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• Issue 15: SVP Focus

  - by rituchhibber

       SVP FOCUS FOCUS -- Chris Baker SVP Oracle Worldwide ISV-OEM-Java Sales Chris Baker is the Global Head of ISV/OEM Sales responsible for working with ISV/OEM partners to maximise Oracle's business through those partners, whilst maximising those partners’ business to their end users. Chris works with partners, customers, innovators, investors and employees to develop innovative business solutions using Oracle products, services and skills. RESOURCES -- Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) OPN Solutions Catalog Oracle Exastack Program Oracle Exastack Optimized Oracle Cloud Computing Oracle Engineered Systems Oracle and Java SUBSCRIBE FEEDBACK PREVIOUS ISSUES "By taking part in marketing activities, our partners accelerate their sales cycles." -- Firstly, could you please explain Oracle's current strategy for ISV partners, globally and in EMEA? Oracle customers use independent software vendor (ISV) applications to run their businesses. They use them to generate revenue and to fulfil obligations to their own customers. Our strategy is very straight-forward. We want all of our ISV partners and OEMs to concentrate on the things that they do the best—building applications to meet the unique industry and functional requirements of their customer. We want to ensure that we deliver a best-in-class application platform so ISVs are free to concentrate their effort on their application functionality and user experience We invest over four billion dollars in research and development every year, and we want our ISVs to benefit from all of that investment in operating systems, virtualisation, databases, middleware, engineered systems, and other hardware. By doing this, we help them to reduce their costs, gain more consistency and agility for quicker implementations, and also rapidly differentiate themselves from other application vendors. It's all about simplification because we believe that around 25 to 30 percent of the development costs incurred by many ISVs are caused by customising infrastructure and have nothing to do with their applications. Our strategy is to enable our ISV partners to standardise their application platform using engineered architecture, so they can write once to the Oracle stack and deploy seamlessly in the cloud, on-premise, or in hybrid deployments. It's really important that architecture is the same in order to keep cost and time overheads at a minimum, so we provide standardisation and an environment that enables our ISVs to concentrate on the core business that makes them the most money and brings them success. How do you believe this strategy is helping the ISVs to work hand-in-hand with Oracle to ensure that end customers get the industry-leading solutions that they need? We work with our ISVs not just to help them be successful, but also to help them market themselves. We have something called the 'Oracle Exastack Ready Program', which enables ISVs to publicise themselves as 'Ready' to run the core software platforms that run on Oracle's engineered systems including Exadata and Exalogic. So, for example, they can become 'Database Ready' which means that they use the latest version of Oracle Database and therefore can run their application without modification on Exadata or the Oracle Database Appliance. Alternatively, they can become WebLogic Ready, Oracle Linux Ready and Oracle Solaris Ready which means they run on the latest release and therefore can run their application, with no new porting work, on Oracle Exalogic. Those 'Ready' logos are important in helping ISVs advertise to their customers that they are using the latest technologies which have been fully tested. We now also have Exadata Ready and Exalogic Ready programmes which allow ISVs to promote the certification of their applications on these platforms. This highlights these partners to Oracle customers as having solutions that run fluently on the Oracle Exadata Database Machine, the Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud or one of our other engineered systems. This makes it easy for customers to identify solutions and provides ISVs with an avenue to connect with Oracle customers who are rapidly adopting engineered systems. We have also taken this programme to the next level in the shape of 'Oracle Exastack Optimized' for partners whose applications run best on the Oracle stack and have invested the time to fully optimise application performance. We ensure that Exastack Optimized partner status is promoted and supported by press releases, and we help our ISVs go to market and differentiate themselves through the use of our technology and the standardisation it delivers. To date we have had several hundred organisations successfully work through our Exastack Optimized programme. How does Oracle's strategy of offering pre-integrated open platform software and hardware allow ISVs to bring their products to market more quickly? One of the problems for many ISVs is that they have to think very carefully about the technology on which their solutions will be deployed, particularly in the cloud or hosted environments. They have to think hard about how they secure these environments, whether the concern is, for example, middleware, identity management, or securing personal data. If they don't use the technology that we build-in to our products to help them to fulfil these roles, they then have to build it themselves. This takes time, requires testing, and must be maintained. By taking advantage of our technology, partners will now know that they have a standard platform. They will know that they can confidently talk about implementation being the same every time they do it. Very large ISV applications could once take a year or two to be implemented at an on-premise environment. But it wasn't just the configuration of the application that took the time, it was actually the infrastructure - the different hardware configurations, operating systems and configurations of databases and middleware. Now we strongly believe that it's all about standardisation and repeatability. It's about making sure that our partners can do it once and are then able to roll it out many different times using standard componentry. What actions would you recommend for existing ISV partners that are looking to do more business with Oracle and its customer base, not only to maximise benefits, but also to maximise partner relationships? My team, around the world and in the EMEA region, is available and ready to talk to any of our ISVs and to explore the possibilities together. We run programmes like 'Excite' and 'Insight' to help us to understand how we can help ISVs with architecture and widen their environments. But we also want to work with, and look at, new opportunities - for example, the Machine-to-Machine (M2M) market or 'The Internet of Things'. Over the next few years, many millions, indeed billions of devices will be collecting massive amounts of data and communicating it back to the central systems where ISVs will be running their applications. The only way that our partners will be able to provide a single vendor 'end-to-end' solution is to use Oracle integrated systems at the back end and Java on the 'smart' devices collecting the data—a complete solution from device to data centre. So there are huge opportunities to work closely with our ISVs, using Oracle's complete M2M platform, to provide the infrastructure that enables them to extract maximum value from the data collected. If any partners don't know where to start or who to contact, then they can contact me directly at [email protected] or indeed any of our teams across the EMEA region. We want to work with ISVs to help them to be as successful as they possibly can through simplification and speed to market, and we also want all of the top ISVs in the world based on Oracle. What opportunities are immediately opened to new ISV partners joining the OPN? As you know OPN is very, very important. New members will discover a huge amount of content that instantly becomes accessible to them. They can access a wealth of no-cost training and enablement materials to build their expertise in Oracle technology. They can download Oracle software and use it for development projects. They can help themselves become more competent by becoming part of a true community and uncovering new opportunities by working with Oracle and their peers in the Oracle Partner Network. As well as publishing massive amounts of information on OPN, we also hold our global Oracle OpenWorld event, at which partners play a huge role. This takes place at the end of September and the beginning of October in San Francisco. Attending ISV partners have an unrivalled opportunity to contribute to elements such as the OpenWorld / OPN Exchange, at which they can talk to other partners and really begin thinking about how they can move their businesses on and play key roles in a very large ecosystem which revolves around technology and standardisation. Finally, are there any other messages that you would like to share with the Oracle ISV community? The crucial message that I always like to reinforce is architecture, architecture and architecture! The key opportunities that ISVs have today revolve around standardising their architectures so that they can confidently think: "I will I be able to do exactly the same thing whenever a customer is looking to deploy on-premise, hosted or in the cloud". The right architecture is critical to being competitive and to really start changing the game. We want to help our ISV partners to do just that; to establish standard architecture and to seize the opportunities it opens up for them. New market opportunities like M2M are enormous - just look at how many devices are all around you right now. We can help our partners to interface with these devices more effectively while thinking about their entire ecosystem, rather than just the piece that they have traditionally focused upon. With standardised architecture, we can help people dramatically improve their speed, reach, agility and delivery of enhanced customer satisfaction and value all the way from the Java side to their centralised systems. All Oracle ISV partners must take advantage of these opportunities, which is why Oracle will continue to invest in and support them. Oracle OpenWorld 2010 Whether you attended Oracle OpenWorld 2009 or not, don't forget to save the date now for Oracle OpenWorld 2010. The event will be held a little earlier next year, from 19th-23rd September, so please don't miss out. With thousands of sessions and hundreds of exhibits and demos already lined up, there's no better place to learn how to optimise your existing systems, get an inside line on upcoming technology breakthroughs, and meet with your partner peers, Oracle strategists and even the developers responsible for the products and services that help you get better results for your end customers. Register Now for Oracle OpenWorld 2010! Perhaps you are interested in learning more about Oracle OpenWorld 2010, but don't wish to register at this time? Great! Please just enter your contact information here and we will contact you at a later date. How to Exhibit at Oracle OpenWorld 2010 Sponsorship Opportunities at Oracle OpenWorld 2010 Advertising Opportunities at Oracle OpenWorld 2010 -- Back to the welcome page

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• Oracle on Oracle: Is that all?

  - by Darin Pendergraft

  On October 17th, I posted a short blog and a podcast interview with Chirag Andani, talking about how Oracle IT uses its own IDM products. Blog link here. In response, I received a comment from reader Jaime Cardoso ([email protected]) who posted: “- You could have talked about how by deploying Oracle's Open standards base technology you were able to integrate any new system in your infrastructure in days. - You could have talked about how by deploying federation you were enabling the business side to keep all their options open in terms of companies to buy and sell while maintaining perfect employee and customer's single view. - You could have talked about how you are now able to cut response times to your audit and security teams into 1/10th of your former times Instead you spent 6 minutes talking about single sign on and self provisioning? If I didn't knew your IDM offer so well I would now be wondering what its differences from Microsoft's offer was. Sorry for not giving a positive comment here but, please your IDM suite is very good and, you simply aren't promoting it well enough” So I decided to send Jaime a note asking him about his experience, and to get his perspective on what makes the Oracle products great. What I found out is that Jaime is a very experienced IDM Architect with several major projects under his belt. Darin Pendergraft: Can you tell me a bit about your experience? How long have you worked in IT, and what is your IDM experience? Jaime Cardoso: I started working in "serious" IT in 1998 when I became Netscape's technical specialist in Portugal. Netscape Portugal didn't exist so, I was working for their VAR here. Most of my work at the time was with Netscape's mail server and LDAP server. Since that time I've been bouncing between the system's side like Sun resellers, Solaris stuff and even worked with Sun's Engineering in the making of an Hierarchical Storage Product (Sun CIS if you know it) and the application's side, mostly in LDAP and IDM. Over the years I've been doing support, service delivery and pre-sales / architecture design of IDM solutions in most big customers in Portugal, to name a few projects: - The first European deployment of Sun Access Manager (SAPO – Portugal Telecom) - The identity repository of 5/5 of the Biggest Portuguese banks - The Portuguese government federation of services project DP: OK, in your blog response, you mentioned 3 topics: 1. Using Oracle's standards based architecture; (you) were able to integrate any new system in days: can you give an example? What systems, how long did it take, number of apps/users/accounts/roles etc. JC: It's relatively easy to design a user management strategy for a static environment, or if you simply assume that you're an <insert vendor here> shop and all your systems will bow to that vendor's will. We've all seen that path, the use of proprietary technologies in interoperability solutions but, then reality kicks in. As an ISP I recall that I made the technical decision to use Active Directory as a central authentication system for the entire IT infrastructure. Clients, systems, apps, everything was there. As a good part of the systems and apps were running on UNIX, then a connector became needed in order to have UNIX boxes to authenticate against AD. And, that strategy worked but, each new machine required the component to be installed, monitoring had to be made for that component and each new app had to be independently certified. A self care user portal was an ongoing project, AD access assumes the client is inside the domain, something the ISP's customers (and UNIX boxes) weren't nor had any intention of ever being. When the Windows 2008 rollout was done, Microsoft changed the Active Directory interface. The Windows administrators didn't have enough know-how about directories and the way systems outside the MS world behaved so, on the go live, things weren't properly tested and a general outage followed. Several hours and 1 roll back later, everything was back working. But, the ISP still had to change all of its applications to work with the new access methods and reset the effort spent on the self service user portal. To keep with the same strategy, they would also have to trust Microsoft not to change interfaces again. Simply by putting up an Oracle LDAP server in the middle and replicating the user info from the AD into LDAP, most of the problems went away. Even systems for which no AD connector existed had PAM in them so, integration was made at the OS level, fully supported by the OS supplier. Sun Identity Manager already had a self care portal, combined with a user workflow so, all the clearances had to be given before the account was created or updated. Adding a new system as a client for these authentication services was simply a new checkbox in the OS installer and, even True64 systems were, for the first time integrated also with a 5 minute work of a junior system admin. True, all the windows clients and MS apps still went to the AD for their authentication needs so, from the start everybody knew that they weren't 100% free of migration pains but, now they had a single point of problems to look at. If you're looking for numbers: - 500K directory entries (users) - 2-300 systems After the initial setup, I personally integrated about 20 systems / apps against LDAP in 1 day while being watched by the different IT teams. The internal IT staff did the rest. DP: 2. Using Federation allows the business to keep options open for buying and selling companies, and yet maintain a single view for both employee and customer. What do you mean by this? Can you give an example? JC: The market is dynamic. The company that's being bought today tomorrow will be sold again. Companies that spread on different markets may see the regulator forcing a sale of part of a company due to monopoly reasons and companies that are in multiple countries have to comply with different legislations. Our job, as IT architects, while addressing the customers and employees authentication services, is quite hard and, quite contrary. On one hand, we need to give access to all of our employees to the relevant systems, apps and resources and, we already have marketing talking with us trying to find out who's a customer of the bough company but not from ours to address. On the other hand, we have to do that and keep in mind we may have to break up all that effort and that different countries legislation may became a problem with a full integration plan. That's a job for user Federation. you don't want to be the one who's telling your President that he will sell that business unit without it's customer's database (making the deal worth a lot less) or that the buyer will take with him a copy of your entire customer's database. Federation enables you to start controlling permissions to users outside of your traditional authentication realm. So what if the people of that company you just bought are keeping their old logins? Do you want, because of that, to have a dedicated system for their expenses reports? And do you want to keep their sales (and pre-sales) people out of the loop in terms of your group's path? Control the information flow, establish a Federation trust circle and give access to your apps to users that haven't (yet?) been brought into your internal login systems. You can still see your users in a unified view, you obviously control if a user has access to any particular application, either that user is in your local database or stored in a directory on the other side of the world. DP: 3. Cut response times of audit and security teams to 1/10. Is this a real number? Can you give an example? JC: No, I don't have any backing for this number. One of the companies I did system Administration for has a SOX compliance policy in place (I remind you that I live in Portugal so, this definition of SOX may be somewhat different from what you're used to) and, every time the audit team says they'll do another audit, we have to negotiate with them the size of the sample and we spend about 15 man/days gathering all the required info they ask. I did some work with Sun's Identity auditor and, from what I've been seeing, Oracle's product is even better and, I've seen that most of the information they ask would have been provided in a few hours with the help of this tool. I do stand by what I said here but, to be honest, someone from Identity Auditor team would do a much better job than me explaining this time savings. Jaime is right: the Oracle IDM products have a lot of business value, and Oracle IT is using them for a lot more than I was able to cover in the short podcast that I posted. I want to thank Jaime for his comments and perspective. We want these blog posts to be informative and honest – so if you have feedback for the Oracle IDM team on any topic discussed here, please post your comments below.

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• Issue 15: Oracle Exadata Marketing Campaigns

  - by rituchhibber

       PARTNER FOCUS Oracle ExadataMarketing Campaign Steve McNickleVP Europe, cVidya Steve McNickle is VP Europe for cVidya, an innovative provider of revenue intelligence solutions for telecom, media and entertainment service providers including AT&T, BT, Deutsche Telecom and Vodafone. The company's product portfolio helps operators and service providers maximise margins, improve customer experience and optimise ecosystem relationships through revenue assurance, fraud and security management, sales performance management, pricing analytics, and inter-carrier services. cVidya has partnered with Oracle for more than a decade. RESOURCES -- Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) Oracle Exastack Program Oracle Exastack Optimized Oracle Exastack Labs and Enablement Resources Oracle Engineered Systems Oracle Communications cVidya SUBSCRIBE FEEDBACK PREVIOUS ISSUES Are you ready for Oracle OpenWorld this October? -- -- Please could you tell us a little about cVidya's partnering history with Oracle, and expand on your Oracle Exastack accreditations? "cVidya was established just over ten years ago and we've had a strong relationship with Oracle almost since the very beginning. Through our Revenue Intelligence work with some of the world's largest service providers we collect tremendous amounts of information, amounting to billions of records per day. We help our clients to collect, store and analyse that data to ensure that their end customers are getting the best levels of service, are billed correctly, and are happy that they are on the correct price plan. We have been an Oracle Gold level partner for seven years, and crucially just two months ago we were also accredited as Oracle Exastack Optimized for MoneyMap, our core Revenue Assurance solution. Very soon we also expect to be Oracle Exastack Optimized DRMap, our Data Retention solution." What unique capabilities and customer benefits does Oracle Exastack add to your applications? "Oracle Exastack enables us to deliver radical benefits to our customers. A typical mobile operator in the UK might handle between 500 million and two billion call data record details daily. Each transaction needs to be validated, billed correctly and fraud checked. Because of the enormous volumes involved, our clients demand scalable infrastructure that allows them to efficiently acquire, store and process all that data within controlled cost, space and environmental constraints. We have proved that the Oracle Exadata system can process data up to seven times faster and load it as much as 20 times faster than other standard best-of-breed server approaches. With the Oracle Exadata Database Machine they can reduce their datacentre equipment from say, the six or seven cabinets that they needed in the past, down to just one. This dramatic simplification delivers incredible value to the customer by cutting down enormously on all of their significant cost, space, energy, cooling and maintenance overheads." "The Oracle Exastack Program has given our clients the ability to switch their focus from reactive to proactive. Traditionally they may have spent 80 percent of their day processing, and just 20 percent enabling end customers to see advanced analytics, and avoiding issues before they occur. With our solutions and Oracle Exadata they can now switch that balance around entirely, resulting not only in reduced revenue leakage, but a far higher focus on proactive leakage prevention. How has the Oracle Exastack Program transformed your customer business? "We can already see the impact. Oracle solutions allow our delivery teams to achieve successful deployments, happy customers and self-satisfaction, and the power of Oracle's Exa solutions is easy to measure in terms of their transformational ability. We gained our first sale into a major European telco by demonstrating the major performance gains that would transform their business. Clients can measure the ease of organisational change, the early prevention of business issues, the reduction in manpower required to provide protection and coverage across all their products and services, plus of course end customer satisfaction. If customers know that that service is provided accurately and that their bills are calculated correctly, then over time this satisfaction can be attributed to revenue intelligence and the underlying systems which provide it. Combine this with the further integration we have with the other layers of the Oracle stack, including the telecommunications offerings such as NCC, OCDM and BRM, and the result is even greater customer value—not to mention the increased speed to market and the reduced project risk." What does the Oracle Exastack community bring to cVidya, both in terms of general benefits, and also tangible new opportunities and partnerships? "A great deal. We have participated in the Oracle Exastack community heavily over the past year, and have had lots of meetings with Oracle and our peers around the globe. It brings us into contact with like-minded, innovative partners, who like us are not happy to just stand still and want to take fresh technology to their customer base in order to gain enhanced value. We identified three new partnerships in each of two recent meetings, and hope these will open up new opportunities, not only in areas that exactly match where we operate today, but also in some new associative areas that will expand our reach into new business sectors. Notably, thanks to the Exastack community we were invited on stage at last year's Oracle OpenWorld conference. Appearing so publically with Oracle senior VP Judson Althoff elevated awareness and visibility of cVidya and has enabled us to participate in a number of other events with Oracle over the past eight months. We've been involved in speaking opportunities, forums and exhibitions, providing us with invaluable opportunities that we wouldn't otherwise have got close to." How has Exastack differentiated cVidya as an ISV, and helped you to evolve your business to the next level? "When we are selling to our core customer base of Tier 1 telecommunications providers, we know that they want more than just software. They want an enduring partnership that will last many years, they want innovation, and a forward thinking partner who knows how to guide them on where they need to be to meet market demand three, five or seven years down the line. Membership of respected global bodies, such as the Telemanagement Forum enables us to lead standard adherence in our area of business, giving us a lot of credibility, but Oracle is also involved in this forum with its own telecommunications portfolio, strengthening our position still further. When we approach CEOs, CTOs and CIOs at the very largest Tier 1 operators, not only can we easily show them that our technology is fantastic, we can also talk about our strong partnership with Oracle, and our joint embracing of today's standards and tomorrow's innovation." Where would you like cVidya to be in one year's time? "We want to get all of our relevant products Oracle Exastack Optimized. Our MoneyMap Revenue Assurance solution is already Exastack Optimised, our DRMAP Data Retention Solution should be Exastack Optimised within the next month, and our FraudView Fraud Management solution within the next two to three months. We'd then like to extend our Oracle accreditation out to include other members of the Oracle Engineered Systems family. We are moving into the 'Big Data' space, and so we're obviously very keen to work closely with Oracle to conduct pilots, map new technologies onto Oracle Big Data platforms, and embrace and measure the benefits of other Oracle systems, namely Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud, the Oracle Exalytics In-Memory Machine and the Oracle SPARC SuperCluster. We would also like to examine how the Oracle Database Appliance might benefit our Tier 2 service provider customers. Finally, we'd also like to continue working with the Oracle Communications Global Business Unit (CGBU), furthering our integration with Oracle billing products so that we are able to quickly deploy fraud solutions into Oracle's Engineered System stack, give operational benefits to our clients that are pre-integrated, more cost-effective, and can be rapidly deployed rapidly and producing benefits in three months, not nine months." Chris Baker ,Senior Vice President, Oracle Worldwide ISV-OEM-Java Sales Chris Baker is the Global Head of ISV/OEM Sales responsible for working with ISV/OEM partners to maximise Oracle's business through those partners, whilst maximising those partners' business to their end users. Chris works with partners, customers, innovators, investors and employees to develop innovative business solutions using Oracle products, services and skills. Firstly, could you please explain Oracle's current strategy for ISV partners, globally and in EMEA? "Oracle customers use independent software vendor (ISV) applications to run their businesses. They use them to generate revenue and to fulfil obligations to their own customers. Our strategy is very straight-forward. We want all of our ISV partners and OEMs to concentrate on the things that they do the best – building applications to meet the unique industry and functional requirements of their customer. We want to ensure that we deliver a best in class application platform so the ISV is free to concentrate their effort on their application functionality and user experience We invest over four billion dollars in research and development every year, and we want our ISVs to benefit from all of that investment in operating systems, virtualisation, databases, middleware, engineered systems, and other hardware. By doing this, we help them to reduce their costs, gain more consistency and agility for quicker implementations, and also rapidly differentiate themselves from other application vendors. It's all about simplification because we believe that around 25 to 30 percent of the development costs incurred by many ISVs are caused by customising infrastructure and have nothing to do with their applications. Our strategy is to enable our ISV partners to standardise their application platform using engineered architecture, so they can write once to the Oracle stack and deploy seamlessly in the cloud, on-premise, or in hybrid deployments. It's really important that architecture is the same in order to keep cost and time overheads at a minimum, so we provide standardisation and an environment that enables our ISVs to concentrate on the core business that makes them the most money and brings them success." How do you believe this strategy is helping the ISVs to work hand-in-hand with Oracle to ensure that end customers get the industry-leading solutions that they need? "We work with our ISVs not just to help them be successful, but also to help them market themselves. We have something called the 'Oracle Exastack Ready Program', which enables ISVs to publicise themselves as 'Ready' to run the core software platforms that run on Oracle's engineered systems including Exadata and Exalogic. So, for example, they can become 'Database Ready' which means that they use the latest version of Oracle Database and therefore can run their application without modification on Exadata or the Oracle Database Appliance. Alternatively, they can become WebLogic Ready, Oracle Linux Ready and Oracle Solaris Ready which means they run on the latest release and therefore can run their application, with no new porting work, on Oracle Exalogic. Those 'Ready' logos are important in helping ISVs advertise to their customers that they are using the latest technologies which have been fully tested. We now also have Exadata Ready and Exalogic Ready programmes which allow ISVs to promote the certification of their applications on these platforms. This highlights these partners to Oracle customers as having solutions that run fluently on the Oracle Exadata Database Machine, the Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud or one of our other engineered systems. This makes it easy for customers to identify solutions and provides ISVs with an avenue to connect with Oracle customers who are rapidly adopting engineered systems. We have also taken this programme to the next level in the shape of 'Oracle Exastack Optimized' for partners whose applications run best on the Oracle stack and have invested the time to fully optimise application performance. We ensure that Exastack Optimized partner status is promoted and supported by press releases, and we help our ISVs go to market and differentiate themselves through the use our technology and the standardisation it delivers. To date we have had several hundred organisations successfully work through our Exastack Optimized programme." How does Oracle's strategy of offering pre-integrated open platform software and hardware allow ISVs to bring their products to market more quickly? "One of the problems for many ISVs is that they have to think very carefully about the technology on which their solutions will be deployed, particularly in the cloud or hosted environments. They have to think hard about how they secure these environments, whether the concern is, for example, middleware, identity management, or securing personal data. If they don't use the technology that we build-in to our products to help them to fulfil these roles, they then have to build it themselves. This takes time, requires testing, and must be maintained. By taking advantage of our technology, partners will now know that they have a standard platform. They will know that they can confidently talk about implementation being the same every time they do it. Very large ISV applications could once take a year or two to be implemented at an on-premise environment. But it wasn't just the configuration of the application that took the time, it was actually the infrastructure - the different hardware configurations, operating systems and configurations of databases and middleware. Now we strongly believe that it's all about standardisation and repeatability. It's about making sure that our partners can do it once and are then able to roll it out many different times using standard componentry." What actions would you recommend for existing ISV partners that are looking to do more business with Oracle and its customer base, not only to maximise benefits, but also to maximise partner relationships? "My team, around the world and in the EMEA region, is available and ready to talk to any of our ISVs and to explore the possibilities together. We run programmes like 'Excite' and 'Insight' to help us to understand how we can help ISVs with architecture and widen their environments. But we also want to work with, and look at, new opportunities - for example, the Machine-to-Machine (M2M) market or 'The Internet of Things'. Over the next few years, many millions, indeed billions of devices will be collecting massive amounts of data and communicating it back to the central systems where ISVs will be running their applications. The only way that our partners will be able to provide a single vendor 'end-to-end' solution is to use Oracle integrated systems at the back end and Java on the 'smart' devices collecting the data – a complete solution from device to data centre. So there are huge opportunities to work closely with our ISVs, using Oracle's complete M2M platform, to provide the infrastructure that enables them to extract maximum value from the data collected. If any partners don't know where to start or who to contact, then they can contact me directly at [email protected] or indeed any of our teams across the EMEA region. We want to work with ISVs to help them to be as successful as they possibly can through simplification and speed to market, and we also want all of the top ISVs in the world based on Oracle." What opportunities are immediately opened to new ISV partners joining the OPN? "As you know OPN is very, very important. New members will discover a huge amount of content that instantly becomes accessible to them. They can access a wealth of no-cost training and enablement materials to build their expertise in Oracle technology. They can download Oracle software and use it for development projects. They can help themselves become more competent by becoming part of a true community and uncovering new opportunities by working with Oracle and their peers in the Oracle Partner Network. As well as publishing massive amounts of information on OPN, we also hold our global Oracle OpenWorld event, at which partners play a huge role. This takes place at the end of September and the beginning of October in San Francisco. Attending ISV partners have an unrivalled opportunity to contribute to elements such as the OpenWorld / OPN Exchange, at which they can talk to other partners and really begin thinking about how they can move their businesses on and play key roles in a very large ecosystem which revolves around technology and standardisation." Finally, are there any other messages that you would like to share with the Oracle ISV community? "The crucial message that I always like to reinforce is architecture, architecture and architecture! The key opportunities that ISVs have today revolve around standardising their architectures so that they can confidently think: “I will I be able to do exactly the same thing whenever a customer is looking to deploy on-premise, hosted or in the cloud”. The right architecture is critical to being competitive and to really start changing the game. We want to help our ISV partners to do just that; to establish standard architecture and to seize the opportunities it opens up for them. New market opportunities like M2M are enormous - just look at how many devices are all around you right now. We can help our partners to interface with these devices more effectively while thinking about their entire ecosystem, rather than just the piece that they have traditionally focused upon. With standardised architecture, we can help people dramatically improve their speed, reach, agility and delivery of enhanced customer satisfaction and value all the way from the Java side to their centralised systems. All Oracle ISV partners must take advantage of these opportunities, which is why Oracle will continue to invest in and support them." -- Gergely Strbik is Oracle Hardware and Software Product Manager for Avnet in Hungary. Avnet Technology Solutions is an OracleValue Added Distributor focused on the development of the existing Oracle channel. This includes the recruitment and enablement of Oracle partners as well as driving deeper adoption of Oracle's technology and application products within the IT channel. "The main business benefits of ODA for our customers and partners are scalability, flexibility, a great price point for the high performance delivered, and the easily configurable embedded Linux operating system. People welcome a lower point of entry and the ability to grow capacity on demand as their business expands." "Marketing and selling the ODA requires another way of thinking because it is an appliance. We have to transform the ways in which our partners and customers think from buying hardware and software independently to buying complete solutions. Successful early adopters and satisfied customer reactions will certainly help us to sell the ODA. We will have more experience with the product after the first deliveries and installations—end users need to see the power and benefits for themselves." "Our typical ODA customers will be those looking for complete solutions from a single reseller partner who is also able to manage the appliance. They will have enjoyed using Oracle Database but now want a new product that is able to unlock new levels of performance. A higher proportion of potential customers will come from our existing Oracle base, with around 30% from new business, but we intend to evangelise the ODA on the market to see how we can change this balance as all our customers adjust to the concept of 'Hardware and Software, Engineered to Work Together'. -- Back to the welcome page

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• Loss of feature set with VMware EVC

  - by Peter

  If I have two machines both 3rd Generation AMD Opteron, one Shanghai & one Istanbul and I can vMotion between them. Does it buy me anything to enable EVC at the 3rd Generation AMD level? Will I lose any CPU features? My thoughts are, I can enable EVC 3rd Generation with running VMs and I can't enable 2nd Generation EVC with running VMs. I figure there won't be a lose in any features because if there was a reduction in feature set then I couldn't enable EVC with running VMs.

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• PO Communication in PDF

  - by Robert Story

  Upcoming WebcastsDate: March 29, 2010 Time: 2 pm London, 9:00 am EDT, 6:00 am PDT, 13:00 GMT Click here to register for this sessionDate: March 29, 2010 Time: 9 am London, 4:00 am EDT, 1:00 am PDT, 8:00 GMT Click here to register for this session Product Family: ProcurementSummary This one-hour session is recommended for technical and functional users who would like to know about the PO Communication functionality in procurement. Topics will include: Introduction to PO PDF communication - 11.5.10 Key ConceptsPrerequisites, Scope Overview of PDF document generation PDF solution overviewTechnical Overview of PDF generation Setup steps Triggering Points of PDF generation PO Output for communication - Concurrent programEnter PO form: View DocIsupplier portal/Contracts preview Enhancements PDF Generation in Custom LayoutsAttachments in fax communicationR12 Communication Nontext Attachments through Email Customizing templates Advantages of PDF communication Troubleshooting (Tips) A short, live demonstration (only if applicable) and question and answer period will be included........ ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... .......The above webcast is a service of the E-Business Suite Communities in My Oracle Support.For more information on other webcasts, please reference the Oracle Advisor Webcast Schedule.Click here to visit the E-Business Communities in My Oracle Support Note that all links require access to My Oracle Support.

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• Oracle ADF Mobile and Developing On-device Mobile Applications

  - by Joe Huang

  Hi, everyone: It has been almost a year since we posted to this blog, and I am happy to report that we are steadily marching toward releasing a new generation of ADF Mobile.  This blog site has been quiet as we are heads down to develop this new generation of ADF Mobile.  As we are nearing releasing this next generation product, there are substantial number of Oracle internal application teams and external customers/partners actively developing using the beta version of this framework.  We are actively taking feedbacks from these teams and ensuring the product is ready for general availability. If you are intersted for more details around this new generation of ADF Mobile, we are hosting a session and a hands on lab this week at the ODTUG KScope 12 conference.  The lab is booked completely full weeks in advance, but perhaps you can still get into the session (Wed at 9:45 AM).   Look for updates from this blog site as well as the Oracle OTN ADF Mobile landing page during the weeks leading to Oracle OpenWorld 2012.   Thanks, Joe Huang

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• C++ destructor problem with boost::scoped_ptr

  - by bb-generation

  I have a question about the following code: #include <iostream> #include <boost/scoped_ptr.hpp> class Interface { }; class A : public Interface { public: A() { std::cout << "A()" << std::endl; } virtual ~A() { std::cout << "~A()" << std::endl; } }; Interface* get_a() { A* a = new A; return a; } int main() { { std::cout << "1" << std::endl; boost::scoped_ptr<Interface> x(get_a()); std::cout << "2" << std::endl; } std::cout << "3" << std::endl; } It creates the following output: 1 A() 2 3 As you can see, it doesn't call the destructor of A. The only way I see to get the destructor of A being called, is to add a destructor for the Interface class like this: virtual ~Interface() { } But I really want to avoid any Implementation in my Interface class and virtual ~Interface() = 0; doesn't work (produces some linker errors complaining about a non existing implementation of ~Interface(). So my question is: What do I have to change in order to make the destructor being called, but (if possible) leave the Interface as an Interface (only abstract methods).

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• Is there an equivalent to COM on *nix systems ? If not, what was the *nix approach to re-usability?

  - by RyBolt

  I have an understanding of windows COM and the ideas behind it. I am trying to understand if *nix systems even have an equivalent or why they don't?

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• WebLogic Server Performance and Tuning: Part I - Tuning JVM

  - by Gokhan Gungor

  Each WebLogic Server instance runs in its own dedicated Java Virtual Machine (JVM) which is their runtime environment. Every Admin Server in any domain executes within a JVM. The same also applies for Managed Servers. WebLogic Server can be used for a wide variety of applications and services which uses the same runtime environment and resources. Oracle WebLogic ships with 2 different JVM, HotSpot and JRocket but you can choose which JVM you want to use. JVM is designed to optimize itself however it also provides some startup options to make small changes. There are default values for its memory and garbage collection. In real world, you will not want to stick with the default values provided by the JVM rather want to customize these values based on your applications which can produce large gains in performance by making small changes with the JVM parameters. We can tell the garbage collector how to delete garbage and we can also tell JVM how much space to allocate for each generation (of java Objects) or for heap. Remember during the garbage collection no other process is executed within the JVM or runtime, which is called STOP THE WORLD which can affect the overall throughput. Each JVM has its own memory segment called Heap Memory which is the storage for java Objects. These objects can be grouped based on their age like young generation (recently created objects) or old generation (surviving objects that have lived to some extent), etc. A java object is considered garbage when it can no longer be reached from anywhere in the running program. Each generation has its own memory segment within the heap. When this segment gets full, garbage collector deletes all the objects that are marked as garbage to create space. When the old generation space gets full, the JVM performs a major collection to remove the unused objects and reclaim their space. A major garbage collect takes a significant amount of time and can affect system performance. When we create a managed server either on the same machine or on remote machine it gets its initial startup parameters from $DOMAIN_HOME/bin/setDomainEnv.sh/cmd file. By default two parameters are set:     Xms: The initial heapsize     Xmx: The max heapsize Try to set equal initial and max heapsize. The startup time can be a little longer but for long running applications it will provide a better performance. When we set -Xms512m -Xmx1024m, the physical heap size will be 512m. This means that there are pages of memory (in the state of the 512m) that the JVM does not explicitly control. It will be controlled by OS which could be reserve for the other tasks. In this case, it is an advantage if the JVM claims the entire memory at once and try not to spend time to extend when more memory is needed. Also you can use -XX:MaxPermSize (Maximum size of the permanent generation) option for Sun JVM. You should adjust the size accordingly if your application dynamically load and unload a lot of classes in order to optimize the performance. You can set the JVM options/heap size from the following places:     Through the Admin console, in the Server start tab     In the startManagedWeblogic script for the managed servers     $DOMAIN_HOME/bin/startManagedWebLogic.sh/cmd     JAVA_OPTIONS="-Xms1024m -Xmx1024m" ${JAVA_OPTIONS}     In the setDomainEnv script for the managed servers and admin server (domain wide)     USER_MEM_ARGS="-Xms1024m -Xmx1024m" When there is free memory available in the heap but it is too fragmented and not contiguously located to store the object or when there is actually insufficient memory we can get java.lang.OutOfMemoryError. We should create Thread Dump and analyze if that is possible in case of such error. The second option we can use to produce higher throughput is to garbage collection. We can roughly divide GC algorithms into 2 categories: parallel and concurrent. Parallel GC stops the execution of all the application and performs the full GC, this generally provides better throughput but also high latency using all the CPU resources during GC. Concurrent GC on the other hand, produces low latency but also low throughput since it performs GC while application executes. The JRockit JVM provides some useful command-line parameters that to control of its GC scheme like -XgcPrio command-line parameter which takes the following options; XgcPrio:pausetime (To minimize latency, parallel GC) XgcPrio:throughput (To minimize throughput, concurrent GC ) XgcPrio:deterministic (To guarantee maximum pause time, for real time systems) Sun JVM has similar parameters (like  -XX:UseParallelGC or -XX:+UseConcMarkSweepGC) to control its GC scheme. We can add -verbosegc -XX:+PrintGCDetails to monitor indications of a problem with garbage collection. Try configuring JVM’s of all managed servers to execute in -server mode to ensure that it is optimized for a server-side production environment.

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• What's up with LDoms: Part 1 - Introduction & Basic Concepts

  - by Stefan Hinker

  LDoms - the correct name is Oracle VM Server for SPARC - have been around for quite a while now.  But to my surprise, I get more and more requests to explain how they work or to give advise on how to make good use of them.  This made me think that writing up a few articles discussing the different features would be a good idea.  Now - I don't intend to rewrite the LDoms Admin Guide or to copy and reformat the (hopefully) well known "Beginners Guide to LDoms" by Tony Shoumack from 2007.  Those documents are very recommendable - especially the Beginners Guide, although based on LDoms 1.0, is still a good place to begin with.  However, LDoms have come a long way since then, and I hope to contribute to their adoption by discussing how they work and what features there are today.  In this and the following posts, I will use the term "LDoms" as a common abbreviation for Oracle VM Server for SPARC, just because it's a lot shorter and easier to type (and presumably, read). So, just to get everyone on the same baseline, lets briefly discuss the basic concepts of virtualization with LDoms.  LDoms make use of a hypervisor as a layer of abstraction between real, physical hardware and virtual hardware.  This virtual hardware is then used to create a number of guest systems which each behave very similar to a system running on bare metal:  Each has its own OBP, each will install its own copy of the Solaris OS and each will see a certain amount of CPU, memory, disk and network resources available to it.  Unlike some other type 1 hypervisors running on x86 hardware, the SPARC hypervisor is embedded in the system firmware and makes use both of supporting functions in the sun4v SPARC instruction set as well as the overall CPU architecture to fulfill its function. The CMT architecture of the supporting CPUs (T1 through T4) provide a large number of cores and threads to the OS.  For example, the current T4 CPU has eight cores, each running 8 threads, for a total of 64 threads per socket.  To the OS, this looks like 64 CPUs.  The SPARC hypervisor, when creating guest systems, simply assigns a certain number of these threads exclusively to one guest, thus avoiding the overhead of having to schedule OS threads to CPUs, as do typical x86 hypervisors.  The hypervisor only assigns CPUs and then steps aside.  It is not involved in the actual work being dispatched from the OS to the CPU, all it does is maintain isolation between different guests. Likewise, memory is assigned exclusively to individual guests.  Here,  the hypervisor provides generic mappings between the physical hardware addresses and the guest's views on memory.  Again, the hypervisor is not involved in the actual memory access, it only maintains isolation between guests. During the inital setup of a system with LDoms, you start with one special domain, called the Control Domain.  Initially, this domain owns all the hardware available in the system, including all CPUs, all RAM and all IO resources.  If you'd be running the system un-virtualized, this would be what you'd be working with.  To allow for guests, you first resize this initial domain (also called a primary domain in LDoms speak), assigning it a small amount of CPU and memory.  This frees up most of the available CPU and memory resources for guest domains.  IO is a little more complex, but very straightforward.  When LDoms 1.0 first came out, the only way to provide IO to guest systems was to create virtual disk and network services and attach guests to these services.  In the meantime, several different ways to connect guest domains to IO have been developed, the most recent one being SR-IOV support for network devices released in version 2.2 of Oracle VM Server for SPARC. I will cover these more advanced features in detail later.  For now, lets have a short look at the initial way IO was virtualized in LDoms: For virtualized IO, you create two services, one "Virtual Disk Service" or vds, and one "Virtual Switch" or vswitch.  You can, of course, also create more of these, but that's more advanced than I want to cover in this introduction.  These IO services now connect real, physical IO resources like a disk LUN or a networt port to the virtual devices that are assigned to guest domains.  For disk IO, the normal case would be to connect a physical LUN (or some other storage option that I'll discuss later) to one specific guest.  That guest would be assigned a virtual disk, which would appear to be just like a real LUN to the guest, while the IO is actually routed through the virtual disk service down to the physical device.  For network, the vswitch acts very much like a real, physical ethernet switch - you connect one physical port to it for outside connectivity and define one or more connections per guest, just like you would plug cables between a real switch and a real system. For completeness, there is another service that provides console access to guest domains which mimics the behavior of serial terminal servers. The connections between the virtual devices on the guest's side and the virtual IO services in the primary domain are created by the hypervisor.  It uses so called "Logical Domain Channels" or LDCs to create point-to-point connections between all of these devices and services.  These LDCs work very similar to high speed serial connections and are configured automatically whenever the Control Domain adds or removes virtual IO. To see all this in action, now lets look at a first example.  I will start with a newly installed machine and configure the control domain so that it's ready to create guest systems. In a first step, after we've installed the software, let's start the virtual console service and downsize the primary domain.  root@sun # ldm list NAME STATE FLAGS CONS VCPU MEMORY UTIL UPTIME primary active -n-c-- UART 512 261632M 0.3% 2d 13h 58m root@sun # ldm add-vconscon port-range=5000-5100 \ primary-console primary root@sun # svcadm enable vntsd root@sun # svcs vntsd STATE STIME FMRI online 9:53:21 svc:/ldoms/vntsd:default root@sun # ldm set-vcpu 16 primary root@sun # ldm set-mau 1 primary root@sun # ldm start-reconf primary root@sun # ldm set-memory 7680m primary root@sun # ldm add-config initial root@sun # shutdown -y -g0 -i6 So what have I done: I've defined a range of ports (5000-5100) for the virtual network terminal service and then started that service.  The vnts will later provide console connections to guest systems, very much like serial NTS's do in the physical world. Next, I assigned 16 vCPUs (on this platform, a T3-4, that's two cores) to the primary domain, freeing the rest up for future guest systems.  I also assigned one MAU to this domain.  A MAU is a crypto unit in the T3 CPU.  These need to be explicitly assigned to domains, just like CPU or memory.  (This is no longer the case with T4 systems, where crypto is always available everywhere.) Before I reassigned the memory, I started what's called a "delayed reconfiguration" session.  That avoids actually doing the change right away, which would take a considerable amount of time in this case.  Instead, I'll need to reboot once I'm all done.  I've assigned 7680MB of RAM to the primary.  That's 8GB less the 512MB which the hypervisor uses for it's own private purposes.  You can, depending on your needs, work with less.  I'll spend a dedicated article on sizing, discussing the pros and cons in detail. Finally, just before the reboot, I saved my work on the ILOM, to make this configuration available after a powercycle of the box.  (It'll always be available after a simple reboot, but the ILOM needs to know the configuration of the hypervisor after a power-cycle, before the primary domain is booted.) Now, lets create a first disk service and a first virtual switch which is connected to the physical network device igb2. We will later use these to connect virtual disks and virtual network ports of our guest systems to real world storage and network. root@sun # ldm add-vds primary-vds root@sun # ldm add-vswitch net-dev=igb2 switch-primary primary You are free to choose whatever names you like for the virtual disk service and the virtual switch.  I strongly recommend that you choose names that make sense to you and describe the function of each service in the context of your implementation.  For the vswitch, for example, you could choose names like "admin-vswitch" or "production-network" etc. This already concludes the configuration of the control domain.  We've freed up considerable amounts of CPU and RAM for guest systems and created the necessary infrastructure - console, vts and vswitch - so that guests systems can actually interact with the outside world.  The system is now ready to create guests, which I'll describe in the next section. For further reading, here are some recommendable links: The LDoms 2.2 Admin Guide The "Beginners Guide to LDoms" The LDoms Information Center on MOS LDoms on OTN

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• Oracle Launches Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c at OpenWorld Japan

  - by Anand Akela

  Oracle Senior Vice President John Fowler and Oracle Vice President of Systems Management Steve Wilson unveiled Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c at Oracle OpenWorld, Tokyo Japan on April 4th morning.  Oracle Enterprise Manager combines management of servers, operating systems, virtualization solution for x86 and SPRC servers, firmware, storage, and network fabrics with Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center. Available at no additional cost as part of the Ops Center Anywhere Program, Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c allows enterprises to accelerate mission-critical cloud deployment, unleash the power of Solaris 11 — the first cloud OS, and simplify Oracle engineered systems management. Here are some of the resources for you to learn more about the new Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c :  Press Release : Introducing Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c White paper: Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c - Making Infrastructure-as-a-Service in the Enterprise a Reality Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center web page at Oracle Technology Network Join Oracle Launch Webcast : Total Cloud Control for Systems on April 12th at 9 AM PST to learn more about  Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center 12c from Oracle Senior Vice President John Fowler, Oracle Vice President of Systems Management Steve Wilson and a panel of Oracle executive. Stay connected with  Oracle Enterprise Manager   :  Twitter | Facebook | YouTube | Linkedin | Newsletter

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• The future for Microsoft

  - by Scott Dorman

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/sdorman/archive/2013/10/16/the-future-for-microsoft.aspxMicrosoft is in the process of reinventing itself. While some may argue that it’s “too little, too late” or that their growing consumer-focused strategy is wrong, the truth of the situation is that Microsoft is reinventing itself into a new company. While Microsoft is now calling themselves a “devices and services” company, that’s not entirely accurate. Let’s look at some facts: Microsoft will always (for the long-term foreseeable future) be financially split into the following divisions: Windows/Operating Systems, which for FY13 made up approximately 24% of overall revenue. Server and Tools, which for FY13 made up approximately 26% of overall revenue. Enterprise/Business Products, which for FY13 made up approximately 32% of overall revenue. Entertainment and Devices, which for FY13 made up approximately 13% of overall revenue. Online Services, which for FY13 made up approximately 4% of overall revenue. It is important to realize that hardware products like the Surface fall under the Windows/Operating Systems division while products like the Xbox 360 fall under the Entertainment and Devices division. (Presumably other hardware, such as mice, keyboards, and cameras, also fall under the Entertainment and Devices division.) It’s also unclear where Microsoft’s recent acquisition of Nokia’s handset division will fall, but let’s assume that it will be under Entertainment and Devices as well. Now, for the sake of argument, let’s assume a slightly different structure that I think is more in line with how Microsoft presents itself and how the general public sees it: Consumer Products and Devices, which would probably make up approximately 9% of overall revenue. Developer Tools, which would probably make up approximately 13% of overall revenue. Enterprise Products and Devices, which would probably make up approximately 47% of overall revenue. Entertainment, which would probably make up approximately 13% of overall revenue. Online Services, which would probably make up approximately 17% of overall revenue. (Just so we’re clear, in this structure hardware products like the Surface, a portion of Windows sales, and other hardware fall under the Consumer Products and Devices division. I’m assuming that more of the income for the Windows division is coming from enterprise/volume licenses so 15% of that income went to the Enterprise Products and Devices division. Most of the enterprise services, like Azure, fall under the Online Services division so half of the Server and Tools income went there as well.) No matter how you look at it, the bulk of Microsoft’s income still comes from not just the enterprise but also software sales, and this really shouldn’t surprise anyone. So, now that the stage is set…what’s the future for Microsoft? The future I see for Microsoft (again, this is just my prediction based on my own instinct, gut-feel and publicly available information) is this: Microsoft is becoming a consumer-focused enterprise company. Let’s look at it a different way. Microsoft is an enterprise-focused company trying to create a larger consumer presence.  To a large extent, this is the exact opposite of Apple, who is really a consumer-focused company trying to create a larger enterprise presence. The major reason consumer-focused companies (like Apple) have started making in-roads into the enterprise is the “bring your own device” phenomenon. Yes, Apple has created some “game-changing” products but their enterprise influence is still relatively small. Unfortunately (for this blog post at least), Apple provides revenue in terms of hardware products rather than business divisions, so it’s not possible to do a direct comparison. However, in the interest of transparency, from Apple’s Quarterly Report (filed 24 July 2013), their revenue breakdown is: iPhone, which for the 3 months ending 29 June 2013 made up approximately 51% of revenue. iPad, which for the 3 months ending 29 June 2013 made up approximately 18% of revenue. Mac, which for the 3 months ending 29 June 2013 made up approximately 14% of revenue. iPod, which for the 3 months ending 29 June 2013 made up approximately 2% of revenue. iTunes, Software, and Services, which for the 3 months ending 29 June 2013 made up approximately 11% of revenue. Accessories, which for the 3 months ending 29 July 2013 made up approximately 3% of revenue. From this, it’s pretty clear that Apple is a consumer-and-hardware-focused company. At this point, you may be asking yourself “Where is all of this going?” The answer to that lies in Microsoft’s shift in company focus. They are becoming more consumer focused, but what exactly does that mean? The biggest change (at least that’s been in the news lately) is the pending purchase of Nokia’s handset division. This, in combination with their Surface line of tablets and the Xbox, will put Microsoft squarely in the realm of a hardware-focused company in addition to being a software-focused company. That can (and most likely will) shift the revenue split to looking at revenue based on software sales (both consumer and enterprise) and also hardware sales (mostly on the consumer side). If we look at things strictly from a Windows perspective, Microsoft clearly has a lot of irons in the fire at the moment. Discounting the various product SKUs available and painting the picture with broader strokes, there are currently 5 different Windows-based operating systems: Windows Phone Windows Phone 7.x, which runs on top of the Windows CE kernel Windows Phone 8.x+, which runs on top of the Windows 8 kernel Windows RT The ARM-based version of Windows 8, which runs on top of the Windows 8 kernel Windows (Pro) The Intel-based version of Windows 8, which runs on top of the Windows 8 kernel Xbox The Xbox 360, which runs it’s own proprietary OS. The Xbox One, which runs it’s own proprietary OS, a version of Windows running on top of the Windows 8 kernel and a proprietary “manager” OS which manages the other two. Over time, Windows Phone 7.x devices will fade so that really leaves 4 different versions. Looking at Windows RT and Windows Phone 8.x paints an interesting story. Right now, all mobile phone devices run on some sort of ARM chip and that doesn’t look like it will change any time soon. That means Microsoft has two different Windows based operating systems for the ARM platform. Long term, it doesn’t make sense for Microsoft to continue supporting that arrangement. I have long suspected (since the Surface was first announced) that Microsoft will unify these two variants of Windows and recent speculation from some of the leading Microsoft watchers lends credence to this suspicion. It is rumored that upcoming Windows Phone releases will include support for larger screen sizes, relax the requirement to have a hardware-based back button and will continue to improve API parity between Windows Phone and Windows RT. At the same time, Windows RT will include support for smaller screen sizes. Since both of these operating systems are based on the same core Windows kernel, it makes sense (both from a financial and development resource perspective) for Microsoft to unify them. The user interfaces are already very similar. So similar in fact, that visually it’s difficult to tell them apart. To illustrate this, here are two screen captures: Other than a few variations (the Bing News app, the picture shown in the Pictures tile and the spacing between the tiles) these are identical. The one on the left is from my Windows 8.1 laptop (which looks the same as on my Surface RT) and the one on the right is from my Windows Phone 8 Lumia 925. This pretty clearly shows that from a consumer perspective, there really is no practical difference between how these two operating systems look and how you interact with them. For the consumer, your entertainment device (Xbox One), phone (Windows Phone) and mobile computing device (Surface [or some other vendors tablet], laptop, netbook or ultrabook) and your desktop computing device (desktop) will all look and feel the same. While many people will denounce this consistency of user experience, I think this will be a good thing in the long term, especially for the upcoming generations. For example, my 5-year old son knows how to use my tablet, phone and Xbox because they all feature nearly identical user experiences. When Windows 8 was released, Microsoft allowed a Windows Store app to be purchased once and installed on as many as 5 devices. With Windows 8.1, this limit has been increased to over 50. Why is that important? If you consider that your phone, computing devices, and entertainment device will be running the same operating system (with minor differences related to physical hardware chipset), that means that I could potentially purchase my sons favorite Angry Birds game once and be able to install it on all of the devices I own. (And for those of you wondering, it’s only 7 [at the moment].) From an app developer perspective, the story becomes even more compelling. Right now there are differences between the different operating systems, but those differences are shrinking. The user interface technology for both is XAML but there are different controls available and different user experience concepts. Some of the APIs available are the same while some are not. You can’t develop a Windows Phone app that can also run on Windows (either Windows Pro or RT). With each release of Windows Phone and Windows RT, those difference become smaller and smaller. Add to this mix the Xbox One, which will also feature a Windows-based operating system and the same “modern” (tile-based) user interface and the visible distinctions between the operating systems will become even smaller. Unifying the operating systems means one set of APIs and one code base to maintain for an app that can run on multiple devices. One code base means it’s easier to add features and fix bugs and that those changes become available on all devices at the same time. It also means a single app store, which will increase the discoverability and reach of your app and consolidate revenue and app profile management. Now, the choice of what devices an app is available on becomes a simple checkbox decision rather than a technical limitation. Ultimately, this means more apps available to consumers, which is always good for the app ecosystem. Is all of this just rumor, speculation and conjecture? Of course, but it’s not unfounded. As I mentioned earlier, some of the prominent Microsoft watchers are also reporting similar rumors. However, Microsoft itself has even hinted at this future with their recent organizational changes and by telling developers “if you want to develop for Xbox One, start developing for Windows 8 now.” I think this pretty clearly paints the following picture: Microsoft is committed to the “modern” user interface paradigm. Microsoft is changing their release cadence (for all products, not just operating systems) to be faster and more modular. Microsoft is going to continue to unify their OS platforms both from a consumer perspective and a developer perspective. While this direction will certainly concern some people it will excite many others. Microsoft’s biggest failing has always been following through with a strong and sustained marketing strategy that presents a consistent view point and highlights what this unified and connected experience looks like and how it benefits consumers and enterprises. We’ve started to see some of this over the last few years, but it needs to continue and become more aggressive and consistent. In the long run, I think Microsoft will be able to pull all of these technologies and devices together into one seamless ecosystem. It isn’t going to happen overnight, but my prediction is that we will be there by the end of 2016. As both a consumer and a developer, I, for one, am excited about the future of Microsoft.

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• career in Mobile sw/Application Development [closed]

  - by pramod

  i m planning to do a course on Wireless & mobile computing.The syllabus are given below.Please check & let me know whether its worth to do.How is the job prospects after that.I m a fresher & from electronic Engg.The modules are- *Wireless and Mobile Computing (WiMC) – Modules* C, C++ Programming and Data Structures 100 Hours C Revision C, C++ programming tools on linux(Vi editor, gdb etc.) OOP concepts Programming constructs Functions Access Specifiers Classes and Objects Overloading Inheritance Polymorphism Templates Data Structures in C++ Arrays, stacks, Queues, Linked Lists( Singly, Doubly, Circular) Trees, Threaded trees, AVL Trees Graphs, Sorting (bubble, Quick, Heap , Merge) System Development Methodology 18 Hours Software life cycle and various life cycle models Project Management Software: A Process Various Phases in s/w Development Risk Analysis and Management Software Quality Assurance Introduction to Coding Standards Software Project Management Testing Strategies and Tactics Project Management and Introduction to Risk Management Java Programming 110 Hours Data Types, Operators and Language Constructs Classes and Objects, Inner Classes and Inheritance Inheritance Interface and Package Exceptions Threads Java.lang Java.util Java.awt Java.io Java.applet Java.swing XML, XSL, DTD Java n/w programming Introduction to servlet Mobile and Wireless Technologies 30 Hours Basics of Wireless Technologies Cellular Communication: Single cell systems, multi-cell systems, frequency reuse, analog cellular systems, digital cellular systems GSM standard: Mobile Station, BTS, BSC, MSC, SMS sever, call processing and protocols CDMA standard: spread spectrum technologies, 2.5G and 3G Systems: HSCSD, GPRS, W-CDMA/UMTS,3GPP and international roaming, Multimedia services CDMA based cellular mobile communication systems Wireless Personal Area Networks: Bluetooth, IEEE 802.11a/b/g standards Mobile Handset Device Interfacing: Data Cables, IrDA, Bluetooth, Touch- Screen Interfacing Wireless Security, Telemetry Java Wireless Programming and Applications Development(J2ME) 100 Hours J2ME Architecture The CLDC and the KVM Tools and Development Process Classification of CLDC Target Devices CLDC Collections API CLDC Streams Model MIDlets MIDlet Lifecycle MIDP Programming MIDP Event Architecture High-Level Event Handling Low-Level Event Handling The CLDC Streams Model The CLDC Networking Package The MIDP Implementation Introduction to WAP, WML Script and XHTML Introduction to Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS) Symbian Programming 60 Hours Symbian OS basics Symbian OS services Symbian OS organization GUI approaches ROM building Debugging Hardware abstraction Base porting Symbian OS reference design porting File systems Overview of Symbian OS Development – DevKits, CustKits and SDKs CodeWarrior Tool Application & UI Development Client Server Framework ECOM STDLIB in Symbian iPhone Programming 80 Hours Introducing iPhone core specifications Understanding iPhone input and output Designing web pages for the iPhone Capturing iPhone events Introducing the webkit CSS transforms transitions and animations Using iUI for web apps Using Canvas for web apps Building web apps with Dashcode Writing Dashcode programs Debugging iPhone web pages SDK programming for web developers An introduction to object-oriented programming Introducing the iPhone OS Using Xcode and Interface builder Programming with the SDK Toolkit OS Concepts & Linux Programming 60 Hours Operating System Concepts What is an OS? Processes Scheduling & Synchronization Memory management Virtual Memory and Paging Linux Architecture Programming in Linux Linux Shell Programming Writing Device Drivers Configuring and Building GNU Cross-tool chain Configuring and Compiling Linux Virtual File System Porting Linux on Target Hardware WinCE.NET and Database Technology 80 Hours Execution Process in .NET Environment Language Interoperability Assemblies Need of C# Operators Namespaces & Assemblies Arrays Preprocessors Delegates and Events Boxing and Unboxing Regular Expression Collections Multithreading Programming Memory Management Exceptions Handling Win Forms Working with database ASP .NET Server Controls and client-side scripts ASP .NET Web Server Controls Validation Controls Principles of database management Need of RDBMS etc Client/Server Computing RDBMS Technologies Codd’s Rules Data Models Normalization Techniques ER Diagrams Data Flow Diagrams Database recovery & backup SQL Android Application 80 Hours Introduction of android Why develop for android Android SDK features Creating android activities Fundamental android UI design Intents, adapters, dialogs Android Technique for saving data Data base in Androids Maps, Geocoding, Location based services Toast, using alarms, Instant messaging Using blue tooth Using Telephony Introducing sensor manager Managing network and wi-fi connection Advanced androids development Linux kernel security Implement AIDL Interface. Project 120 Hours

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• Cloud Computing and Data Utilization

  - by Ahsan Alam

  Someone recently asked me “is cloud computing going to change the way we perceive data?”. My first instinct was “off course”; but I restrained myself and thought for a moment. Then my answer was “no”. Why do I feel that way? Technology and business have evolved quite a bit in the past few decades; however, the need to effectively view and utilize data hasn't changed. It is not uncommon to see many organization to rely on multiple database management systems (DBMS). Applications and systems are often built to utilize information from all these data sources, and effectively present them to users. In addition to multiple DBMS, corporations are also housing their systems across numerous data centers. In fact, systems and data can reside anywhere around the world with the advent of globalization. Cloud based systems have simply provided us a different place to maintain our data, nothing more. Hosting costs, security and accessibility are different issues; however, the way we utilize and view these data remains the same.

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• What are Information Centers?

  - by user12244613

  Information Centers are similar to product pages in the Oracle Sun System Handbook Many customers like the Oracle Sun System Handbook concept of a home page with all the product attributes, troubleshooting etc. access from a single home page. This concept is now available for a range of Oracle Solaris, Systems, and Storage products. The Information Center for each product covers areas such as: Overview, Hot Topics, Patching and Maintenance. The Information Center pages are dynamically generated each night to ensure the latest content is available to you. Here are the top Solaris, Systems, and Storage Information Centers: Oracle Explorer Data Collector Oracle Solaris 10 Live Upgrade Oracle Solaris 11 Booting Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Desktop and Graphics Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Image Packaging System (IPS) Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Installation Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Product Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Security Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 System Administration Information Center Oracle Solaris 11 Zones Information Center Oracle Solaris Crash Analysis Tool(SCAT) - Information Center Oracle Solaris Cluster Information Center Oracle Solaris Internet Protocol Multipathing (IPMP) Information Center Oracle Solaris Live Upgrade Information Center Oracle Solaris ZFS Information Center Oracle Solaris Zones Information Center CMT T1000/T2000 and Netra T2000 CMT T5120/T5120/T5140/T5220/T5240/T5440 Systems M3000/M4000/M5000/M8000/M9000-32/M9000-64 Management and Diagnostic Tools for Oracle Sun Systems Netra CT410/810 and Netra CT900 Network-Attached Storage (NAS) Oracle Explorer Data Collector Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms) Pillar Axiom 600 SL3000 Tape Library Sun Disk Storage Patching and Updates Sun Fire 3800/4800/4810/6800/E2900/E4900/E6900/V1280 - Netra 1280/1290 Sun Fire 12K/15K/E20K/E25K Sun Fire X4270 M2 Server Sun x86 Servers T3 and T4 Systems Tape Domain Firmware V210/V240/V440/V215/V245/V445 Servers VSM (VTSS/VLE/VTCS)

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• Light-Based Computing

  Exploring reservoir computing in photonic systems Computer science - Physics - Optics - Photonic crystal - Distributed Computing

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• Is there a better approach to speech synthesis than text-to-speech for more natural output? [closed]

  - by Anne Nonimus

  We've all heard the output of text-to-speech systems, and for anything but very short phrases, it sounds very machine-like. The ultimate goal of speech synthesis systems is to pass a Turing test of hearing. Clearly, the state of the art in text-to-speech has much to improve. However, speech synthesis isn't restricted to just text-to-speech systems, and I'm wondering if other approaches have been tried with better success. In other words, has there been any work done (libraries, software, research papers, etc.) on natural speech synthesis other than text-to-speech systems?

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• Is Java Open?

  - by EmbeddedInsider

  One way to answer- “which one”  Brew, IBM, Nokia, Android?   Well lets look at the real deal- Sun Java.  How will this work for embedded devices: DEFINITIONS…. The use of Software in systems and solutions that provide dedicated functionality … or designed for use in embedded or function-specific software applications, for example but not limited to: Software embedded in or bundled with industrial control systems, wireless mobile telephones, wireless handheld devices, netbooks, kiosks, TV/STB, Blu-ray Disc devices, telematics and network control switching equipment, printers and storage management systems, and other related systems are excluded from this definition and not licensed under this Agreement. http://www.java.com/en/download/license.jsp Now, the interesting thing is the license between Sun and the people with Java clones.  Does that pass on this exclusion? Lawrence Ricci www.EmbeddedInsider.com

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• And now for XAML completely different

  Using Markup Extensions to build individual markup based declarative systems with XAML

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• Intel Server Strategy Shift with Sandy Bridge EN & EP

  - by jchang

  The arrival of the Sandy Bridge EN and EP processors, expected in early 2012, will mark the completion of a significant shift in Intel server strategy. For the longest time 1995-2009, the strategy had been to focus on producing a premium processor designed for 4-way systems that might also be used in 8-way systems and higher. The objective for 2-way systems was use the desktop processor that later had a separate brand and different package & socket to leverage the low cost structure in driving...(read more)

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• Goodbye, Spreadsheets and Hello Modern ERP

  - by Christine Randle

  By: Steve Cox, Vice President, Oracle Accelerate for Midsize Companies     Signs of the resurging economy continue to sprout, with green shoots rising across different sectors and industries. With the economy on the rebound, businesses are increasing their investment in technology to keep up with growth and evolving demands; as proof, Gartner recently increased its worldwide IT spending forecast for 2012 to $3.6 trillion, anticipating a 3 percent increase from 2011 spending.   One of the segments most reliant on technology to catapult growth is midsize companies – established businesses leveraging every competitive efficiency and advantage to compete with much larger enterprises. We find that to compete against the big guys, they need to create an internal technology infrastructure to fuel that growth. Goodbye, spreadsheets and hello modern ERP.   While many businesses postponed upgrading or replacing financial and HR management systems during the recession, now some have started dusting off RFPs and revisiting technology options. Years ago, midsize organizations used spreadsheet-based systems and processes to manage employees, customers, partners, products and revenue. We’ve found that as companies scale up, they are apt to avoid heavily customizing their existing systems, and instead are more prone to standardize on a modern, enterprise-class ERP system.   Modern ERP platforms enable growing companies to immediately address the most pressing challenges – accounting, talent management, customer retention, et. al. Midsize companies implement these systems and processes to help them earn more, go public or expand globally.   And today, choice is a primary factor when selecting an ERP solution. Businesses have more deployment options now than ever before, depending on their unique structures and needs. Whether the preference is on demand, cloud, hosted or on premise, a modular, scalable deployment is available to meet the need.   With modern ERP systems, business that once struggled to do more with fewer resources have access to the same quality tools as larger competitors. By adopting top tier ERP systems tailored to individual business needs, midsize companies can support business operations while creating an enterprise system that seamlessly scales up to fuel future growth. Meaning that the ERP decision that your company makes today, will have legs to serve your business for years to come.

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• Serial Port R/W With Read Thread

  A Simple Comm Port Implementation with Read Thread to be used with Embedded Systems

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• Revisiting the Generations

  - by Row Henson

  I was asked earlier this year to contribute an article to the IHRIM publication – Workforce Solutions Review.  My topic focused on the reality of the Gen Y population 10 years after their entry into the workforce.  Below is an excerpt from that article: It seems like yesterday that we were all talking about the entry of the Gen Y'ers into the workforce and what a radical change that would have on how we attract, retain, motivate, reward, and engage this new, younger segment of the workforce.  We all heard and read that these youngsters would be more entrepreneurial than their predecessors – the Gen X'ers – who were said to be more loyal to their profession than their employer. And, we heard that these “youngsters” would certainly be far less loyal to their employers than the Baby Boomers or even earlier Traditionalists. It was also predicted that – at least for the developed parts of the world – they would be more interested in work/life balance than financial reward; they would need constant and immediate reinforcement and recognition and we would be lucky to have them in our employment for two to three years. And, to keep them longer than that we would need to promote them often so they would be continuously learning since their long-term (10-year) goal would be to own their own business or be an independent consultant.  Well, it occurred to me recently that the first of the Gen Y'ers are now in their early 30s and it is time to look back on some of these predictions. Many really believed the Gen Y'ers would enter the workforce with an attitude – expect everything to be easy for them – have their employers meet their demands or move to the next employer, and I believe that we can now say that, generally, has not been the case. Speaking from personal experience, I have mentored a number of Gen Y'ers and initially felt that with a 40-year career in Human Resources and Human Resources Technology – I could share a lot with them. I found out very quickly that I was learning at least as much from them! Some of the amazing attributes I found from these under-30s was their fearlessness, ease of which they were able to multi-task, amazing energy and great technical savvy. They were very comfortable with collaborating with colleagues from both inside the company and peers outside their organization to problem-solve quickly. Most were eager to learn and willing to work hard.  This brings me to the generation that will follow the Gen Y'ers – the Generation Z'ers – those born after 1998. We have come full circle. If we look at the Silent Generation or Traditionalists, we find a workforce that preceded the television and even very early telephones. We Baby Boomers (as I fall right squarely in this category) remembered the invention of the television and telephone – but laptop computers and personal digital assistants (PDAs) were a thing of “StarTrek” and other science fiction movies and publications. Certainly, the Gen X'ers and Gen Y'ers grew up with the comfort of these devices just as we did with calculators. But, what of those under the age of 10 – how will the workplace look in 15 more years and what type of workforce will be required to operate in the mobile, global, virtual world. I spoke to a friend recently who had her four-year-old granddaughter for a visit. She said she found her in the den in front of the TV trying to use her hand to get the screen to move! So, you see – we have come full circle. The under-70 Traditionalist grew up in a world without TV and the Generation Z'er may never remember the TV we knew just a few years ago. As with every generation – we spend much time generalizing on their characteristics. The most important thing to remember is every generation – just like every individual – is different. The important thing for those of us in Human Resources to remember is that one size doesn’t fit all. What motivates one employee to come to work for you and stay there and be productive is very different than what the next employee is looking for and the organization that can provide this fluidity and flexibility will be the survivor for generations to come. And, finally, just when we think we have it figured out, a multitude of external factors such as the economy, world politics, industries, and technologies we haven’t even thought about will come along and change those predictions. As I reach retirement age – I do so believing that our organizations are in good hands with the generations to follow – energetic, collaborative and capable of working hard while still understanding the need for balance at work, at home and in the community! 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• What is the difference between _Procedural Generation_ and _Random Generation_?

  - by U-No-Poo

  Today, I got into an argument about the term "procedural generation". My point was that its different from "classic" random generation in that procedural generation is based on a more mathematical, fractal-based, algorithm leading to a more "realistic" distribution and the usual randomness of most languages are based on a pseudo-random-number generator, leading to an "unrealistic", in a way, ugly, distribution. This discussion was made with a heightmap in mind. The discussion left me somehow unconvinced about my own arguments though, so, is there more to it? Or am I the one who is, in fact, simply wrong?

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• Multiple vulnerabilities in Firefox web browser

  - by chandan

  CVE DescriptionCVSSv2 Base ScoreComponentProduct and Resolution CVE-2011-3062 Numeric Errors vulnerability 6.8 Firefox web browser Solaris 11 11/11 SRU 9.5 Solaris 10 SPARC: 145080-11 X86: 145081-10 CVE-2012-0467 Denial of service (DoS) vulnerability 10.0 CVE-2012-0468 Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer vulnerability 10.0 CVE-2012-0469 Resource Management Errors vulnerability 10.0 CVE-2012-0470 Improper Restriction of Operations within the Bounds of a Memory Buffer vulnerability 10.0 CVE-2012-0471 Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability 4.3 CVE-2012-0473 Numeric Errors vulnerability 5.0 CVE-2012-0474 Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability 4.3 CVE-2012-0477 Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability 4.3 CVE-2012-0478 Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls vulnerability 9.3 CVE-2012-0479 Identity spoofing vulnerability 4.3 This notification describes vulnerabilities fixed in third-party components that are included in Sun's product distribution.Information about vulnerabilities affecting Oracle Sun products can be found on Oracle Critical Patch Updates and Security Alerts page.

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