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• Setting up Ubuntu on my mother's computer

  - by idealmachine

  Intended use My mother had an old Compaq desktop computer running Windows 98, which she used for occasional Web browsing and playing cards. The name of her card game is Hoyle Card Games 3. Although I had to repair it several times over the last 10 years, it worked fine until it finally died at the end of last year. Hardware specifications A relative brought up a newer computer soon afterward: Operating system: Windows XP Asus K8N motherboard (with broken on-board sound; getting a sound card) Athlon 64? processor (don't remember the clock speed) 512 MB RAM Hope the graphics card works... Replacement sound card will be one of: Ensoniq ES1370 AudioPCI Diamond Monster Sound MX300 (Aureal chipset) Sound Blaster Audigy 2 SE Peripherals HP Scanjet 3400c scanner (USB connected) HP LaserJet multi-function printer (parallel port connected, and printing works with a PCL driver) Same serial mouse as old computer Question I had set up an SSH/VNC connection to allow for remotely working out problems. Or so I thought. A month later, the computer would not boot, rendering the SSH connection useless and an OS reinstall necessary. Unfortunately, I have neither the original Windows disc nor the product key. Unless I were to pay $200 for a full Windows 7 Home Premium license for my computer, I would not be able to re-install Windows XP on hers. I consider myself an advanced Linux user, having used Debian for years. So here are my questions. I have only one day to decide whether to use Ubuntu or buy Windows: A quick search leads me to believe all the hardware listed above is supposed to work with Linux, but am I mistaken? Would Ubuntu/Xubuntu suffice (specify which one if it matters), or would I be better off paying the $200 necessary for Windows XP? Is the card game likely to run on Wine? I believe the minimum system requirement is Windows 95. Failing Wine compatibility, will VirtualBox run fast enough on such a computer (Windows 98 as the guest OS)? Are there any free card games just as good? She plays mainly Bridge, Poker, and Solitaire. Is there any "Large Fonts" option for those with poor vision? The lack of it would be a big disadvantage. BONUS: Although I would probably replace the old mouse upon a move to Ubuntu, is it even possible to get a serial mouse working?

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• Your Cinnamon Roll & Morning Coffee: Powered by Oracle Enterprise Manager

  - by Ruma Sanyal

  1024x768 Truth be told, as I was getting my morning coffee today, I was pondering the recent election results more than Oracle [there, I said it]. But then an email from Glen Hawkins from the Enterprise Management team hit my Inbox and I started viewing this video. It was about the world’s largest convenience store chain, 7-Eleven, focusing on creating the best Digital Guest Experience (DGE) for their customers. Turns out that Oracle Enterprise Manager (OEM) powers 7-Eleven’s DGE Middleware Platform as a Service solution that consists of Oracle SOA Suite, Exalogic, and Exadata. “We need to present a consistent view of 7-Eleven across all our endpoints: 10,000 stores & various digital entities like our websites and apps”, said Ronald Clanton, the DGE Program Director for 7-Eleven. As 7-Eleven was rolling out a loyalty program with mobile support across multiple geos, it had many complex business & technical requirements, including supporting a wide variety of different apps, 10M guests in NA alone, ability to support high speed transactions, and very aggressive timelines. A key requirement was shortening the cycle for provisioning new environments. Whereas with other vendors this would take a few weeks, Oracle consulting showed them how with OEM provisioning new environments would take half a day, which was quite impressive. 7-Eleven has started to roll out this new program and are delighted to report that some provisioning cycles are as low as 10 minutes which includes provisioning the full Oracle SOA suite, Exalogic and more. They are delighted with OEM’s reporting capabilities and customization thereof. Watch the video to see for yourself. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* 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:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";}

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• SEO effects of intermix of WP blog, custom PHP site and FB app game

  - by melbournetechlover

  We're a melbourne tech company in the process of building a custom site in PHP. We plan to launch a "pre-launch" page which is also custom coded (CSS3 on twitter bootstrap framework + HTML5 front end and PHP back end). On that site will be a link to a blog - the idea behind this is to build up ranking for a variety of relevant keywords prior to the full site going live (given the majority of the site is a member only community anyway so the blog is really the main way we'll be able to execute on-site SEO. Ideally, we would like to install wordpress in a subdirectory on our servers and just customise the header to look the same as the landing page of the website. But some questions and concerns... Is there any detrimental effect on SEO efforts in having two separate systems (one custom PHP, the other an installation of wordpress) to manage the blog vs the rest of the site? Are there any benefits or detriments to installing on a sub domain such as blog.sitename.com vs. sitename.com/blog. My preference would be sitename.com/blog as it feels neater - but open to suggestions based on knowledge of Google preferences. Separately, we are building a Facebook app which is under another site name. Again because we are launching this app first, from an SEO perspective, would it actually be better to run it from a sub domain on the main site - e.g. gamename.mainsitename.com instead of on app.gamename.com? Currently we have it on app.gamename.com, but if there are SEO benefits to moving it to the other domain and server then we'll do it. Basically we don't want to have our SEO efforts divided - will Google algorithms prefer two sites heavily referring traffic, or is it better to focus our efforts on one. I guess that's the crux of the issue. But the other one is - does Google care about traffic accessing a page built for the Facebook app iFrame - does that count toward rankings? Sorry I hope these questions aren't too complex - but we're in the tech world every day and still can't seem to find a good answer to these ones...hence I'm taking to the forums!! Free beer for whoever can give me a solid answer!

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• Do other developers feel that as they get better, it becomes harder to get jobs?

  - by nbv4

  When I was starting out, it seemed I had a much better time getting interviews and passing them. But now that I'm more experienced, I'm finding that its harder and harder to find a job. Do other developers out there feel the same way? I'll give you an example. I did an interview last Wednesday. It was a small start-up with only one other engineer and the CEO. They flew me in from Ohio (they are SF based). When I got there, they had me write them a link shortener, which took me about 10 minutes to write. I was supposed to be there all day working on this. When I finished it early, the interviewer seemed kind of shocked. After that, we were talking, and I asked him what they use to store data. He told me Mongo. I ask why he decided to use mongo. He then stammered and mumbled his answer, which basically boiled down to "We're using it because Mongo is a the trendy database technology and we don't want to be left out", which I've found is pretty much most common reason people use NoSQL these days. The interviewer quickly ended the interview and pretty much shoved me out the door. I was supposed to have lunch with the CEO, but I he kicked me out before I had a chance. The intervier wasn't mean or rude, (and neither was I). After I got back to Ohio, I got an email from them saying "I wasn't a fit". This sot of thing happens to me all the time. I'm starting to think "not a fit" can sometimes mean "are too high of a skill level that we are". Is this all in my head, or do other experienced developers notice the same thing happening? Back when I used to struggle with coding problems, I would work with the interviewer and it would be a positive thing and I'd get hired. But now I usually blow through the coding part, and the interviewer being left speechless is working against me. Should I feign struggling with coding problems?

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• Is there a usage count for packages or programs?

  - by math

  Motivation: I want to remove applications I do not use to speed up my package processing tasks like dist upgrades, regular updates, but also for saving disk space and other reasons. I know this is a complex topic so first I will ask my question and second I will give some answers I already found out. Question: How do I find out which package I did not used at all? For example I always use the VLC so I could remove totem package. (Which I could have been used some day, yes.) Of course package dependencies could force me to have programs installed which I will never use. Notes: Find the packages which consume much space via synaptic: Select "Status" in lower left, select "Installed" in upper left, sort column on "size" in upper right. Then you can decide which big packages you really need. Use aptitude autoremove Use ubuntu-tweak's Janitor for removing old kernel packages, old configs, apt-cache entries, etc. Manually search for applications for a given task that you usually solve with your standard app. E.g. Movie player, Music player, Office program, Browser etc. (BTW: this is what I want to be helped with my question) When removing packages I always favour "apt-get purge" over "aptitude remove --purge" as aptitude often will also remove essential packages due to package dependencies. E.g. when removing "evolution" (as I use thunderbird) aptitude wants to remove also "ubuntu-desktop" and 756 other packages as well, while apt-get just removes evolution and its helping pacakges like evolution-common. Ubuntu lense gives me most recent used applications which are candidates for keeping :) Employ deborphan as I read in this related answer: How do I clean up my harddrive? I should certainly keep essential packages: Keep only essential packages This question is pretty much a duplicate of How to see what installed packages I have never used for cleaning purposes but covering only few aspects. However one answer suggests to use a program called unusedpkg but the link seems down. There is also a program called Kleen http://code.google.com/p/kleen/ but it won't compile in 11.10. However I hacked it to compile but the results are unusable, as for example the g++ package was marked as not used for 203, but actually I used it seconds ago for compiling Kleen itself ;) So don't use this tool. On http://wiki.debian.org/DebianPackageInformation I read the the package popularity-contest will produce log files with usage statistics. Unfortunately I didn't enabled the popularity contest so I can't find this log file.

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• Problem Solving vs. Solution Finding

  - by ryanabr

  By enlarge, most developers fall into these two camps I will try to explain what I mean by way of example. A manager gives the developer a task that is communicated like this: “Figure out why control A is not loading on this form”. Now, right there it could be argued that the manager should probably have given better direction and said something more like: “Control A is not loading on the Form, fix it”. They might sound like the same thing to most people, but the first statement will have the developer problem solving the reason why it is failing. The second statement should have the developer looking for the solution to make it work, not focus on why it is broken. In the end, they might be the same thing, but I usually see the first approach take way longer than the second approach. The Problem Solver: The problem solver’s approach to fixing something that is broken is likely to take the error or behavior that is being observed and start to research it using a tool like Google, or any other search engine. 7/10 times this will yield results for the most common of issues. The challenge is in the other 30% of issues that will take the problem solver down the rabbit hole and cause them not to surface for days on end while every avenue is explored for the cause of the problem. In the end, they will probably find the cause of the issue and resolve it, but the cost can be days, or weeks of work. The Solution Finder: The solution finder’s approach to a problem will begin the same way the Problem Solver’s approach will. The difference comes in the more difficult cases. Rather than stick to the pure “This has to work so I am going to work with it until it does” approach, the Solution Finder will look for other ways to get the requirements satisfied that may or may not be using the original approach. For example. there are two area of an application of externally equivalent features, meaning that from a user’s perspective, the behavior is the same. So, say that for whatever reason, area A is now not working, but area B is working. The Problem Solver will dig in to see why area A is broken, where the Solution Finder will investigate to see what is the difference between the two areas and solve the problem by potentially working around it. The other notable difference between the two types of developers described is what point they reach before they re-emerge from their task. The problem solver will likely emerge with a triumphant “I have found the problem” where as the Solution Finder will emerge with the more useful “I have the solution”. Conclusion At the end of the day, users are what drives features in software development. With out users there is no need for software. In todays world of software development with so many tools to use, and generally tight schedules I believe that a work around to a problem that takes 8 hours vs. the more pure solution to the problem that takes 40 hours is a more fruitful approach.

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• eSTEP Newsletter for October 2013 Now Available

  - by Cinzia Mascanzoni

  The October'13 issue of our Newsletter is now available. The issue contains information on the following topics: Oracle Open World Summary Oracle Cloud: Oracle Engineered Systems Oracle Database and Middleware Oracle Applications and Software as a Service Oracle Industries Oracle Partners and the "Internet of Things" JavaOne News MySQL News Corporate News Create Your HR Strategic Vision at Oracle HCM World Oracle Database Protection Redefined A Preview: Oracle Database Backup Logging Recovery Appliance Oracle closed Tekelec acquisition Congratulations to ORACLE TEAM USA! Tech sectionARC M6 Oracle's SPARC M6 Oracle SuperCluster M6-32 - Oracle’s Most Scalable Engineered System Oracle Multitenant on SPARC Servers and Oracle Solaris Oracle Database 12c Enterprise Edition: Plug into the Cloud Oracle In-Memory Database Cache Oracle Virtual Compute Appliance New Benchmark-Results published (Sept. 2013) Video Interview: Elasticity, the Biggest Challenge Facing Data Centers Today Tech blog Announcing New Sun Storage 2500-M2 Drives SPARC Product Line Update ZFS RAID Calculator v6 What ships with ODA X3-2? Tech Article: Oracle Multitenant on SPARC Servers and Oracle Solaris New release of Sun Rack II capacity calculator available Announcing: Oracle Solaris Cluster Product Bulletin, September 2013 Learning & events Planned TechCasts Quarterly Partner Update Live Webcast: Simplify and Accelerate Oracle Database deployment with Oracle VM Templates Join us for OTN's Virtual Developer Day - Harnessing the Power of Oracle WebLogic and Oracle Coherence. Learn from OOW 2013 what is going on in Virtualization How to Implementing Early Arriving Facts in ODI, Part I and Part II: Proof of Concept Overview Multi-Factor Authentication in Oracle WebLogic Using multi-factor authentication to protect web applications deployed on Oracle WebLogic. If Virtualization Is Free, It Can't Be Any Good—Right? Looking beyond System/HW SOA and User Interfaces Overcoming the challenges to developing user interfaces in a service oriented References Vodafone Romania Improves Business Agility and Customer Satisfaction, with 10x Faster Business Intelligence Delivery and 12x Faster Processing Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Captures 47% Market Share in a Competitive Market, Thanks to 24/7 Availability Home Credit and Finance Bank Accelerates Getting New Banking Products to Market Extra A Conversation with Java Champion Johan Vos You can find the Newsletter on our portal under eSTEP News ---> Latest Newsletter. You will need to provide your email address and the pin below to get access. Link to the portal is shown below. URL: http://launch.oracle.com/ PIN: eSTEP_2011 Previous published Newsletters can be found under the Archived Newsletters section and more useful information under the Events, Download and Links tab.

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• ArchBeat Link-o-Rama for 10-24-2012

  - by Bob Rhubart

  Play Oracle Vanquisher Here's a little respite from whatever it is you normally spend your time on. Oracle Vanquisher is an online diversion that makes a game of data center optimization. According to the description: "Armed with a cool Oracle vacuum pack suit and a strategic IT roadmap, you will thwart threats and optimize your data center to increase your company’s stock price and boost your company's position." Mainly you avoid electric shock and killer birds. The current high score belongs to someone identified as "TEN." My score? Never mind. Book: DevOps for Developers | The Java Source The subject of DevOps has come up in a couple of recent OTN ArchBeat Podcasts, so it's somewhat serendipitous that Tori Weildt's recent blog post offers an overview of Java Champion Michael Hutterman's new book, DevOps for Developers, now available from Apress. Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) : Context is everything… | The ORACLE-BASE Blog BOYD is a factor in the evolution of IT, but in what context? "The real IT work in companies is still being done on PCs," says Oracle ACE Director Tim Hall. "Yes, you can use a cloud service on your phone, but look around the office and you will see those cloud services are actually being used by people on PCs." Oracle in the Cloud: Oracle EBusiness Suite sizing | Tom Laszewski Cloud expert Tom Laszewski shares several technical resources that will be helpful for sizing of Oracle EBusiness Suite. Setting Up, Configuring, and Using an Oracle WebLogic Server Cluster Author and expert Yuli Vasiliev shows you how take advantage of multiple Oracle WebLogic Server instances grouped into a cluster to maximize scalability and availability. Webcast: Reduce Costs with Oracle's Database Storage Management Watch this! Join Oracle experts Kevin Jernigan and Margaret Hamburger for an interactive webcast in which you'll learn how Oracle's Database Storage Management can reduce storage costs and management complexity while improving query performance to meet service-level agreements and compliance requirements. Event Date: Tuesday, November 6, 2012 Event Time: 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET Thought for the Day "Most software today is very much like an Egyptian pyramid with millions of bricks piled on top of each other, with no structural integrity, but just done by brute force and thousands of slaves." — Alan Kay Source: softwarequotes.com

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• ORACLE UK TECHNOLOGY “TEST FEST”

  - by mseika

  ORACLE UK TECHNOLOGY “TEST FEST” Join us at the UKOUG Conference at the ICC in Birmingham and Take your OPN Implementation Specialist Exam for Free! 3-5 December 2012, ICC Birmingham (UK) Dear Oracle Partner,** As a priority partner, we are sending you advance notice of these exclusive “Technology Test Fest” free examination sessions. Please note that this communication will be sent out to the wider community one week from today, so please register immediately to secure your place! ** We are delighted to offer you the exclusive opportunity to register and attend the Oracle UK “Technology Test Fest” being held as Part of the UKOUG Conference at the ICC in Birmingham in the Drawing Room at the Hyatt Regency hotel adjacent to the ICC venue, from 3rd to 5th December 2012.This is your opportunity to sit your chosen Oracle Technology Specialist Implementation Exam free of charge on this day. Four sessions are being run (10.00AM and 14.00PM), with just 15 places at each session – so register now to avoid disappointment! (Exams take about 1.5 hours to complete.) REGISTER - 3 December Afternoon Session - 2:00pm REGISTER - 4 December Morning Session 10:00am REGISTER - 4 December Afternoon Session - 2:00pm REGISTER - 5 December Morning Session - 10:00am Price: FREE Address:The Drawing Room Hyatt Regency Hotel Birmingham 2 Bridge Street Birmingham BI 2JZ 3 - 5 December 2012 Which Implementation Specialist Exams are available to take?Click here to see the list of exams available for you to sit for free at the Oracle UKOUG “Technology Test Fest”. The links also include the study guide for the particular exam. Please review the Specialization Guide as well. How do I register for the Oracle UK “Technology Test Fest”? Fill out the Pearson Vue profile HERE and complete it with your OPN Company ID. NB: Instructions on how to create/update the profile can be found HERE. Register for one of the 4 sessions using the registration links at the top of this page You will need to bring your own laptop with 'Windows OS' and a form of identification to be able to take any of the exams. Need Help or Advice?For more information about the tests and Get Specialized programme, please contact: [email protected] issues with your profile or any other OPN-related problems, please contact our Oracle Partner Business Centre: [email protected] or call 08705 194 194. We look forward to welcoming you to the Oracle UK “Technology Test Fest” on the 3rd- 5thDecember 2012! Book early to avoid disappointment.

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• Oracle Linux Partner Pavilion Spotlight - Part II

  - by Ted Davis

  As we draw closer to the first day of Oracle OpenWorld, starting in less than a week, we continue to showcase some of our premier partners exhibiting in the Oracle Linux Partner Pavilion ( Booth #1033). We have Independent Hardware Vendors, Independent Software Vendors and Systems Integrators that show the breadth of support in the Oracle Linux and Oracle VM ecosystem. In today's post we highlight three additional Oracle Linux / Oracle VM Partners from the pavilion. Micro Focus delivers mainframe solutions software and software delivery tools with its Borland products. These tools are grouped under the following solutions: Analysis and testing tools for JDeveloper Micro Focus Enterprise Analyzer is key to the success of application overhaul and modernization strategies by ensuring that they are based on a solid knowledge foundation. It reveals the reality of enterprise application portfolios and the detailed constructs of business applications. COBOL for Oracle Database, Oracle Linux, and Tuxedo Micro Focus Visual COBOL delivers the next generation of COBOL development and deployment. Itbrings the productivity of the Eclipse IDE to COBOL, and provides the ability to deploy key business critical COBOL applications to Oracle Linux both natively and under a JVM. Migration and Modernization tooling for mainframes Enterprise application knowledge, development, test and workload re-hosting tools significantly improves the efficiency of business application delivery, enabling CIOs and IT leaders to modernize application portfolios and target platforms such as Oracle Linux. When it comes to Oracle Linux database environments, supporting high transaction rates with minimal response times is no longer just a goal. It’s a strategic imperative. The “data deluge” is impacting the ability of databases and other strategic applications to access data and provide real-time analytics and reporting. As such, customer demand for accelerated application performance is increasing. Visit LSI at the Oracle Linux Pavilion, #733, to find out how LSI Nytro Application Acceleration products are designed from the ground up for database acceleration. Our intelligent solid-state storage solutions help to eliminate I/O bottlenecks, increase throughput and enable Oracle customers achieve the highest levels of DB performance. Accelerate Your Exadata Success With Teleran. Teleran’s software solutions for Oracle Exadata and Oracle Database reduce the cost, time and effort of migrating and consolidating applications on Exadata. In addition Teleran delivers visibility and control solutions for BI/data warehouse performance and user management that ensure service levels and cost efficiency.Teleran will demonstrate these solutions at the Oracle Open World Linux Pavilion: Consolidation Accelerator - Reduces the cost, time and risk ofof migrating and consolidation applications on Exadata. Application Readiness – Identifies legacy application performance enhancements needed to take advantage of Exadata performance features Workload Accelerator – Identifies and clusters workloads for faster performance on Exadata Application Visibility and Control - Improves performance, user productivity, and alignment to business objectives while reducing support and resource costs. Thanks for reading today's Partner Spotlight. Three more partners will be highlighted tomorrow. If you missed our first Partner Spotlight check it out here.

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• MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0.11 has been released

  - by Andy Bang

  We are pleased to announce that MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0.11 is now available for download on the My Oracle Support (MOS) web site. It will also be available via the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud in about 1 week. This is a maintenance release that includes a few new features and fixes a number of bugs. You can find more information on the contents of this release in the change log. You will find binaries for the new release on My Oracle Support. Choose the "Patches & Updates" tab, and then choose the "Product or Family (Advanced Search)" side tab in the "Patch Search" portlet. You will also find the binaries on the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud in approximately 1 week. Choose "MySQL Database" as the Product Pack and you will find the Enterprise Monitor along with other MySQL products. Based on feedback from our customers, MySQL Enterprise Monitor (MEM) 3.0 offers many significant improvements over previous releases. Highlights include: Policy-based automatic scheduling of rules and event handling (including email notifications) make administration of scale-out easier and automatic Enhancements such as automatic discovery of MySQL instances, centralized agent configuration and multi-instance monitoring further improve ease of configuration and management The new cloud and virtualization-friendly, "agent-less" design allows remote monitoring of MySQL databases without the need for any remote agents Trends, projections and forecasting - Graphs and Event handlers inform you in advance of impending file system capacity problems Zero Configuration Query Analyzer - Works "out of the box" with MySQL 5.6 Performance_Schema (supported by 5.6.14 or later) False positives from flapping or spikes are avoided using exponential moving averages and other statistical techniques Advisors can analyze data across an entire group; for example, the Replication Configuration Advisor can scan an entire topology to find common configuration errors like duplicate server UUIDs or a slave whose version is less than its master's More information on the contents of this release is available here: What's new in MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0? MySQL Enterprise Edition: Demos MySQL Enterprise Monitor Frequently Asked Questions MySQL Enterprise Monitor Change History More information on MySQL Enterprise and the Enterprise Monitor can be found here: http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/ http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/monitor.html http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/query.html http://forums.mysql.com/list.php?142 If you are not a MySQL Enterprise customer and want to try the Monitor and Query Analyzer using our 30-day free customer trial, go to http://www.mysql.com/trials, or contact Sales at http://www.mysql.com/about/contact. If you haven't looked at MEM recently, and especially MEM 3.0, please do so now and let us know what you think. Thanks and Happy Monitoring! - The MySQL Enterprise Tools Development Team

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• Upgrades from Beta or CTP SQL Server Software is NOT Supported

  - by BuckWoody

  As of this writing, SQL Server 2008 R2 has released, and just like every release, I get e-mails and calls from folks with this question: “Can I upgrade from Customer Technical Preview (CTP) x or Beta #x or Release Candidate (RC) to the “Released to Manufacturing” (RTM) version?” No. Right up until the last minute, things are changing in the code – and you want that to happen. Our internal testing runs right up until the second we lock down for release, and we watch the CTP/RC/Beta reports to make sure there are no show-stoppers, and fix what we find. And it’s not just “big” changes you need to worry about – a simple change in one line of code can have a massive effect. I know, I know – you’ve possibly upgraded an RC or CTP to the RTM version and it worked “just fine”. But hear this tale: I’ve dealt with someone who faced this exact situation in SQL Server 2008. They upgraded (which is clearly prohibited in the documentation) from a CTP to the RTM version over a year ago. Everything was working fine. But then…one day they had an issue. Couldn’t fix it themselves, we took a look, days went by, and we finally had to call in the big guns for support. Turns out, the upgrade was the problem. So we had to come up with some elaborate schemes to get the system migrated over while they were in production. This was painful for everyone involved. So the answer is still no. Just don’t do it. There is one caveat to this story – if you are a “TAP” customer (you’ll know if you are), we help you move from the CTP products to RTM, but that’s a special case that we track carefully and send along special instructions and tools to help you along. That level of effort isn’t possible on a large scale, so it’s not just a magic tool that we run to upgrade from CTP to RTM. So again, unless you’re a TAP customer, it’s a no-no. Share this post: email it! | bookmark it! | digg it! | reddit! | kick it! | live it!

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• PBCS Hyperion Planning in the Cloud Implementation Workshop

  - by Mike.Hallett(at)Oracle-BI&EPM

  Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS) opens up opportunities for organizations of all sizes to streamline planning and forecasting, accelerate deployment, and reduce costs. This one-day in-person workshop is delivered by Oracle Development (free to OPN member partners), and will cover the handoff from selling-to-implementing of PBCS. Although the basic building blocks are the same as with on-premises Planning, there is a paradigm shift when it comes to selling and implementing a Cloud Service solution. The value proposition behind Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service is all about the deployment model, how it’s sold and how it gets implemented – simplicity, fast adoption and flexible deployment, without sacrificing first-class functionality. To be successful, the entire cycle from sales to implementation should consistently support this value proposition to your clients. This training event is for OPN member partners whose business roles involve presales, implementation consulting, and support. This workshop briefly reviews the sales approach, as background, with emphasis on partner sales support. The main objective is to learn what is needed to successfully implement Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service once the sales hand off is made – how to leverage your current Hyperion Planning knowledge and use the features designed specifically to build out a Cloud Service solution. This Workshop is being offered at three locations for partners from all countries in EMEA: June 24, 2014: Kista, Sweden June 26, 2014: Reading, United Kingdom June 29-30, 2014 (split days): Dubaï, United Arab Emirates To get more information, to check pre-requisites, and to register, click here. /* 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:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}

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• Nashorn in the Twitterverse

  - by jlaskey

  I have been following how often Nashorn has been showing up on the net.  Nashorn got a burst of tweets when we announced Project Nashorn and I was curious how Nashorn was trending per day, maybe graph the result.  Counting tweets manually seemed mindless, so why not write a program to do the same. This is where Nashorn + Java came shining through.  There is a very nice Java library out there called Twitter4J https://github.com/yusuke/twitter4j that handles all things Twitter.  After running bin/getAccessToken.sh to get a twitter4j.properties file with personal authorization, all I had to do to run my simple exploratory app was; nashorn -cp $TWITTER4J/twitter4j-core-3.0.1.jar GetHomeTimeline.js The content of GetHomeTimeline.js is as follows; var twitter4j      = Packages.twitter4j; var TwitterFactory = twitter4j.TwitterFactory; var Query          = twitter4j.Query; var twitter = new TwitterFactory().instance; var query   = new Query("nashorn OR nashornjs"); query.count = 100; do {     var result = twitter.search(query);     var tweets = result.tweets;     for each (tweet in tweets) {         print("@" + tweet.user.screenName + "\t" + tweet.text);     } } while (query = result.nextQuery()); How easy was that?  Now to hook it up to the JavaFX graphing library... 

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• Why can't Ubuntu find an ext3 filesystem on my hard-drive?

  - by urig

  This question is related to this question: Not enough components to start the RAID array? I'm trying to retrieve data from a "Western Digital MyBook World Edition (white light)" NAS device. This is basically an embedded Linux box with a 1TB HDD in it formatted in ext3. It stopped booting one day for no apparent reason. I have extracted the HDD from the NAS device and installed it in a desktop machine running Ubuntu 10.10 in the hope of accessing the files on the drive. I have followed instructions in this forum post, intended to mount the drive through Terminal: http://mybookworld.wikidot.com/forum/t-90514/how-to-recover-data-from-wd-my-book-world-edition-nas-device#post-976452 I have identified the partition that I want to mount and recover files from as /dev/sd4 by running "fdisk -l" and getting this: Disk /dev/sdb: 1000.2 GB, 1000204886016 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 121601 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x0001cf00 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdb1 5 248 1959930 fd Linux raid autodetect /dev/sdb2 249 280 257040 fd Linux raid autodetect /dev/sdb3 281 403 987997+ fd Linux raid autodetect /dev/sdb4 404 121601 973522935 fd Linux raid autodetect// When I try to mount using: "mount -t ext3 /dev/sdb4 /media/xyz" I get the following error: mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sdb4, missing codepage or helper program, or other error In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try dmesg | tail or so And "dmesg | tail" shows me: [ 15.184757] [drm] Initialized nouveau 0.0.16 20090420 for 0000:01:00.0 on minor 0 [ 15.986859] [drm] nouveau 0000:01:00.0: Allocating FIFO number 1 [ 15.988379] [drm] nouveau 0000:01:00.0: nouveau_channel_alloc: initialised FIFO 1 [ 16.353379] EXT4-fs (sda5): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro,commit=0 [ 16.705944] tg3 0000:02:00.0: eth0: Link is up at 100 Mbps, full duplex [ 16.705951] tg3 0000:02:00.0: eth0: Flow control is off for TX and off for RX [ 16.706102] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_CHANGE): eth0: link becomes ready [ 19.125673] EXT4-fs (sda5): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro,commit=0 [ 27.600012] eth0: no IPv6 routers present [ 373.478031] EXT3-fs (sdb4): error: can't find ext3 filesystem on dev sdb4. I guess that last line is the punch line :) Why can't it find the ext3 filesystem on my drive? What do I need to do to mount this partition and copy its contents? Does it have anything to do with the drive being part of a RAID Array (see question mentioned above)? Many thanks to any who can help.

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• June 2013 release of SSDT contains a minor bug that you should be aware of

  - by jamiet

  I have discovered what seems, to me, like a bug in the June 2013 release of SSDT and given the problems that it created yesterday on my current gig I thought it prudent to write this blog post to inform people of it. I’ve built a very simple SSDT project to reproduce the problem that has just two tables, [Table1] and [Table2], and also a procedure [Procedure1]: The two tables have exactly the same definition, both a have a single column called [Id] of type integer. CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Table1] (     [Id] INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY ) My stored procedure simply joins the two together, orders them by the column used in the join predicate, and returns the results: CREATE PROCEDURE [dbo].[Procedure1] AS     SELECT t1.*     FROM    Table1 t1     INNER JOIN Table2 t2         ON    t1.Id = t2.Id     ORDER BY Id Now if I create those three objects manually and then execute the stored procedure, it works fine: So we know that the code works. Unfortunately, SSDT thinks that there is an error here: The text of that error is: Procedure: [dbo].[Procedure1] contains an unresolved reference to an object. Either the object does not exist or the reference is ambiguous because it could refer to any of the following objects: [dbo].[Table1].[Id] or [dbo].[Table2].[Id]. Its complaining that the [Id] field in the ORDER BY clause is ambiguous. Now you may well be thinking at this point “OK, just stick a table alias into the ORDER BY predicate and everything will be fine!” Well that’s true, but there’s a bigger problem here. One of the developers at my current client installed this drop of SSDT and all of a sudden all the builds started failing on his machine – he had errors left right and centre because, as it transpires, we have a fair bit of code that exhibits this scenario.  Worse, previous installations of SSDT do not flag this code as erroneous and therein lies the rub. We immediately had a mass panic where we had to run around the department to our developers (of which there are many) ensuring that none of them should upgrade their SSDT installation if they wanted to carry on being productive for the rest of the day. Also bear in mind that as soon as a new drop of SSDT comes out then the previous version is instantly unavailable so rolling back is going to be impossible unless you have created an administrative install of SSDT for that previous version. Just thought you should know! In the grand schema of things this isn’t a big deal as the bug can be worked around with a simple code modification but forewarned is forearmed so they say! Last thing to say, if you want to know which version of SSDT you are running check my blog post Which version of SSDT Database Projects do I have installed? @Jamiet

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• Registering domain during Christmas holidays

  - by arkascha

  One of the domain names I tried to register previously has been blocked by a domain grabber two days prior to my own attempt. That was about 1 year ago. The attempt to buy the domain from that person failed due to a totally exaggerated price. So I dropped the issue and watched the domain (offered at sedo.com). As expected there were no more offers, the domain was not sold. Now I learn from the whois database that the registration of that domain name ends on 25 Dec 2012 (Christmas holiday). This raises two questions for me, I fail to find reliable answers on the internet. So maybe someone experienced here can drop a statement or a hint: Is it reasonable that the domain name in question really will be free again when that date mentioned in the whois database up to when the domain is registered has passed? I certainly know that the registration can be prolonged, that is not what I mean. I expect (hope) that that domain grabber does not extend the registration, since it costs money and effort and he failed to sell the domain. Provided this is the case and the domain registration is not prolonged, is that date mentioned reliable? Or might it just be some 'default' date? I would like to try to register that domain name as soon as it is unregistered. Since that domain grabber registered that domain only two days before my own registration attempt I would like to prevent such annoying interference next time. So I ask myself: is it possible to register a domain name on a holiday? I mean not to send an email to my provider to do so on that day or before, but to actually have to process taking place as not to wait for 1-2 days after the unregistration? My own provider which I am very happy with does not offer such service on a holiday (which is perfectly understandable). They are 'still checking' if they can offer something automatic. I researched and did not find an answer to the question if that is possible at all. Is an automatic registration attempt on a holiday possible? Where can I do that? Is that reliable?

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• So Much Happening at Devoxx

  - by Tori Wieldt

  Devoxx, the premier Java conference in Europe, has been sold out for a while. The organizers (thanks Stephan and crew!) cap the attendance to make sure all attendees have a great experience, and that speaks volumes about their priorities. The speakers, hackathons, labs, and networking are all first class. The Oracle Technology Network will be there, and if you were smart/lucky enough to get a ticket, come find us and join the fun: IoT Hack Fest Build fun and creative Internet of Things (IoT) applications with Java Embedded, Raspberry Pi and Leap Motion on the University Days (Monday and Tuesday). Learn from top experts Yara & Vinicius Senger and Geert Bevin at two Raspberry Pi & Leap Motion hands-on labs and hacking sessions. Bring your computer. Training and equipment will be provided. Devoxx will also host an Internet of Things shop in the exhibition floor where attendees can purchase Arduino, Raspberry PI and Robot starter kits. Bring your IoT wish list! Video Interviews Yolande Poirier and I will be interviewing members of the Java Community in the back of the Expo hall on Wednesday and Thursday. Videos are posted on Parleys and YouTube/Java. We have a few slots left, so contact me (you can DM @Java) if you want to share your insights or cool new tip or trick with the rest of the developer community. (No commercials, no fluff. Keep it techie and keep it real.)  Oracle Keynote Wednesday morning Mark Reinhold, Chief Java Platform Architect, and Brian Goetz, Java Language Architect will provide an update on Java 8 and beyond. Oracle Booth Drop by the Oracle booth to see old and new friends.  We'll have Java in Action demos and the experts to explain them and answer your questions. We are raffling off Raspberry Pi's each day, so be sure to get your badged scanned. We'll have beer in the booth each evening. Look for @Java in her lab coat.  See you at Devoxx! 

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• Why is everything crashing?

  - by Kopkins

  I've been using Ubuntu for a while now and I love it, I wouldn't think of using another OS unless I can't fix this issue. The install I'm on is only around a month and a half old. I'm running 12.04 64bit on a 8,1 MBP. Up until around 2 weeks ago everything was running smoothly. Around then applications started crashing and weird things started happening. At first I thought it was just certain applications. The first thing to start giving me trouble was compiz. Occasionally compiz will stop decorating windows and lost many other functionalities. running compiz --replace fixes this, but I don't feel like doing it usually once a day. The other thing with this is that after running compiz --replace, my conky window gets lost somewhere and so I run killall conky && conky -c .conkyrc. But this isn't with just a couple applications, it seems like it is proliferating through my system. Last week fontforge started crashing while doing whatever task. So I ended up unable to finish what I was working on to completeness. Didn't find a fix. Today rhythmbox started crashing. Whenever I try to play anything, Rhythmbox becomes unresponsive and needs to be forced to close. When I try to do certain things with the disk utility, it crashes. I get the Ubuntu has experienced an internal error message much more often than I would like. Frequently applications stop appearing in the launcher. Wine almost never does anymore. After not being active for a little while, thunderbird can only fetch my mail after restarting wireless, sudo rmmod b43 && sudo modprobe b43 Occasionally some of my startup apps don't start. What is my best option here? Could they be bugs? I don't want to submit a ton of vague bug reports. Reinstall? switch OS? Thank you to anyone who responds. Kopkins

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• MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0.3 Is Now Available

  - by Andy Bang

  We are pleased to announce that MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0.3 is now available for download on the My Oracle Support (MOS) web site. It will also be available via the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud with the November update in about 1 week. This is a maintenance release that fixes a number of bugs. You can find more information on the contents of this release in the change log. You will find binaries for the new release on My Oracle Support. Choose the "Patches & Updates" tab, and then use the "Product or Family (Advanced Search)" feature. You will also find the binaries on the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud in approximately 1 week. Choose "MySQL Database" as the Product Pack and you will find the Enterprise Monitor along with other MySQL products. Based on feedback from our customers, MySQL Enterprise Monitor (MEM) 3.0 offers many significant improvements over previous releases. Highlights include: Policy-based automatic scheduling of rules and event handling (including email notifications) make administration of scale-out easier and automatic Enhancements such as automatic discovery of MySQL instances, centralized agent configuration and multi-instance monitoring further improve ease of configuration and management The new cloud and virtualization-friendly, "agent-less" design allows remote monitoring of MySQL databases without the need for any remote agents Trends, projections and forecasting - Graphs and Event handlers inform you in advance of impending file system capacity problems Zero Configuration Query Analyzer - Works "out of the box" with MySQL 5.6 Performance_Schema (supported by 5.6.14 or later) False positives from flapping or spikes are avoided using exponential moving averages and other statistical techniques Advisors can analyze data across an entire group; for example, the Replication Configuration Advisor can scan an entire topology to find common configuration errors like duplicate server UUIDs or a slave whose version is less than its master's More information on the contents of this release is available here: What's new in MySQL Enterprise Monitor 3.0? MySQL Enterprise Edition: Demos MySQL Enterprise Monitor Frequently Asked Questions MySQL Enterprise Monitor Change History More information on MySQL Enterprise and the Enterprise Monitor can be found here: http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/ http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/monitor.html http://www.mysql.com/products/enterprise/query.html http://forums.mysql.com/list.php?142 If you are not a MySQL Enterprise customer and want to try the Monitor and Query Analyzer using our 30-day free customer trial, go to http://www.mysql.com/trials, or contact Sales at http://www.mysql.com/about/contact. If you haven't looked at MEM recently, and especially MEM 3.0, please do so now and let us know what you think. Thanks and Happy Monitoring! - The MySQL Enterprise Tools Development Team

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• Tricky situation with EF and Include while projecting (Select / SelectMany)

  - by Vincent Grondin

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/vincentgrondin/archive/2014/06/07/tricky-situation-with-ef-and-include-while-projecting-select.aspxHello, the other day I stumbled on a problem I had a while back with EF and Include method calls and decided this was it and I was going to blog about it…  This would sort of to pin it inside my head and maybe help others too !  So I was using DBContext and wanted to query a DBSet and include some of it’s associations and in the end, do a projection to get a list of Ids…   At first it seems easy…  Query your DBSet, call Include right afterward, then code the rest of your statement with the appropriate where clause and then, do the projection…   Well it wasn’t that easy as my query required I code my where on some entities a few degree further in the association chain and most of these links where “Many”…  I had to do my projection right away with the SelectMany method.  So I did my stuff and tested the query….  no association where loaded…  My Include statement was simply ignored !  Then I remembered this behavior and how to get it to work…  You need to move the Include AFTER your first projection (Select or SelectMany).  So my sequence became:   Query the DBSet, do the projection with SelectMany, Include the associations, code the where clause and do the final projection…. but it wouldn’t compile…   It kept saying that it could not find an “Include” method on an IQueryable… which is perfectly true!  I knew this should work so I went to the definition of the DBset and saw it inherited DBQuery and sure enough the include method was there…  So I had to cast my statement from start until the end of the first projection in a DBQuery then do the Includes and then the rest of my query….   Bottom line is, whenever your Include statement seem to be ignored, then maybe you will need to move them further down in your query and cast your statement in whatever class gives you access to the Include…   Happy coding all !

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• What's Happening in Business Analytics at OpenWorld 2012?

  - by jmorourke

  Oracle OpenWorld 2012 is rapidly approaching on September 30th when we take over the city of San Francisco for five days.  The Business Analytics this year is our strongest ever with over 150 EPM, BI, Analytics and Data Warehousing sessions delivered by Oracle, our customers and partners.  We’ll also have Hands-On Labs, 20 demo pods dedicated to Business Analytics products, and over 30 partners exhibiting their solutions.  So what’s hot in the Business Analytics program at OpenWorld?  Here are some of the “can’t miss” sessions at this year’s conference: The EPM and BI general sessions, led by SVP of Product Development Balaji Yelamanchili will highlight what’s new provide a view into Oracle’s EPM, BI and Analytics strategies.  Both sessions are scheduled on Monday, October 1st. Thursday Keynote:  See More, Act Faster:  Oracle Business Analytics, led by Oracle President Mark Hurd, will provide a view into Oracle’s strategy for Business Analytics, especially engineered systems designed to provide extreme performance for the most rigorous analytic tasks. Superfast Business Intelligence with Oracle Exalytics.  Hear about various business intelligence scenarios in which Oracle Exalytics provides exemplary value—from operational reporting and prepackaged applications to analytics on unstructured data. Turn Insights into Real-Time Actions with Oracle Business Intelligence Mobile.  Learn how Oracle Business Intelligence Mobile enables organizations to deliver relevant information and turn insight into real-time action, no matter where employees are located. Empowering the Business User: Introduction to Oracle Endeca Information Discovery.  Find out how you can find fast answers to the new questions that confront your business every day, while avoiding the confusion and inconsistencies brought about by spreadsheets and desktop tools. Big Data:  The Big Story.  Learn how to harness big data, your existing data, and predictive analytics to make better decisions in an environment of rapid shifts in behavior and instant feedback.  Learn about the technologies that constitute a big data architecture, how to leverage and implement advanced analytics for real-time decisions, and the tools needed to know the unknown. Planning at the Speed of Business with Oracle Exalytics.  Learn how Oracle Hyperion Planning leverages the power of Oracle Exalytics to do planning faster, with more detail and more users than ever. For more details on these and other Business Analytics sessions at OpenWorld, download the Focus On Business Analytics program guide at:  http://www.oracle.com/openworld/focus-on/index.html We look forward to seeing you in San Francisco!

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• Forced to be trained [closed]

  - by steeb

  is it OK to force employees to take a training in order to make them sign a contract to stay in the job for X years? Here I'm the only developer in the company and before this job I've developed in VB6, VB.Net and others. There are others technicians here but they query the database server to make reports and make little programs but do not spend all day in programming. I was hired here to manage some legacy data to be migrated to a new system and I used my experience to accomplish the task. I also have made some utilities and other developments. Since we went live with the new system I've been developing a lot of side programs, add-ons and changed the source code of it and basically I've been learning from it since then and became some sort of jack of all trades when some feature needs to be changed or corrected. I have one and a half year in this company but during the last 8 months I've been entirely programming in the system. There have been times when even the implementers ask me how I accomplish certain things. The issue here is that the company has come and told me and other co-workers (which do not program in the system but know basic programming and databases) to have a basic training to program for the new system's platform and when we finish it we will sign a contract to stay in the company for an unspecified time. They have offered also an unspecified better salary. I'm feeling very suspicious cause I know the basics of system and I don't understand why I have to take it, being known by everybody all developments I've made. I gathered with my boss and told him that I should not take that course because I feel that I can learn more with all the daily requirements I've been asked and they should save that money. But he responded me that I have to take it and sign after that. I think they want me to be with them for a long time, and I'd like to, but my opinion is that I would like to stay in the company because I feel comfortable in all laboral aspects (including salary) but not because I signed a contract forced to do more tasks and forced to say no if I have others and better job offers. What advice can you give me in this kind of situation?

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• Working for Web using open-source Technologies

  - by anirudha

  As a Web Developer we all have own dream to make a great web application. a great application was built upon high discipline and best practice on the process of development then we can make modification easier in future as if we want. the user feedback also have a matter because they tell us what they want or expected with the application we make day and night. sometime they report a nice story , experience or a problem they got with our application. so that's matter because they telling about our application much more because they use our software and a part of process of future development or next version of application we make. so the Web have a good thing that they updated as soon as possible. in desktop application their is a numbers of trouble client have when they want to use our application. first thing that installation of software never goes right on every system. big company spent a big amount of money to troble these problem the user have with their software.   Web application is nice implementation of application because their is no trouble with installation all have same experience and if something goes wrong patch come soon and no waiting for new version. Chrome even a desktop application [browser] but they automatically update themselves so their is no trouble for user to get next version now hasseles.    Web application development in Microsoft way have their own rule , pattern practice to make better application in less time. the technologies i want to show you here is some great opensource example like MySQL jQuery and ASP.NET MVC a framework based on ASP.NET server side language.   For going to next step we need to show you a list of software you need to have to fully experience this tutorial.   Visual Web Developer 2010 Express Edition  MySQL [open-source RDBMS]   Query [open-source javascript library]   for getting these software you need to pay nothing.   Visual Web Developer can obtained from Microsoft.com/Express or if you are student or Web Developer you are eligible to get the Visual studio professional and many other great software from Microsoft through their Dreamspark or WebsiteSpark programmes.   MySQL is a great Relational Database management software who are freely available from MySQL.com as a database monitorting tool you can use MySQL workbrench who can be freely get from MySQL official website or many other free tool are available for begining development with MySQL   jQuery is a great library for making javascipt development easier and faster.you can obtained jQuery from jQuery.com their official website.

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• Are You Meeting Social Customer Service Expectations?

  - by Mike Stiles

  Whether it’s B2B or B2C, one sure path to repeat business is making sure your buyer has a memorably pleasant and successful customer service experience with you. If they get that kind of treatment consistently, that’s called a relationship. And those aren’t broken easily. Social customer service, driven by integrated SRM (social relationship management) technology, is the venue that can effectively connect customers not only to the brand, but to other customers. Positive experiences, once administered, don’t just rest with the recipient. They’re published in the form of public raves and peer-to-peer recommendation, a force far more actionable than push advertising. What’s more, your customers have come to expect access to you and satisfaction from you using social. An NM Incite study shows 83% of Twitter users and 71% of Facebook users expect to get an answer from brands the same day they post to them on their social assets. To make sure you’re responding, you’ve got to have a tech platform that’s set up to moderate and alert so you’ll know ASAP a customer needs help. The more integrated your social enterprise is, the faster you can not only respond, but respond with the answer they’re looking for, because your system is connected to the internal resources that can surface the answer or put wheels in motion to rectify the situation in the shortest amount of time possible. But if you go to the necessary lengths to make sure your customers feel valued and important, will they really reward you? The study says 71% of consumers who got quick and effective responses from companies they contacted via social were more likely to recommend the brand to their friends and followers. So yes, sweeping people off their feet pays big dividends in terms of word-of-mouth marketing. But you should be keenly aware of the reverse side of that coin. Give people a negative experience, either in real world or virtual customer service, and that message is highly likely to get amplified through social channels faster and louder. Only 36% of the NM Incite study’s respondents reported that their problems were solved quickly and effectively. 36%? That’s hardly an impressive number. It gets worse. 10% never got so much as a response - at all. Going back to the relationship analogy, companies that are this deep in the ditch where customer service is concerned are making their girl or boyfriends really easy for a competitor to steal. Given the technology tools and data available right now for having an intimate knowledge of the customer, what products they’ve purchased, likely problems with those products, effective resolutions to those problems, and follow-up communication to gauge satisfaction, there are fewer excuses than ever for making the lifeblood of your business feel like you couldn’t care less. @mikestiles

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