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• Why do XSLT editors insert tab or space characters into XSLT to format it?

  - by pgfearo

  All XSLT editors I've tried till now add tab or space characters to the XSLT to indent it for formatting. This is done even in places within the XSLT where these characters are significant to the XSLT processor. XSLT modified for formatting in this way can produce output very different to that of the original XSLT if it had no formatting. To prevent this, xsl:text elements or other XSLT must be added to a sequence constructor to help separate formatting from content, this additional XSLT impacts on maintainability. Formatting characters also adversely impact on general usability of the tool in a number of ways (this is why word-processors don't use them I guess) and add to the size of the file. As part of a larger project I've had to develop a light-weight XSLT editor, it's designed to format XSLT properly, but without tab or space characters, just a dynamic left-margin for each new line. The XSLT therefore doesn't need additional elements to separate formatting tab or space characters from content. The problem with this is that if XSLT from this editor is opened in other XSLT editors, characters will be added for formatting reasons and the XSLT may therefore no longer behave as intended. Why then do existing XSLT editors use tabs or spaces for formatting in the first place? I feel there must be valid reasons, perhaps historical, perhaps practical. An answer will help me understand whether I need to put compatibility options in place in my XSLT editor somehow, whether I should simply revert to using tabs or spaces for both XSLT content and formatting (though this seems like a backwards step to me), or even whether enough XSLT users might be able to persuade their tools vendors to include alternative formatting methods to tabs or spaces. Note: I provided an XSLT sample demonstrating formatting differences in this answer to the question: Tabs versus spaces—what is the proper indentation character for everything, in every situation, ever?

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• Five Point Partners Reviews Oracle Utilities Mobile Workforce Management 2.0

  - by caroline.yu

  Oracle recently provided Five Point Partners, Research and Analysis Division's Warren B. Causey and Bart Thielbar a one-hour briefing of Oracle Utilities Mobile Workforce Management 2.0. Based on that briefing, Warren and Bart provided an evaluation of the new software. The review notes that this is the first major rewrite of a mobile system. Oracle Utilities has made numerous updates in structure, architecture and functionality to the software that should well-position Oracle Utilities Mobile Workforce Management 2.0 for the current utility market. Additionally, the reviewers noted that one of the most significant improvements in the new version of Oracle Utilities Mobile Workforce Management is that it has moved to the same Java technical stack of other Oracle Utilities products. Utilities can deploy the software in multiple environments including Linux, Unix and Windows. This will simplify integration with existing Oracle products, as well as with other systems, thus potentially lowering cost of installation and ownership for utilities. Overall, Warren and Bart note that Oracle Utilities now has an impressive, state-of-the-art mobile workforce management system that utilities can readily deploy in a bundle with other Oracle solutions, or use as a stand-alone system with relatively easy integration to other utility systems. They state that Oracle Utilities Mobile Workforce Management 2.0 should significantly strengthen Oracle's competitive position in the mobile workforce management solution space. To take a look at the full review, click here.

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• The 'desktops' move to Oracle

  - by [email protected]

  The move to Oracle has been most interesting.  Here we have an organization who are interested in what they are interested in.  Not so much in things that aren't 'core'. The legacy Sun desktop products are things that Oracle is interested in.  To that end there are some changes coming to policies and products - and from my perspective they are all good. Very good. One of the changes to the Product suite is that we are now referred to as part of the Virtualization team, falling under Oracle's Chief Corporate Archtiect, Edward Screven.  Edward says that the Products were a 'gem' found inside the great pile of stuff that was Sun. Another change is that while StarOffice/Open Office has been certainly endorsed by Oracle, and it also falls under Edward's purview, and here has been a push on to use it as opposed to... well... you know.    It is not, however, part of the Virtualization team's product suite any more. There are some other really interesting changes coming that you will hear about quite soon.  The big message for today, though, is that Sun Rays, Secure Global Desktop, VirtualBox, and Oracle VDI software are all still alive and kicking and moving forward.  Infact, at the Oracle earnings call last week, Charles Phillips announced more significant wins with Sun Rays in the US Federal Governmnet space.  He could have talked about all kinds of legacy Sun products, but chose to mention Sun Rays in the first Quarterly statement since the acquisition of Sun - you should see this as a very good sign indeed. More soon - until then...

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• Looking ahead at 2011-with Paul Greenberg

  - by divya.malik

  It is almost the end of 2010, rather unbelievable how fast this year has gone by. It is always interesting to read what our CRM gurus have to say about the coming year. So here is CRM luminary, Paul Greenberg’s  forecast for 2011. Mobile CRM growth accelerates. CRM and “Social” companies continue to integrate their capabilities as a few suites begin to emerge. Social “rankings”, as a measure of customer engagement, will become a standard public measure. Analytics exhibits the most significant growth of any area with Customer Insight apps leading the way. Marketing apps mature with social marketing becoming an integral part of the application offering. Customer service begins to redefine itself with greater emphasis on service communities, web self-service and customer knowledge capture. Knowledge management replaces enterprise content management as a core requirement for large businesses. Customer experience reasserts itself loudly as the core of CRM and SCRM - This one is kind of a no-brainer in a way. Co-creation and customer driven product innovation becomes more than just an advanced idea. Microsoft Azure emerges as a true cloud provider at the level of Amazon as cloud computing considers its rise to becoming a primary technology infrastructure. Application marketplaces will become commonplace as companies look to platform providers to fill ecosystem needs, not just CRM. I do encourage you to read the details of his forecasts, that are split into two blog posts. For Part I click here and for Part II, click here. Technorati Tags: oracle,siebel CRM,scrm,paul greenberg

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• The Grenelle II Act In France: A Milestone Towards Integrated Reporting

  - by Evelyn Neumayr

  By Elena Avesani, Principal Product Strategy Manager, Oracle In July of 2010, France took a significant step towards mandating integrated sustainability and financial reporting for all large companies with a new law called Grenelle II. Article 225 of Grenelle II requires that many listed companies on the French stock exchanges incorporate information on the social and environmental consequences of their activities into their annual reports, as well as their societal commitments for sustainable development. The decree that implements Article 225 of Grenelle II was passed in April 2012. Grenelle II is the strongest governmental mandate yet in support of sustainability reporting. The law defines the phase-in process, with large listed companies expected to comply in their 2012 reports and smaller companies expected to comply with their 2014 annual reports. This extra-financial information will have to be embedded in the annual management report, approved by the Board of Directors, verified by a third-party body and given to the annual general meeting. The subjects that must be reported on are grouped into Environmental, Social, and Governance categories. Oracle solutions can help organizations integrate financial and sustainability reporting and provide a more accurate and auditable approach to collecting, consolidating, and reporting such environmental, social, and economic metrics. Through Oracle Environmental Accounting and Reporting and Oracle Hyperion Financial Management Sustainability Starter Kit organizations can collect environmental, social and governance data and collect and consolidate corporate sustainability reporting data from multiple systems and business units. For more information about these solutions please contact [email protected].

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• Elevating Customer Experience through Enterprise Social Networking

  - by john.brunswick

  I am not sure about most people, but I really dislike automated call center routing systems. They are impersonal and convey a sense that the company I am dealing with does not see the value of providing customer service that increases positive perception of their brand. By the time I am connected with a live support representative I am actually more frustrated than before I originally dialed. Each time a company interacts with its customers or prospects there is an opportunity to enhance that relationship. Technical enablers like call center routing systems can be a double edged sword - providing process efficiencies, but removing the human context of some interactions that can build a lot of long term value and create substantial repeat business. Certain web systems, available through "chat with a representative" now links on some web sites, provide a quick and easy way to get in touch with someone and cut down on help desk calls, but miss the opportunity to deliver an even more personal experience to customers and prospects. As more and more users head to the web for self-service and product information, the quality of this interaction becomes critical to supporting a company's brand image and viability. It takes very little effort to go a step further and elevate customer experience, without adding significant cost through social enterprise software technologies. Enterprise Social Networking Social networking technologies have slowly gained footholds in the enterprise, evolving from something that people may have been simply curious about, to tools that have started to provide tangible value in the enterprise. Much like instant messaging, once considered a toy in the enterprise, expertise search, blogs as communications tools, wikis for tacit knowledge sharing are all seeing adoption in a way that is directly applicable to the business and quickly adding value. So where does social networking come in when trying to enhance customer experience?

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• New Bundling and Minification Support (ASP.NET 4.5 Series)

  - by ScottGu

  This is the sixth in a series of blog posts I'm doing on ASP.NET 4.5. The next release of .NET and Visual Studio include a ton of great new features and capabilities.  With ASP.NET 4.5 you'll see a bunch of really nice improvements with both Web Forms and MVC - as well as in the core ASP.NET base foundation that both are built upon. Today’s post covers some of the work we are doing to add built-in support for bundling and minification into ASP.NET - which makes it easy to improve the performance of applications.  This feature can be used by all ASP.NET applications, including both ASP.NET MVC and ASP.NET Web Forms solutions. Basics of Bundling and Minification As more and more people use mobile devices to surf the web, it is becoming increasingly important that the websites and apps we build perform well with them. We’ve all tried loading sites on our smartphones – only to eventually give up in frustration as it loads slowly over a slow cellular network.  If your site/app loads slowly like that, you are likely losing potential customers because of bad performance.  Even with powerful desktop machines, the load time of your site and perceived performance can make an enormous customer perception. Most websites today are made up of multiple JavaScript and CSS files to separate the concerns and keep the code base tight. While this is a good practice from a coding point of view, it often has some unfortunate consequences for the overall performance of the website.  Multiple JavaScript and CSS files require multiple HTTP requests from a browser – which in turn can slow down the performance load time.  Simple Example Below I’ve opened a local website in IE9 and recorded the network traffic using IE’s built-in F12 developer tools. As shown below, the website consists of 5 CSS and 4 JavaScript files which the browser has to download. Each file is currently requested separately by the browser and returned by the server, and the process can take a significant amount of time proportional to the number of files in question. Bundling ASP.NET is adding a feature that makes it easy to “bundle” or “combine” multiple CSS and JavaScript files into fewer HTTP requests. This causes the browser to request a lot fewer files and in turn reduces the time it takes to fetch them.   Below is an updated version of the above sample that takes advantage of this new bundling functionality (making only one request for the JavaScript and one request for the CSS): The browser now has to send fewer requests to the server. The content of the individual files have been bundled/combined into the same response, but the content of the files remains the same - so the overall file size is exactly the same as before the bundling.   But notice how even on a local dev machine (where the network latency between the browser and server is minimal), the act of bundling the CSS and JavaScript files together still manages to reduce the overall page load time by almost 20%.  Over a slow network the performance improvement would be even better. Minification The next release of ASP.NET is also adding a new feature that makes it easy to reduce or “minify” the download size of the content as well.  This is a process that removes whitespace, comments and other unneeded characters from both CSS and JavaScript. The result is smaller files, which will download and load in a browser faster.  The graph below shows the performance gain we are seeing when both bundling and minification are used together: Even on my local dev box (where the network latency is minimal), we now have a 40% performance improvement from where we originally started.  On slow networks (and especially with international customers), the gains would be even more significant. Using Bundling and Minification inside ASP.NET The upcoming release of ASP.NET makes it really easy to take advantage of bundling and minification within projects and see performance gains like in the scenario above. The way it does this allows you to avoid having to run custom tools as part of your build process –  instead ASP.NET has added runtime support to perform the bundling/minification for you dynamically (caching the results to make sure perf is great).  This enables a really clean development experience and makes it super easy to start to take advantage of these new features. Let’s assume that we have a simple project that has 4 JavaScript files and 6 CSS files: Bundling and Minifying the .css files Let’s say you wanted to reference all of the stylesheets in the “Styles” folder above on a page.  Today you’d have to add multiple CSS references to get all of them – which would translate into 6 separate HTTP requests: The new bundling/minification feature now allows you to instead bundle and minify all of the .css files in the Styles folder – simply by sending a URL request to the folder (in this case “styles”) with an appended “/css” path after it.  For example:    This will cause ASP.NET to scan the directory, bundle and minify the .css files within it, and send back a single HTTP response with all of the CSS content to the browser.  You don’t need to run any tools or pre-processor to get this behavior.  This enables you to cleanly separate your CSS into separate logical .css files and maintain a very clean development experience – while not taking a performance hit at runtime for doing so.  The Visual Studio designer will also honor the new bundling/minification logic as well – so you’ll still get a WYSWIYG designer experience inside VS as well. Bundling and Minifying the JavaScript files Like the CSS approach above, if we wanted to bundle and minify all of our JavaScript into a single response we could send a URL request to the folder (in this case “scripts”) with an appended “/js” path after it:   This will cause ASP.NET to scan the directory, bundle and minify the .js files within it, and send back a single HTTP response with all of the JavaScript content to the browser.  Again – no custom tools or builds steps were required in order to get this behavior.  And it works with all browsers. Ordering of Files within a Bundle By default, when files are bundled by ASP.NET they are sorted alphabetically first, just like they are shown in Solution Explorer. Then they are automatically shifted around so that known libraries and their custom extensions such as jQuery, MooTools and Dojo are loaded before anything else. So the default order for the merged bundling of the Scripts folder as shown above will be: Jquery-1.6.2.js Jquery-ui.js Jquery.tools.js a.js By default, CSS files are also sorted alphabetically and then shifted around so that reset.css and normalize.css (if they are there) will go before any other file. So the default sorting of the bundling of the Styles folder as shown above will be: reset.css content.css forms.css globals.css menu.css styles.css The sorting is fully customizable, though, and can easily be changed to accommodate most use cases and any common naming pattern you prefer.  The goal with the out of the box experience, though, is to have smart defaults that you can just use and be successful with. Any number of directories/sub-directories supported In the example above we just had a single “Scripts” and “Styles” folder for our application.  This works for some application types (e.g. single page applications).  Often, though, you’ll want to have multiple CSS/JS bundles within your application – for example: a “common” bundle that has core JS and CSS files that all pages use, and then page specific or section specific files that are not used globally. You can use the bundling/minification support across any number of directories or sub-directories in your project – this makes it easy to structure your code so as to maximize the bunding/minification benefits.  Each directory by default can be accessed as a separate URL addressable bundle.  Bundling/Minification Extensibility ASP.NET’s bundling and minification support is built with extensibility in mind and every part of the process can be extended or replaced. Custom Rules In addition to enabling the out of the box - directory-based - bundling approach, ASP.NET also supports the ability to register custom bundles using a new programmatic API we are exposing.  The below code demonstrates how you can register a “customscript” bundle using code within an application’s Global.asax class.  The API allows you to add/remove/filter files that go into the bundle on a very granular level:     The above custom bundle can then be referenced anywhere within the application using the below <script> reference:     Custom Processing You can also override the default CSS and JavaScript bundles to support your own custom processing of the bundled files (for example: custom minification rules, support for Saas, LESS or Coffeescript syntax, etc). In the example below we are indicating that we want to replace the built-in minification transforms with a custom MyJsTransform and MyCssTransform class. They both subclass the CSS and JavaScript minifier respectively and can add extra functionality:     The end result of this extensibility is that you can plug-into the bundling/minification logic at a deep level and do some pretty cool things with it. 2 Minute Video of Bundling and Minification in Action Mads Kristensen has a great 90 second video that shows off using the new Bundling and Minification feature.  You can watch the 90 second video here. Summary The new bundling and minification support within the next release of ASP.NET will make it easier to build fast web applications.  It is really easy to use, and doesn’t require major changes to your existing dev workflow.  It is also supports a rich extensibility API that enables you to customize it however you want. You can easily take advantage of this new support within ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET Web Forms and ASP.NET Web Pages based applications. Hope this helps, Scott P.S. In addition to blogging, I use Twitter to-do quick posts and share links. My Twitter handle is: @scottgu

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• Async & Await in C# with Xamarin

  - by Wallym

   One of the great things about the .NET Framework is that Microsoft has worked long and hard to improve many features. Since the initial release of .NET 1.0, there has been support for threading via .NET threads as well as an application-level threadpool. This provided a great starting point when compared to Visual Basic 6 and classic ASP programming. The release of.NET 4 brought significant improvements in the area of threading, asynchronous operations and parallel operations. While the improvements made working with asynchronous operations easier, new problems were introduced, since many of these operations work based on callbacks. For example: How should a developer handle error checking? The program flow tends to be non-linear. Fixing bugs can be problematic. It is hard for a developer to get an understanding of what is happening within an application. The release of .NET 4.5 (and C# 5.0), in the fall of 2012, was a blockbuster update with regards to asynchronous operations and threads. Microsoft has added C# language keywords to take this non-linear callback-based program flow and turn it into a much more linear flow. Recently, Xamarin has updated Xamarin.Android and Xamarin.iOS to support async. This article will look at how Xamarin has implemented the .NET 4.5/C# 5 support into their Xamarin.iOS and Xamarin.Android productions. There are three general areas that I'll focus on: A general look at the asynchronous support in Xamarin's mobile products. This includes async, await, and the implications that this has for cross-platform code. The new HttpClient class that is provided in .NET 4.5/Mono 3.2. Xamarin's extensions for asynchronous operations for Android and iOS. FYI: Be aware that sometimes the OpenWeatherMap API breaks, for no reason.  I found this out after I shipped the article in.

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• JCP Party at JavOne and other JCP events

  - by heathervc

  Don't miss all of these great opportunities to get involved with the JCP program at JavaOne next week. The details are listed below and listed on the JCP at JavaOne page  as well. Join us for the annual JCP community party on Tuesday evening, 2 October, to be held at the Infusion Lounge. Drop by starting at 6:30 pm to meet fellow Java Community members, JCP members and EC representatives, enjoy appetizers/beer, pick up a door prize, enter a raffle and congratulate the winners and nominees (newly updated nominee information available now) of the 10th annual awards in three categories: JCP Member of the Year, Outstanding Spec Lead, and Most Significant JSR. The day by day breakdown is as follows... Sunday 9/30/12JCP and OpenJDK: Using the JUGs' "Adopt" Programs in Your Group Session ID: UGF10434Location: Moscone West - 2002Date and Time: 9/30/12, 12:15 PM - 1:00 PMJCP Public Executive Committee Face-to-Face Meeting Open to Executive Committee Members and the Java Developer CommunityLocation: Clift Hotel, 495 Geary Street, San Francisco - Rita Room (downstairs from Lobby)Date and Time: 9/30/12, 2:00 PM - 3:30 PM; Agenda includes open Q&A, JCP.Next, EC Elections - no JavaOne pass required! Monday 10/1/12JCP in the OTN Java DEMOgrounds Location: Hilton Hotel Grand BallroomDate and Time: 10/1/12, 4:00 PM - 4:30 PMJCP.Next: Reinvigorating Java Standards Session ID: BOF6272Location: Hilton San Francisco - Plaza A/BDate and Time: 10/1/12, 4:30 PM - 5:15 PM101 Ways to Improve Java: Why Developer Participation Matters Session ID: BOF6283Location: Hilton San Francisco - Continental Ballroom 4Date and Time: 10/1/12, 5:30 PM - 6:15 PM Tuesday 10/2/12JCP in the OTN Java DEMOgrounds Location: Hilton Hotel Grand BallroomDate and Time: 10/2/12, 12:00 PM - 1:30 PMSpec Leads Meeting with the JCP PMO Location: Hilton San Francisco - Van Ness RoomDate and Time: 10/2/12, 3:00 PM - 4:00 PMCome learn how you benefit from the changesMeet the JCP Executive Committee Candidates Session ID: BOF6307Location: Hilton San Francisco - Golden Gate 3/4/5Date and Time: 10/2/12, 4:30 PM - 5:15 PMThe 10th Annual JCP Awards Presentation and Party Enjoy an evening with this year's JCP Award nominees and watch as we announce the winners -  no JavaOne pass required! Location: Infusion Lounge - 124 Ellis Street, San FranciscoDate and Time: 10/2/12, 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM Hope to see you there!

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• How does an optimizing compiler react to a program with nested loops?

  - by D.Singh

  Say you have a bunch of nested loops. public void testMethod() { for(int i = 0; i<1203; i++){ //some computation for(int k=2; k<123; k++){ //some computation for(int j=2; j<12312; j++){ //some computation for(int l=2; l<123123; l++){ //some computation for(int p=2; p<12312; p++){ //some computation } } } } } } When the above code reaches the stage where the compiler will try to optimize it (I believe it's when the intermediate language needs to converted to machine code?), what will the compiler try to do? Is there any significant optimization that will take place? I understand that the optimizer will break up the loops by means of loop fission. But this is only per loop isn't it? What I mean with my question is will it take any action exclusively based on seeing the nested loops? Or will it just optimize the loops one by one? If the Java VM complicates the explanation then please just assume that it's C or C++ code.

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• Documentation in Oracle Retail Analytics, Release 13.3

  - by Oracle Retail Documentation Team

  The 13.3 Release of Oracle Retail Analytics is now available on the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud and from My Oracle Support. The Oracle Retail Analytics 13.3 release introduced significant new functionality with its new Customer Analytics module. The Customer Analytics module enables you to perform retail analysis of customers and customer segments. Market basket analysis (part of the Customer Analytics module) provides insight into which products have strong affinity with one another. Customer behavior information is obtained from mining sales transaction history, and it is correlated with customer segment attributes to inform promotion strategies. The ability to understand market basket affinities allows marketers to calculate, monitor, and build promotion strategies based on critical metrics such as customer profitability. Highlighted End User Documentation Updates With the addition of Oracle Retail Customer Analytics, the documentation set addresses both modules under the single umbrella name of Oracle Retail Analytics. Note, however, that the modules, Oracle Retail Merchandising Analytics and Oracle Retail Customer Analytics, are licensed separately. To accommodate new functionality, the Retail Analytics suite of documentation has been updated in the following areas, among others: The User Guide has been updated with an overview of Customer Analytics. It also contains a list of metrics associated with Customer Analytics. The Operations Guide provides details on Market Basket Analysis as well as an updated list of APIs. The program reference list now also details the module (Merchandising Analytics or Customer Analytics) to which each program applies. The Data Model was updated to include new information related to Customer Analytics, and a new section, Market Basket Analysis Module, was added to the document with its own entity relationship diagrams and data definitions. List of Documents The following documents are included in Oracle Retail Analytics 13.3: Oracle Retail Analytics Release Notes Oracle Retail Analytics Installation Guide Oracle Retail Analytics User Guide Oracle Retail Analytics Implementation Guide Oracle Retail Analytics Operations Guide Oracle Retail Analytics Data Model

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• Does HTML 5 &ldquo;Rich vs. Reach&rdquo; a False Choice?

  - by andrewbrust

  The competition between the Web and proprietary rich platforms, including Windows, Mac OS, iPhone/iPad, Adobe’s Flash/AIR and Microsoft’s Silverlight, is not new. But with the emergence of HTML 5 and imminent support for it in the next release of the major Web browsers, the battle is heating up. And with the announcements made Wednesday at Google's I/O conference, it's getting kicked up yet another notch. The impact of this platform battle on companies in the media and advertising world, and the developers who serve them, is significant. The most prominent question is whether video and rich media online will shift towards pure HTML and away from plug-ins like Flash and Silverlight. In fact, certain features in HTML 5 make it suitable for development for line of business applications as well, further threatening those plug-in technologies. So what's the deal? Is this real or hype? To answer that question, I've done my own research into HTML 5's features and talked to several media-focused, New York area developers to get their opinions. I present my findings to you in this post. Before bearing down into HTML 5 specifics and practitioners’ quotes, let's set the context. To understand what HTML 5 can do, take a look at this video of Sports Illustrated’s HTML 5 prototype. This should start to get you bought into the idea that HTML 5 could be a game-changer. Next, if you happen to have installed the beta version of Google's Chrome 5 browser, take a look at the page linked to below, and in that page, click on any of the game thumbnails to see what's possible, without a plug-in, in this brave new world. (Note, although the instructions for each game tell you to press the A key to start, press the Z key instead.). Here's the link: http://www.kesiev.com/akihabara As an adjunct to what's enabled by HTML 5, consider the various transforms that are part of CSS 3. If you're running Safari as your browser, the following link will showcase this live; if not, you'll see a bitmap that will give you an idea of what's possible: http://webkit.org/blog/386/3d-transforms Are you starting to get the picture (literally)? What has up until now required browser plug-ins and other patches to HTML, most typically Flash, will soon be renderable, natively, in all major browsers. Moreover, it's looking likely that developers will be able to deliver such content and experiences in these browsers using one base of markup and script code (using straight JavaScript and/or jQuery), without resorting to browser-specific code and workarounds. If you're skeptical of this, I wouldn't blame you, especially with respect to Microsoft's Internet Explorer. However, i can tell you with confidence that even Microsoft is dedicated to full-on HTML 5 support in version 9 of that browser, which is currently under development. So what’s new in HTML 5, specifically, that makes sites like this possible?  The specification documents go into deep detail, and there’s no sense in rehashing them here, but a summary is probably in order.   Here is a non-authoritative, but useful, list of the major new feature areas in HTML 5: 2D drawing capabilities and 3D transforms. 2D drawing instructions can be embedded statically into a Web page; application interactivity and animation can be achieved through script.  As mentioned above, 3D transforms are technically part of version 3 of the CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) spec, rather than HTML 5, but they can nonetheless be thought of as part of the bundle.  They allow for rendering of 3D images and animations that, together with 2D drawing, make HTML-based games much more feasible than they are presently, as the links above demonstrate. Embedded audio and video. A media player can appear directly in a rendered Web page, using HTML markup and no plug-ins. Alternately, player controls can be hidden and the content can play automatically. Major enhancements to form-based input. This includes such things as specification of required fields, embedding of text “hints” into a control, limiting valid input on a field to dates, email addresses or a list of values.  There’s more to this, but the gist is that line-of-business applications, with complicated input and data validation, are supported directly Offline caching, local storage and client-side SQL database. These facilities allow Web applications to function more like native apps, even if no internet connection is available. User-defined data. Data (or metadata – data about data) can easily be embedded statically and/or retrieved and updated with Javascript code. This avoids having to embed that data in a separate file, or within script code. Taken together, these features position HTML to compete with, and perhaps overtake, Adobe’s Flash/AIR (and Microsoft’s Silverlight) as a viable Web platform for media, RIAs (rich internet applications – apps that function more like desktop software than Web sites) and interactive Web content, including games. What do players in the media world think about this?  From the embedded video above, we know what Sports Illustrated (and, therefore, Time Warner) think.  Hulu, the major Internet site for broadcast TV content, is on record as saying HTML5 video does not pass muster with them, at least not yet.  YouTube, on the other hand, already has an experimental HTML 5-based version of their site.  TechCrunch has reported that NetFlix is flirting with HTML 5 too, especially as it pertains to embedded browsers in TV-based devices.  And the New York Times’ Web site now embeds some video clips without resorting to Flash.  They have to – otherwise iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad users couldn’t see them in the Mobile Safari browser. What do media-focused developers think about all this?  I talked to several to get their opinions. Michael Pinto is CEO and Founder of Very Memorable Design whose primary focus has been to help marketing directors get traction online.  The firm’s client roster includes the likes Time, Inc., Scholastic and PBS.  Pinto predicts that “More and more microsites that were done entirely in Flash will be done more and more using jQuery. I can also see slideshows and video now being done without Flash. However if you needed to create a game or highly interactive activity Flash would still be the way to go for the web.” A dissenting view comes from Jesse Erlbaum, CEO of The Erlbaum Group, LLC, which serves numerous clients in the magazine publishing sector.  When I asked Erlbaum whether he thought HTML 5 and jQuery/JavaScript would steal significant market share from Flash, he responded “Not at all!  In particular, not for media and advertising customers!  These sectors are not generally in the business of making highly functional applications, which is the one place where HTML5/jQuery/etc really shines.” Ironically, Pinto’s firm is a heavy user of Flash for its projects and Erlbaum’s develops atop the “LAMP” (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP/Perl) stack.  For whatever reason, each firm seems to see the other’s toolset as a more viable choice.  But both agree that the developer tool story around HTML 5 is deficient.  Pinto explains “What’s lost with [HTML 5 and Javascript] techniques is that there isn’t a single widely favored easy-to-use tool of choice for authoring. So with Flash you can get up and running right away and not worry about what is different from one browser to the next.“  Erlbaum agrees, saying: “HTML5/Javascript lacks a sophisticated integrated development environment (IDE) which is an essential part of Flash.  If what someone is trying to make is primarily animation, it's a waste of time…to do this in Javascript.  It can be done much more easily in Flash, and with greater cross-browser compatibility and consistency due to the ubiquity of Flash.” Adobe (maker of Flash since its 2005 acquisition of Macromedia) likely agrees.  And for better or worse, they’ve decided to address this shortcoming of HTML 5, even at risk of diminishing their Flash platfrom. Yesterday Adobe announced that their hugely popular Deamweaver Web design authoring tool would directly support HTML 5 and CSS 3 development.  In fact, the Adobe Dreamweaver CS5 HTML5 Pack is downloadable now from Adobe Labs. Maybe Adobe is bowing to pressure from ardent Web professionals like Scott Kellum, Lead Designer at Channel V Media,  a digital and offline branding firm, serving the media and marketing sectors, among others.  Kellum told me that HTML 5 “…will definitely move people away from Flash. It has many of the same functionalities with faster load times and better accessibility. HTML5 will help Flash as well: with the new caching methods you can now even run Flash apps offline.” Although all three Web developers I interviewed would agree that Flash is still required for more sophisticated applications, Kellum seems to have put his finger on why HTML 5 may nonetheless dominate.  In his view, much of the Web development out there has little need for high-end capabilities: “Most people want to add a little punch to a navigation bar or some video and now you can get the biggest bang for your buck with HTML5, CSS3 and Javascript.” I’ve already mentioned that Google’s ongoing I/O conference, at the Moscone West center in San Francisco, is driving the HTML 5 news cycle, big time.  And Google made many announcements of their own, including the open sourcing of their VP8 video codec, new enterprise-oriented capabilities for its App Engine cloud offering, and the creation of the Chrome Web Store, which the company says will make it easier to find and “install” Web applications, in a fashion similar to  the way users procure native apps on various mobile platforms. HTML 5 looks to be disruptive, especially to the media world.  And even if the technology ends up disappointing, the chatter around it alone is causing big changes in the technology world.  If the richness it promises delivers, then magazine publishers and non-text digital advertisers may indeed have a platform for creating compelling content that loads quickly, is standards-based and will render identically in (the newest versions of) all major Web browsers.  Can this development in the digital arena save the titans of the print world?  I can’t predict, but it’s going to be fun to watch, and the competitive innovation from all players in both industries will likely be immense.

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• Frank Buytendijk on Prahalad, Business Best Practices

  - by Bob Rhubart

    In his video on the questionable value of some business best practices, Frank Buytendijk mentions a recent HBR article by business guru C.K. Prahalad. I just learned that Prahalad passed away this past weekend at the age of 68. (Information Week obit) A couple of years ago I had the good fortune to attend Mr. Prahalad’s keynote address at a Gartner event.  He had an audience of software architects absolutely mesmerized as he discussed technology’s role in the changing nature of business competition.  The often dysfunctional relationship between IT and business has and will probably always be hot-button issue. But during Prahalad’s keynote,  there was a palpable sense that the largely technical audience was having some kind of breakthrough, that they had achieved a new level of understanding about the importance of the relationship between the two camps. Fortunately, Prahalad leaves behind a significant body of work that will remain a valuable resource as business and the technology that supports it continues to evolve. Technorati Tags: business best practices,enterprise architecture,prahalad,oracle del.icio.us Tags: business best practices,enterprise architecture,prahalad,oracle

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• Windows 8 Will be Here Tomorrow; but Should Silverlight be Gone Today?

  - by andrewbrust

  The software industry lives within an interesting paradox. IT in the enterprise moves slowly and cautiously, upgrading only when safe and necessary.  IT interests intentionally live in the past.  On the other hand, developers, and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) not only want to use the latest and greatest technologies, but this constituency prides itself on gauging tech’s future, and basing its present-day strategy upon it.  Normally, we as an industry manage this paradox with a shrug of the shoulder and musings along the lines of “it takes all kinds.”  Different subcultures have different tendencies.  So be it. Microsoft, with its Windows operating system (OS), can’t take such a laissez-faire view of the world though.  Redmond relies on IT to deploy Windows and (at the very least) influence its procurement, but it also relies on developers to build software for Windows, especially software that has a dependency on features in new versions of the OS.  It must indulge and nourish developers’ fetish for an early birthing of the next generation of software, even as it acknowledges the IT reality that the next wave will arrive on-schedule in Redmond and will travel very slowly to end users. With the move to Windows 8, and the corresponding shift in application development models, this paradox is certainly in place. On the one hand, the next version of Windows is widely expected sometime in 2012, and its full-scale deployment will likely push into 2014 or even later.  Meanwhile, there’s a technology that runs on today’s Windows 7, will continue to run in the desktop mode of Windows 8 (the next version’s codename), and provides absolutely the best architectural bridge to the Windows 8 Metro-style application development stack.  That technology is Silverlight.  And given what we now know about Windows 8, one might think, as I do, that Microsoft ecosystem developers should be flocking to it. But because developers are trying to get a jump on the future, and since many of them believe the impending v5.0 release of Silverlight will be the technology’s last, not everyone is flocking to it; in fact some are fleeing from it.  Is this sensible?  Is it not unprecedented?  What options does it lead to?  What’s the right way to think about the situation? Is v5.0 really the last major version of the technology called Silverlight?  We don’t know.  But Scott Guthrie, the “father” and champion of the technology, left the Developer Division of Microsoft months ago to work on the Windows Azure team, and he took his people with him.  John Papa, who was a very influential Redmond-based evangelist for Silverlight (and is a Visual Studio Magazine author), left Microsoft completely.  About a year ago, when initial suspicion of Silverlight’s demise reached significant magnitude, Papa interviewed Guthrie on video and their discussion served to dispel developers’ fears; but now they’ve moved on. So read into that what you will and let’s suppose, for the sake of argument, speculation that Silverlight’s days of major revision and iteration are over now is correct.  Let’s assume the shine and glimmer has dimmed.  Let’s assume that any Silverlight application written today, and that therefore any investment of financial and human resources made in Silverlight development today, is destined for rework and extra investment in a few years, if the application’s platform needs to stay current. Is this really so different from any technology investment we make?  Every framework, language, runtime and operating system is subject to change, to improvement, to flux and, yes, to obsolescence.  What differs from project to project, is how near-term that obsolescence is and how disruptive the change will be.  The shift from .NET 1.1. to 2.0 was incremental.  Some of the further changes were too.  But the switch from Windows Forms to WPF was major, and the change from ASP.NET Web Services (asmx) to Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) was downright fundamental. Meanwhile, the transition to the .NET development model for Windows 8 Metro-style applications is actually quite gentle.  The finer points of this subject are covered nicely in Magenic’s excellent white paper “Assessing the Windows 8 Development Platform.” As the authors of that paper (including Rocky Lhotka)  point out, Silverlight code won’t just “port” to Windows 8.  And, no, Silverlight user interfaces won’t either; Metro always supports XAML, but that relationship is not commutative.  But the concepts, the syntax, the architecture and developers’ skills map from Silverlight to Windows 8 Metro and the Windows Runtime (WinRT) very nicely.  That’s not a coincidence.  It’s not an accident.  This is a protected transition.  It’s not a slap in the face. There are few things that are unnerving about this transition, which make it seem markedly different from others: The assumed end of the road for Silverlight is something many think they can see.  Instead of being ignorant of the technology’s expiration date, we believe we know it.  If ignorance is bliss, it would seem our situation lacks it. The new technology involving WinRT and Metro involves a name change from Silverlight. .NET, which underlies both Silverlight and the XAML approach to WinRT development, has just about reached 10 years of age.  That’s equivalent to 80 in human years, or so many fear. My take is that the combination of these three factors has contributed to what for many is a psychologically compelling case that Silverlight should be abandoned today and HTML 5 (the agnostic kind, not the Windows RT variety) should be embraced in its stead.  I understand the logic behind that.  I appreciate the preemptive, proactive, vigilant conscientiousness involved in its calculus.  But for a great many scenarios, I don’t agree with it.  HTML 5 clients, no matter how impressive their interactivity and the emulation of native application interfaces they present may be, are still second-class clients.  They are getting better, especially when hardware acceleration and fast processors are involved.  But they still lag.  They still feel like they’re emulating something, like they’re prototypes, like they’re not comfortable in their own skins.  They are based on compromise, and they feel compromised too. HTML 5/JavaScript development tools are getting better, and will get better still, but they are not as productive as tools for other environments, like Flash, like Silverlight or even more primitive tooling for iOS or Android.  HTML’s roots as a document markup language, rather than an application interface, create a disconnect that impedes productivity.  I do not necessarily think that problem is insurmountable, but it’s here today. If you’re building line-of-business applications, you need a first-class client and you need productivity.  Lack of productivity increases your costs and worsens your backlog.  A second class client will erode user satisfaction, which is never good.  Worse yet, this erosion will be inconspicuous, rather than easily identified and diagnosed, because the inferiority of an HTML 5 client over a native one is hard to identify and, notably, doing so at this juncture in the industry is unpopular.  Why would you fault a technology that everyone believes is revolutionary?  Instead, user disenchantment will remain latent and yet will add to the malaise caused by slower development. If you’re an ISV and you’re coveting the reach of running multi-platform, it’s a different story.  You’ve likely wanted to move to HTML 5 already, and the uncertainty around Silverlight may be the only remaining momentum or pretext you need to make the shift.  You’re deploying many more copies of your application than a line-of-business developer is anyway; this makes the economic hit from lower productivity less impactful, and the wider potential installed base might even make it profitable. But no matter who you are, it’s important to take stock of the situation and do it accurately.  Continued, but merely incremental changes in a development model lead to conservatism and general lack of innovation in the underlying platform.  Periods of stability and equilibrium are necessary, but permanence in that equilibrium leads to loss of platform relevance, market share and utility.  Arguably, that’s already happened to Windows.  The change Windows 8 brings is necessary and overdue.  The marked changes in using .NET if we’re to build applications for the new OS are inevitable.  We will ultimately benefit from the change, and what we can reasonably hope for in the interim is a migration path for our code and skills that is navigable, logical and conceptually comfortable. That path takes us to a place called WinRT, rather than a place called Silverlight.  But considering everything that is changing for the good, the number of disruptive changes is impressively minimal.  The name may be changing, and there may even be some significance to that in terms of Microsoft’s internal management of products and technologies.  But as the consumer, you should care about the ingredients, not the name.  Turkish coffee and Greek coffee are much the same. Although you’ll find plenty of interested parties who will find the names significant, drinkers of the beverage should enjoy either one.  It’s all coffee, it’s all sweet, and you can tell your fortune from the grounds that are left at the end.  Back on the software side, it’s all XAML, and C# or VB .NET, and you can make your fortune from the product that comes out at the end.  Coffee drinkers wouldn’t switch to tea.  Why should XAML developers switch to HTML?

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• Java devs: why not use Groovy?

  - by FarmBoy

  OK, so there are quite a few people using Java these days. But as the language nears two decades of age, it isn't exactly the coolest option out there. Many of us are excited about dynamic languages with some functional features like Ruby or Python, even though we spend our days using Java. So why is it that the adoption of Groovy has been so slow? It seems that Groovy offers much of the benefits of Ruby and Python, but it is far easier to transition a Java shop to Groovy. Even if performance were the concern, it seems that many would want to use Groovy for testing the production Java code. Or use Groovy/Grails for internal apps in which performance concerns are minimal. Or for writing one-off scripts to generate code. Yet Groovy languishes outside of Tiobe's top 50 languages, for reasons that are unclear to me. I have been using Groovy and Grails professionally for about four months, and it has been an excellent experience, such that I hate to think about going back to the Java/Spring/Hibernate model. Does anyone have any sense on why we are not seeing more significant migration from Java to Groovy? Note that I'm not asking why Java developers are still using Java for new projects. My question is: Why is it that most Java Developers are still not using Groovy at all. Edit: I am assuming that all good developers see the utility of dynamic typing and higher order functions for some programming tasks. (Even if it is deemed inappropriate for production code.)

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• Virtualization in Solaris 11 Express

  - by lynn.rohrer(at)oracle.com

  In Oracle Solaris 10 we introduced Oracle Solaris Containers -- lightweight virtual application environments that allow you to consolidate your Oracle Solaris applications onto a single Oracle Solaris server and make the most of your system resources.The majority of our customers are now using Oracle Solaris Containers on their enterprise systems for applications ranging from web servers to Oracle Database installations. We can also make these Containers highly available with Oracle Solaris Cluster, the industry's first virtualization-aware enterprise cluster product. Using Oracle Solaris Cluster you can failover applications in a Container to another Container on a single system or across systems for additional availability.We've added significant features in Oracle Solaris 11 Express to improve and extend the Oracle Solaris Zone model:Integration of Zones with our new Solaris 11 packaging system (aka Image Packaging System) to provide easy software updates within a zoneSupport for Oracle Solaris 10 Zones to run your Solaris 10 applications unaltered on an Oracle Solaris 11 Express systemIntegration with the new Oracle Solaris 11 network stack architecture (more on this in a future blog post)Improved observability with the zonestat management interface and commandsDelegated administration rights for owners of individual non-global zonesTight integration with Oracle Solaris ZFS to allow dedicated datasets per zoneWith ZFS as the default file system we can now provide easy to manage Boot Environments for zonesThis quick summary is just to whet your appetite to learn more about Oracle Solaris 11 Express Zones enhancements. Fortunately we can serve a full meal at the Oracle Solaris 11 Express Technology Spotlight on Virtualization page on the Oracle Technical Network.

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• CRM at Oracle Series: Do Not Call & Do Not Email

  - by tony.berk

  Who you gonna call? Or not call! Sorry, just kidding, this isn't a movie blog! Do Not Call is an important topic for all businesses as there are government regulations that can lead to significant fines, and of course, possible damage to your brand. Oracle leverages Siebel CRM to develop an effective solution to address the Do Not Call and Email Permissible Use requirements. The application uses the Contacts functionality to manage communication preferences, which when defined, centrally synchronizes all contact records that share the same phone number and email address. Additionally, the relevant information is masked so Oracle employees cannot accidentally reach out to the contact. Therefore, the solution ensures that we are compliant with regulations, enables us to respect individuals' communication preferences and provides an audit trail of changes to their preferences. Today's CRM at Oracle slidecast discusses the requirements, highlights benefits and provides screen shots of the solution. CRM at Oracle Series: Do Not Call & Do Not Email Click here to learn more about Siebel CRM and other Oracle CRM products. Are you enjoying the CRM at Oracle Series? We are working on more topics for this year, but if there is a particular CRM area or function which you'd like to hear how Oracle implemented it internally, leave us a comment and we'll try to get it on our list.

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• Gain Total Control of Systems running Oracle Linux

  - by Anand Akela

  Oracle Linux is the best Linux for enterprise computing needs and Oracle Enterprise Manager enables enterprises to gain total control over systems running Oracle Linux. Linux Management functionality is available as part of Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c and is available to Oracle Linux Basic and Premier Support customers at no cost. The solution provides an integrated and cost-effective solution for complete Linux systems lifecycle management and delivers comprehensive provisioning, patching, monitoring, and administration capabilities via a single, web-based user interface thus significantly reducing the complexity and cost associated with managing Linux operating system environments. Many enterprises are transforming their IT infrastructure from multiple independent datacenters to an Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) model, in which shared pools of compute and storage are made available to end-users on a self-service basis. While providing significant improvements when implemented properly, this strategy introduces change and complexity at a time when datacenters are already understaffed and overburdened. To aid in this transformation, IT managers need the proper tools to help them provide the array of IT capabilities required throughout the organization without stretching their staff and budget to the limit. Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c offers  the advanced capabilities to enable IT departments and end-users to take advantage of many benefits and cost savings of IaaS. Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c addresses this challenge with a converged approach that integrates systems management across the infrastructure stack, helping organizations to streamline operations, increase productivity, and reduce system downtime.  You can see the Linux management functionality in action by watching the latest integrated Linux management demo . Stay Connected with Oracle Enterprise Manager: Twitter |  Face book |  You Tube |  Linked in |  Newsletter

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• Frank Ludolph's Last Day at Work

  - by mprove

  Hi Frank, today is your last day at Oracle. I cannot belief that retirement is an alternative to designing software and improving products for decades. I might figure it out myself in a couple of years. Our ways have crossed several times. And I am extremely thankful for that. I still remember my first session on an Apple Lisa. It must have been around 1985. I was still in school, and we were visiting the University of Hamburg to get some orientation on the departments. When I started I chose Informatics. And I suppose the Apple Lisa played a significant role in my decision. Is it fate that I later wrote about Apple Lisa? I’ve attended your presentation and public demo of the Lisa System at CHI ’98 in Los Angeles. Maybe a video still exists. I should look it up and publish it somewhere. You had also booth duty for Sun Microsystems – presenting HotJava Views, a user interface for a network computer. And you were handing out VHS tapes (!) of Starfire. I still have mine – but no player anymore. Then I joined Sun in 2002, and I guess I popped up in your office each time when I came to Santa Clara. The SEED mentoring program finally made it possible that we exchanged and discussed many ideas on the past and future of HCI. Dueling Interaction Models of Personal-Computing and Web-Computing at MEDICI 2007 is one of the results. But do you remember for instance also our jam session with Phil Clevenger on Hello World? Marvelous! I will miss you at Oracle. Enjoy your life and let’s stay in touch.Matthias

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• Ajax Control Toolkit May 2012 Release

  - by Stephen.Walther

  I’m happy to announce the May 2012 release of the Ajax Control Toolkit. This newest release of the Ajax Control Toolkit includes a new file upload control which displays file upload progress. We’ve also added several significant enhancements to the existing HtmlEditorExtender control such as support for uploading images and Source View. You can download and start using the newest version of the Ajax Control Toolkit by entering the following command in the Library Package Manager console in Visual Studio: Install-Package AjaxControlToolkit Alternatively, you can download the latest version of the Ajax Control Toolkit from CodePlex: http://AjaxControlToolkit.CodePlex.com The New Ajax File Upload Control The most requested new feature for the Ajax Control Toolkit (according to the CodePlex Issue Tracker) has been support for file upload with progress. We worked hard over the last few months to create an entirely new file upload control which displays upload progress. Here is a sample which illustrates how you can use the new AjaxFileUpload control: <%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeBehind="01_FileUpload.aspx.cs" Inherits="WebApplication1._01_FileUpload" %> <html> <head runat="server"> <title>Simple File Upload</title> </head> <body> <form id="form1" runat="server"> <div> <ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager runat="server" /> <ajaxToolkit:AjaxFileUpload id="ajaxUpload1" OnUploadComplete="ajaxUpload1_OnUploadComplete" runat="server" /> </div> </form> </body> </html> The page above includes a ToolkitScriptManager control. This control is required to use any of the controls in the Ajax Control Toolkit because this control is responsible for loading all of the scripts required by a control. The page also contains an AjaxFileUpload control. The UploadComplete event is handled in the code-behind for the page: namespace WebApplication1 { public partial class _01_FileUpload : System.Web.UI.Page { protected void ajaxUpload1_OnUploadComplete(object sender, AjaxControlToolkit.AjaxFileUploadEventArgs e) { // Generate file path string filePath = "~/Images/" + e.FileName; // Save upload file to the file system ajaxUpload1.SaveAs(MapPath(filePath)); } } } The UploadComplete handler saves each uploaded file by calling the AjaxFileUpload control’s SaveAs() method with a full file path. Here’s a video which illustrates the process of uploading a file: Warning: in order to write to the Images folder on a production IIS server, you need Write permissions on the Images folder. You need to provide permissions for the IIS Application Pool account to write to the Images folder. To learn more, see: http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/624/application-pool-identities/ Showing File Upload Progress The new AjaxFileUpload control takes advantage of HTML5 upload progress events (described in the XMLHttpRequest Level 2 standard). This standard is supported by Firefox 8+, Chrome 16+, Safari 5+, and Internet Explorer 10+. In other words, the standard is supported by the most recent versions of all browsers except for Internet Explorer which will support the standard with the release of Internet Explorer 10. The AjaxFileUpload control works with all browsers, even browsers which do not support the new XMLHttpRequest Level 2 standard. If you use the AjaxFileUpload control with a downlevel browser – such as Internet Explorer 9 — then you get a simple throbber image during a file upload instead of a progress indicator. Here’s how you specify a throbber image when declaring the AjaxFileUpload control: <%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeBehind="02_FileUpload.aspx.cs" Inherits="WebApplication1._02_FileUpload" %> <html> <head id="Head1" runat="server"> <title>File Upload with Throbber</title> </head> <body> <form id="form1" runat="server"> <div> <ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager ID="ToolkitScriptManager1" runat="server" /> <ajaxToolkit:AjaxFileUpload id="ajaxUpload1" OnUploadComplete="ajaxUpload1_OnUploadComplete" ThrobberID="MyThrobber" runat="server" /> <asp:Image id="MyThrobber" ImageUrl="ajax-loader.gif" Style="display:None" runat="server" /> </div> </form> </body> </html> Notice that the page above includes an image with the Id MyThrobber. This image is displayed while files are being uploaded. I use the website http://AjaxLoad.info to generate animated busy wait images. Drag-And-Drop File Upload If you are using an uplevel browser then you can drag-and-drop the files which you want to upload onto the AjaxFileUpload control. The following video illustrates how drag-and-drop works: Remember that drag-and-drop will not work on Internet Explorer 9 or older. Accepting Multiple Files By default, the AjaxFileUpload control enables you to upload multiple files at a time. When you open the file dialog, use the CTRL or SHIFT key to select multiple files. If you want to restrict the number of files that can be uploaded then use the MaximumNumberOfFiles property like this: <ajaxToolkit:AjaxFileUpload id="ajaxUpload1" OnUploadComplete="ajaxUpload1_OnUploadComplete" ThrobberID="throbber" MaximumNumberOfFiles="1" runat="server" /> In the code above, the maximum number of files which can be uploaded is restricted to a single file. Restricting Uploaded File Types You might want to allow only certain types of files to be uploaded. For example, you might want to accept only image uploads. In that case, you can use the AllowedFileTypes property to provide a list of allowed file types like this: <ajaxToolkit:AjaxFileUpload id="ajaxUpload1" OnUploadComplete="ajaxUpload1_OnUploadComplete" ThrobberID="throbber" AllowedFileTypes="jpg,jpeg,gif,png" runat="server" /> The code above prevents any files except jpeg, gif, and png files from being uploaded. Enhancements to the HTMLEditorExtender Over the past months, we spent a considerable amount of time making bug fixes and feature enhancements to the existing HtmlEditorExtender control. I want to focus on two of the most significant enhancements that we made to the control: support for Source View and support for uploading images. Adding Source View Support to the HtmlEditorExtender When you click the Source View tag, the HtmlEditorExtender changes modes and displays the HTML source of the contents contained in the TextBox being extended. You can use Source View to make fine-grain changes to HTML before submitting the HTML to the server. For reasons of backwards compatibility, the Source View tab is disabled by default. To enable Source View, you need to declare your HtmlEditorExtender with the DisplaySourceTab property like this: <%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeBehind="05_SourceView.aspx.cs" Inherits="WebApplication1._05_SourceView" %> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html> <head id="Head1" runat="server"> <title>HtmlEditorExtender with Source View</title> </head> <body> <form id="form1" runat="server"> <div> <ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager ID="ToolkitScriptManager1" runat="server" /> <asp:TextBox id="txtComments" TextMode="MultiLine" Columns="60" Rows="10" Runat="server" /> <ajaxToolkit:HtmlEditorExtender id="HEE1" TargetControlID="txtComments" DisplaySourceTab="true" runat="server" /> </div> </form> </body> </html> The page above includes a ToolkitScriptManager, TextBox, and HtmlEditorExtender control. The HtmlEditorExtender extends the TextBox so that it supports rich text editing. Notice that the HtmlEditorExtender includes a DisplaySourceTab property. This property causes a button to appear at the bottom of the HtmlEditorExtender which enables you to switch to Source View: Note: when using the HtmlEditorExtender, we recommend that you set the DOCTYPE for the document. Otherwise, you can encounter weird formatting issues. Accepting Image Uploads We also enhanced the HtmlEditorExtender to support image uploads (another very highly requested feature at CodePlex). The following video illustrates the experience of adding an image to the editor: Once again, for backwards compatibility reasons, support for image uploads is disabled by default. Here’s how you can declare the HtmlEditorExtender so that it supports image uploads: <ajaxToolkit:HtmlEditorExtender id="MyHtmlEditorExtender" TargetControlID="txtComments" OnImageUploadComplete="MyHtmlEditorExtender_ImageUploadComplete" DisplaySourceTab="true" runat="server" > <Toolbar> <ajaxToolkit:Bold /> <ajaxToolkit:Italic /> <ajaxToolkit:Underline /> <ajaxToolkit:InsertImage /> </Toolbar> </ajaxToolkit:HtmlEditorExtender> There are two things that you should notice about the code above. First, notice that an InsertImage toolbar button is added to the HtmlEditorExtender toolbar. This HtmlEditorExtender will render toolbar buttons for bold, italic, underline, and insert image. Second, notice that the HtmlEditorExtender includes an event handler for the ImageUploadComplete event. The code for this event handler is below: using System.Web.UI; using AjaxControlToolkit; namespace WebApplication1 { public partial class _06_ImageUpload : System.Web.UI.Page { protected void MyHtmlEditorExtender_ImageUploadComplete(object sender, AjaxFileUploadEventArgs e) { // Generate file path string filePath = "~/Images/" + e.FileName; // Save uploaded file to the file system var ajaxFileUpload = (AjaxFileUpload)sender; ajaxFileUpload.SaveAs(MapPath(filePath)); // Update client with saved image path e.PostedUrl = Page.ResolveUrl(filePath); } } } Within the ImageUploadComplete event handler, you need to do two things: 1) Save the uploaded image (for example, to the file system, a database, or Azure storage) 2) Provide the URL to the saved image so the image can be displayed within the HtmlEditorExtender In the code above, the uploaded image is saved to the ~/Images folder. The path of the saved image is returned to the client by setting the AjaxFileUploadEventArgs PostedUrl property. Not surprisingly, under the covers, the HtmlEditorExtender uses the AjaxFileUpload. You can get a direct reference to the AjaxFileUpload control used by an HtmlEditorExtender by using the following code: void Page_Load() { var ajaxFileUpload = MyHtmlEditorExtender.AjaxFileUpload; ajaxFileUpload.AllowedFileTypes = "jpg,jpeg"; } The code above illustrates how you can restrict the types of images that can be uploaded to the HtmlEditorExtender. This code prevents anything but jpeg images from being uploaded. Summary This was the most difficult release of the Ajax Control Toolkit to date. We iterated through several designs for the AjaxFileUpload control – with each iteration, the goal was to make the AjaxFileUpload control easier for developers to use. My hope is that we were able to create a control which Web Forms developers will find very intuitive. I want to thank the developers on the Superexpert.com team for their hard work on this release.

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• Promoting Organizational Visibility for SOA and SOA Governance Initiatives – Part I by Manuel Rosa and André Sampaio

  - by JuergenKress

  The costs of technology assets can become significant and the need to centralize, monitor and control the contribution of each technology asset becomes a paramount responsibility for many organizations. Through the implementation of various mechanisms, it is possible to obtain a holistic vision and develop synergies between different assets, empowering their re-utilization and analyzing the impact on the organization caused by IT changes. When the SOA domain is considered, the issue of governance should therefore always come into play. Although SOA governance is mandatory to achieve any measure of SOA success, its value still passes incognito in most organizations, mostly due to the lack of visibility and the detached view of the SOA initiatives. There are a number of problems that jeopardize the visibility of these initiatives: Understanding and measuring the value of SOA governance and its contribution – SOA governance tools are too technical and isolated from other systems. They are inadequate for anyone outside of the domain (Business Analyst, Project Managers, or even some Enterprise Architects), and are especially harsh at the CxO level. Lack of information exchange with the business, other operational areas and project management – It is not only a matter of lack of dialog but also the question of using a common vocabulary (textual or graphic) that is adequate for all the stakeholders. We need to generate information that can be useful for a wider scope of stakeholders like Business and enterprise architectures. In this article we describe how an organization can leverage from the existing best practices, and with the help of adequate exploration and communication tools, achieve and maintain the level of quality and visibility that is required for SOA and SOA governance initiatives. Introduction Understanding and implementing effective SOA governance has become a corporate imperative in order to ensure coherence and the attainment of the basic objectives of SOA initiatives: develop the correct services control costs and risks bound to the development process reduce time-to-market Read the full article here. SOA & BPM Partner Community For regular information on Oracle SOA Suite become a member in the SOA & BPM Partner Community for registration please visit www.oracle.com/goto/emea/soa (OPN account required) If you need support with your account please contact the Oracle Partner Business Center. Blog Twitter LinkedIn Facebook Wiki Mix Forum Technorati Tags: SOA Governance,Link Consulting,SOA Community,Oracle SOA,Oracle BPM,Community,OPN,Jürgen Kress

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• Have SSIS' differing type systems ever caused you problems?

  - by jamiet

  One thing that has always infuriated me about SSIS is the fact that every package has three different type systems; to give you an idea of what I am talking about consider the following: The SSIS dataflow's type system is made up of types called DT_*  (e.g. DT_STR, DT_I4) The SSIS variable type system is based on .Net datatypes (e.g. String, Int32) The types available for Execute SQL Task's parameters are based on something else - I don't exactly know what (e.g. VARCHAR, LONG) Speaking euphemistically ... this is not an optimum situation (were I not speaking euphemistically I would be a lot ruder) and hence I have submitted a suggestion to Connect at [SSIS] Consolidate three type systems into one requesting that it be remedied. This accompanying blog post is not however a request for votes (though that would be nice); the reason is actually subtler than that. Let me explain. I have been submitting bugs and suggestions pertaining to SSIS for years and have, so far, submitted over 200 Connect items. If that experience has taught me anything it is this - Connect items are not generally actioned because they are considered "nice to have". No, SSIS Connect items get actioned because they cause customers grief and if I am perfectly honest I must admit that, other than being a bit gnarly, SSIS' three type system architecture has never knowingly caused me any significant problems. The reason for this blog post is to ask if any reader out there has ever encountered any problems on account of SSIS' three type systems or have you, like me, never found them to be a problem? Errors or performance degredation caused by implicit type conversions would, I believe, present a strong case for getting this situation remedied in a future version of SSIS so if you HAVE encountered such problems I would encourage you to leave a comment on the Connect submission accordingly. Let me know in the comments too - I would be interested to hear others' opinions on this. @Jamiet

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• IoT end-to-end demo – Remote Monitoring and Service By Harish Doddala

  - by JuergenKress

  Historically, data was generated from predictable sources, stored in storage systems and accessed for further processing. This data was correlated, filtered and analyzed to derive insights and/or drive well constructed processes. There was little ambiguity in the kinds of data, the sources it would originate from and the routes that it would follow. Internet of Things (IoT) creates many opportunities to extract value from data that result in significant improvements across industries such as Automotive, Industrial Manufacturing, Smart Utilities, Oil and Gas, High Tech and Professional Services, etc. This demo showcases how the health of remotely deployed machinery can be monitored to illustrate how data coming from devices can be analyzed in real-time, integrated with back-end systems and visualized to initiate action as may be necessary. Use-case: Remote Service and Maintenance Critical machinery once deployed on the field, is expected to work with minimal failures, while delivering high performance and reliability. In typical remote monitoring and industrial automation scenarios, although many physical objects from machinery to equipment may already be “smart and connected,” they are typically operated in a standalone fashion and not integrated into existing business processes. IoT adds an interesting dynamic to remote monitoring in industrial automation solutions in that it allows equipment to be monitored, upgraded, maintained and serviced in ways not possible before. Read the complete article here. SOA & BPM Partner Community For regular information on Oracle SOA Suite become a member in the SOA & BPM Partner Community for registration please visit www.oracle.com/goto/emea/soa (OPN account required) If you need support with your account please contact the Oracle Partner Business Center. Blog Twitter LinkedIn Facebook Wiki Technorati Tags: IoT,Iot demo,sales,SOA Community,Oracle SOA,Oracle BPM,Community,OPN,Jürgen Kress

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• HYUNDAI @ Oracle Open World 2012 General Session (GEN9449): Engineered Systems - From Vision to Game-Changing Results

  - by Sanjeev Sharma

   Why do data centers still demand an “assembly required” approach? This necessity  proves costly and complex, forces customers to deal with a wide range of vendors  for each  application, and fails to deliver performance optimization for application and data  workloads.  Oracle believes that systems (just like automobiles) should be designed and engineered “at the  factory” with the goal of reducing customers’ costs and complexity and delivering extreme performance, reliability, availability, and simplicity with a higher degree of automation. Hyundai Motor Company was founded in 1967 and since then has become a global brand in the automotive industry. Hyundai Motor Company’s was looking for a solution to manage its intellectual capital by capturing and facilitating re-use of knowledge of its thousands of employees. To achieve this Hyundai Motor Company set out to build a centralized document management platform that will allow its 30,000 knowledge workers to collaborate by sharing documents in a secure manner, anytime, anywhere. Furthermore this new knowledge management platform would bring about significant improvements in employee productivity.  Hear senior business leaders from Hyundai speak about the role and benefits of running their knowledge management platform on the Oracle family of engineered systems at the following general session at Oracle Open World 2012: Session: GEN9499 - General Session: Engineered Systems—From Vision to Game-Changing Results Date: Monday, 1 Oct, 2012Time: 1:45 pm - 2:45 pm (PST)Venue: Moscone West (2002 / 2004)

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• The emergence of Atlassian's Bamboo (and a free SQL Source Control license offer!)

  - by David Atkinson

  The rise in demand for database continuous integration has forced me to skill-up in various new tools and technologies, particularly build servers. We have been using JetBrain's TeamCity here at Red Gate for a couple of years now, having replaced the ageing CruiseControl.NET, so it was a natural choice for us to use this for our database CI demos. Most of our early adopter customers have also transitioned away from CruiseControl, the majority to TeamCity and Microsoft's TeamBuild. However, more recently, for reasons we've yet to fully comprehend, we've observed a significant surge in the number of evaluators for Atlassian's Bamboo. I installed this a couple of weeks back to satisfy myself that it works seamlessly with Red Gate tools. As you would expect Bamboo's UI has the same clean feel found in any Atlassian tool (we use JIRA extensively here at Red Gate). In the coming weeks I will post a short step-by-step guide to setting up SQL Server continuous integration using the Red Gate command lines. To help us further optimize the integration between these tools I'd be very keen to hear from any Bamboo users who also use Red Gate tools who might be willing to participate in usability tests and other similar research in exchange for Amazon vouchers. If you are interested in helping out please contact me at David dot Atkinson at red-gate.com I recently spoke with Sarah, the product marketing manager for Bamboo, and we ended up having a detailed conversation about database CI, which has been meticulously documented in the form of a blog post on Atlassian's website: http://blogs.atlassian.com/2012/05/database-continuous-integration-redgate/ We've also managed to persuade Red Gate marketing to provide a great free-tool offer, provide a free SQL Source Control or SQL Connect license to Atlassian users provided it is claimed before the end of June! Full details are at the bottom of the post. Technorati Tags: sql server

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