD Intel X-25E Drive, Simple Recovery Model, running on SQL Server 2008 R2. If you also want to to tests on your own, you can download the test script here: Open TestIndexPerformance.sql

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• Windows Azure Recipe: Consumer Portal

  - by Clint Edmonson

  Nearly every company on the internet has a web presence. Many are merely using theirs for informational purposes. More sophisticated portals allow customers to register their contact information and provide some level of interaction or customer support. But as our understanding of how consumers use the web increases, the more progressive companies are taking advantage of social web and rich media delivery to connect at a deeper level with the consumers of their goods and services. Drivers Cost reduction Scalability Global distribution Time to market Solution Here’s a sketch of how a Windows Azure Consumer Portal might be built out: Ingredients Web Role – this will host the core of the solution. Each web role is a virtual machine hosting an application written in ASP.NET (or optionally php, or node.js). The number of web roles can be scaled up or down as needed to handle peak and non-peak traffic loads. Database – every modern web application needs to store data. SQL Azure databases look and act exactly like their on-premise siblings but are fault tolerant and have data redundancy built in. Access Control (optional) – if identity needs to be tracked within the solution, the access control service combined with the Windows Identity Foundation framework provides out-of-the-box support for several social media platforms including Windows LiveID, Google, Yahoo!, Facebook. It also has a provider model to allow integration with other platforms as well. Caching (optional) – for sites with high traffic with lots of read-only data and lists, the distributed in-memory caching service can be used to cache and serve up static data at higher scale and speed than direct database requests. It can also be used to manage user session state. Blob Storage (optional) – for sites that serve up unstructured data such as documents, video, audio, device drivers, and more. The data is highly available and stored redundantly across data centers. Each entry in blob storage is provided with it’s own unique URL for direct access by the browser. Content Delivery Network (CDN) (optional) – for sites that service users around the globe, the CDN is an extension to blob storage that, when enabled, will automatically cache frequently accessed blobs and static site content at edge data centers around the world. The data can be delivered statically or streamed in the case of rich media content. Training Labs These links point to online Windows Azure training labs where you can learn more about the individual ingredients described above. (Note: The entire Windows Azure Training Kit can also be downloaded for offline use.) Windows Azure (16 labs) Windows Azure is an internet-scale cloud computing and services platform hosted in Microsoft data centers, which provides an operating system and a set of developer services which can be used individually or together. It gives developers the choice to build web applications; applications running on connected devices, PCs, or servers; or hybrid solutions offering the best of both worlds. New or enhanced applications can be built using existing skills with the Visual Studio development environment and the .NET Framework. With its standards-based and interoperable approach, the services platform supports multiple internet protocols, including HTTP, REST, SOAP, and plain XML SQL Azure (7 labs) Microsoft SQL Azure delivers on the Microsoft Data Platform vision of extending the SQL Server capabilities to the cloud as web-based services, enabling you to store structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data. Windows Azure Services (9 labs) As applications collaborate across organizational boundaries, ensuring secure transactions across disparate security domains is crucial but difficult to implement. Windows Azure Services provides hosted authentication and access control using powerful, secure, standards-based infrastructure. See my Windows Azure Resource Guide for more guidance on how to get started, including links web portals, training kits, samples, and blogs related to Windows Azure.

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• Abstraction, Politics, and Software Architecture

  Abstraction can be defined as a general concept and/or idea that lack any concrete details. Throughout history this type of thinking has led to an array of new ideas and innovations as well as increased confusion and conspiracy. If one was to look back at our history they will see that abstraction has been used in various forms throughout our past. When I was growing up I do not know how many times I heard politicians say “Leave no child left behind” or “No child left behind” as a major part of their campaign rhetoric in regards to a stance on education. As you can see their slogan is a perfect example of abstraction because it only offers a very general concept about improving our education system but they do not mention how they would like to do it. If they did then they would be adding concrete details to their abstraction thus turning it in to an actual working plan as to how we as a society can help children succeed in school and in life, but then they would not be using abstraction. By now I sure you are thinking what does abstraction have to do with software architecture. You are valid in thinking this way, but abstraction is a wonderful tool used in information technology especially in the world of software architecture. Abstraction is one method of extracting the concepts of an idea so that it can be understood and discussed by others of varying technical abilities and backgrounds. One ways in which I tend to extract my architectural design thoughts is through the use of basic diagrams to convey an idea for a system or a new feature for an existing application. This allows me to generically model an architectural design through the use of views and Unified Markup Language (UML). UML is a standard method for creating a 4+1 Architectural View Models. The 4+1 Architectural View Model consists of 4 views typically created with UML as well as a general description of the concept that is being expressed by a model. The 4+1 Architectural View Model: Logical View: Models a system’s end-user functionality. Development View: Models a system as a collection of components and connectors to illustrate how it is intended to be developed.  Process View: Models the interaction between system components and connectors as to indicate the activities of a system. Physical View: Models the placement of the collection of components and connectors of a system within a physical environment. Recently I had to use the concept of abstraction to express an idea for implementing a new security framework on an existing website. My concept would add session based management in order to properly secure and allow page access based on valid user credentials and last user activity.  I created a basic Process View by using UML diagrams to communicate the basic process flow of my changes in the application so that all of the projects stakeholders would be able to understand my idea. Additionally I created a Logical View on a whiteboard while conveying the process workflow with a few stakeholders to show how end-user will be affected by the new framework and gaining additional input about the design. After my Logical and Process Views were accepted I then started on creating a more detailed Development View in order to map how the system will be built based on the concept of components and connections based on the previously defined interactions. I really did not need to create a Physical view for this idea because we were updating an existing system that was already deployed based on an existing Physical View. What do you think about the use of abstraction in the development of software architecture? Please let me know.

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• 45 minutes to talk about C# [closed]

  - by Philip

  I have the opportunity to give a 45 minute talk on C# in the theory of programming languages class I'm taking. The college teaches Java almost exclusively, so that's what all the students are most familiar with. (There's a little C, assembly, Prolog and LISP as well.) I decide what to talk about. It seems to me the best approach is to focus on a few of the big, obvious differences between C# and Java. I don't intend it to be a recommendation to use C# -- there are reasons to use each, mostly because of their ecosystems. So I want to focus on C# as a language. I don't want to go too fast and end up listing a whole bunch of features without showing their usefulness. My current plan is this: Functions as first class objects. This is, in my opinion, one of the biggest differences between C# and Java. The professor briefly mentioned this notion and showed a LISP example, but many of the students have probably never used it. I can show real world examples where it's made my code more readable. Lambda expressions as concise syntax for anonymous functions. Obviously with examples to show how this is useful. The real hit-home examples will be at the end when it's combined with the rest. I don't see an advantage to first showing the old delegate syntax and then replacing it with lambdas -- most of us won't have ever seen delegates anyway so it would just be confusing. The yield keyword and how it's different from returning an array. I have the impression that a lot of C# developers aren't familiar with how to use this. It will likely be very foreign to Java developers. I have some examples from my own work where it was really useful, such as iterating over a tree traversal, or iterating over neighbors in a graph where the neighbors aren't stored in memory. In both cases, doing it in Java would likely mean returning a complete list -- with yield I can stop iterating if I find what I want early on, without using memory for superfluous lists or arrays. Extension methods as a way to write implementation on interfaces. We'll all be familiar with how interfaces don't allow method implementation, and how this leads to code duplication. I'll show a specific example of this and how the extension method can solve the problem. Demonstrate how the above can be combined by implementing some simple Linq methods and using them. Where, Select, First, maybe more depending on how much time is left. Ideas on which ones might 'hit home' the best? There are other things I could talk about such as generics, value types, properties and more. I haven't yet though of good ways to incorporate these. In the case of generics and value types, the advantages might not be obvious or as relevant. Properties are obviously useful, particularly since we're taught strict JavaBeans here, but I don't know if I could integrate it with the "path to Linq" discussion above without it feeling tacked on. So I'm looking for thoughts on how to talk about C#, and what to talk about. Even minor details. I'm sure there are more experienced C# developers than me here who have good insight about what's really important in the language, and what would miss the point.

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• Workflow versioning

  - by Nitra

  I believe I have a fundamental misunderstanding when it comes to workflow engines which I would appreciate if you could help me sort out. I'm not sure if my misunderstanding is specific to the workflow engine I'm using, or if it's a general misunderstanding. I happen to use Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF). TLDR-version WWF allows you to implement business processes in long-running workflows (think months or even years). When started, the workflows can't be changed. But what business process can't change at any time? And if a business process changes, wouldn't you want your software to reflect this change for already started 'instances' of the business process? What am I missing? Background In WWF you define a workflow by combining a set of activites. There are different types of activities - some of them are for flow control, such as the IfElseActivity and the WhileActivty while others allows you to perform actual tasks, such as the CodeActivity wich allows you to run .NET code and the InvokeWebServiceActivity which allows you to call web services. The activites are combined to a workflow using a visual designer. You pretty much drag-and-drop activities from a toolbox to a designer area and connect the activites to each other. The workflow and activities have input paramters, output parameters and variables. We have a single workflow which sometimes runs in a matter of a few days, but it may run for 5-6 months. WWF takes care of persisting the workflow state (what activity are we currently executing, what are the variable values and so on). So far I think WWF makes sense. Some people will prefer to implement a software representation of a business process using a visual designer over writing all of it in code. So what's the issue then? What I don't really get is the following: WWF is designed to take care of long-running workflows. But at the same time, WWF has no built-in functionality which allows you to modify the running workflows. So if you model a business process using a workflow and run that for 6 months, you better hope that the business process does not change. Because if it do, you'll have to have multiple versions of the workflow executing at the same time. This seems like a fundamental design mistake to me, but at the same time it seems more likely that I've misunderstood something. For us, this has had some real-world effects: We release new versions every month, but some workflows may run for a year. This means that we have several versions of the workflow running in parallell, in other words several versions of the business logics. This is the same as having many differnt versions of your code running in production in the same system at the same time, which becomes a bit hard to understand for users. (depending on on whether they clicked a 'Start' button 9 or 10 months ago, the software will behave differently) Our workflow refers to different types of entities and since WWF now has persisted and serialized these we can't really refactor the entities since then existing workflows can't be resumed (deserialization will fail We've received some suggestions on how to handle this When we create a new version of the workflow, cancel all running workflows and create new ones. But in our workflows there's a lot of manual work involved and if we start from scratch a lot of people has to re-do their work. Track what has been done in the workflow and when you create a new one skip activites which have already been executed. I feel that this alternative may work for simple workflows, but it becomes hairy to automatically figure out what activities to skip if there's major refactoring done to a workflow. When we create a new version of the workflow, upgrade old versions using the new WWF 4.5 functionality for upgrading workflows. But then we would have to skip using the visual designer and write code to inject activities in the right places in the workflow. According to MSDN, this upgrade functionality is only intended for minor bug fixes and not larger changes. What am I missing?

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