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• Windows Azure Recipe: Social Web / Big Media

  - by Clint Edmonson

  With the rise of social media there’s been an explosion of special interest media web sites on the web. From athletics to board games to funny animal behaviors, you can bet there’s a group of people somewhere on the web talking about it. Social media sites allow us to interact, share experiences, and bond with like minded enthusiasts around the globe. And through the power of software, we can follow trends in these unique domains in real time. Drivers Reach Scalability Media hosting Global distribution Solution Here’s a sketch of how a social media application might be built out on Windows Azure: Ingredients Traffic Manager (optional) – can be used to provide hosting and load balancing across different instances and/or data centers. Perfect if the solution needs to be delivered to different cultures or regions around the world. Access Control – this service is essential to managing user identity. It’s backed by a full blown implementation of Active Directory and allows the definition and management of users, groups, and roles. A pre-built ASP.NET membership provider is included in the training kit to leverage this capability but it’s also flexible enough to be combined with external Identity providers including Windows LiveID, Google, Yahoo!, and Facebook. The provider model has extensibility points to hook into other identity providers as well. Web Role – hosts the core of the web application and presents a central social hub users. Database – used to store core operational, functional, and workflow data for the solution’s web services. Caching (optional) – as a web site traffic grows caching can be leveraged to keep frequently used read-only, user specific, and application resource data in a high-speed distributed in-memory for faster response times and ultimately higher scalability without spinning up more web and worker roles. It includes a token based security model that works alongside the Access Control service. Tables (optional) – for semi-structured data streams that don’t need relational integrity such as conversations, comments, or activity streams, tables provide a faster and more flexible way to store this kind of historical data. Blobs (optional) – users may be creating or uploading large volumes of heterogeneous data such as documents or rich media. Blob storage provides a scalable, resilient way to store terabytes of user data. The storage facilities can also integrate with the Access Control service to ensure users’ data is delivered securely. 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 These links point to online Windows Azure training labs and resources 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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• Get Your Enterprise Working With Oracle On Track Communication 1.0

  - by Josh Lannin

  The On Track Development team is very pleased to announce that today On Track is available for our customers to download and evaluate.  To learn more about what On Track does start with our whitepaper and datasheet.   If you are a developer, take a look at our documentation and samples posted to our OTN page. For this first blog post, I’ll be speaking to several notable points about our product. Graceful Escalation via Conversations: On Track addresses the “Collaboration Problem” through a single guiding principle – graceful escalation – within the construct of a Conversation. In On Track, collaboration is based on a context (called a “Conversation”) that gracefully escalates in form, structure, and content, as dictated by the particular needs of a given collaboration.  Within that context, On Track provides a rich set of tools to choose from.  These tools provide for communication, coordination, content management, organization, decision making, and analysis -- all essential aspects of collaboration, but not all of them are essential all of the time.  Every collaborative interaction will evolve differently.  Some will evolve to represent work spreading over the course of years and involving a large, distributed team, while others may involve few people and not evolve at all.  Regardless, all collaborative contexts are built from the same parts, utilize the same concepts, and start the same way.  The principle of graceful escalation is that you only use the tools and structure you need; so you only incur the complexity you need. Purposeful Collaboration: Through application integration, On Track Conversations bring enterprise application users the communication and collaboration capabilities required to complete business process.  By association with specific processes or business objects conversations extend the possible interactions and broaden participation to internal or external non-application users and provide a sophisticated interaction experience, all the while enhancing the data set within the owning application.  Purposeful collaboration not only needs to happen in the context of applications, it must support a full range of real-time and long-running interactions to provide the greatest value. Multi Client, Multi Modal: This On Track 1.0 product release includes the same day availability of  multiple clients, including iPhone and iPad applications which are now available on the Apple Store, a fully capable and accessible Outlook Add-In, along with our browser web client.  With each client we have sought to leverage the strengths of each unique device- our iPhone client supports picture and voice posts, the iPad is optimized for meeting room situations and document viewing, and our Outlook add-in allows you to take emails in context and bring them into On Track.  In addition to supporting a diverse array of clients, On Track provides a unified multi modal experience support starting with basic messages moving through to integrated documents with live annotations, snapshots, application sharing, and voice. Next Generation Web Architecture: We believe On Track will help move the bar higher for what users can expect from all web applications, most notably ones that involve real-time activity.  On Track is built from the ground up with an innovative, real-time architecture that leverages the extensive push capabilities of our server.  Whether you are receiving a new message, viewing where crowds of people are collaborating, or doing live annotation on a document with a set of people, that information comes to you immediately without refreshes or moving back and forth between pages.  We’ve leveraged this core architecture across the product experience and raised the user experience bar for this type of application.  As well these capabilities are based on open standards and protocols, and are fully extensible by anyone- enabling sophisticated integrations to be created with a wide variety of both legacy and next-generation applications. Agile Product Development: As a product team we operate using continuous feedback and modified agile development methodologies.  We have thousands of active internal Oracle users who have helped pilot our product for critical business functions, and the On Track product development team uses our product as our primary vehicle for all our collaboration.  Additionally we been working with early access customers who are adopting our technology and providing us valuable feedback - which our process has rapidly realized in improvements to our software.  On Track agility extends to our server as well, which is built to scale, and is very simple to install and configure. We are pleased to make this product announcement and encourage you to join us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter, as well as checking back here for the latest product information.

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• Unable to make properly work the Ralink rt3090 wifi card on my Lenovo B575 with Kubuntu 12.04 64bit

  - by Sebastien

  I look and tried many solution from many thread but I still unable to make this wifi card work properly (very slow, unable to connect to some wifi spot, etc.). I tried to compile the driver from the ralink website but it doesn't work. Tried to blacklist many mod, withou any result. So here are some command results, hope their help you help me: lspci sebastien@sebastien-portable:~$ lspci 00:00.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 14h Processor Root Complex 00:01.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI Wrestler [Radeon HD 6310] 00:01.1 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI Wrestler HDMI Audio [Radeon HD 6250/6310] 00:11.0 SATA controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 SATA Controller [AHCI mode] 00:12.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 USB OHCI0 Controller 00:12.2 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 USB EHCI Controller 00:13.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 USB OHCI0 Controller 00:13.2 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 USB EHCI Controller 00:14.0 SMBus: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SBx00 SMBus Controller (rev 42) 00:14.2 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA) (rev 40) 00:14.3 ISA bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 LPC host controller (rev 40) 00:14.4 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SBx00 PCI to PCI Bridge (rev 40) 00:14.5 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB7x0/SB8x0/SB9x0 USB OHCI2 Controller 00:15.0 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB700/SB800/SB900 PCI to PCI bridge (PCIE port 0) 00:15.2 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI SB900 PCI to PCI bridge (PCIE port 2) 00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 0 (rev 43) 00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 1 00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 2 00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 3 00:18.4 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 4 00:18.5 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 6 00:18.6 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 5 00:18.7 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 12h/14h Processor Function 7 02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller (rev 06) 03:00.0 Network controller: Ralink corp. RT3090 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe lsmod sebastien@sebastien-portable:~$ lsmod Module Size Used by rt2800pci 18715 0 arc4 12529 2 rt2800lib 58925 1 rt2800pci crc_ccitt 12667 1 rt2800lib rt2x00pci 14577 1 rt2800pci rt2x00lib 55301 3 rt2800pci,rt2800lib,rt2x00pci mac80211 506816 3 rt2800lib,rt2x00pci,rt2x00lib cfg80211 205544 2 rt2x00lib,mac80211 eeprom_93cx6 12725 1 rt2800pci rt2860sta 864748 0 snd_hda_codec_conexant 62128 1 snd_hda_codec_hdmi 32474 1 uvcvideo 72627 0 rts5139 351143 0 snd_hda_intel 33773 4 videodev 98259 1 uvcvideo snd_hda_codec 127706 3 snd_hda_codec_conexant,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel snd_hwdep 13668 1 snd_hda_codec psmouse 87692 0 v4l2_compat_ioctl32 17128 1 videodev serio_raw 13211 0 k10temp 13166 0 snd_pcm 97188 3 snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec sp5100_tco 13791 0 i2c_piix4 13301 0 snd_seq_midi 13324 0 snd_rawmidi 30748 1 snd_seq_midi ideapad_laptop 18234 0 sparse_keymap 13890 1 ideapad_laptop rfcomm 47604 0 joydev 17693 0 snd_seq_midi_event 14899 1 snd_seq_midi bnep 18281 2 bluetooth 180104 10 rfcomm,bnep parport_pc 32866 0 ppdev 17113 0 snd_seq 61896 2 snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event snd_timer 29990 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq snd_seq_device 14540 3 snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq snd 78855 18 snd_hda_codec_conexant,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_hwdep,snd_pcm,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device soundcore 15091 1 snd mac_hid 13253 0 snd_page_alloc 18529 2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm lp 17799 0 parport 46562 3 parport_pc,ppdev,lp usbhid 47199 0 hid 99559 1 usbhid r8169 62099 0 radeon 804372 4 video 19596 0 wmi 19256 0 ttm 76949 1 radeon drm_kms_helper 46978 1 radeon drm 242038 6 radeon,ttm,drm_kms_helper i2c_algo_bit 13423 1 radeon iwconfig sebastien@sebastien-portable:~$ iwconfig lo no wireless extensions. wlan0 IEEE 802.11bgn ESSID:"4CE6763F0E0A" Mode:Managed Frequency:2.452 GHz Access Point: 4C:E6:76:3F:0E:0A Bit Rate=54 Mb/s Tx-Power=20 dBm Retry long limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Power Management:off Link Quality=70/70 Signal level=-39 dBm Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0 Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:100 Missed beacon:0 eth0 no wireless extensions.

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• Tuning Default WorkManager - Advantages and Disadvantages

  - by Murali Veligeti

  Before discussing on Tuning Default WorkManager, lets have a brief introduction on What is Default WorkManger Before Weblogic Server 9.0 release, we had the concept of Execute Queues. WebLogic Server (before WLS 9.0), processing was performed in multiple execute queues. Different classes of work were executed in different queues, based on priority and ordering requirements, and to avoid deadlocks. In addition to the default execute queue, weblogic.kernel.default, there were pre-configured queues dedicated to internal administrative traffic, such as weblogic.admin.HTTP and weblogic.admin.RMI.Users could control thread usage by altering the number of threads in the default queue, or configure custom execute queues to ensure that particular applications had access to a fixed number of execute threads, regardless of overall system load. From WLS 9.0 release onwards WebLogic Server uses is a single thread pool (single thread pool which is called Default WorkManager), in which all types of work are executed. WebLogic Server prioritizes work based on rules you define, and run-time metrics, including the actual time it takes to execute a request and the rate at which requests are entering and leaving the pool.The common thread pool changes its size automatically to maximize throughput. The queue monitors throughput over time and based on history, determines whether to adjust the thread count. For example, if historical throughput statistics indicate that a higher thread count increased throughput, WebLogic increases the thread count. Similarly, if statistics indicate that fewer threads did not reduce throughput, WebLogic decreases the thread count. This new strategy makes it easier for administrators to allocate processing resources and manage performance, avoiding the effort and complexity involved in configuring, monitoring, and tuning custom executes queues. The Default WorkManager is used to handle thread management and perform self-tuning.This Work Manager is used by an application when no other Work Managers are specified in the application’s deployment descriptors. In many situations, the default Work Manager may be sufficient for most application requirements. WebLogic Server’s thread-handling algorithms assign each application its own fair share by default. Applications are given equal priority for threads and are prevented from monopolizing them. The default work-manager, as its name tells, is the work-manager defined by default.Thus, all applications deployed on WLS will use it. But sometimes, when your application is already in production, it's obvious you can't take your EAR / WAR, update the deployment descriptor(s) and redeploy it.The default work-manager belongs to a thread-pool, as initial thread-pool comes with only five threads, that's not much. If your application has to face a large number of hits, you may want to start with more than that.Well, that's quite easy. You have  two option to do so.1) Modify the config.xmlJust add the following line(s) in your server definition : <server> <name>AdminServer</name> <self-tuning-thread-pool-size-min>100</self-tuning-thread-pool-size-min> <self-tuning-thread-pool-size-max>200</self-tuning-thread-pool-size-max> [...] </server> 2) Adding some JVM parameters Add the following system property in setDomainEnv.sh/setDomainEnv.cmd or startWebLogic.sh/startWebLogic.cmd : -Dweblogic.threadpool.MinPoolSize=100 -Dweblogic.threadpool.MaxPoolSize=100 Reboot WLS and see the option has been taken into account . Disadvantage: So far its fine. But here there is an disadvantage in tuning Default WorkManager. Internally Weblogic Server has many work managers configured for different types of work.  if we run out of threads in the self-tuning pool(because of system property -Dweblogic.threadpool.MaxPoolSize) due to being undersized, then important work that WLS might need to do could be starved.  So, while limiting the self-tuning would limit the default WorkManager and internally it also limits all other internal WorkManagers which WLS uses.So the best alternative is to override the default WorkManager that means creating a WorkManager for the Application and assign the WorkManager for the application instead of tuning the Default WorkManager.

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• "Why We Chose Fusion CRM" by Vikas Bhambri, Managing Partner, The Athene Group

  - by Natalia Rachelson

  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: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;} A guest post by Vikas Bhambri, Managing Partner, The Athene Group This year The Athene Group (www.theathenegroup.com) celebrated our tenth anniversary. The company has accomplished a lot in ten years overcoming a number of hurdles and challenges to have grown organically to a 150+ person global company with offices in the US, UK, and India and customers in the US, Canada, and Europe. Now more than ever with the current global landscape from an economic and competitive standpoint it was vital that we make some changes to remain successful for the next ten years. There were two key initiatives that we discussed internally that would enable us to successfully accomplish this – collaboration and the concept of “insight to action”. With our existing Oracle CRM On Demand platform we had components of this but not the full depth and breadth that we were looking for. When we started to discuss Fusion CRM we immediately saw several next generation tools that would embrace these two objectives. For a consulting and development organization the collaboration required between business development and consulting delivery is as important as the collaboration required during the projects between the project delivery and account management teams. The Activity Streams functionality in Fusion CRM immediately addressed the communication of key discussion topics and exchanges around our clients. Of course when we saw the Oracle Social Network (which is part of our Fusion CRM roadmap) we were blown away. The combination OSN and our CRM is going to make us more effective as we discuss and work cohesively on client engagements – ensuring mutual success for both Athene and our clients. When we looked at “insight to action” we saw that we had a great platform when folks were at their desks, unfortunately a lot of our business development and consulting folks are on the road. The Fusion Mobile Sales and Fusion Outlook Desktop provide information to our teams when they are on the go. So that they can provide real-time information and react to real-time information provided by their peers. We are in the early stages of our transformative experience with Fusion CRM but we believe the platform along with our people and processes are going to help us achieve our goals in the future.

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• Graduate Life in Oracle by Ramakrishna Nalabothula

  - by david.talamelli

  Preparation for the BIG interview: I prepared in both technical and logical aspects to face the Oracle Interview. I had to cover almost all main areas in technical and many types of problems in logical areas. We attended mock- interviews and written tests at our college, browsed websites and communities. Having started with such a rigorous preparation before Oracle visited the college; it was possible for me to make it into the list of final selection. I put in a big effort to reach this position and I am very happy to achieve this. Why I chose Oracle: Oracle is one of the best technology providers and has a large customer base. I think it is not an easy job to offer services to that many customers. So, the company needs young and dynamic people and I wanted to be one among them. This gave me spirit and led me to walk into Oracle. I am working on different technologies and learning something new in the field. Having many customers is challenging Oracle and my work is challenging me. I am confident enough that customers to both me and Oracle will never lose their faith. Learning at Oracle: The style of learning is good and never resembles a classroom session in a college. It is always fun to learn here. There is no exam to track the performance. There is enough time until we completely learn it. There is no concept of stiff competition. Peers help through KT (Knowledge Transfers) and there are good resources in the Oracle to learn. People are always there to direct you to those. There are lots of opportunities for Web learning too! My Work Area: My team gives me a great opportunity to offer service to the entire product. There were no situations when I got tense with my work or targets and deliverables. I work with a Global Team and my manager is based in the UK. I have a lot of freedom and flexibility. I use the work from home option in case of any disturbances in the city or due to personal problems. I have a weekly meeting with my manager and use Instant Messenger for status updates. My manager plans very well to give me enough time to complete tasks. I have good coordination from the team towards our deadlines. My work has also brought me close to many people across various technology and product teams. I am glad to make many friends across Oracle. I am enjoying my time and work here. I cover all the major activities in the team. I am thankful to everyone from the Development and Quality Assurance Team to have high confidence in me by assigning such big responsibilities. Primary tasks are maintaining the environments that are very unstable at times. This really requires big time and effort to trace the root causes. I am working and still learning on all these areas. The happiest thing is I got chances to travel to USA & UK for training and for supporting a few customer demo projects. I have got to explore more across two countries and got sponsored to visit the places around due to Oracle's policies. I am very much thankful for these what I have from Oracle and for the cooperation there from other colleagues. Fun at Work: Oracle has a club from Employees to conduct games and events. I had an opportunity to participate in competitions, tournaments inside Oracle and Inter-Corporate for all games. I thank Oracle for providing me all these opportunities and I would like to extend my thanks to Senior Management for their confidence in me. I thank Oracle HR Recruiting Team too for selecting me into Oracle and giving me this opportunity to share my experience and feelings. Ramakrishna Nalabothula

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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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• DallasXAML.com – A New User Group for Silverlight, WPF, XBAP, etc.

  - by vblasberg

                                   http://DallasXAML.com   I’ve devoted much of last month to starting the DallasXAML User Group.  I finally got back into user group management after 2 years away from leading the Dallas C# SIG.  Now I’m having fun getting a Silverlight/WPF user group going strong for the Dallas / Ft. Worth community.  Our first meeting was March 3rd at the Improving Enterprises offices in North Dallas.  We had about 25 to 35 attendees in the first meeting and it went well.  We covered the most important topic that everyone should understand well – data binding.   So I chose the XAML user group so we can get together for a common group improvement in the Dallas / Ft. Worth area and learn cross-technology information that we can use now.  It is not a lecture hall.  The great thing is that we’ll provide hands-on experience with most every meeting.  The goal is to get the experience that we can use the next work day.  I unfortunately broke that rule by speaking all through the first meeting, but next month is part two with more hands-on data binding.   The differentiation is this group concentrates on XAML, not Silverlight or Windows Client alone.  What we learn in one area, we gain for all areas.  That includes the Silverlight for Windows Phone 7 coming later this year.  Next year it may be Windows Phone 8, 9, or whatever.    I started developing WPF seriously almost a year ago.  I experienced the painful learning curve.  Anyone who reports that there isn’t a big learning curve either thinks in XAML before it was developed, is on the Silverlight or WPF development team, or has already conquered the learning and forgot the pain.  So I wanted to share the pain or make it easier for others – same thing.  I have found that the more I learn and use good disciplined techniques, the more interesting and rewarding development is again.   A few months ago, I was sitting in the iPhone development session at the Dallas C# SIG.  After the meeting, the audience was polled for future topics.  After a few suggestions, Silverlight got the big hands up.  That makes sense because it’s still the hot topic for many Microsoft developers.  So I surfed around and found that there aren’t enough user groups to help in this area.  I polled a few local group leaders and did the work to start the group.  This week I got a telerik controls licence and improved the site with some great controls, namely the RadHtmlPlaceholder control.  It provides a Silverlight control to show HTML in an IFrame-like area.  On DallasXAML.com, the newsletters and resource pages display in HTML because Silverlight just isn’t there yet.  I’m looking forward to a Silverlight XPS viewer with flow documents.  There are some good commercial version available, but this is a non-profit group.    The DallasXAML.com site points to many other resources such as podcasts and webcasts.  I would rather give them the credit than try to out-do them.  So check out the DallasXAML user group site and attend our meetings if you can.  We meet the first Tuesday of the month.   -Vince DallasXAML User Group Leader  

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• User Produtivity Kit - Powerful Packages (Part 1)

  - by [email protected]

  User Productivity Kit provides the ability to create a variety of content types including robust topics on system process and web pages with formatted text and graphics. There are times when you want to enhance content with media types not naively created by User Productivity Kit, media types such as video, custom animations, forms, and more. One method of doing this is to maintain these media files on a web server - separate from the User Productivity Kit player content and link to the files using absolute URLs such as http://myserver/overview.html. While this will get you going, you won't benefit from the content management capabilities of the UPK Developer. Features such as check-in / check-out, history, document properties, folder permissions and more are not available to this external content. Further, if you ever need to move that content to a server with a different name or domain, you'd need to update all your links. UPK version 3.1 introduced a new document type - the package. A package is a group of folders and files that you manage in the Developer library as a single document. These package documents work in the same manner as any other document in the library and you can use all of the collaborative content development features you see with other document types. Packages can be used for anything from single Word documents, PDF files, and graphics to more intricate sets of inter-related files commonly seen with HTML files and their graphics, style sheets, and JavaScript files. The structure of the files and folders within a package will always be preserved so this means that any relative links between files in the package will work. For example, an HTML file containing an image tag with a relative link to a graphic elsewhere in the same package will continue to function properly both when viewed in the Developer and when published to outputs such as the UPK Player. Once you start to use packages, you'll soon discover that there is a lot of existing content that can be re-purposed by placing it into UPK packages. Packages are easily created by selecting File...New...Package. Files can be added in a number of ways including the "Add Files" button, copy & paste from Windows Explorer, and drag & drop. To use one of the files in the package, just create a link to the file in the package you want to target. This is supported throughout the Developer in places such as section & topic concepts, frame links and hyperlinks in web pages. A little more challenging is determining how to structure packages in your library. As I mentioned earlier, a package can contain anything from a single file to dozens of files and folders. So what should you do? You could create a package for each file. You could create one package for all your files. But which one is right? Well, there's not a right and wrong answer to this question. There are advantages and disadvantages to each. The right decision will be influenced by the package files themselves, the structure of the content in the library, the size and working style of the development team, how content is shared between different outlines and more. The first consideration can be assessed the quickest. If the content to be placed in the package is composed of multiple files and those files reference each other, they should be in the same package. There are loads of examples of this type of content. HTML files with graphics and style sheets, HTML files with embedded Flash movies, and Word documents saved as HTML are all examples where the content is composed of multiple files and the files reference each other in some way. Content like this should always be placed in a singe package such that these relative links between the files are preserved and play properly in the UPK Player. In upcoming posts, I'll explain additional considerations.

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• ArchBeat Link-o-Rama for October 14-20, 2012

  - by Bob Rhubart

  The Top 10 items shared on the OTN ArchBeat Facebook page for the week of October 14-21, 2012. Panel: On the Impact of Software | InfoQ Les Hatton (Oakwood Computing Associates), Clive King (Oracle), Paul Good (Shell), Mike Andrews (Microsoft) and Michiel van Genuchten (moderator) discuss the impact of software engineering on our lives in this panel discussion recorded at the Computer Society Software Experts Summit 2012. ResCare Solves Content Lifecycle Challenges with Oracle WebCenter Learn how ResCare solves content lifecycle challenges with Oracle WebCenter. Speakers: Joe Lichtefeld, VP of Application Services & PMO, ResCare Wayne Boerger, Product Manager, TEAM Informatics Doug Thompson, EVP Global Development, TEAM Informatics Date: Tuesday, October 30, 2012 Time: 10:00 a.m. PT / 1:00 p.m. ET WebLogic Server 11gR1 Interactive Quick Reference "The WebLogic Server 11gR1 Administration interactive quick reference," explains Juergen Kress, "is a multimedia tool for various terms and concepts used in WebLogic Server architecture. This tool is available for administrators for online or offline use. This is built as a multimedia web page which provides descriptions of WebLogic Server Architectural components, and references to relevant documentation. This tool offers valuable reference information for any complex concept or product in an intuitive and useful manner." Oracle ACE Directors Nordic Tour 2012 : Venues and BI Presentations | Mark Rittman Oracle ACE Director Mark Rittman shares information on the Oracle ACE Director Tour, as the community leaders make their way through the land of the midnight sun, with events in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo and Helsinki. Mobile Apps for EBS | Capgemini Oracle Blog Capgemini solution architect Satish Iyer breifly describes how Oracle ADF and Oracle SOA Suite can be used to fill the gap in mobile applications for Oracle EBS. Introducing the New Face of Fusion Applications | Misha Vaughan Oracle ACE Directors Debra Lilly and Floyd Teter have already blogged about the the new face of Oracle Fusion Applications. Now Applications User Experience Architect Misha Vaughan shares a brief overview of how the Oracle Applications User Experience (UX) team developed the new look. BPM 11g - Dynamic Task Assignment with Multi-level Organization Units | Mark Foster "I've seen several requirements to have a more granular level of task assignment in BPM 11g based on some value in the data passed to the process," says Fusion Middleware A-Team architect Mark Foster. "Parametric Roles is normally the first port of call to try to satisfy this requirement, but in this blog we will show how a lot of use-cases can be satisfied by the easier to implement and flexible Organization Unit." OTN Architect Day Los Angeles - Oct 25 Oracle Technology Network Architect Day in Los Angeles happens in one week. Register now to make sure you don't miss out on a rich schedule of expert technical sessions and peer interaction covering the use of Oracle technologies in cloud computing, SOA, and more. Even better: it's all free. When: October 25, 2012, 8:30am - 5:00pm. Where: Sofitel Los Angeles, 8555 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048. Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.2.2 released | Oracle's Virtualization Blog The Fat Bloke weighs in with a short post with information on where you can find information and the download for the latest VirtualBox release. Advanced Oracle SOA Suite #OOW 2012 SOA Presentations The Oracle SOA Product Management team has compiled a complete list of all twelve of their Oracle SOA Suite presentations from Oracle OpenWorld 2012, with links to the slide decks. Thought for the Day "Software: do you write it like a book, grow it like a plant, accrete it like a pearl, or construct it like a building?" — Jeff Atwood Source: softwarequotes.com

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• Launching Ops Center 12c

  - by user12601629

  Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c is most ambitious version of the Ops Center tooling that we've ever released. I think that make it appropriate that we launched it in grand style! When it became clear we were going to be complete with the 12c final release about this time of year, the marketing team proposed that we roll the launch of 12c into Oracle OpenWorld Tokyo.  I thought that sounded like a fine idea!  You see, I have always loved Japan.  I even studied a bit of Japanese language back in school. OpenWorld Tokyo was an outstanding even this year.  It was held in Roppongi, one of the most stylish districts in Tokyo. And, to make things even better, the Sakura (cherry blossoms) were blooming.  If you've never been in Japan for cherry blossom season, it's a must see!  Here are a couple of pics for you. Here is a picture from Roppongi, near the conference.  Here's a picture near the Imperial Palace.  A couple of friends from the local sales team took me here before my flight out. So, now back to the product launch! We choose to launch the product in John Fowler's "Engineered Systems" keynote address.  It made perfect sense because of the close ties of Ops Center to the Systems portfolio of products.  It was a packed house for the keynote.  Here's a picture I took just before we started -- there were also hundreds more people in "overflow" rooms in other parts of the venue. Here's a picture of me on stage during the launch. While there are countless new features in Ops Center 12c that customers will love, I had to limit myself to discussing just three. Mission Critical Clouds Solaris 11 Engineered Systems So, what does Mission Critical Cloud mean?  It means we've expanded EM's cloud capabilities in a couple of key areas. First, we've expanded the "self service provisioning" capabilities we have to include SPARC -- not just x86.  Now you can build clouds of Solaris Zones with ease!  Second, we've much more deeply integrated high-end storage and network management into the cloud layers.  These may our IaaS story is now much more powerful! For Solaris 11, we didn't simply port our monitoring agent to S11.  That would have been easy, but also boring! We support S11 deeply.  Full access to the power of the IPS packaging system, the new virtualized networking stack, new Zones features, the Auto Install framework.  If you're ready to try Solaris 11 then Ops Center is ready for you. Last is on the area of Engineered Systems.  These combinations of hardware and software are fast and powerful. However, we're also on a mission to make them ever easier to manage.  We've made major strides with Ops Center 12c. Manage these systems as racks, not individual components.  The new capabilities for the new engineered systems like Exalogic and SPARC SuperCluster and striking. You can read more here: Oracle Unveils Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c So, I'll wrap this up with one final bit of fun. One of my friends from the Oracle marketing department found a super cool place to get dinner.  It's a restaurant called Gonpachi. It turns out this is the place that inspired the scene in the Quentin Taratino movie Kill Bill where Uma Thurman fights 88 Ninjas.  Here is a picture I snapped while we were there. It was surely a good time. Check it out next time you're in Tokyo.

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• Bug in Delphi XE RegularExpressions Unit

  - by Jan Goyvaerts

  Using the new RegularExpressions unit in Delphi XE, you can iterate over all the matches that a regex finds in a string like this: procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject); var RegEx: TRegEx; Match: TMatch; begin RegEx := TRegex.Create('\w+'); Match := RegEx.Match('One two three four'); while Match.Success do begin Memo1.Lines.Add(Match.Value); Match := Match.NextMatch; end end; Or you could save yourself two lines of code by using the static TRegEx.Match call: procedure TForm1.Button2Click(Sender: TObject); var Match: TMatch; begin Match := TRegEx.Match('One two three four', '\w+'); while Match.Success do begin Memo1.Lines.Add(Match.Value); Match := Match.NextMatch; end end; Unfortunately, due to a bug in the RegularExpressions unit, the static call doesn’t work. Depending on your exact code, you may get fewer matches or blank matches than you should, or your application may crash with an access violation. The RegularExpressions unit defines TRegEx and TMatch as records. That way you don’t have to explicitly create and destroy them. Internally, TRegEx uses TPerlRegEx to do the heavy lifting. TPerlRegEx is a class that needs to be created and destroyed like any other class. If you look at the TRegEx source code, you’ll notice that it uses an interface to destroy the TPerlRegEx instance when TRegEx goes out of scope. Interfaces are reference counted in Delphi, making them usable for automatic memory management. The bug is that TMatch and TGroupCollection also need the TPerlRegEx instance to do their work. TRegEx passes its TPerlRegEx instance to TMatch and TGroupCollection, but it does not pass the instance of the interface that is responsible for destroying TPerlRegEx. This is not a problem in our first code sample. TRegEx stays in scope until we’re done with TMatch. The interface is destroyed when Button1Click exits. In the second code sample, the static TRegEx.Match call creates a local variable of type TRegEx. This local variable goes out of scope when TRegEx.Match returns. Thus the reference count on the interface reaches zero and TPerlRegEx is destroyed when TRegEx.Match returns. When we call MatchAgain the TMatch record tries to use a TPerlRegEx instance that has already been destroyed. To fix this bug, delete or rename the two RegularExpressions.dcu files and copy RegularExpressions.pas into your source code folder. Make these changes to both the TMatch and TGroupCollection records in this unit: Declare FNotifier: IInterface; in the private section. Add the parameter ANotifier: IInterface; to the Create constructor. Assign FNotifier := ANotifier; in the constructor’s implementation. You also need to add the ANotifier: IInterface; parameter to the TMatchCollection.Create constructor. Now try to compile some code that uses the RegularExpressions unit. The compiler will flag all calls to TMatch.Create, TGroupCollection.Create and TMatchCollection.Create. Fix them by adding the ANotifier or FNotifier parameter, depending on whether ARegEx or FRegEx is being passed. With these fixes, the TPerlRegEx instance won’t be destroyed until the last TRegEx, TMatch, or TGroupCollection that uses it goes out of scope or is used with a different regular expression.

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• 13 MORE Things from the Oracle Social Summit You Should Know

  - by Mike Stiles

  In our previous blog, we started giving those of you who couldn’t make it just a sampling of the valuable takeaways from the first annual Oracle Social Summit, held Nov 14 and 15 in Las Vegas. And while yes, 13 items is a pretty healthy sampling, we wanted to go the extra mile and give you 13 more, an indication of just how much great information came out of it.  Follow the arrow, and come on in as if you were there with us. 1. Weber Shandwick takes a 70/20/10 approach when advising clients how to allocate resources to paid social opportunities. 70% of spend should go toward paid opportunities the agency and client both know work, 20% should go toward paid social the agency knows works, and 10% should go toward experimentation. (Matt Dickman – Weber Shandwick) 2. By 2017, the technically competent CMO will spend more on IT than the CIO. (Gartner Study) 3. CIOs are focused on infrastructure. As the roles of the CMO and CIO continue coming together, those CIOs have to make a very conscious decision to get CMOs what they need. 4. It’s now harder for brands to differentiate based on product. The advantage will go to the brands that are successful in garnering customer trust. 5. More and more, enterprise software is going to start looking like the software consumers are used to seeing and using. 6. You will see brands prioritizing mobile and dropping investments in www, HTML, POS systems, etc. 7. The social graph has to be added to brands’ customer data for a more holistic view. Customers will give you the information you need if the reward is appropriate. 8. Viacom did a study that showed viewers are most honest on social. Not so much on surveys or other feedback vehicles. 9. How are you determining your influencers? Influence isn’t about reach. It’s about getting people to change behavior. 10. A mix of skills is becoming critically important in a social staff. It shouldn’t be a mixture of several disciplines, not just a bunch of “social experts.” 11. If senior management isn’t engaged, the social team is forced into guessing what might be considered a “success” by the C-suite. 12. Mobile customization will be getting big investments from brands in 2013. Brands need to provide shoppers utility, not just information. 75% will use mobile this holiday season to avoid in-store madness. 13. Data becomes information, information becomes insight, and insight becomes actionable. The Oracle Social Summit brought together brands, agencies, Oracle social experts and industry thought leaders to take a serious look at where social stands today, and where it’s headed in the near future. Given the speed of social’s evolution, attending such events (or at least reading nifty summary blogs) is a good investment in making sure your enterprise isn’t falling gradually behind.

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• Create a Remote Git Repository from an Existing XCode Repository

  - by codeWithoutFear

  Introduction Distributed version control systems (VCS’s), like Git, provide a rich set of features for managing source code.  Many development tools, including XCode, provide built-in support for various VCS’s.  These tools provide simple configuration with limited customization to get you up and running quickly while still providing the safety net of basic version control. I hate losing (and re-doing) work.  I have OCD when it comes to saving and versioning source code.  Save early, save often, and commit to the VCS often.  I also hate merging code.  Smaller and more frequent commits enable me to minimize merge time and effort as well. The work flow I prefer even for personal exploratory projects is: Make small local changes to the codebase to create an incrementally improved (and working) system. Commit these changes to the local repository.  Local repositories are quick to access, function even while offline, and provides the confidence to continue making bold changes to the system.  After all, I can easily recover to a recent working state. Repeat 1 & 2 until the codebase contains “significant” functionality and I have connectivity to the remote repository. Push the accumulated changes to the remote repository.  The smaller the change set, the less likely extensive merging will be required.  Smaller is better, IMHO. The remote repository typically has a greater degree of fault tolerance and active management dedicated to it.  This can be as simple as a network share that is backed up nightly or as complex as dedicated hardware with specialized server-side processing and significant administrative monitoring. XCode’s out-of-the-box Git integration enables steps 1 and 2 above.  Time Machine backups of the local repository add an additional degree of fault tolerance, but do not support collaboration or take advantage of managed infrastructure such as on-premises or cloud-based storage. Creating a Remote Repository These are the steps I use to enable the full workflow identified above.  For simplicity the “remote” repository is created on the local file system.  This location could easily be on a mounted network volume. Create a Test Project My project is called HelloGit and is located at /Users/Don/Dev/HelloGit.  Be sure to commit all outstanding changes.  XCode always leaves a single changed file for me after the project is created and the initial commit is submitted. Clone the Local Repository We want to clone the XCode-created Git repository to the location where the remote repository will reside.  In this case it will be /Users/Don/Dev/RemoteHelloGit. Open the Terminal application. Clone the local repository to the remote repository location: git clone /Users/Don/Dev/HelloGit /Users/Don/Dev/RemoteHelloGit Convert the Remote Repository to a Bare Repository The remote repository only needs to contain the Git database.  It does not need a checked out branch or local files. Go to the remote repository folder: cd /Users/Don/Dev/RemoteHelloGit Indicate the repository is “bare”: git config --bool core.bare true Remove files, leaving the .git folder: rm -R * Remove the “origin” remote: git remote rm origin Configure the Local Repository The local repository should reference the remote repository.  The remote name “origin” is used by convention to indicate the originating repository.  This is set automatically when a repository is cloned.  We will use the “origin” name here to reflect that relationship. Go to the local repository folder: cd /Users/Don/Dev/HelloGit Add the remote: git remote add origin /Users/Don/Dev/RemoteHelloGit Test Connectivity Any changes made to the local Git repository can be pushed to the remote repository subject to the merging rules Git enforces. Create a new local file: date > date.txt /li> Add the new file to the local index: git add date.txt Commit the change to the local repository: git commit -m "New file: date.txt" Push the change to the remote repository: git push origin master Now you can save, commit, and push/pull to your OCD hearts’ content! Code without fear! --Don

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• Is Cloud Security Holding Back Social SaaS?

  - by Mike Stiles

  The true promise of social data co-mingling with enterprise data to influence and inform social marketing (all marketing really) lives in cloud computing. The cloud brings processing power, services, speed and cost savings the likes of which few organizations could ever put into action on their own. So why wouldn’t anyone jump into SaaS (Software as a Service) with both feet? Cloud security. Being concerned about security is proper and healthy. That just means you’re a responsible operator. Whether it’s protecting your customers’ data or trying to stay off the radar of regulatory agencies, you have plenty of reasons to make sure you’re as protected from hacking, theft and loss as you can possibly be. But you also have plenty of reasons to not let security concerns freeze you in your tracks, preventing you from innovating, moving the socially-enabled enterprise forward, and keeping up with competitors who may not be as skittish regarding SaaS technology adoption. Over half of organizations are transferring sensitive or confidential data to the cloud, an increase of 10% over last year. With the roles and responsibilities of CMO’s, CIO’s and other C’s changing, the first thing you should probably determine is who should take point on analyzing cloud software options, providers, and policies. An oft-quoted Ponemon Institute study found 36% of businesses don’t have a cloud security policy at all. So that’s as good a place to start as any. What applications and data are you comfortable housing in the cloud? Do you have a classification system for data that clearly spells out where data types can go and how they can be used? Who, both internally and at the cloud provider, will function as admins? What are the different levels of admin clearance? Will your security policies and procedures sync up with those of your cloud provider? The key is verifiable trust. Trust in cloud security is actually going up. 1/3 of organizations polled say it’s the cloud provider who should be responsible for data protection. And when you look specifically at SaaS providers, that expectation goes up to 60%. 57% “strongly agree” or “agree” there’s more confidence in cloud providers’ ability to protect data. In fact, some businesses bypass the “verifiable” part of verifiable trust. Just over half have no idea what their cloud provider does to protect data. And yet, according to the “Private Cloud Vision vs. Reality” InformationWeek Report, 82% of organizations say security/data privacy are one of the main reasons they’re still holding the public cloud at arm’s length. That’s going to be a tough position to maintain, because just as social is rapidly changing the face of marketing, big data is rapidly changing the face of enterprise IT. Netflix, who’s particularly big on the benefits of the cloud, says, "We're systematically disassembling the corporate IT components." An enterprise can never realize the full power of big data, nor get the full potential value out of it, if it’s unwilling to enable the integrations and dataset connections necessary in the cloud. Because integration is called for to reduce fragmentation, a standardized platform makes a lot of sense. With multiple components crafted to work together, you’re maximizing scalability, optimization, cost effectiveness, and yes security and identity management benefits. You can see how the incentive is there for cloud companies to develop and add ever-improving security features, making cloud computing an eventual far safer bet than traditional IT. @mikestilesPhoto: stock.xchng

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• Session and Pop Up Window

  - by imran_ku07

   Introduction :        Session is the secure state management. It allows the user to store their information in one page and access in another page. Also it is so much powerful that store any type of object. Every user's session is identified by their cookie, which client presents to server. But unfortunately when you open a new pop up window, this cookie is not post to server with request, due to which server is unable to identify the session data for current user.         In this Article i will show you how to handle this situation,  Description :         During working in a application, i was getting an Exception saying that Session is null, when a pop window opens. After seeing the problem more closely i found that ASP.NET_SessionId cookie for parent page is not post in cookie header of child (popup) window.         Therefore for making session present in both parent and child (popup) window, you have to present same cookie. For cookie sharing i passed parent SessionID in query string,   window.open('http://abc.com/s.aspx?SASID=" & Session.SessionID &','V');           and in Application_PostMapRequestHandler application Event, check if the current request has no ASP.NET_SessionId cookie and SASID query string is not null then add this cookie to Request before Session is acquired, so that Session data remain same for both parent and popup window.    Private Sub Application_PostMapRequestHandler(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)           If (Request.Cookies("ASP.NET_SessionId") Is Nothing) AndAlso (Request.QueryString("SASID") IsNot Nothing) Then               Request.Cookies.Add(New HttpCookie("ASP.NET_SessionId", Request.QueryString("SASID")))           End If       End Sub           Now access Session in your parent and child window without any problem. How this works :          ASP.NET (both Web Form or MVC) uses a cookie (ASP.NET_SessionId) to identify the user who is requesting. Cookies are may be persistent (saved permanently in user cookies ) or non-persistent (saved temporary in browser memory). ASP.NET_SessionId cookie saved as non-persistent. This means that if the user closes the browser, the cookie is immediately removed. This is a sensible step that ensures security. That's why ASP.NET unable to identify that the request is coming from the same user. Therefore every browser instance get it's own ASP.NET_SessionId. To resolve this you need to present the same parent ASP.NET_SessionId cookie to the server when open a popup window.           You can confirm this situation by using some tools like Firebug, Fiddler,  Summary :          Hopefully you will enjoy after reading this article, by seeing that how to workaround the problem of sharing Session between different browser instances by sharing their Session identifier Cookie.

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• VirtualBox 3.2 is released! A Red Letter Day?

  - by Fat Bloke

  Big news today! A new release of VirtualBox packed full of innovation and improvements. Over the next few weeks we'll take a closer look at some of these new features in a lot more depth, but today we'll whet your appetite with the headline descriptions. To start with, we should point out that this is the first Oracle-branded version which makes today a real Red-letter day ;-)  Oracle VM VirtualBox 3.2 Version 3.2 moves VirtualBox forward in 3 main areas ( handily, all beginning with "P" ) : performance, power and supported guest operating system platforms.  Let's take a look: Performance New Latest Intel hardware support - Harnessing the latest in chip-level support for virtualization, VirtualBox 3.2 supports new Intel Core i5 and i7 processor and Intel Xeon processor 5600 Series support for Unrestricted Guest Execution bringing faster boot times for everything from Windows to Solaris guests; New Large Page support - Reducing the size and overhead of key system resources, Large Page support delivers increased performance by enabling faster lookups and shorter table creation times. New In-hypervisor Networking - Significant optimization of the networking subsystem has reduced context switching between guests and host, increasing network throughput by up to 25%. New New Storage I/O subsystem - VirtualBox 3.2 offers a completely re-worked virtual disk subsystem which utilizes asynchronous I/O to achieve high-performance whilst maintaining high data integrity; New Remote Video Acceleration - The unique built-in VirtualBox Remote Display Protocol (VRDP), which is primarily used in virtual desktop infrastructure deployments, has been enhanced to deliver video acceleration. This delivers a rich user experience coupled with reduced computational expense, which is vital when servers are running hundreds of virtual machines; Power New Page Fusion - Traditional Page Sharing techniques have suffered from long and expensive cache construction as pages are scrutinized as candidates for de-duplication. Taking a smarter approach, VirtualBox Page Fusion uses intelligence in the guest virtual machine to determine much more rapidly and accurately those pages which can be eliminated thereby increasing the capacity or vm density of the system; New Memory Ballooning- Ballooning provides another method to increase vm density by allowing the memory of one guest to be recouped and made available to others; New Multiple Virtual Monitors - VirtualBox 3.2 now supports multi-headed virtual machines with up to 8 virtual monitors attached to a guest. Each virtual monitor can be a host window, or be mapped to the hosts physical monitors; New Hot-plug CPU's - Modern operating systems such Windows Server 2008 x64 Data Center Edition or the latest Linux server platforms allow CPUs to be dynamically inserted into a system to provide incremental computing power while the system is running. Version 3.2 introduces support for Hot-plug vCPUs, allowing VirtualBox virtual machines to be given more power, with zero-downtime of the guest; New Virtual SAS Controller - VirtualBox 3.2 now offers a virtual SAS controller, enabling it to run the most demanding of high-end guests; New Online Snapshot Merging - Snapshots are powerful but can eat up disk space and need to be pruned from time to time. Historically, machines have needed to be turned off to delete or merge snapshots but with VirtualBox 3.2 this operation can be done whilst the machines are running. This allows sophisticated system management with minimal interruption of operations; New OVF Enhancements - VirtualBox has supported the OVF standard for virtual machine portability for some time. Now with 3.2, VirtualBox specific configuration data is also stored in the standard allowing richer virtual machine definitions without compromising portability; New Guest Automation - The Guest Automation APIs allow host-based logic to drive operations in the guest; Platforms New USB Keyboard and Mouse - Support more guests that require USB input devices; New Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.5 - Support for the latest version of Oracle's flagship Linux platform; New Ubuntu 10.04 ("Lucid Lynx") - Support for both the desktop and server version of the popular Ubuntu Linux distribution; And as a man once said, "just one more thing" ... New Mac OS X (experimental) - On Apple hardware only, support for creating virtual machines run Mac OS X. All in all this is a pretty powerful release packed full of innovation and speedups. So what are you waiting for?  -FB 

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• Enterprise Manager in EPM 11.1.2.x...a game of hide and seek!

  - by THE

  Normal 0 21 false false false DE 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:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} guest article: Maurice Bauhahn: Users of Oracle Hyperion Enterprise Performance Management 11.1.2.0 and 11.1.2.1 may puzzle why the URL http://<servername>:7001/em may not conjure up Enterprise Manager Fusion Middleware Control. This powerful tool has been installed by default...but WebLogic may not have been 'Extended' to allow you to call it up (we are hopeful this ‘Extend’  step will not be needed with 11.1.2.2). The explanation is on pages 425 and following of the following document: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/bi-foundation/epm-tips-issues-1-72-427329.pdf A close look at the screen dumps in that section reveals a somewhat scary prospect, however: the non-AdminServer servlets had all failed (see the red down-arrow icons to the right of their names) after the configuration! Of course you would want to avoid that scenario! A rephrasing of the instructions might help: Ensure the WebLogic AdminServer is not running (in a default scenario that would mean port 7001 is not active). Ensure you have logged into the computer as the installing owner of EPM. Since Enterprise Manager uses a LOT of resources, be sure that there is adequate free RAM to accommodate the added load. On the machine where WebLogic AdminServer is set up (typically the Foundation Services machine), run \Oracle\Middleware\wlserver_10.3\common\bin\config (config.sh on Unix). Select the 'Extend an existing WebLogic domain' option, and click the 'Next' button. Select the domain being used by EPM System. - Typically, the default domain is created under /Oracle/Middleware/user_projects/domains and is named EPMSystem. - Click 'Next'. Under 'Extend my domain automatically to support the following added products' - place a check mark before 'Oracle Enterprise Manager - 11.1.1.0 [oracle_common]' to select it. - Continue accepting the defaults by clicking 'Next' on each page until - on the last page you click 'Extend'. - The system will grind for a few minutes while it configures (deploys?) EM. - Start the AdminServer. Sometimes there is contention in the startup order of the various servlets (resulting in some not coming up). To avoid that problem on Microsoft Windows machines you may start and stop services via the following analogous command line commands to those run on Linux/Unix (these more carefully space out timings of these events): Ensure EPM is up:\Oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\bin\start.bat Ensure WebLogic is up:\Oracle\Middleware\user_projects\domains\EPMSystem\bin\startWebLogic.cmd Shut down WebLogic:\Oracle\Middleware\user_projects\domains\EPMSystem\bin\stopWebLogic.cmd Shut down EPM:\Oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\bin\stop.bat  Now you should be able to more successfully troubleshoot with the EM tool:

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• Updated SOA Documents now available in ITSO Reference Library

  - by Bob Rhubart

  Nine documents within the IT Strategies from Oracle (ITSO) reference library have recently been updated. (Access to the ITSO collection is free to registered Oracle.com members -- and that membership is free.) All nine documents fall within the Service Oriented Architecture section of the ITSO collection, and cover the following topics: SOA Practitioner Guides Creating an SOA Roadmap (PDF, 54 pages, published: February 2012) The secret to successful SOA is to build a roadmap that can be successfully executed. SOA offers an opportunity to adopt an iterative technique to deliver solutions incrementally. This document offers a structured, iterative methodology to help you stay focused on business results, mitigate technology and organizational risk, and deliver successful SOA projects. A Framework for SOA Governance (PDF, 58 pages, published: February 2012) Successful SOA requires a strong governance strategy that designs-in measurement, management, and enforcement procedures. Enterprise SOA adoption introduces new assets, processes, technologies, standards, roles, etc. which require application of appropriate governance policies and procedures. This document offers a framework for defining and building a proper SOA governance model. Determining ROI of SOA through Reuse (PDF, 28 pages, published: February 2012) SOA offers the opportunity to save millions of dollars annually through reuse. Sharing common services intuitively reduces workload, increases developer productivity, and decreases maintenance costs. This document provides an approach for estimating the reuse value of the various software assets contained in a typical portfolio. Identifying and Discovering Services (PDF, 64 pages, published: March 2012) What services should we build? How can we promote the reuse of existing services? A sound approach to answer these questions is a primary measure for the success of a SOA initiative. This document describes a pragmatic approach for collecting the necessary information for identifying proper services and facilitating service reuse. Software Engineering in an SOA Environment (PDF, 66 pages, published: March 2012) Traditional software delivery methods are too narrowly focused and need to be adjusted to enable SOA. This document describes an engineering approach for delivering projects within an SOA environment. It identifies the unique software engineering challenges faced by enterprises adopting SOA and provides a framework to remove the hurdles and improve the efficiency of the SOA initiative. SOA Reference Architectures SOA Foundation (PDF, 70 pages, published: February 2012) This document describes they key tenets for SOA design, development, and execution environments. Topics include: service definition, service layering, service types, the service model, composite applications, invocation patterns, and standards. SOA Infrastructure (PDF, 86 pages, published: February 2012) Properly architected, SOA provides a robust and manageable infrastructure that enables faster solution delivery. This document describes the role of infrastructure and its capabilities. Topics include: logical architecture, deployment views, and Oracle product mapping. SOA White Papers and Data Sheets Oracle's Approach to SOA (white paper) (PDF, 14 pages, published: February 2012) Oracle has developed a pragmatic, holistic approach, based on years of experience with numerous companies to help customers successfully adopt SOA and realize measureable business benefits. This executive datasheet and whitepaper describe Oracle's proven approach to SOA. Oracle's Approach to SOA (data sheet) (PDF, 3 pages, published: March 2012) SOA adoption is complex and success is far from assured. This is why Oracle has developed a pragmatic, holistic approach, based on years of experience with numerous companies, to help customers successfully adopt SOA and realize measurable business benefits. This data sheet provides an executive overview of Oracle's proven approach to SOA.

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• SSAS: Utility to export SQL code from your cube's Data Source View (DSV)

  - by DrJohn

  When you are working on a cube, particularly in a multi-person team, it is sometimes necessary to review what changes that have been done to the SQL queries in the cube's data source view (DSV). This can be a problem as the SQL editor in the DSV is not the best interface to review code. Now of course you can cut and paste the SQL into SSMS, but you have to do each query one-by-one. What is worse your DBA is unlikely to have BIDS installed, so you will have to manually export all the SQL yourself and send him the files. To make it easy to get hold of the SQL in a Data Source View, I developed a C# utility which connects to an OLAP database and uses Analysis Services Management Objects (AMO) to obtain and export all the SQL to a series of files. The added benefit of this approach is that these SQL files can be placed under source code control which means the DBA can easily compare one version with another. The Trick When I came to implement this utility, I quickly found that the AMO API does not give direct access to anything useful about the tables in the data source view. Iterating through the DSVs and tables is easy, but getting to the SQL proved to be much harder. My Google searches returned little of value, so I took a look at the idea of using the XmlDom to open the DSV’s XML and obtaining the SQL from that. This is when the breakthrough happened. Inspecting the DSV’s XML I saw the things I was interested in were called TableType DbTableName FriendlyName QueryDefinition Searching Google for FriendlyName returned this page: Programming AMO Fundamental Objects which hinted at the fact that I could use something called ExtendedProperties to obtain these XML attributes. This simplified my code tremendously to make the implementation almost trivial. So here is my code with appropriate comments. The full solution can be downloaded from here: ExportCubeDsvSQL.zip   using System;using System.Data;using System.IO;using Microsoft.AnalysisServices; ... class code removed for clarity// connect to the OLAP server Server olapServer = new Server();olapServer.Connect(config.olapServerName);if (olapServer != null){ // connected to server ok, so obtain reference to the OLAP databaseDatabase olapDatabase = olapServer.Databases.FindByName(config.olapDatabaseName);if (olapDatabase != null){ Console.WriteLine(string.Format("Succesfully connected to '{0}' on '{1}'",   config.olapDatabaseName,   config.olapServerName));// export SQL from each data source view (usually only one, but can be many!)foreach (DataSourceView dsv in olapDatabase.DataSourceViews){ Console.WriteLine(string.Format("Exporting SQL from DSV '{0}'", dsv.Name));// for each table in the DSV, export the SQL in a fileforeach (DataTable dt in dsv.Schema.Tables){ Console.WriteLine(string.Format("Exporting SQL from table '{0}'", dt.TableName)); // get name of the table in the DSV// use the FriendlyName as the user inputs this and therefore has control of itstring queryName = dt.ExtendedProperties["FriendlyName"].ToString().Replace(" ", "_");string sqlFilePath = Path.Combine(targetDir.FullName, queryName + ".sql"); // delete the sql file if it exists... file deletion code removed for clarity// write out the SQL to a fileif (dt.ExtendedProperties["TableType"].ToString() == "View"){ File.WriteAllText(sqlFilePath, dt.ExtendedProperties["QueryDefinition"].ToString());}if (dt.ExtendedProperties["TableType"].ToString() == "Table"){ File.WriteAllText(sqlFilePath, dt.ExtendedProperties["DbTableName"].ToString()); } } } Console.WriteLine(string.Format("Successfully written out SQL scripts to '{0}'", targetDir.FullName)); } }   Of course, if you are following industry best practice, you should be basing your cube on a series of views. This will mean that this utility will be of limited practical value unless of course you are inheriting a project and want to check if someone did the implementation correctly.

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• Come see us at JavaU at JavaOne!

  - by tmcginn

  In just a little under a month, JavaOne will be in full swing (no pun intended) and thousands of Java developers will gather to hear the latest Java news, immerse themselves in Java technology and learn some new things. This year, I am fortunate enough to be able to attend, along with my Java curriculum development colleagues Matt Heimer and Mike Williams. We start our week at JavaOne teaching a one-day session at JavaU on Sunday morning. If you have never attended a training session through JavaU, you should check it out. There are some terrific sessions this year, and it might help to justify your trip to JavaOne if you can say it was for training! This year I am teaching a one day session on Java SE 7 New Features - a great session for anyone interested in the specific details of what is new in Java SE 7. Matt is teaching a one-day session on Developing Portable Java EE applications with the Enterprise JavaBeans 3.1 API and Java Persistence 2.0 API  EJB, and Mike is doing a one-day session on developing Rich Client applications with Java SE 7 using Java FX 2. I asked Matt and Mike to tell me what developers can expect from their sessions. Matt: "My session will get you up to speed on everything you need to know to create portable Java EE 6 applications using EJB 3.1 and JPA 2. I am going to cover why everyone can benefit from using EJBs (and why developers should relearn them if they haven't looked at them for years). Students who attend my session will see JPA examples showcasing how to use relational databases in an enterprise applications without programming to JDBC and without writing SQL statements. EJB and JPA benefit from being paired together, so I will also show how transaction management is easier in a container. I encourage students to bring a laptop and code as they learn!" Mike: "My session covers how to develop a rich client application using Java FX 2. Starting with the basic concepts of JavaFX, students will see how a JavaFX application is built from its layout, to its controls, to its data structures. In addition, more advanced controls like charts, smart tables, and transitions will be added to the application. Finally, a quick review of JavaFX concurrency and data binding is included. Blended with the core concepts the session will include some of the latest JavaFX technology. This includes using Scene Builder to create a JavaFX UI and connecting your XML UI definition to Java code.  In addition, packaging of the JavaFX application will be covered with some examples of the new native packaging features." As I mentioned, my session covers the changes in the Java for SE 7, including the  language changes that were voted into Java SE 7 from Project Coin. I will also look at how you can take advantage if the the new I/O library (NIO.2) for writing applications that work with files, directories and file systems. We will also look at the changes in Asynchronous I/O that are a part of the changes in NIO/2. We will spend some time looking at the changes to the Java Virtual Machine as well, including support for dynamically typed languages (JSR-292). We will spend some time looking at the Java Concurrency enhancements (JSR-166), including the new Fork/Join framework. And we'll round out the day with a look at changes in Swing, XML and a number of smaller changes in the API's. And, if these topics aren't grabbing your interest, take a look at the other 10 sessions that range from topics on architecture to how to pass the Oracle Certified Programmer I and II exams. See you soon!

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• Orchestrating the Virtual Enterprise, Part I

  - by Kathryn Perry

  A guest post by Jon Chorley, Oracle's Chief Sustainability Officer & Vice President, SCM Product Strategy During the American Industrial Revolution, the Ford Motor Company did it all. It turned raw materials into a showroom full of Model Ts. It owned a steel mill, a glass factory, and an automobile assembly line. The company was both self-sufficient and innovative and went on to become one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world. Nowadays, it's unusual for any business to follow this vertical integration model because its much harder to be best in class across such a wide a range of capabilities and services. Instead, businesses focus on their core competencies and outsource other business functions to specialized suppliers. They exchange vertical integration for collaboration. When done well, all parties benefit from this arrangement and the collaboration leads to the creation of an agile, lean and successful "virtual enterprise." Case in point: For Sun hardware, Oracle outsources most of its manufacturing and all of its logistics to third parties. These are vital activities, but ones where Oracle doesn't have a core competency, so we shift them to business partners who do. Within our enterprise, we always retain the core functions of product development, support, and most of the sales function, because that's what constitutes our core value to our customers. This is a perfect example of a virtual enterprise.  What are the implications of this? It means that we must exchange direct internal control for indirect external collaboration. This fundamentally changes the relative importance of different business processes, the boundaries of security and information sharing, and the relationship of the supply chain systems to the ERP. The challenge is that the systems required to support this virtual paradigm are still mired in "island enterprise" thinking. But help is at hand. Developments such as the Web, social networks, collaboration, and rules-based orchestration offer great potential to fundamentally re-architect supply chain systems to better support the virtual enterprise.  Supply Chain Management Systems in a Virtual Enterprise Historically enterprise software was constructed to automate the ERP - and then the supply chain systems extended the ERP. They were joined at the hip. In virtual enterprises, the supply chain system needs to be ERP agnostic, sitting above each of the ERPs that are distributed across the virtual enterprise - most of which are operating in other businesses. This is vital so that the supply chain system can manage the flow of material and the related information through the multiple enterprises. It has to have strong collaboration tools. It needs to be highly flexible. Users need to be able to see information that's coming from multiple sources and be able to react and respond to events across those sources.  Oracle Fusion Distributed Order Orchestration (DOO) is a perfect example of a supply chain system designed to operate in this virtual way. DOO embraces the idea that a company's fulfillment challenge is a distributed, multi-enterprise problem. It enables users to manage the process and the trading partners in a uniform way and deliver a consistent user experience while operating over a heterogeneous, virtual enterprise. This is a fundamental shift at the core of managing supply chains. It forces virtual enterprises to think architecturally about how best to construct their supply chain systems. In my next post, I will share examples of companies that have made that shift and talk more about the distributed orchestration process.

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• links for 2010-12-23

  - by Bob Rhubart

  Oracle VM Virtualbox 4.0 extension packs (Wim Coekaerts Blog) Wim Coekaerts describes the the new extension pack in Oracle VM Virtualbox 4.0 and how it's different from 3.2 and earlier releases. (tags: oracle otn virtualization virtualbox) Oracle Fusion Middleware Security: Creating OES SM instances on 64 bit systems "I've already opened a bug on this against OES 10gR3 CP5, but in case anyone else runs into it before it gets fixed I wanted to blog it too. (NOTE: CP5 is when official support was introduced for running OES on a 64 bit system with a 64 bit JVM)" - Chris Johnson (tags: oracle otn fusionmiddleware security) Oracle Enterprise Manager Grid Control: Shared loader directory, RAC and WebLogic Clustering "RAC is optional. Even the load balancer is optional. The feed from the agents also goes to the load balancer on a different port and it is routed to the available management server. In normal case, this is ok." - Porus Homi Havewala (tags: WebLogic oracle otn grid clustering) Magic Web Doctor: Thought Process on Upgrading WebLogic Server to 11g "Upgrading to new versions can be challenging task, but it's done for linear scalability, continuous enhanced availability, efficient manageability and automatic/dynamic infrastructure provisioning at a low cost." - Chintan Patel (tags: oracle otn weblogic upgrading) InfoQ: Using a Service Bus to Connect the Supply Chain Peter Paul van de Beek presents a case study of using a service bus in a supply channel connecting a wholesale supplier with hundreds of retailers, the overall context and challenges faced – including the integration of POS software coming from different software providers-, the solution chosen and its implementation, how it worked out and the lessons learned along the way. (tags: ping.fm) Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.0 is released! - The Fat Bloke Sings The Fat Bloke spreads the news and shares some screenshots.  (tags: oracle otn virtualization virtualbox) Leaks on Wikis: "Corporations...You're Next!" Oracle Desktop Virtualization Can Help. (Oracle's Virtualization Blog) "So what can you do to guard against these types of breaches where there is no outsider (or even insider) intrusion to detect per se, but rather someone with malicious intent is physically walking out the door with data that they are otherwise allowed to access in their daily work?" - Adam Hawley (tags: oracle otn virtualization security) OTN ArchBeat Podcast Guest Roster As the OTN ArchBeat Podcast enters its third year, it's time to acknowledge the invaluable contributions of the guests who have participated in ArchBeat programs. Check out this who's who of ArchBeat podcast panelists, with links to their respective interviews and more. (tags: oracle otn oracleace podcast archbeat) Show Notes: Architects in the Cloud (ArchBeat) Now available! Part 2 (of 4) of the ArchBeat interview with Stephen G. Bennett and Archie Reed, the authors of "Silver Clouds, Dark Linings: A Concise Guide to Cloud Computing." (tags: oracle otn podcast cloud) A Cautionary Tale About Multi-Source JNDI Configuration (Scott Nelson's Portal Productivity Ponderings) "I ran into this issue after reading that p13nDataSource and cgDataSource-NonXA should not be configured as multi-source. There were some issues changing them to use the basic JDBC connection string and when rolling back to the bad configuration the server went 'Boom.'" - Scott Nelson (tags: weblogic jdbc oracle jndi)

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• Cloud Backup: Getting the Users' Backs Up

  - by Tony Davis

  On Wednesday last week, Microsoft announced that as of July 1, all data transfers into its Microsoft Azure cloud will be free (though you have to pay for transferring data out). On Thursday last week, SQL Azure in Western Europe went down. It was a relatively short outage, but since SQL Azure currently provides no easy way to take a standard backup of a database and store it locally, many people had no recourse but to wait patiently for their cloud-based app to resume. It seems that Microsoft are very keen encourage developers to move their data onto their cloud, but are developers ready to do it, given that such basic backup capabilities are lacking? Recently on Simple-Talk, Mike Mooney described a perfect use case for the Microsoft Cloud. They had a simple web-based application with a SQL Server backend; they could move the application to Windows Azure, and the data into SQL Azure and in the process free themselves from much of the hassle surrounding management and scaling of the hardware, network and so on. It was a great fit and yet it nearly didn't happen; lack of support for the BACKUP command almost proved a show-stopper. Of course, backups of Azure databases are always and have always been taken automatically, for disaster recovery purposes, but these are strictly on-cloud copies and as of now it is not possible to use them to them to restore a database to a particular point in time. It seems that none of those clever Microsoft people managed to predict the need to perform basic backups of Azure databases so that copies could be stored locally, outside the Azure universe. At the very least, as Mike points out, performing a local backup before a new deployment is more or less mandatory. Microsoft did at least note the sound of gnashing teeth and, as a stop-gap measure, offered SQL Azure Database Copy which basically allows you to create an online clone of your database, but this doesn't allow for storing local archives of the data. To that end MS has provided SQL Azure Import/Export, to package up and export a database and its data, using BACPACs. These BACPACs do not guarantee transactional consistency; for example, if a child table is modified after the parent is copied, then the copied database will be in inconsistent state (meaning, to add to the fun, BACPACs need to be created from a database copy). In any event, widespread problems with BACPAC's evil cousin, the DACPAC have been well-documented, and it seems likely that many will also give BACPAC the bum's rush. Finally, in a TechEd 2011 presentation tagged "SQL Azure Advanced Administration", it was announced that "backup and restore" were coming in the next SQL Azure CTP. And yet this still doesn't mean that we'll get simple backups as DBAs know and love them. What it does mean, at least, is the ability to restore any given database to a point in time within a 2-week window. For the time being, if you want a local copy of your data and don't want to brave the BACPAC, one is left with SSIS or BCP, creative use of schema and data comparison tools, or use of SQL Azure Backup (currently in beta) in order to perform this simple but vital task. Cheers, Tony.

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