4/AB3@/>>23D3:=>;3<B

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trademark of Network Appliance, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries. Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of
their respective holders and should be treated as such.

oraclemag_partner_1112.indd 1 11/13/07 10:43:45 AM

 JA N UARY/FEBRUARY 2 0 0 8 O R A C L E.C O M /O R A C L EMA GA ZI NE

INFORMATION COMES HOME

ORACLE DATABASE 11g MANAGES ALL YOUR ENTERPRISE DATA

MAKING ENTERPRISE DEFINITELY NOT BETTER WORKLOAD, INTELLIGENCE AND

CHOICES /42 OLD-SCHOOL /49 BETTER TESTING /59 IDENTITY /63

JF08_Cover.indd 5 11/9/07 2:55:34 PM

omag0108pCov2_p001 11/28/07 2:52 PM Page 1

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omag0108pCov2_p001 11/28/07 2:54 PM Page 2

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 CONTENTS VOLU M E XXI I , I SSUE 1

FEATUR ES

MAKING
ENTERPRISE
INFORMATION CHOICES
With investments

COMES HOME
Traditional relational content, unstructured content, XML,
in SOA and other
standards-based technologies, every
Oracle application upgrade offers better
3-D spatial data—your enterprise is home to all kinds of integration choices. Find out how Oracle
information. Read how customers are using Oracle Database gives companies options for upgrades
11g to store all their data, simplify management, and improve that improve performance, reduce
complexity, and prepare the enterprise
systems performance. —David Baum
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DE PAR T M E NTS

12
From Our Readers / 8
From the Editor / 10
Capturing the Enterprise AT OR AC LE
Imagination —Tom Haunert Events / 12 Oracle News / 21
Find out about current and With full support for Oracle and non-Oracle
upcoming industry events. applications, Oracle VM promises faster,
cheaper, more scalable server virtualization.
Oracle OpenWorld / 14
Highlights from the show Interview / 22
Vince Casarez, Oracle vice president of
Oracle Resources / 16
product management, talks about Oracle
OTN Bulletin / 17 WebCenter and Web 2.0.
Learn what’s happening with
Interview / 24
Oracle’s most dynamic online
Ray Roccaforte, Oracle vice president of
community.
database development, talks about the Oracle
Oracle News Briefs / 18 Optimized Warehouse.

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 3

JF08_TOC.indd 3 12/4/07 12:09:22 PM

 CONTENTS

59 TEC HNOLOGY
DATABAS E R EP LAY
Better Workload, Better Testing / 59
Use database replay to record and replay database
activities for better testing. —Arup Nanda

25 C OM MU NI TY
Commitment / 25
IDENTITY
Intelligence and Identity / 63
Integrating Oracle Business Intelligence and Oracle
Oracle promotes teacher training to improve Identity Management —Mark Rittman and Joel Crisp
math and science education.
Partner News / 26 OC P
Wipro, Promero, Centennial Software, Become a Certified Expert / 67
BearingPoint, Solution Beacon, CPSG, Oracle University offers Oracle Expert certification in
Partners Consulting Services Oracle Real Application Clusters.
—Harald van Breederode and Joel Goodman
Book Beat / 26
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Chris Ostrowski, Andrejus Baranovskis, On Tuning By Tracing / 71
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75 R ES OUR C ES
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53 D EVEL O PER
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77 C OMMENT

development in minutes. —Steve Muench

IN THE FIELD
Succeeding with Failure / 77
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B RO WSER-B A SED
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Reporting from Your Browser / 57
Publish high-fidelity business intelligence
reports with Oracle Application Express.
ALL S EC UR E
Beyond Data Protection / 79
—David Peake
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search and Oracle
Information Rights Management protect
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ANALY S T’ S C OR NER
Moving the Business Forward / 80
Nucleus Research’s Rebecca Wettemann
discusses how Oracle Fusion Middleware and
Oracle On Demand pave the way for application
upgrades. —David Baum

4 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_TOC.indd 4 12/4/07 12:09:45 PM

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 ED ITOR IA L

Editor in Chief Tom Haunert tom.haunert@oracle.com

Senior Managing Editor Caroline Kvitka caroline.kvitka@oracle.com
Features Editor Kay Keppler kay.keppler@oracle.com
Contributing Editor and Writer Blair Campbell
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Technology Advisor Tom Kyte
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permission from the editors. ORACLE MAGAZINE IS PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” BASIS. ORACLE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ALL
WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED. IN NO EVENT SHALL ORACLE BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES OF ANY
KIND ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF OR RELIANCE ON ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED HEREIN. The information is intended to
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Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 7

JF08_TOC.indd 7 11/12/07 2:07:06 PM

 f r o m o u r READERS

Your corrections, your opinions, and your requests:

Here’s your forum for telling us what’s right and
wrong in each issue of Oracle Magazine, and for
letting us know what you want to read.

ARUP AGAIN FOR THE BEGINNING

Arup Nanda has done it again, with the article “More
Partitioning Choices”! [See Oracle Magazine, September/
October 2007, otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/07-sep/
o57partition.html.] The article clearly showcases the new
partitioning features with just the right balance of concepts
and working examples. I
attended the Oracle Database
11g launch in New York, but
the partitioning option was
a little difficult to under-
stand from that session.
This article is wonderful in
that regard. In particular,
the explanation of reference
partitioning is spectacular.
I can’t wait to go to Oracle
Database 11g to try out the
new features. Please keep
on publishing this type
of article with high tech-
nical content.
Mary Hunt
mary1975.hunt@gmail.com
I just read the article “More Partitioning Choices” by Arup
Nanda. Then I read it again and again until I had completely
internalized it. Words can’t describe how valuable the content
of the article is. I’m amazed and awestruck by how well the
author presented the new concepts to make it easier for the
reader to grasp and put into use. I am playing with Oracle
Database 11g now, and this is one article that surely helps
me to pitch for the upgrade to the management. I shared this
with the development staff, the architects, and other assorted
individuals and everyone just “got it.” My job of convincing
them [to upgrade] just got much easier.
Thank you to the author, and may he produce more of
this type of article.
Tom Urban
turbanity@excite.com
I suggest you add a column for beginners in Oracle Magazine
so as to encourage new users to build up their skills.
Kobbla Emmanuel Idamah
kobbla2003@yahoo.com
MORE ORACLE DATABASE 11g
I would like to thank Oracle for providing Oracle Magazine.
The features in Oracle Database 11g are amazing, so could
you kindly include more-detailed explanations on these fea-
tures in future magazine issues?
August Ahadjiste
edem80us@yahoo.com
SECURITY, TOO
Oracle Magazine is very good at explaining the new features
and operations of the latest Oracle software. I want to add
that the magazine should also discuss security-related issues
and techniques used in Oracle Database 11g.
Sukhvinder Singh Deora
sukhvinder.singh.deora@gmail.com
CORRECTION
In the November/December 2007 issue of Oracle Magazine,
the Browser-Based column, “Application Integration Workshop,”
was credited to Michael Hichwa, a past author of that column.
The November/December 2007 column, however, was written
by David Peake, principal product manager in Oracle’s Server
Technologies division, who authored this issue’s column as well.
We apologize for the error.
send mail to the EDITOR
Send your opinions about what you read in Oracle Magazine, and suggestions
for possible technical articles, to opubedit_us@oracle.com. Or click on the Write
the Editors link on our Web site, oracle.com/oraclemagazine.
Letters may be edited for length and clarity and may be published in any
medium. We consider any communications we receive publishable.

8 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_READERS.indd 8 11/9/07 12:17:49 PM

The adventures of
Harry & Garry

PL/SQL Developer is the Oracle development tool that gives you

maximum productivity, ease of use and all the features you need,
for a reasonable price.
Visit our website for additional details:
www.allroundautomations.com/plsqldev

Capturing the Enterprise Imagination
Enterprise Web 2.0 collaboration has arrived, and I say ‘thank you.’
eb 2.0 has captured the world’s imagination.
Literally. In a recent TV crime drama, for example,
the victims, criminals, and detective work involved
online avatars and virtual worlds. I haven’t seen or
used any avatars in virtual worlds in the workplace (yet), but
I’ve definitely been exposed to some Web 2.0 collaboration on
the job. And I have to admit that I haven’t always immediately
recognized the benefits of Web 2.0, even when they were gift-
wrapped and delivered right to me.
I JUST MISSED IT
Recently a coworker e-mailed me about one of my “living
documents.” In my experience (up to now), to call something
a living document has usually been a disclaimer—a description
for a document that is at risk of being out-of-date, incomplete,
or containing some number of errors due to rapid and recent
changes in what’s documented, lack of time by the document
owner to make updates, or both. This particular living docu-
ment needed updating for both reasons.
My coworker was letting me know that she had posted my
living document—which covered editorial requirements and
process—to a new internal wiki here at Oracle. My coworker’s
generosity came about because she had contributed to earlier
versions of this document, so while she was posting other doc-
uments to this wiki, she did me the favor of posting my docu-
ment and making some edits. And I was happy to have her
post the document, but my first thought was that I was happy
to have her edits—edits on a document that I’d been meaning
to schedule for a formal review and update.
I sent her an e-mail back, thanking her for posting the docu-
ment to the wiki and then asking if she had any additional sug-
gestions, edits, or updates she wanted to make to my document.
Within seconds of clicking “Send,” I realized what I had done.
In my pre–Web 2.0 world of static Web pages with one
COLLABORATE
Oracle discussion forums
forums.oracle.com
Oracle Wiki
wiki.oracle.com
READ more about Oracle WebCenter
otn.oracle.com/products/webcenter
LISTEN to Oracle Magazine Feature Casts
otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts
10 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_EdNote.indd 14
f r o m t h e EDITOR
owner/manager and desktop document information silos,
asking a past contributor to one of my docs or pages if she had
any edit suggestions would have made perfect sense. But she’d
just loaded my doc into a wiki to which she and thousands
of other people now have direct editing access. I was now in
a position to get comments, edits, and additions from a large
group of people directly in the new source-of-truth document
without formally inviting, planning, and managing edit cycles.
In the course of working on Oracle Magazine, I deal with a lot
of very formal edit cycles, so while I know I’ll still be editing
and updating the new wiki content, it’s nice to know there’s
one less formal edit process for which I’ll need to search for
stakeholders, schedule reviews, e-mail a document (that sup-
ports revision tracking), gather the changes from different
drafts, reconcile changes, and so on.
So after my coworker-inspired Web 2.0 epiphany, I took a
look at the document content in the wiki, and for some reason,
it looked better than I remembered. I made some updates,
made plans to make some more, pointed some people to it,
and asked them for their input (which I won’t have to dig out
of multiple, revision-controlled documents).
So what I used to call a living document as a disclaimer is
now a true living document in the wiki, and it’s definitely living
much better than it was.
SPEAKING OF WIKIS
In this issue’s OTN Bulletin (on page 17), OTN editor in chief
Justin Kestelyn introduces the new, official Oracle Wiki at
wiki.oracle.com and invites members of the Oracle community
to contribute and update real living documents for and about
Oracle and the Oracle community. I echo Justin’s invitation,
and look forward to collaborating with the Oracle community
on wiki content about Oracle Magazine.
MORE WEB 2.0
In “Web 2.0 Meets the Enterprise” (on page 22), Oracle
Magazine Senior Managing Editor Caroline Kvitka talks with
Vince Casarez, Oracle vice president of product management
with a focus on Oracle WebCenter, about Web 2.0 in the
enterprise (including wikis, blogs, and instant messaging) and
how Oracle WebCenter is helping deliver Web 2.0 to the enter-
prise today. Check out the interview and listen to the Oracle
Magazine Feature Cast at otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts.
Tom Haunert, Editor in Chief
tom.haunert@oracle.com
11/12/07 11:56:11 AM
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 a t O r a c l e EVENTS

ORACLE USER
GROUPS

Technology Events
German Oracle User Group (DOAG)
Regional Meeting
January 15, Jena, Germany
www.doag.org/termine/143633
Conferences and sessions to help you stay on the cutting edge Nashville Oracle Users Group Meetings
January 16 and February 20,
Nashville, Tennessee
HIMSS 2008 www.noug.net
February 24–28, Dallas Oracle Users Group Meeting
Orlando, Florida with Cary Millsap of Hotsos
January 17, Dallas, Texas
Join the Healthcare Information and www.doug.org
Management Systems Society for its
Northern California Oracle
annual conference for healthcare IT Applications User Group Training Day
(HIT) professionals, physicians, nurses, January 17, Santa Clara, California
executives, pharmacists, and vendors. www.norcaloaug.org
Keynote speakers include former U.S.
Twin Cities Oracle User Group
Senator Bill Frist and Revolution Chairman Winter Meeting
and CEO Steve Case. Learn more at January 17, Golden Valley, Minnesota
www.himssconference.org. www.tcoug.org
Atlanta Oracle Applications Users
47th Annual Geomatics Gartner India CIO Summit 2008 Group Meetings
January 18 and February 15,
Engineering Conference February 18–19, Mumbai, India Atlanta, Georgia
January 24–26, Clovis, California The second Gartner India CIO Summit features www.atloaug.org
This student-run conference, sponsored by two tracks—Business Alignment and the
UKOUG UNIX SIG Meeting
California State University, Fresno, brings Workforce, and Technology and Processes— January 22, London
together hundreds of participants from around and structured interactive roundtable discus- www.ukoug.org
the world for workshops on geographic sions facilitated by Gartner analysts. Apply at
Greater Cincinnati Oracle User
information systems, surveying, and photo- www.gartnerinfo.com/ciosummitindia. Group Meeting
grammetry. Sign up at www.csufresno.edu/ January 23, Cincinnati, Ohio
geomatics/conference. FutureTest 2008 www.gcoug.org
February 26–27, New York City Northeast Ohio Oracle Users
GTC Southwest 2008 Industry leaders will discuss the present and Group Meeting
January 28–31, Austin, Texas future of software testing at this first-of-its- January 25, Independence, Ohio
www.neooug.org
With the theme “21st-Century Government kind event. Expand your testing and quality
Meets 21st-Century IT,” this event for gov- assurance (QA) horizons with topics ranging Ottawa Oracle User Group Meeting
ernment technology professionals provides from open source models to team dynamics. January 31, Ottawa, Canada
www.oug-ottawa.org
business and technical training and features Interact, innovate, and network with other QA
keynotes by New York Times technology writer professionals. Sign up at www.futuretest.net. Rocky Mountain Oracle Users Group
Training Days
David Pogue and by Frank Abagnale, whose life
February 13–14, Denver, Colorado
story inspired the movie Catch Me if You Can. Oracle Applications Users Group www.rmoug.org
Sign up at www.govtech.com/events/silo Free eLearning
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
.php?id=126027. Tuesdays–Thursdays, online Database SIG
The Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG) Hotsos training with Cary Millsap
Southern California Linux Expo offers free online training session to its February 19–21, Bellevue, Washington
(SCALE) members. Training Tuesdays and Training www.psoug.org
February 8–10, Los Angeles Wednesdays cover a range of topics and are
This exposition includes several focused con- presented by top-rated OAUG trainers. OAUG
ferences, including Women in Open Source, Community Thursdays highlight educational eventsLOCATOR
Open Source in Education, and DOHCS and training sessions presented at OAUG geo- Oracle Events
(Demonstrating Open Source Health Care graphic and special interest group meetings. oracle.com/events

Space is limited. Register at www.oaug.org/ Locate user groups

CORBIS

Systems), with technical and business tracks.

otn.oracle.com/collaboration/user_group
Get details at www.socallinuxexpo.org. conferencesandeducation/elearning.

12 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_EVENTS.indd 12 11/7/07 1:52:29 PM

 B:8.25 in
CMYK
T:8 in
S:7 in

Alternative Thinking About Critical Data:

MISSION UNBELIEVABLY-IMPORTANT-DATA,
MISSION LIFE-OR-DEATH-DATA,
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B:11.125 in
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For a solution that fits your mission, go to hp.com/go/myoracle

© 2007 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. Oracle, JD Edwards, PeopleSoft, and Siebel are registered trademarks of Oracle Corporation and/or its affiliates.

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 O r a c l e OPENWORLD 2007

The Oracle OpenWorld

Annual conference celebrates Oracle’s 30 years

racle OpenWorld 2007 began with a look back at

Oracle’s 30-year history and a dedication to Oracle
customers. From November 11 to 15, 2007, more than
40,000 Oracle customers and enthusiasts converged on San
Francisco to experience the conference, the largest Oracle
OpenWorld yet.
Major topics at the weeklong event included integration,
business intelligence, data warehousing, enterprise 2.0, server
virtualization, and green computing. Throughout the week,
Oracle executives including CEO Larry Ellison, President
Charles Phillips, Executive Vice President Chuck Rozwat, and
Senior Vice President Thomas Kurian discussed Oracle tech-
nologies for innovation and integration: Oracle Database 11g,
Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle Fusion Applications, Oracle
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison takes the stage for his keynote presentation after an
Application Integration Architecture, and Oracle VM. introduction by Billy Joel, who performed at the customer appreciation event.

In addition to the keynotes and more than 1,600 breakout ses-

sions, hundreds of partners and vendors showcased products and services in the exhibition halls,
and Oracle University offered onsite training and certification. Several special programs—for
Oracle product lines including JD Edwards, Hyperion, and Agile Product Lifecycle Management—
helped attendees dig deeper into Oracle products. At the Oracle Develop program, developers
heard from leading experts on Java, .NET, XML, PL/SQL, Ajax, PHP, and other technologies.
The 2007 conference also offered several new programs. The Oracle OpenWorld Unconference
provided attendees with the opportunity to present their own sessions in
an informal, interactive setting. In the No-Slide Zone, attendees took part in
Oracle OpenWorld 2007
lively discussions about cutting-edge technologies, with a ban on Microsoft oracle.com/openworld/2007

Oracle OpenWorld podcasts

PowerPoint slides. Inside Innovation, sponsored by Intel, gave attendees a oracle.com/techcasts
PHOTOGRAPHY/ THE PHOTO GROUP

sneak peak into technologies that will influence the way we live, work, and Oracle OpenWorld blogs, photos,
and more
play in the not-so-distant future. otn.oracle.com/events/oracle-openworld-2007

You can watch archived keynotes and videocasts, read blogs, listen to pod- Oracle’s 30-year timeline
oracle.com/timeline
casts, and view photos and more online. See the webLOCATOR for links to ThinkQuest
www.thinkquest.org
more of the Oracle OpenWorld 2007 experience.

14 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_OOW.indd 14 11/21/07 2:19:52 PM

Experience
and 300,000 customers.

Nidal Haddad, Jan Roehl, Karen Mazer, and Tara Hall from Deloitte
Consulting accept the Oracle E-Business Suite Solution Titan Award from
Oracle Senior Vice President Matt Mills (far left) and Oracle Chairman Jeff
Henley (far right). At Oracle OpenWorld, Oracle PartnerNetwork presented
awards to 17 North American–based partners: Accenture, CedarCrestone,
CGH Technologies, Cloud Creek Systems, Deloitte Consulting, Entology,
Hitachi Consulting, IBM Global Business Services, Intelenex, Io Consulting,
iSP3 Solution Providers, Piocon Technologies, SYSTIME Computer Corp.,
Tallgrass Technologies, Terillium, Trianz, and TUSC.

Oracle President Charles Phillips announces Oracle VM, a scalable,

low-cost server virtualization product that supports both Oracle and
non-Oracle applications.

ROBERT BENGTSON

ThinkQuest, an international Web site–building competition for students sponsored

by the Oracle Education Foundation, brought more than 30 award-winning students
from 17 countries to Oracle OpenWorld. The 2007 winners (pictured) hail from
Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Croatia, Egypt, Germany, India, Indonesia, the
Netherlands, the Philippines, Romania, Singapore, Switzerland, the United States,
Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

Hundreds of Oracle partners displayed and demonstrated their solutions

in Moscone Center’s exhibition hall.

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 15

JF08_OOW.indd 15 11/21/07 2:20:26 PM

 a t O r a c l e RESOURCES
What’s New at Oracle
The latest Webcasts, courses, and online content
WEBCASTS
Web 2.0 in the Enterprise: Separating Myths
from the New Realities of Collaborative
Business Processes
oracle.com/pls/ebn/live_viewer.main?p_
shows_id=5828710
Sonny Singh, senior vice president,
Products and Industries Business Unit,
Oracle; Thomas Kurian, senior vice presi-
dent, Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle;
and Andrew McAfee, associate professor,
Harvard Business School, discuss the role
of Web 2.0 in the enterprise and how Oracle
WebCenter Suite supports implementing
Web 2.0 capabilities in business processes.
ECM Profile Online Seminar Series
oracle.com/dm/08q1field/8396_ev_
aiim_ecm_webseminars.html
Oracle has partnered with AIIM, the
Enterprise Content Management
Association, to present six 60-minute
profiles of Oracle content management
customers. Featured topics include Web
content management, records management,
and secure enterprise search.
ORACLE UNIVERSITY
PeopleSoft HRMS 8.8 to 9.0 Delta
oracle.com/education
(Search keyword: HRMS 9)
Get an in-depth look at the enhance-
ments and changes made from Oracle’s
PeopleSoft HRMS Release 8.8 to Release
9.0. This two-day class includes examples
and several activities that address the
new features in PeopleSoft HRMS, from
implementing security enhancements to
the introduction of a centralized Profile
Management module that delivers enter-
prisewide talent management.
PeopleTools Certified Expert certification
oracle.com/education
(Search keyword: certification)
Oracle University is now offering two
new credentials for PeopleTools experts:
PeopleTools Developer Certified Expert
16 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_Resources.indd 16
and PeopleTools Advanced Developer
Certified Expert. These credentials are for
developers who are proficient at develop-
ing, implementing, and customizing Oracle’s
PeopleSoft Enterprise applications.
PODCASTS
Focus on Embedded Technologies:
The In-Memory Database Explained
oracle.com/techcasts
Mike Olson, vice president of embed-
ded technologies, Oracle, describes the
architecture and functionality of the Oracle
TimesTen In-Memory Database, a solution
for extremely fast and predictable applica-
tion performance.
The Secret History of Oracle Berkeley DB
oracle.com/techcasts
Margo Seltzer, one of the inventors of
Berkeley DB and still an architect on the
Oracle Berkeley DB team, explains the
origins of the world’s most popular embed-
ded database.
Inside Oracle AppsLab
oracle.com/techcasts
Paul Pedrazzi, founder of Oracle AppsLab,
a small think tank within Oracle that evan-
gelizes Web 2.0 technologies and concepts,
talks with Oracle Technology Network Editor
in Chief Justin Kestelyn about its origins and
future plans.
Oracle Application Express 3.0: A Closer Look
otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts
Scott Spendolini, CEO of Sumner
Technologies, talks about the benefits of
Oracle Application Express 3.0 and how it
works with Oracle Database.
Asking Tom: What’s New in Oracle Database 11g
otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts
In this two-part series, Tom Kyte of Ask
Tom fame talks with Oracle Magazine’s
Tom Haunert about managing change,
key new performance and manageability
features in Oracle Database 11g, how to
get ready for Oracle Database 11g, and
changes in virtual location.
The Benefits of the PeopleSoft HCM 8.3
to 9.0 Wrapper
oracle.com/applications/podcasts.html
Shaun Braun, director of release operations,
PeopleSoft, discusses the new upgrade
wrapper for Oracle’s PeopleSoft HCM and
what customers can expect from it.
Automating Paper-Based Processes with
Imaging and Business Process Management
oracle.com/products/middleware/
ofmradio.html
Sancho Pinto, principal product manager for
Oracle Imaging and Process Management,
discusses how to image-enable your enter-
prise applications and eliminate process
bottlenecks. Find out how to minimize docu-
ment processing costs, reduce error and
loss, and cut physical storage space costs.
For Oracle product information, call the number
for your region:
Country Phone Number
U.S. and Canada .....................................1.800.367.8674
Australia ....................................................1800.735.467
Austria.......................................................0800.29.7626
Belgium ........................................................0800.73280
Brazil .........................................................0800.901.985
China.........................................................800.810.0161
Denmark.........................................................8088.1068
Finland ......................................................0800.113.573
France .......................................................0800.905.805
Germany.................................................0800.1.810.111
Greece.................................................00800.353.12020
Hong Kong......................................................3002.1246
India ..........................................................1600.44.6725
Indonesia...........................................001.800.1.672.253
Ireland ........................................................1850.672253
Italy ..............................................................8008.74720
Japan ........................................................0120.155.096
Malaysia ....................................................1800.80.1837
Mexico...................................................01800.221.7321
The Netherlands .............................................0800.0827
New Zealand .............................................0508.555.215
Norway...........................................................800.14411
Philippines........................................................811.5831
Portugal.......................................................800.853.021
Singapore ................................................1800.6722.531
South Africa...............................................0800.994.225
South Korea...............................................080.2194.114
Spain............................................................900.952900
Sweden ........................................................020.798798
Switzerland................................................0800.55.2574
Taiwan.......................................................0800.672.253
Thailand ..............................................001800.441.0545
Turkey .................................................00800.353.90014
U.K. .........................................................0870.5.332200
11/6/07 2:51:25 PM
 a t O r a c l e OTN BULLETIN
The Official Oracle Wiki
The Oracle community now has its own platform for collaboratively exchanging knowledge.
ince the late 1990s, the Oracle
Technology Network (OTN)
Web site has provided the
Oracle community with a
means of informally interacting and
exchanging knowledge with each other
as well as with Oracle employees. In
2005, that formula was further enriched
by a large collection of official Oracle
blogs (blogs.oracle.com). However, these
resources primarily contain information
provided by Oracle—and that informa-
tion is structured the way we like it.
Now, for the first time, customers and
partners can complement this “official”
content with that generated completely
by the OTN community—thanks to the
new Oracle Wiki, sponsored by Oracle.
As defined by Wikipedia (what else?),
a wiki is “computer software that allows
users to easily edit, create, and link Web
pages.” In essence, it’s an extremely easy-
to-use content management system that
facilitates cross-linking and collaborative
editing—a Web site that you can manip-
ulate on the fly.
With the Oracle Wiki, you can create
your own Web content—whether instal-
lation guides and tips, project docu-
mentation, technical notes, or anything
else that’s appropriate and captures your
imagination—as well as edit and post
comments on pages created by others.
Think of it as a free-form “Oracle parallel
universe” built by customers and part-
ners, and thus the perfect complement
to the OTN Web site, Oracle discussion
forums, and blogs.
Create your own Oracle Wiki pages at
wiki.oracle.com.
CALLING ALL ORACLE APPLICATIONS ACES
Once the bastion of DBAs and develop-
ers, Oracle ACE-dom has come to the
Oracle Applications community. So if
you are or know an “ace” in the Oracle
JF08_OTN.indd 17
Applications community (any product
line), now is the time to nominate
them for the Oracle ACE Program for
Application Advocates.
Oracle ACEs are known for their
strong credentials as Oracle com-
munity enthusiasts and advocates,
with candidates nominated by anyone
in the Oracle Technology (and now
Applications) communities. Oracle ACEs
are promoted as official experts at events
and on the OTN Web site, and their
profiles are posted in the online Oracle
ACE Directory.
To qualify for the Oracle ACE
Applications program, candidates
should be contributing applications
expertise through blogs, podcasts,
speaking events, articles, or forums.
Find more information and nomina-
tion forms at oracle.com/aceapps. Learn
more about the Oracle ACE program
(and find an Oracle ACE) at otn.oracle
.com/goto/oracle-ace.
ACES HOST EVENTS AROUND THE WORLD
Leave it to Oracle ACE Mogens Norgaard
to provide the 2007 Miracle OpenWorld
technical conference with its own beer.
Aside from kegs of Miracle Beer, the
170 attendees at the annual conference
(held September 27–29, 2007, near
Copenhagen) were treated to technical
sessions by fellow Oracle ACEs Cary
Millsap, Anjo Kolk, and other big names
in the Oracle Database community.
At the keynote, Managing Director of
Oracle Denmark Thomas Honoré spoke
on the challenges of communicating to
partners and customers about Oracle’s
strategic plans regarding the 32 com-
panies that had been acquired in the
two years leading up to the conference.
Honoré said that Oracle hadn’t really
bought 32 products but rather that many
technology stacks.
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY JU STIN KESTELYN
A little farther south was the
IndicThreads.com Conference On Java
Technology in Pune, India, founded by
Oracle ACE Director (Oracle Fusion
Middleware) Harshad Oak. The editor
in chief at Rightrix Media and author of
several Java technology books, includ-
ing Oracle JDeveloper 10g: Empowering
J2EE Development (Apress), Oak still
finds time to spearhead this leading
independent conference on Java tech-
nology. The conference held its second
annual event in October 2007 in the
Symbiosis Infotech Campus audi-
toriums in Pune. Oak and his wife,
Sangeeta, also an accomplished Java
programmer, hosted the conference.
Learn more about the Miracle
OpenWorld conference at www.miracleas
.dk. Learn more about the IndicThreads
conference at www.indicthreads.com. O
Justin Kestelyn (justin.kestelyn@oracle.com) is the
editor in chief of Oracle Technology Network.
OTN home
otn.oracle.com
OTN Headlines
otn.oracle.com/pub/news
Free software downloads
otn.oracle.com/software
Documentation
otn.oracle.com/documentation
Technology Centers
otn.oracle.com/tech
Podcasts
otn.oracle.com/techcasts
Technical articles
otn.oracle.com/pub/articles
Blogs
blogs.oracle.com
Discussion forums
forums.oracle.com
Developer Events Calendar
otn.oracle.com/events
Oracle ACE Program
otn.oracle.com/goto/oracle-ace
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 17
11/7/07 1:48:10 PM
 D I D Y O U KNOW
? a t O r a c l e BRIEFS
GREEN ISSUES GROW ON IT AGENDAS
11 percent of IT professionals surveyed say
their operations address energy concerns,
and 25 percent more expect to be addressing
energy concerns within three years. 21
percent claim that energy conservation
influenced their company’s IT purchasing
decisions in the past year, and 46 percent
predict that energy conservation will be a
factor in the coming year. Still, the majority
of companies do not have any infrastructure
to monitor IT energy use. A total of 1,011 IT
professionals, 81 percent of whom work in
the U.S., took the online survey.
Source: The 451 Group
www.the451.com/special_reports/special_
report_detail.php?icid=465
CIOS SAY INTERNAL TECH SUPPORT
IS UNDERSTAFFED
When asked about the ratio of internal end
users to technical support employees, CIOs
said that the ideal ratio is 82 users for each
support person. When the same CIOs were
asked about the ratio of end users to support
personnel in their own companies, they said
it was 136:1. Things are a little better for
companies with more than 1,000 employees:
their actual ratio is 118:1, whereas CIOs
for midsize firms said their actual ratio was
131:1. The survey polled 1,400 CIOs from U.S.
companies with 100 or more employees.
Source: Robert Half Technology
www.rht.com
VALUE OF B2B E-COMMERCE RISING
AMONG COMPUTER, ELECTRONICS FIRMS
59 percent of computer and electronics
companies surveyed say the value of
business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce to
their organizations is increasing significantly,
and 38 percent say it is increasing slightly.
57 percent of survey respondents reported a
significant increase in transactional volume
using B2B e-commerce. The most frequently
cited hurdles to greater B2B e-commerce
use are internal manual process costs (86
percent), the cost of implementing data and
business process standards (62 percent), and
the cost of doing e-business (57 percent).
Source: CompTIA
comptia.org/pressroom/get_
pr.aspx?prid=1291
18 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_BRIEFS.indd 18
NEW ORACLE APPLICATION INTEGRATION
ARCHITECTURE FOR SAP INITIATIVE
O racle has unveiled the Oracle
Application Integration Architecture
for SAP Initiative, which provides joint
Oracle/SAP customers with a standards-
based method to unify their enterprise
applications and rapidly adopt service-
oriented architectures. Through this ini-
tiative, Oracle/SAP customers can build
sustainable, composite business appli-
cations across Oracle, SAP, and other
third-party applications.
Several Oracle to SAP prebuilt inte-
gration packs, which reduce the time to
deploy key cross-application business
processes, are available. These include
Siebel CRM to SAP, Agile PLM to SAP,
Hyperion to SAP, Oracle Utilities to
SAP, Oracle Communications Billing
and Revenue Management to SAP, and
PeopleSoft HR to SAP.
“Oracle and SAP share the same
customers, and we are pleased to offer
a standards-based approach to building
composite applications and prebuilt inte-
grations for key industries,” says Ed Abbo,
senior vice president of applications
development, Oracle. “Oracle Application
Integration Architecture for SAP extends
the leadership we’ve demonstrated in
delivering on the promise of a service-
oriented architecture and reinforces our
commitment to maximizing value from
Oracle’s existing product lines.”
ORACLE RELEASES DATA MASKING PACK FOR
ORACLE ENTERPRISE MANAGER
N ow shipping, Oracle Data Masking
Pack for Oracle Enterprise Manager
automates masking of sensitive data for
secure, scalable data sharing. The pack
helps customers protect sensitive data by
replacing confidential or sensitive pro-
duction information with realistic but
scrubbed data based on masking rules.
“Providing a comprehensive manage-
ment solution that spans applications,
middleware, and database management
is the foundation for Oracle Enterprise
Manager’s top-down approach. With the
Oracle Data Masking Pack, companies
can now share data within and across
company boundaries while addressing
regulatory and privacy compliance,” says
Richard Sarwal, senior vice president of
systems management products, Oracle.
“Through the pack’s innovative use of
templates, which support application-
aware masking definitions, customers
can achieve greater IT efficiencies while
reducing costs.”
Oracle Data Masking Pack enables
regulatory compliance through consistent
and rule-based application of masking
formats across enterprisewide databases.
It also supports a rich and extensible
format library that covers a variety of
mask formats. This helps ensure consis-
tent enforcement of information security
policies and allows organizations to share
data quickly and scalably without violat-
ing privacy regulations.
ORACLE FUSION GOVERNANCE, RISK, AND
COMPLIANCE INTELLIGENCE CENTRALIZES
RISK AND COMPLIANCE INFORMATION
O racle has released Oracle Fusion
Governance, Risk, and Compliance
Intelligence version 7.7.1, which deliv-
ers expanded risk and compliance
diagnostics. Business process owners,
compliance officers, and risk managers
can use this tool to better understand
the effectiveness of governance, risk,
and compliance (GRC) programs across
the enterprise.
The new release combines qualitative
and quantitative information from both
Oracle and non-Oracle systems and
presents this information in integrated
dashboards and reports, allowing execu-
tives and managers to identify and focus
efforts on key risk and control issues.
Built on Oracle’s business intelligence
technology, Oracle Fusion Governance,
Risk, and Compliance Intelligence offers
organizations prebuilt, role-tailored
intelligence and personalized reporting
and diagnostics.
“To effectively gain an understanding
of the status and effectiveness of GRC
programs, an organization must have a
way of integrating risk and control infor-
11/21/07 9:17:13 AM
 mation from different business functions
and systems,” says Chris Leone, group
vice president of applications strategy,
Oracle. “Oracle Fusion Governance,
Risk, and Compliance Intelligence deliv-
ers such an information hub for GRC,
enabling business users to identify key
risks and respond in real time.”
ORACLE UPDATES SOFTWARE
CONFIGURATION MANAGER
O racle is shipping a new release of
Oracle Software Configuration
Manager that collects and integrates
detailed and dynamic system configura-
tion information and enables Oracle to
deliver highly automated and personal-
ized support. It also lays the founda-
tion for a more fully personalized,
knowledge-driven, and high-value-add
support environment. Based on Oracle
Enterprise Manager, Oracle Software
Configuration Manager tightly integrates
the capabilities of Oracle software with
support processes, knowledgebases, and
support tools.
“We are committed to delivering
the next-generation support experience
through a new technology platform that
delivers better information and solu-
tions to our customers proactively,” says
Juergen Rottler, executive vice president,
Oracle Customer Services. “The new
version of Oracle Software Configuration
Manager is a significant enhancement
toward delivering this new support
foundation consisting of a secure, per-
sonalized system that provides easy
access to configuration data.”
NEW INTEGRATION PACK STREAMLINES
TRADE PROMOTION PROCESS
N
ow shipping, Oracle’s Siebel CRM
Integration Pack for Oracle Trade
Promotion Management synchronizes
critical promotion, customer, and
financial information. Part of Oracle
Application Integration Architecture, the
pack delivers prebuilt business process
integration between Oracle’s Siebel CRM
and Oracle E-Business Suite. Consumer
goods companies can use the integra-
JF08_BRIEFS.indd 19
tion pack to create efficiencies across the
enterprise and extract more value from
promotions by synchronizing customer,
product, and financial information
across Oracle applications.
“The Siebel CRM Integration
Pack for Oracle Trade Promotion
Management enables companies to
implement a closed-loop trade promo-
tions process that is both efficient and
delivers the value and functionality they
need right out of the box,” says Jose
Lazares, vice president of applications
development, Oracle.
UPGRADE MANAGEMENT SERVICE ENABLES
SEAMLESS ORACLE DATABASE UPGRADES
O racle has enhanced the Oracle
Advanced Customer Services
Upgrade Management Service to help
customers minimize upgrade risk
and increase the value of their Oracle
Database investment. The offering
provides a portfolio of upgrade man-
agement tools and services that help
Oracle customers seamlessly move from
their current Oracle Database environ-
ments to the most appropriate versions
for their business.
The upgrade service is a three-
pronged program. The first phase
includes analysis, testing, and prepara-
tion to help companies understand their
business and technical readiness. The
second phase includes remote or onsite
assistance and ongoing assessments
during the actual upgrade, so any issues
that come up are mitigated before they
can slow or derail the upgrade process.
The final step is testing the new produc-
tion environment for continual opera-
tional improvement.
“Our goal is continual operational
improvement for the entire Oracle
stack,” says Larry Abramson, senior
vice president, Oracle Advanced
Customer Services. “The enhancements
to the Upgrade Management Service
are designed, developed, and tested to
help Oracle users leverage our expertise
to ensure that their upgrade projects
are successful.”
ORACLE MAGAZINE
ORACLE ACQUIRES INTERLACE SYSTEMS
O racle has acquired Interlace Systems,
a provider of strategic operation
planning software. Interlace Systems
software helps organizations to quickly
and collaboratively combine functional
processes to address strategic opera-
tional planning needs. The software
uses a change-based data modeling
server, connecting operational plans in
an integrated model and allowing busi-
ness planners across functions to rapidly
change operational assumptions, re-
evaluate scenarios, assess business
impact, and update the plan of record.
“In today’s global economy, orga-
nizations need a streamlined planning
process that links strategic operational
plans to the financial plan of record,”
says Thomas Kurian, senior vice presi-
dent, Oracle Fusion Middleware. “The
combination of Interlace Systems and
Oracle will help enable business planners
to rapidly evaluate the impact of changes
to business assumptions across all plans
and benefit from flexibility, speed, integ-
rity, and accuracy, typically not found
in traditional spreadsheet-based and
function-specific planning solutions.” O
Oracle Application Integration
Architecture for SAP Initiative
oracle.com/aia
Data Masking Pack for
Oracle Enterprise Manager
oracle.com/enterprisemanager
Oracle Fusion Governance, Risk,
and Compliance Intelligence
oracle.com/grc
Oracle Software Configuration
Manager
oracle.com/support/premier/software-
configuration-manager.html
Siebel CRM Integration Pack
for Oracle Trade Promotion
Management
oracle.com/aia
Oracle Advanced Customer Services
Upgrade Management Service
oracle.com/support/advanced-customer-services
Oracle and Interlace Systems
oracle.com/interlacesystems
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 19
11/21/07 9:17:13 AM
  Number of silos in which your customer data resides.
Coincidentally, also the number of totally different
definitions you have for “customer.”

definition —
Embarcadero solutions help manage data
enterprise-wide, enabling you to build and
communicate an architecture of your data assets
so you always know what is what, and where it is.
With just one, everything gets simpler. You and
your business are empowered to use and reuse
reliable, relevant, and timely data across a range
of platforms and storage formats. Understanding
your data is finally possible, and getting a hold
of the metadata is the key. Standards can be
© 2007 Embarcadero Technologies, Inc. All rights reserved.

defined and enforced. Data redundancy is

eliminated. It’s no coincidence that the most
sophisticated solution is also the simplest.
See how one gets it done.

Call 415.834.3131 or visit www.embarcadero.com

 a t O r a c l e ORACLE NEWS
Making Virtual Servers a Reality
Oracle VM delivers faster, lower-cost, scalable server virtualization.
s the volume of information in
data centers continues to grow
exponentially, IT professionals
are faced with myriad chal-
lenges: increased hardware, energy, and
cooling costs; real estate, facility, and
space expansion costs; resource under-
utilization; and scalability, reliability, and
availability issues. Oracle is addressing
these challenges with Oracle VM, a new
scalable, low-cost server virtualization
product that supports both Oracle and
non-Oracle applications.
“Oracle VM extends Oracle’s support
for grid computing, by providing the
ability to virtualize within as well as
across servers,” says Edward Screven,
Oracle chief corporate architect. “Oracle
is the only software vendor that combines
the benefits of server clustering and server
virtualization technologies to deliver inte-
grated clustering, virtualization, storage,
and management for grid computing.”
Oracle VM enables customers to
increase server utilization through virtual
machine consolidation with very little
overhead—saving power, floor space,
and hardware costs. And with Oracle
VM, customers can grow or shrink the
physical server resources dedicated to an
application, without downtime, through
Oracle VM live migration.
With Oracle VM, users can create
and manage virtual machines that exist
on the same physical server but behave
like independent physical servers. Each
virtual machine created with Oracle VM
has its own virtual CPUs, network inter-
faces, storage, and operating system.
SUPPORT FOR MULTIPLE SYSTEMS
Oracle VM consists of Xen’s open source
server software and an easy-to-use inte-
grated, Web-browser-based management
BOB ADLER
console for creating, cloning, sharing,
configuring, booting, and migrating
JF08_NEWS.indd 21
Edward Screven, Chief Corporate Architect, Oracle
virtual machines running on x86- and
x86-64-based systems across an enter-
prise, with support for Linux and
Windows guest operating systems.
Because Oracle VM is backed by
Oracle’s world-class support organiza-
tion, Oracle customers have a single
point of support for their entire virtu-
alization environments, including the
Linux operating system, Oracle Database,
Oracle Fusion Middleware, and Oracle
Applications—all of which are certified
with Oracle VM.
“With Oracle VM, customers can
respond more rapidly to business
changes, increase return on investment,
and reduce lifetime total cost of owner-
ship,” says Screven. “Oracle VM brings
enterprise-class support and backing
to server virtualization, giving custom-
ers the confidence to deploy virtual-
ized solutions.” He adds that among its
many features and benefits, Oracle VM
offers simplified installation, with single
install, patching, and upgrading for both
Oracle VM and Oracle Enterprise Linux;
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY R IC H SCHWERI N
faster deployment through preconfig-
ured virtual machine images of Oracle
Database and Oracle Enterprise Linux;
and up to three times the efficiency of
other server virtualization products.
LOW-COST SUPPORT
“With Oracle VM, customers can deploy
server virtualization for a fraction of the
cost of using other vendor products,”
explains Screven. Oracle VM software
is free to download, and pricing for
enterprise-class support for Oracle VM is
on a per-system basis, with 24/7 support
for a system with one or two CPUs
priced at $499 per year per system and
a system with unlimited CPUs priced at
$999 per year per system.
Oracle On Demand, which provides a
portfolio of applications on a subscription
or managed basis, is offering Oracle VM
server virtualization within the Oracle
On Demand Managed Services Grid. This
will enable Oracle to better optimize each
Oracle On Demand customer’s configura-
tion, more fully harness server capabili-
ties, maintain operational enhancements
deployed over the last several years, and
introduce new benefits—not to mention
gaining significant savings in terms of
space, power, and cooling. O
Rich Schwerin (rich.schwerin@oracle.com) is
the Linux, virtualization, and open source product
marketing manager with Oracle technology marketing.
LEARN more about Oracle VM
oracle.com/virtualization
DOWNLOAD Oracle VM
edelivery.oracle.com/oraclevm
READ about Oracle VM technology
otn.oracle.com/tech/virtualization
LISTEN to an Oracle VM podcast
streaming.oracle.com/ebn/podcasts/otn/6084482.mp3
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 21
11/21/07 9:20:11 AM
 a t O r a c l e INTERVIEW
Web 2.0 Meets the Enterprise
Oracle WebCenter provides a platform for integrating Web 2.0 with enterprise applications.
oday’s consumers expect Web
2.0 capabilities—from blogs to
podcasts to community—in the
Web sites that they frequent.
Now many organizations are bring-
ing those same Web 2.0 capabilities
into their enterprise applications.
Vince Casarez, Oracle vice president of
product management with a focus on
Oracle WebCenter, sat down with Oracle
Magazine’s Caroline Kvitka to talk about
Web 2.0 in the enterprise and Oracle
WebCenter. The following is an excerpt
from that interview. Download a podcast
of the full interview at otn.oracle.com/
syndication/magcasts.
Oracle Magazine: Most of our readers
are familiar with some type of Web 2.0
capability. However, integrating Web 2.0
with business processes is still a rela-
tively young concept. Could you start
off by defining Web 2.0 in the enterprise
and talk about the benefits?
Casarez: If we look at the evolution of the
Web, there was Web 1.0, which is just
publishing content; then Web 1.5, which
is enabling sites to provide services. Now
Web 2.0 is that pairing of information
with some social networking elements
that allow people to interact together.
We see people wanting to take Web
2.0 services and combine them with
their enterprise application information
in order to get a better picture of what
they are talking about to their customers
and partners, or to drive internal inno-
vations. If you can pair Web 2.0 experi-
ences with transactional applications, it
makes it easier to make better decisions.
Oracle Magazine: How difficult is it to
incorporate Web 2.0 into business pro-
cesses today?
Casarez: All of these services are available
today, hosted on the Web. Organizations
can get started very easily. But, we hear
customers say, “I like wikis, I like blogs.
22 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_INTERVIEW.indd 22
Vince Casarez, Oracle Vice President of Product
Management (Oracle WebCenter)
I want to get started with those, but I am
a little exposed if I put it out on the Web
as a service. I need to have a little more
control, so that it ties into my security
infrastructure, so that I can restrict access
to certain areas for people and teams, so
that they can have their own private area
to evolve their designs and plans.”
We are pulling those types of Web 2.0
services into the enterprise with an inte-
grated platform, Oracle WebCenter, so
that when enterprises choose to deploy
them to different groups, they don’t have
to worry about different departments
choosing different services on the Web
for doing the same type of work.
Customers can get started with this
platform that plugs into their existing
enterprise architecture and allows them
to use these services together to provide
social networking or enable better interac-
tion between users and their information.
Oracle Magazine: Tell us more about how
Oracle WebCenter supports the integra-
tion of Web 2.0 with business processes.
Casarez: With Oracle WebCenter 10g
BY C A ROLINE KVITKA
Release 3, customers can start to lever-
age the most-popular Web 2.0 services
within their enterprise today, including
online discussions, enterprise wikis for
collaboration around different projects,
and a Session Initiation Protocol–based
presence and instant messaging platform
that lets you find experts in the organiza-
tion in order to resolve issues quickly.
In addition, these can be paired with
content integrated from different back-
end sources like Oracle Content Database
Suite, EMC Documentum, Lotus Notes,
and Microsoft Sharepoint. In this way,
users can assemble all this information in
the context of the enterprise applications
and do things like discuss the latest sales
proposal, or create a wiki to work on the
latest marketing plan, or contact the best
person to help resolve a customer issue.
Oracle Magazine: What are customers
doing today with Oracle WebCenter in
terms of Web 2.0?
Casarez: Quite a few customers have
started to use Oracle WebCenter as
an aggregation point across all of their
enterprise applications. They want to be
able to bring multiple custom and siloed
applications together in an aggregated
view for their business users. They are
also adding a richer set of interactions
into their existing applications. Oracle
WebCenter provides them that UI to
pull in enterprise application content,
business intelligence content, business
processes, and Web content, so that
users can get an overall view of what’s
going on in the business and make
better decisions moving forward. O
LISTEN to the podcast
otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts
BOB ADLER
LEARN more about Oracle WebCenter
webcenter.oracle.com
11/6/07 2:34:17 PM
 C

CM

MY

CY

CMY

K
 a t O r a c l e INTERVIEW
Optimized for Data Warehousing
Oracle and partners provide preconfigured hardware and software for data warehousing.
ay Roccaforte, Oracle vice presi-
dent of database development for
data warehousing, analytics, and
business intelligence (BI), sat
down with Oracle Magazine’s Jeff Erickson
to talk about data growth and the Oracle
Optimized Warehouse. The following is
an excerpt from that interview. Download
a podcast of the full interview at otn
.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts.
Oracle Magazine: Tell us about data
growth and how it contributed to the
Oracle Optimized Warehouse.
Roccaforte: Everybody’s familiar with
Moore’s Law, which says that processor
speeds are doubling every 18 months.
But with those remarkable changes in
processor speeds, why isn’t our work pro-
ductivity improving at a similar rate or at
least at a more-rapid rate?
The answer is that data volumes
are actually growing at a faster rate
than Moore’s Law. Ten years ago, it was
unusual to see a data warehouse of 50
gigabytes. Today people are running
Oracle data warehouses of hundreds of
terabytes. So even though computers are
getting much faster, computing is actu-
ally slowing down relative to the amount
of data. This is going to have profound
implications on how data is going to be
managed and analyzed in the future.
One of the biggest implications is that
with data volumes at such large levels,
you really need to be able to scan data
very rapidly, and that is what led to the
Oracle Optimized Warehouse. In the
Oracle Optimized Warehouse, we present
the customer with an out-of-the-box,
balanced configuration that is optimized
for data warehousing. It’s a complete
data warehouse solution from Oracle and
hardware partners including Dell Inc.,
IBM, and Sun. Oracle Database is prein-
stalled and preconfigured. The hardware
is designed and tested to be balanced so
24 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_ROCCAFORTE.indd 24
Ray Roccaforte, Oracle Vice President of Database
Development for Data Warehousing, Analytics, and
Business Intelligence
that scan rates are very high and there’s
enough bandwidth to get the data to the
processors at a fast enough rate to keep
those processors busy.
Oracle Magazine: What kinds of custom-
ers is the Oracle Optimized Warehouse
best suited for?
Roccaforte: There’s a whole class of cus-
tomers that we see coming on board
here, as data warehousing has become
much more popular. Today, everybody
wants a data warehouse, because that’s
where you do your analytics.
But there’s not as much expertise
available compared to the number of
data warehouses in the world, so there
are a lot of emerging customers now who
want something that’s ready to use out-
of-the-box. They don’t want to design
everything from scratch. And those are
the customers that we’re targeting with
Oracle Optimized Warehouse.
Oracle Magazine: You’ve stated that Oracle
Database 11g, which is at the heart of the
Oracle Optimized Warehouse Initiative,
BY JEFF ERI CKSO N
will fundamentally change BI. Tell us
more about that.
Roccaforte: One of the things that I’m
very excited about is the integration in
Oracle Database 11g between our online
analytical processing (OLAP) technology
and our materialized views technology,
which is the classical approach to man-
aging aggregated data in the Oracle data
warehouse. This is profound because the
basic operations of BI are dominated
by aggregations.
Materialized views allow customers to
precompute and store the aggregations
that they’re interested in. So at runtime
they don’t have to do the aggregation,
and queries return orders of magnitude
faster. But it’s really difficult for customers
to create all the materialized views they
need. Even if they could create them,
it would be very costly to keep them
refreshed. The revolutionary step that
we’ve taken is to integrate the material-
ized views technology with our OLAP
cube technology. An Oracle OLAP 11g
cube is a collection of thousands, or tens
of thousands, of individual aggregations,
all managed as a single object, stored
compactly, and refreshed as a single
object. By marrying these two technolo-
gies, we get the benefits of both. The
precomputed aggregations in the cube
give great query performance on a much
larger set of queries, and the maintenance
is handled by the Oracle database, which
removes that burden from the customer. O
Jeff Erickson is a senior editor with Oracle Publishing.
LISTEN to the podcast
otn.oracle.com/syndication/magcasts
LEARN more about the Oracle
BOB ADLER
Optimized Warehouse Initiative
oracle.com/goto/oowi
11/6/07 2:53:24 PM
 c o m m u n i t y COMMITMENT BY A A RO N L A Z E N BY

Formula for Success

Oracle promotes teacher training to improve math and science education.
inus Pauling’s molecular biology. AVERAGE NOT ENOUGH Board Certification. Oracle awarded the
Gordon E. Moore’s oft-cited Law. Merely average performance in math and NBPTS a US$1 million Commitment
Grace Hopper’s UNIVAC compiler. science is not enough to drive the next Grant to create the Oracle Professional
Buckminster Fuller’s geodesic generation of IT innovation, so Oracle Development Initiative to Improve Math
domes. Such high-profile breakthroughs executives have developed a particular Education, designed to identify the chal-
by American scientists belie the truth interest in this issue. “Long-term invest- lenges teachers face in teaching math
about the state of math and science ment in student math and science skills and to create a collection of online and
education in the United States. In fact, is good for the economy in general, and in-person professional development
according to a 2003 survey by the it is good for Oracle in particular,” says sessions. Through lectures, roundtable
National Center for Education Statistics, Rosalie Gann, director, Oracle Global discussions, video presentations, and
the performance of American software tools, the initiative
students is average, compared will encourage teachers to a
to other industrialized coun- develop a deeper understanding
tries—ranking behind England, of effective math teaching prac-
Singapore, and the Russian tices, based on National Board
Federation but ahead of Italy, Certification math standards.
Scotland, and the Philippines. To determine where math
Teacher turnover is one of and science teachers are experi-
the key factors influencing the encing challenges, NBPTS ana-
quality of education in U.S. lysts mined an Oracle database
elementary and middle schools. containing four years of certi-
According to the National fication entries. These findings
Commission on Teaching and will be analyzed by education
America’s Future, almost half experts and board-certified
of America’s new teachers leave teachers to create the core cur-
the profession during their first riculum behind the initiative,
five years. This brain drain which is scheduled for rollout
puts further stress on limited Raising student aptitude is the goal of Oracle’s partnership with the National Board among math teachers by the
school district budgets, thwarts for Professional Teaching Standards. start of the 2009 school year.
the introduction of new teach- “Research shows that
ing methods, and prevents schools from Corporate Citizenship. “Research shows National Board Certified Teachers have
preparing for impending retirements of that promoting professional development proven that they know their subject
teachers. So students suffer. plays a direct role in improving student matter and can successfully teach it,” says
“It is a big concern,” says Mark Ellis, performance—and we’re happy to find a Joseph A. Aguerrebere, president and
assistant professor of secondary education partner that shares our concerns.” CEO, NBPTS. “Working with Oracle, we
at California State University, Fullerton. In 2007 Oracle teamed up with the hope to elevate the performance of math
“One of the reasons people leave the pro- National Board for Professional Teaching educators and math students.” O
fession is that they end up feeling sort of Standards (NBPTS), an independent non-
isolated, that they are stuck out there on profit organization dedicated to advanc- Aaron Lazenby is a director with Oracle Publishing.
their own, often without adequate prepa- ing the quality of teaching and learning
ration for what they should know and be through professional standards, to create
able to do.” Ellis, himself a former middle a professional development program to Oracle’s Commitment
school math teacher and a National Board reduce attrition among math and science oracle.com/commitment

Certified Teacher, believes that National teachers in the U.S. by connecting teach- National Board for Professional
Board Certification could help reverse ers with their peers, providing teach- Teaching Standards
NBPTS

www.nbpts.org
troubling trends in teacher attrition. ing resources, and promoting National

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 25

JF08_COMMITMENT.indd 25 11/7/07 1:51:28 PM


b o o k BEAT
The Berkeley DB
Book
By Himanshu Yadava
Apress
Apress.com
ISBN: 1590596722
This practical guide covers the intricacies of
Oracle Berkeley DB, a family of open source,
embeddable databases. The book goes
into depth on complex design issues that
are only touched on in the footnotes of the
Berkeley DB reference manual. It explains
the technology at a higher level and also
covers the internals, providing generous
code and design examples.
Author Himanshu Yadava provides a
developer’s perspective on design issues in
Berkeley DB–based applications and offers
design options for specific conditions. He
also includes a look at fault tolerance and
high-availability frameworks and offers
extensive coverage on replication, distributed
transactions, and environment recovery.
Yadava is a software developer and
consultant through his company, BitSeer.
Oracle Database
11g SQL
By Jason Price
Oracle Press
www.oraclepress.com
ISBN: 0071498508
In Oracle Database 11g SQL, author Jason
Price teaches readers to access Oracle
databases through SQL statements and
to construct PL/SQL programs. The book
explains how to retrieve and modify
database information, use Oracle SQL*Plus
and Oracle SQL Developer, work with
database objects, write PL/SQL programs,
and more. Readers will find in-depth
coverage of the latest SQL features and
tools, performance optimization techniques,
advanced queries, Java support, and XML.
Readers will learn to take advantage of
Oracle Database 11g features such as
PIVOT, UNPIVOT, and flashback archives.
With practical examples, code samples,
and programming tips, this book provides
everything you need to master SQL, whether
you are a technical manager or consultant,
business user, database administrator, or
developer. No prior knowledge of Oracle
Database, SQL, or PL/SQL is assumed.
Price is a freelance consultant and former
product manager at Oracle. He is an Oracle
Certified DBA and Application Developer.
Look for Oracle books at oracle.com/
technology/bookstore
26 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_PARTNER.indd 26
c o m m u n i t y PARTNER NEWS
ORACLE AND WIPRO PROVIDE MANAGED
IDENTITY SERVICES
C
ertified Advantage Partner Wipro
has partnered with Oracle to provide
Oracle Identity and Access Management
Suite as a managed service. This new
offering allows companies to outsource
the user management, help desk, and
maintenance elements of identity man-
agement to Wipro. These services are
provided at a single monthly cost that
covers product licenses, implementation,
and maintenance.
The offering is delivered on two
concurrent tracks. A Transition and
Operation Support track evaluates the
extent of automation and help-desk call
volume, while an Identity Management
Automation track builds out an auto-
mated solution based on products in the
Oracle Identity and Access Management
Suite. Wipro migrates manual tasks to
Oracle-powered automated processes
over time; once the system is configured,
customers can leverage proven security
templates and toolkits to take advantage
of repetitive tasks such as on-boarding
identities and integrating Sarbanes-
Oxley applications.
PROMERO OFFERS VOICE OVER IP CALL
CENTER SOLUTIONS
P
romero, an Oracle Certified Partner
and a provider of Oracle Contact
Center Anywhere virtual call center
solution, now offers a hosted, virtual
call center solution using third-party
Voice over IP (VoIP) carriers. Promero’s
hosted configuration, coupled with VoIP
media gateways from Quintum, has
been successfully deployed with VoIP
carriers including Nexogy, Packet8, XO
Communications, and Qwest. The use
of virtual phone numbers and internet-
based voice traffic enables customers
to take advantage of free or low-cost
long distance, advanced calling fea-
tures offered by VoIP providers, virtual
remote employee access, and low total
cost of ownership.
Oracle Contact Center Anywhere—
formerly known as Telephony@Work
CallCenterAnywhere—is an integrated,
multichannel contact center platform
that merges traditional phone calls with
e-mail, chat, fax, and Web callback.
“The important benefits of this offer-
ing are high voice quality, virtual access,
stability, enhanced inbound/outbound
calling features, and very low opera-
tional cost,” says Gregg Troyanowski,
president of Promero.
CENTENNIAL SOFTWARE DELIVERS
INTEGRATED IT ASSET MANAGEMENT
C entennial Software, a developer of
IT asset discovery and audit solu-
tions, has released IT asset management
products for use with Oracle E-Business
Suite and Oracle’s PeopleSoft Enterprise.
Called Centennial Discovery Connector,
the products enable Oracle IT Asset
Management customers to use IT asset
inventory data from Centennial’s IT
audit solution, Centennial Discovery.
“By integrating Centennial Discovery
with Oracle IT Asset Management solu-
tions, organizations have the ability to
implement a true best-of-breed solu-
tion with class-leading ERP [enterprise
resource planning] solutions,” says Andy
Burton, CEO of Centennial Software.
Centennial Discovery includes
a hardware and software audit for
all computers and network devices,
including smartphones, printers, and
wireless access points. Combined with
Oracle’s IT Asset Management solutions,
Centennial Discovery helps to control
IT costs, maintain regulatory compli-
ance, comply with software licenses, and
provide better IT service.
ORACLE OFFERS BUSINESS PROCESS
OUTSOURCING PARTNER PROGRAM
O
racle now offers Business Process
Outsourcing (BPO) service pro-
vider partners the complete Oracle
stack (applications, database, and
middleware) under the Oracle BPO
Go-to-Market Initiative. The initiative
includes programs and services to help
partners develop and promote solu-
tions that complement Oracle Business
11/8/07 1:19:24 PM
 PARTNER SPOTLIGHT BearingPoint Puts Customers on the Road to Fusion

O racle and BearingPoint have launched the Roadmap to

Application (RTA) strategy, a program to help customers
build a business and IT strategy that aligns with Oracle’s
application and technology landscape, including Oracle
Fusion. The program helps customers create information-
centric, role-based, intelligent, and industry-specific IT
systems that use the best components of Oracle’s
application portfolio.
The RTA strategy is not to “rip and replace” existing
systems but to identify options that take advantage of
the customer’s current platform while considering the
evolving technology landscape, the customer’s business
goals, and Oracle’s road map. Through a series of focused
evaluations of key corporate initiatives and trouble spots,
BearingPoint consultants build a three- to five-year plan
for the extension, evolution, and sometimes revolution,
of corporate systems. Ongoing health checks and updates
are also part of the program, allowing for changes in busi-
ness conditions while maintaining consistent progress
toward program goals.
“[The RTA strategy] answers important customer con-
cerns about integrating IT systems, how new IT elements
affect the entire system enterprisewide, how to get technol-
ogy and applications into sync, and how to make deci-
sions now that will make sense for your future needs,” says
Robert Youngblood, managing director of Oracle technol-
ogy solutions at BearingPoint.
On the road to Oracle Fusion Applications, Oracle
Fusion Architecture and Oracle Fusion Middleware—both
available now—address today’s business challenges, includ-
ing increasing the capacity for growth and change; improv-
ing insight into business operations and strategic drivers;
mitigating risk and driving compliance; and enhancing the
profitability and productivity of connections with custom-
ers, partners, and workers. Oracle Fusion Middleware tech-
nologies are compatible with current Oracle applications
and many non-Oracle products. In addition, Oracle’s acqui-
sition strategy has brought open standards to many new
technologies and strengthened the prospect for customers
to create a more dynamic infrastructure.

Process Outsourcing in selected product,
market, and solution channels. Partners
who qualify can brand their services
with a “BPO Powered by Oracle” logo.
SOLUTION BEACON AND ORACLE DELIVER
ADVERTISING INDUSTRY SOLUTION
will have a positive impact on profit
margins and the quality of operations.”
Solution Beacon’s Silk Paradigm inte-
grates budgeting, scheduling, and actuals
to provide real-time information about
advertising campaigns. It uses business
intelligence and a powerful research
Pittsburgh, and San Francisco.
“We understand how to get the most
out of this platform and believe that our
combined capabilities . . . will make
CPSG a clear choice when it comes to
implementing Oracle technologies,” says
Jim Guinn, vice president of enterprise

O racle Certified Advantage Partner

Solution Beacon has created an
advertising industry–specific technol-
engine to improve analysis of the client’s
products, competition, target demo-
graphic audience, media spend, ratings,
architecture for CPSG. O

ogy solution called Silk Paradigm
that integrates with Oracle Media and
Entertainment solutions. Silk Paradigm
allows advertising companies to esti-
mate, manage, and control the processes
and costs related to campaigns.
“The advertising industry continues
buying trends, and market conditions.
Wipro
oracle.com/partnerships/si/wipro
CPSG MERGES WITH PARTNERS
Promero
CONSULTING SERVICES
www.promero.com/call_center_software/
C PSG, an Oracle Certified Partner, has
merged with Partners Consulting
Services (PCS), an Oracle Partner, to
call_center_software.asp

to be challenged in its management of
advertising and marketing campaigns
that include many dynamic activities,
creative teams across disparate geogra-
phies, and collaboration across campaign
agencies,” says David Murphy, chief strat-
egy officer at Solution Beacon and former
executive vice president at advertising
and marketing company Young and
Rubicam. “Automation of this process
and real-time performance monitoring
Centennial Software
www.centennial-software.com/oracle
create a national company that provides BearingPoint
Oracle E-Business Suite and Oracle www.bearingpoint.com/oracle
Fusion Middleware solutions. Oracle BPO Go-to-Market Initiative
CPSG delivers service-oriented oracle.com/partners/home/bi/global/bpo/
unauth/index.html
architecture and identity and access
management solutions. PCS has 25 years Solution Beacon
www.solutionbeacon.com
of experience with Oracle solutions,
including Oracle’s PeopleSoft and Oracle CPSG
www.cpsg-inc.com
E-Business Suite. The companies will
Partners Consulting Services
maintain operations in Atlanta, Chicago, www.partnersconsulting.com
Dallas, Denver, Houston, Irvine,

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 27

JF08_PARTNER.indd 27 11/8/07 1:19:25 PM

 c o m m u n i t y PEER-TO-PEER BY B la ir C a m pbell

Favorite Things
Oracle ADF, Oracle JDeveloper, and Oracle Application Server top the list for these Oracle ACEs.
Chris Ostrowski tions. Although if we’re talking peerSPECS
Company: IBM Global Business
What’s your favorite tool or about forums, it’s highly possible Services, a business and technology
technique on the job? Oracle that someone has already asked services provider
JDeveloper combined your question. So don’t be lazy— Job title/description:
Technical consultant, responsible
with Oracle Application search before you ask! for consulting on Oracle projects,
Development Framework What technology has most changed resolving development issues, and
designing software architectures
[Oracle ADF] is a phenom- your life? Oracle JDeveloper with
Location: Vilnius, Lithuania
enal piece of software. The Oracle ADF. I’m developing and
Oracle credentials: Oracle
latest version—10g Release posting sample applications using Certified DBA (Oracle Database
3—makes creating portlets this technology on my blog [www 10g ), with three years of experience
using Oracle products
incredibly easy. For developing sophisticated, Web-enabled, .andrejusb.blogspot.com], which
Oracle ACE
Oracle-based applications, no other tool comes close. has helped me to become recog- otn.oracle.com/community/
What would you like to see Oracle, nized in the technical community. oracle_ace

as a company, do better? Oracle peerSPECS

Application Server technologies
Company: TUSC, an Oracle
consulting firm Jacco Landlust
are changing so fast, it’s difficult Job title/description: Tell us about your current project. I’m contracted out to ISC,
Technical management consultant,
for many clients to fully under- responsible for maintaining a strong
the national information and communications technologies
stand all the different versions and working knowledge of all core company for Dutch police and fire departments and other
Oracle technologies
what’s included in each. A more public services. My main job is to
Location: Lakewood, Colorado
clearly defined road map of Oracle guide applications into produc-
Oracle credentials: Oracle
Application Server technologies Certified DBA (Oracle9i ), with 20 tion, so the company’s local DBAs
would be invaluable. years of experience using Oracle can support these applications.
products
If you were going to the International I’m also responsible for maintain-
Oracle ACE
Space Station for six months and otn.oracle.com/community/
ing its high-availability environ-
could only take one Oracle refer- oracle_ace ment for national services, which
ence book, what would it be? Oracle runs Oracle Real Application
professionals are lucky to have so many outstanding books to Clusters [Oracle RAC] and Oracle
choose from. Kevin Loney’s Oracle Database 10g: The Complete Application Server. I’ve come to
Reference gives the reader both quality and quantity. have the most interest in trouble-
shooting application server problems.
Andrejus Baranovskis What’s your favorite tool or technique on the job? Since my main
How did you get started in IT? After earning my bachelor’s job is analyzing what’s wrong with software created by others,
degree, I joined a local company that’s an Oracle Certified my favorite tool is a UNIX kit. Even on Windows, I install the
Advantage Partner—an IT service provider called Informacines
. GNU toolkit all the time. This peerSPECS
Technologijos. My first IT project, which involved defining data- helps me analyze log files, debug Company: Desyde B.V., a software
development company
base schema as well as developing SQL statements for location file handles, and much more.
Job title/description: DBA,
information management, was You’ve taken an Oracle University partially responsible for maintaining
based on Oracle Spatial. This class—how was that experience? Desyde B.V.’s internal systems
and all UNIX/Linux systems
wasn’t accidental—from very The class I took is mandatory administration duties, as well as
early on it was my goal to work for the DBA Oracle Certified troubleshooting for customers

with Oracle technology. Professional exam, but I didn’t Location: Deventer, the
Netherlands
What advice do you have about enroll for that purpose. Since all
Length of time using Oracle
how to get into Web and database five students were experienced products: Seven years
development? If you want to DBAs, we dove right into Oracle Oracle ACE
be a successful developer, you Database 10g new features and otn.oracle.com/community/
oracle_ace
shouldn’t be afraid to ask ques- even built an Oracle RAC cluster. ■

oracle magazine  m ay / J u n e 2 0 0 7   28
 54% of Profit Readers
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 INFORMATION

30 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_DATABASE.indd 30 11/12/07 11:34:15 AM

 COMES HOME
BY DAV ID B AUM

ORACLE DATABASE 11g MANAGES ALL

YOUR ENTERPRISE DATA.

very business depends on the ability to capture,

analyze, and share information efficiently. The need

to establish unified, enterprisewide policies for man-

aging this information is leading IT departments

to Oracle Database 11g, which can manage all types

of data—from traditional business information

to office documents, XML, and both 2-D and 3-D

spatial information.

These capabilities are making Oracle Database 11g

a popular choice to power transaction process-

ing, data warehousing, and content management

applications. “Our objective with Oracle Database

11g is to provide a single platform to store, manage,

back up, and secure all your data,” says Vishu

PHIL SALTONSTALL

Krishnamurthy, Oracle’s senior director of SQL, text,

and XML development. “We’re delivering a single

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 31

JF08_DATABASE.indd 31 11/12/07 11:34:17 AM

 “Oracle SecureFiles enables the customer to manage unstructured data in the same
way as structured data. It gives the same security, backup, recovery, encryption,
flashback technology, locking, clustering technology, partitioning. . . . All these mature
database features can now be brought to bear on all types of data.”
— Richard J. Niemiec, CEO, TUSC

repository for both data and metadata, much of which is cur-
rently stored in file systems and content management systems
and on unmanaged PCs.”
AN EVOLVING ARCHITECTURE
In addition to improvements in performance, scalability, avail-
ability, security, and management efficiency, Oracle Database
11g includes many new features that support all your enter-
prise data. For example, Oracle Database 11g’s Spatial option
provides native semantic technology, which identifies and
creates connections between disparate pieces of data—such as
a company’s customers, orders, and products—creating new,
actionable insights. These capabilities are of particular impor-
tance to Metatomix, a leading provider of semantic solutions
in the government, financial services, manufacturing, and life
sciences sectors.
“I’m not just looking for solutions to relational data storage
but for a reliable repository for all types of information,” says
Colin Britton, chief technology officer at Metatomix. “With an
Oracle database, we can manage our data, our configuration
information, and all of our code in a single repository. We get
all the benefits of backup, management, failover, clustering,
and so forth, without supporting different strategies for differ-
ent parts of the application.”
Metatomix also favors Oracle Database 11g for its native
Resource Description Framework (RDF) storage capabilities.
“Oracle supplies a semantic layer within the database, and
Oracle is the only database vendor that offers native support
for RDF datatypes and OWL [Web ontology language] ontolo-
gies,” adds Britton. “This makes it a good technical option for
us and our customers.”
For example, a U.K.-based financial services organization
hired Metatomix to speed up data-intensive tasks related to
the processing of mutual fund trades. The bank needed a
business intelligence application that could understand the
meaning of the information it was gathering, which led the
company to semantic technology.
Britton says that the Oracle-based solution helps this finan-
cial services organization verify fund prices and identify data
anomalies. “Financial services firms have massive amounts of

PROVIDING BETTER DATA MANAGEMENT

Until recently, data storage was managed by
individual company policy. However, new gov-
ernment regulations and guidelines such as
Sarbanes-Oxley and HIPAA in the United States
and the Data Privacy Directive in the European
Union now specify increased data storage,
retention, privacy, and protection requirements.
As a consequence, the amount of information a
company must store has vastly expanded. The
challenge for companies is to understand how
their data evolves, determine how it grows,
monitor how its usage changes over time, and
decide how long it should survive.
Richard J. Niemiec, CEO of TUSC, favors
Oracle Database 11g for its ability to store
massive amounts of information. “We’re in the
midst of a data explosion, and most companies
are seeing their data needs rise exponentially,”
he says. “Oracle Database 11g can store 8 exa-
bytes of information—8 million terabytes.”
Oracle Information Lifecycle Management
(ILM) can help solve these challenges of data
management and storage. Oracle Information
Lifecycle Management Assistant helps admin-
istrators design and implement an ILM strategy
that aligns partitioned data to appropriate storage
tiers, keeping more data online for longer in a
cost-efficient manner. Oracle Database 11g offers
advanced compression and partitioning capabili-
ties that enable companies to implement an ILM
strategy using multitier storage.
The data that companies must store
on average triples every two years. Oracle
Advanced Compression in Oracle Database
11g helps organizations reduce disk storage
requirements, compressing data stored
on-disk. It can lower costs by reducing disk
space requirements for any type of data,
including structured and unstructured data
such as documents, images, and multimedia.
Oracle Advanced Compression can be used
with any type of database application without
application changes, and disk space savings
will cascade throughout the data center.
Oracle Partitioning enables tables and
indexes to be split into smaller, more manage-
able components. Oracle Database 11g offers
several partitioning methods, including range,
interval, reference, and list, in addition to com-
posite partitions of two methods such as order
date (range) and region (list) or region (list) and
customer type (list). This functionality enables
faster query performance and administrative
operations by executing at the smaller partition
level. Oracle Partitioning doesn’t require any
application changes, and Oracle Database 11g
offers a partitioning advisor to help administra-
tors implement the right partitioning methodol-
ogy for their business model.
“Whether you call it unstructured data, enter-
prise information, or content management, it’s
all about creating a richer experience for the end
user, both on the internet and within the enter-
prise,” says Vishu Krishnamurthy, Oracle’s senior
director of SQL, text, and XML development. “It
used to take a lot of coding to combine various
types of information. By consolidating data in a
single repository, Oracle Database 11g enables a
truly integrated information platform.”

32 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_DATABASE.indd 32 11/12/07 11:34:18 AM

 of LOB performance, Oracle Database 11g includes Oracle
SecureFiles, a new and improved storage infrastructure for
LOB datatypes.
Oracle partner TUSC has been working with a large gov-
ernment client testing Oracle SecureFiles. Based in Chicago,
TUSC is a consulting firm that helps companies optimize their
investments in Oracle technology and applications.
“Oracle SecureFiles enables the customer to manage
unstructured data in the same way as structured data,” says
Richard J. Niemiec, CEO of TUSC and former president of the
International Oracle User Group. “It gives the same security,
backup, recovery, encryption, flashback technology, locking,
clustering technology, partitioning. . . . All these mature data-
base features can now be brought to bear on all types of data.”
While some companies have had reservations about
putting unstructured information into a relational database
for performance reasons, Niemiec believes that the new func-
tionality of Oracle Database 11g with Oracle SecureFiles can
resolve these concerns. “Oracle SecureFiles uses entirely dif-
ferent technology for locking, space management, and disk
storage than former versions of the database,” he says. “Oracle
SecureFiles is not only much faster than traditional LOBs, it’s
faster than a file system. This is one of the most compelling
reasons to move to Oracle SecureFiles and Oracle Database 11g.”

SNAPSHOTS
Metatomix www.metatomix.com
Location: Boston, Massachusetts Industry: High technology
Employees: 46 Oracle products: Oracle Database, Oracle
Application Server

TUSC www.tusc.com
Location: Chicago, Illinois Industry: Professional services
Employees: 180 Oracle products: Oracle Database, Oracle Applications,
Rich Niemiec, CEO of TUSC, says that new functionality of Oracle Database 11g with Oracle Application Server, Oracle Developer Suite, Oracle Enterprise
Oracle SecureFiles can resolve concerns that companies might have had about Manager, Oracle Portal
putting unstructured information into a relational database.
Warner Music Group www.wmg.com
Location: New York City Industry: Entertainment
data, governed by complex business processes and analytics,”
Employees: 4,000 (2006) Oracle products: Oracle Database,
he says. “Semantic technology offers insight whenever excep- Oracle XML DB, Oracle SQL*Loader
tions occur, and Oracle has the right database platform for
maintaining the information.” U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Engineer Research and Development Center/Cold Regions
REDUCING PERFORMANCE OVERHEAD Research and Engineering Laboratory
www.erdc.usace.army.mil
ANDREA MANDEL

Organizations see the wisdom in consolidating information

into a professionally managed database; however, there have
been concerns about the performance overhead required to
store and retrieve large objects (LOBs). To address the issue
Location: Hanover, New Hampshire Industry: Government
Employees: 2,000 Oracle products: Oracle Database, Oracle Application
Server, Oracle Portal, Oracle Web Services, Oracle Spatial

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 33

JF08_DATABASE.indd 33 11/12/07 11:46:06 AM

 Don Janik, senior technical manager at Warner Music Group, likes Oracle Database for its XML capabilities. “It is not necessary for Oracle XML DB to store XML tag
names when storing the contents of XML documents. This can significantly reduce the storage space required,” Janik says.
During their testing, TUSC found out that Oracle
SecureFiles was 22 times faster than LOBs when reusing
deleted space. Similarly, TUSC saw PL/SQL reads as 6 times
faster, and SQL*Loader operation as nearly 3 times faster. “All
of the performance issues that might have prevented people
from storing unstructured content in the database have been
addressed,” Niemiec says.
A REMODELED STOREHOUSE FOR XML
As a markup language capable of describing all kinds of
information—including structured, unstructured, and semi-
structured data—XML appeals to many types of organizations.
Oracle was the first commercial relational database vendor
to offer native XML capabilities within a relational database.
“Oracle made XML a fundamental datatype with Oracle9i
Database Release 2,” says Oracle’s Krishnamurthy.
Oracle Database’s XML capabilities caught the ear of Don
Janik, senior technical manager at Warner Music Group, home
to well-known record labels such as Asylum, Atlantic, and
Elektra. Last year, Warner Music Group implemented the XML
DB feature in Oracle Database 10g to collect, validate, and
track critical sales information from its business partners. The
music company has also tested the new XML capabilities in
Oracle Database 11g.
Warner Music Group looked at various solutions for han-
dling XML data. They chose the Oracle solution because they
like the way Oracle implements structured storage. “Based on
the XML schema, it is not necessary for Oracle XML DB to
store XML tag names when storing the contents of XML docu-
34 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_DATABASE.indd 34
ments,” Janik says. “This can significantly reduce the storage
space required.”
Oracle XML DB is commonly used for storing, retrieving,
and managing massive volumes of XML data. XML documents
can be stored either as character large objects for unstruc-
tured and semistructured documents such as Microsoft Word
documents, or as object-relational datatypes for structured
documents such as purchase orders.
This functionality enables XML documents to be
accessed using industry standard SQL, XML, and file/folder
interfaces. Moreover, says Oracle’s Krishnamurthy, Oracle
Database 11g introduces a new storage representation and
indexing method for XML data: Binary XML datatype and
XMLIndex. Binary XML improves performance and storage
efficiency. In combination with XMLIndex, it can provide
up to a 15-fold performance improvement when accessing
XML documents.
Warner Music Group uses Oracle XML DB to expedite the
loading and validation of digitally formatted sales information.
In one test, Janik’s team processed 50,000 sales transactions
in 15 minutes. This is partly due to the unique architecture of
Oracle Database. When an XML schema is registered, Oracle
XML DB generates a set of SQL objects that correspond to
complex types defined in that schema. XPath expressions,
sent to Oracle XML DB functions, are translated to SQL access
methods that operate directly against the underlying objects.
PETER STEMBER
“By abstracting the storage model through the use of the
XMLType datatype, and providing a set of operators that use
XPath to perform operations against XML documents, Oracle
11/12/07 11:34:23 AM
 “Oracle XML DB lets us switch between structured and unstructured storage and to
experiment with different forms of structured storage without affecting the application.”
—Don Janik, Senior Technical Manager,
Warner Music Group

XML DB lets us switch between structured and unstructured
storage and to experiment with different forms of structured
storage without affecting the application,” Janik says.
This is particularly important as the music industry pre-
pares for compliance with Recording Industry Association of
America (RIAA) standards for electronic messages. The RIAA
is proposing use of the Digital Data Exchange XML-based
message formats for processing payments and royalties among
music service providers, artists, publishers, and composers.
Because of the innovative work being done by Janik and his
team, Warner Music Group will be well positioned to take
advantage of these new standards.
INTEGRATING SPATIAL DATA
Scientists working for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers rely
on Oracle to store all kinds of data, including geospatial and
multimedia information.
“Oracle Database 11g helps us pull together and process
very large sets of both unstructured and traditional struc-
tured data,” says Michael Smith, a physical scientist who

Oracle Database 11g: Storing More Data

Oracle Database 11g offers Oracle Information Lifecycle Management Assistant, Oracle Partitioning, and Oracle Advanced Compression to enable information
lifecycle management that streamlines data management, improves performance for mission-critical systems, and reduces storage costs.

With Oracle Database 11g, store all your data, including relational, XML, binary XML, 2D and 3D spatial,
Data Types
semantic, DICOM, RFID, e-mail, multimedia, spreadsheets, and documents.

Active Data (5–10%) Less Active Data (30 –35%) Historical Data (60%)
The high-peformance storage tier The low-cost storage tier holds The archive storage tier holds
holds current and frequently less current, less frequently read-only data that is rarely accessed
accessed data. accessed data. (but still needs to be available).

Oracle Advanced Compression Oracle Partitioning

Oracle Advanced Compression in Oracle Database 11g not only
reduces disk space requirements for all types of data, it also improves
application performance, enhances memory and network efficiency,
and can be used with any type of application without any
STEVE LYONS
Partitioning allows database objects to be subdivided into smaller
pieces, and Oracle Partitioning provides a comprehensive range of
partitioning schemes, including range-hash, range-list, range-range,
list-range, list-hash, and list-list composite partitioning. Oracle

application changes. Partitioning enhances the manageability, performance, and availability

of a wide variety of applications.

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 35

JF08_DATABASE.indd 35 11/12/07 11:34:24 AM

 “Spatial storage maintains the spatial
indexes, including the type of geometry,
the projections, the tolerances, and
the whole series of coordinate pairs.
This lets us do a lot more work inside
the database.”
—Michael Smith, Physical Scientist,
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

works at the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Lab of

the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer’s Engineer Research and
Development Center.
Smith says that one application in particular that can
benefit from the new features of Oracle Database 11g is
the Operation and Maintenance Business Information Link
Regulatory Module (ORM2), a Web-based system for issuing
and tracking development projects in and around public
wetlands. Anyone who wants to develop on waters of the
United States is required to apply for a wetland permit. The
Corps uses ORM2 to track the development and its associated
impact on the landscape.
According to Smith, this permit data used to be stored in
database columns as x-y coordinate pairs. The Corps recently
moved it to Oracle Spatial to gain point, line, and polygon
storage capabilities. “Spatial storage maintains the spatial
indexes, including the type of geometry, the projections, the
tolerances, and the whole series of coordinate pairs,” he says.
“This lets us do a lot more work inside the database.”
The Corps makes this data available through Web Feature
Services (WFS), making it easier to enter data and share it
with other government agencies. Oracle Database 11g can
dispatch those Web services directly from the database, thus
simplifying the infrastructure.
“Being able to store the spatial indexes directly in the data-
base, at the transactional level, enables us to edit the polygons
through the WFS transactions,” says Smith. “It’s a standard-
ized format, so we don’t have to develop and maintain as
much code.”
The center is also developing database applications to
work with 3-D point cloud storage and indexing functions,
which can now be stored directly in Oracle Database 11g. (A
point cloud is a set of three-dimensional points describing
the outlines or surface features of an
object.) The laboratory uses this
type of data structure for record-
ing measurements that come
from its light detection and
ranging instruments.
Michael Smith, physical scientist for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, says
that Oracle Database 11g allows the Corps to process very large sets of both
unstructured and traditional structured data.
the data sets so that we could run calculations against them
as a single entity,” says Smith. “Oracle Spatial 11g can store a
point cloud as a single object. This means that we can write
simple queries to do line-of-sight, data-point-intensity, or
nearest-neighbor calculations without even moving the data
out of the database.”
Moving forward, the agency plans to use Oracle Database
11g to merge business and technical data into a common
repository. Like thousands of other Oracle customers, Smith
and his team have learned an important lesson: To simplify
management and gain meaningful insight into all your infor-
mation, you need to be able to store, manage, and analyze all
types of data in a cohesive way. O
David Baum (david@dbaumcomm.com) is a freelance business writer based in
Santa Barbara, California.
READ more about
Oracle Database
otn.oracle.com/products/database/oracle11g
Oracle Spatial
oracle.com/database/spatial.html
Oracle XML DB
otn.oracle.com/tech/xml/xmldb

“Up until now, such Oracle Information Lifecycle Management

DAVE BRADLEY

data had to be stored in otn.oracle.com/deploy/ilm

flat text files, because data- DOWNLOAD Oracle Database 11g

otn.oracle.com/software/products/database
bases had no way of tying together

36 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_DATABASE.indd 36 11/12/07 11:34:30 AM

 Special Advertising Section

ORACLE DATABASE 11g

Partner
Guide
Partners Are Lining Up to Help Customers Meet
Change with Confidence

THE FOLLOWING SECTION HIGHLIGHTS

key hardware, storage, and service partners
who are ready to help Oracle customers
manage change while reducing risk, lowering
cost, and improving performance.

PARTNER INDEX
HP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Pillar Data Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Fujitsu Siemens Computers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
NetApp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

JF08_11g_Advertorial.indd 37 11/19/07 11:46:30 AM

 Special Advertising Section
HP
HP and Oracle: Improving Business Outcomes
T he speed and unpredictability of business cycles
have pushed the limits of information technology (IT)
infrastructures at many enterprises. Organizations need to
become more adaptable, but often their information systems
are slow to respond. At the same time, these enterprises
want to gain greater efficiency and effectiveness from their
IT systems, lower the cost of computing, and optimize their
business outcomes.
HP has a tradition of helping customers profit from new IT
innovations. As enterprises all over the world discover that
they need new levels of availability and integration—in real
time—they are turning to HP. HP Integrity, HP ProLiant, and
HP BladeSystem servers offer the highest levels of service
of any platform in their class. HP storage systems scale to
meet the most demanding customer workloads. HP software
provides a leading management platform for the data cen-
ter, plus tools such as HP LoadRunner and Quality Center
software, to help customers optimize their environments. In
other words, HP provides all of the components of an agile,
high-performance, highly available data center, thus helping
customers achieve better business outcomes.
HP also has a long history of working with Oracle. And
Oracle Database 11g will be an integral part of HP’s cus-
tomer solutions.
“Oracle Database 11g, with its low-cost maximum avail-
ability architecture, combined with HP’s software, servers,
and storage, provides an opportunity for customers to take
advantage of this next level of IT innovation and, in turn, achieve
better business outcomes,” says Ron Eller, vice president and
general manager, enterprise solution alliances, at HP.
A TOTAL SOLUTION
HP and Oracle share more than 100,000 customers, from
small and medium businesses to large enterprises. The
breadth and depth of this joint solution stack—including HP/
Oracle reference architectures, applications, and operating
systems—allow these two partners to provide customers
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT | www.hp.com/go/oracle
JF08_11g_Advertorial.indd 38
with a total solution. “For customers who want to optimize
their business outcomes, HP and Oracle together offer the
products, services, and experience to accelerate business
growth, mitigate risks, and lower costs, providing a solid
return on IT investments,” explains Eller.
The companies have invested heavily in their joint
solutions. In fact, HP and Oracle manage 13 competency
centers across the globe that provide proofs of concept;
design, configuration, and benchmarking assistance; thought
leadership; and training.
HP has been involved in the Oracle Database 11g beta
program for more than a year. As an Oracle database
customer, HP gained insight into how the new release would
help the company improve its business. At the same time, as
an Oracle partner participating in the beta program, HP lent
its perspective and expertise to Oracle’s development team
to make the new database release even better.
For example, HP worked with Oracle to incorporate HP’s
industry-leading network-attached storage solution directly
into the Oracle Direct network file system (Oracle Direct
NFS) The result? With Oracle Database 11g, customers
can realize scalable and available I/O performance on
network-attached storage that was not previously possible.
In addition, this combination of Oracle and HP technology
can leverage existing storage area networks, providing
customers with investment protection while allowing
flexibility for growth with mitigated risk.
“We’re excited that Oracle has developed its [Oracle]
Direct NFS feature in Oracle Database 11g on HP Storage
products so that customers can choose simple, inexpensive
storage connectivity and provisioning for grid deployment,”
says Eller. “It’s just another example of the way Oracle
and HP work together to provide customers with better
overall answers.”
HP and Oracle share a common goal of improving their
customers’ business outcomes through IT. Because IT isn’t a
separate piece of the business—IT helps drive the business.
11/19/07 11:46:30 AM
 Special Advertising Section
PILLAR DATA SYSTEMS
Optimized Storage for Oracle Environments
E xponential data growth, and the data center complexity
that comes with it, is now a fact of life. That’s why Pillar
and Oracle work together to reduce complexity and provide
the power and flexibility to meet service levels, even as data
volumes explode. Pillar and Oracle share a road map for
joint integration, certify each other’s products, and provide
consolidated service offerings. The result is the worlds most
efficient system for Oracle storage management—one that
consolidates storage assets and modularly scales capacity
and performance to reduce cost and mitigate risk.
GET CONFIDENT WITH ORACLE VALIDATED CONFIGURATIONS
Oracle Validated Configurations provide the assurance that
deployed solutions will run optimally and reduce testing
cycles, ultimately enabling faster deployment of Oracle
with the Pillar Axiom. These certified architectures, based
on Oracle Database 11g, ensure that servers, operating
systems, and storage network connectivity components
all work together seamlessly, according to Mike Workman,
Pillar’s CEO. As a result, customers experience the benefits
of standardization, scalability, and reliability without
the cost and delays of validation or the risk of untested
configurations. “The result is true IT automation and
streamlined deployments,” says Workman.
Also, Pillar’s commitment to publishing new validated
configurations for Oracle Database 11g running on Oracle
Enterprise Linux provides confidence to customers looking
to expedite early adoption of our joint technologies.
“We see [Oracle] Database 11g as a natural progression in
providing our joint customers with the right solutions for their
needs,” says Paul Veilleux, Pillar’s executive director, Global
Alliances. “Customers who migrate to Oracle Database 11g
on Pillar will experience a new era in automation.”
CONSOLIDATE ON PILLAR FOR MAXIMUM EFFICIENCY
The Pillar Oracle Enterprise Manager Plug-in along with
Oracle Enterprise Manager’s monitoring and provisioning
capabilities provide a seamless administration point from
a single Oracle management console for managing large
and complex storage pools. Having a common platform for
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT | www.pillardata.com
JF08_11g_Advertorial.indd 39
monitoring applications, databases, and storage helps IT
staff manage mission-critical applications more efficiently.
Database administrators can also establish quality of service
levels by using a policy-driven framework for automating
storage requirements. This capability increases operational
flexibility, enables fulfillment of business service-level
agreements, and reduces administrative costs.
Pillar also addresses the growing customer concern
of resources: power and physical space. In fact, Gartner
predicts that 50 percent of data centers will not have
sufficient power or cooling capacity by 2008 to keep up with
the demand for high-density computing.
“There is a major shift in the way database administrators
and IT professionals view storage today,” says Pillar’s
Veilleux. “Space is at a premium and power requirements
are becoming an important issue. Companies can avoid
significant costs by purchasing a Pillar solution that
consolidates SAN [storage area network] and NAS [network-
attached storage] systems onto a single platform and scales
out to grow with your database applications.”
In consolidating multiple tiers of storage and driving
up utilization, customers can achieve more than twice the
efficiency for each operation performed per watt of power
consumed, he says. Pillar is also a member of the Green
Grid, a consortium of information technology companies and
professionals seeking to improve energy efficiency in data
centers around the globe.
MORE ABOUT PILLAR
Pillar Data Systems takes a sensible, customer-centric
approach to networked storage. We build reliable, flexible
solutions that, for the first time, seamlessly unite SAN with
NAS Systems and enable multiple tiers of storage on a single
platform. The close collaboration between Pillar and Oracle
includes complementary products, certification processes,
joint integration efforts, and joint expert services. The world-
class power of Oracle integrated with the world’s most
efficient storage solution from Pillar Data Systems results
in the most cost-effective, highly available networked data
warehouse available.
11/19/07 11:46:31 AM
 Special Advertising Section
FUJITSU SIEMENS COMPUTERS
Oracle and Fujitsu Siemens Computers
“I t’s a fact that no one vendor offers the whole picture, so
partnerships are vital,” says Dr. Bernd Kosch, vice president
of strategic alliances within Fujitsu Siemens Computers. “The
key is that both companies bring unique contributions to a
strategic partnership, giving joint customers a leading edge
and business advantage.”
It is precisely these types of strategic partnerships that
fuel growth and innovation. It’s also one of the many drivers
behind why Oracle has had a strategic global partnership with
the Fujitsu Group for decades —including Fujitsu Limited and
Fujitsu Siemens Computers.
Oracle technology is a key component in the Fujitsu
Group’s range of servers running Linux, Windows, and Solaris
operating environments on both Intel and SPARC platforms.
The Fujitsu Group meets the needs of the world’s largest
and most-progressive users of information technology by
providing enterprise and e-business open systems server
and storage solutions. In fact, Fujitsu Siemens Computers
is the only company that supports three out of five strategic
platforms—Linux, Windows, and Solaris running on UNIX/
SPARC–based PRIMEPOWER, PRIMEQUEST, and Intel-based
PRIMERGY servers.
A SYMBIOTIC RELATIONSHIP
Oracle recently named the Fujitsu Group a Global Alliance
Partner and assigned a dedicated Global Alliance Manager
in Europe who reports directly to Oracle’s headquarters
in Redwood Shores. “We are now able to draw on direct
support from Oracle’s headquarters, which clearly improves
the planning and implementation of joint activities,” Kosch
explains. Within the Oracle PartnerNetwork, Fujitsu Siemens
Computers is an Oracle Certified Advantage Partner.
“Together with Oracle we can guarantee our customers
enhanced application performance, unlimited scalability,
fault tolerance, optimum security, and increased value from
products and services that are fully integrated and compatible
with our technology,” says Kosch.
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT | www.fujitsu-siemens.com/solutions/strategic_partners/oracle/index.html
JF08_11g_Advertorial.indd 40
Oracle Database 11g will deliver the highest level of
manageability, availability, performance, and security for cus-
tomers. In the jointly run Center of Excellence at the Oracle
facility in Munich, Germany, Fujitsu Siemens Computers and
Oracle will evaluate and test Oracle Database 11g with Fujitsu
Siemens Computers’s infrastructure solutions and storage
systems. Fujitsu Siemens Computers also plans to integrate
Oracle Database 11g as soon as possible into its own product
and solution portfolio, and to promote its benefits to customers
and partners via the joint Oracle/Fujitsu Siemens Computers
ISV Migration Centers in Europe.
CHECKS AND BALANCES
Ongoing performance testing and analysis will ensure that
Oracle and Fujitsu Siemens Computers deliver on the top
performance-improvement features, including faster and
more-reliable direct connections to network file system storage
devices, faster upgrades, faster backup/restore for large files,
faster backup compression, and new security features, such
as improved transparent data encryption to support tablespace
encryption and tighter integration with hardware security
modules for high-assurance masterkey protection. Also in the
works is increased password security with support for case-
sensitive, multibyte passwords, plus strong password-hashing
algorithms such as Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA-1) and salt.
Additional features include secure-by-default configuration
settings supporting password policies and audit options,
and strong authentication support for database system
administrator and database system operator connections.
Kosch anticipates great things to come. “Fujitsu and
Fujitsu Siemens Computers are strategic to Oracle,” he
says. “We see significant sales opportunities for Oracle’s
technology solutions running on Fujitsu Siemens Computers
platforms in general, including PRIMERGY, PRIMEPOWER,
PRIMEQUEST, and BS2000, as well as especially the
FlexFrame for Oracle solution. We look forward to growing
our sales efforts to capitalize on this opportunity.”
11/19/07 11:46:31 AM
 Special Advertising Section
NETWORK APPLIANCE, INC.
Multiplying the Power of Oracle Database 11g
A key Oracle partner in the development of grid computing,
leading storage provider Network Appliance, Inc.,
(NetApp) provides solutions that significantly enhance the power
of Oracle Database 11g to enable cost-efficient ILM, increase
DBA productivity, and shrink development cycle times.
“Since the advent of grid computing, NetApp and Ora-
cle have gone down the same path and shared the same
mind-set,” says Patrick Rogers, vice president of solutions
marketing, Network Appliance, Inc. “Both companies are fo-
cused on developing innovative solutions that reduce IT cost
and complexity.”
CLOSING THE ILM LOOP
With the launch of Oracle Database 11g, Oracle has signifi-
cantly expanded its commitment to content management.
Running on NetApp’s unified storage architecture, Oracle
Database 11g can deliver seamless information lifecycle
management (ILM).
Unlike many of its competitors, NetApp doesn’t have a siloed
approach to storage. High-performance, low-cost, archival,
and write-once-read-many (WORM) systems all run on a single
architecture, making it far simpler to migrate data from one system
to another. The result: Enhanced data protection for compliance
as well as reduced data management costs. “NetApp’s single
architecture means that customers can leverage a single
platform to enable data security and compliance,” Rogers adds.
BOOSTING DBA PRODUCTIVITY
Oracle Database 11g includes a series of advances that speed
development cycles and boost DBA productivity. NetApp builds
on the momentum with SnapManager for Oracle, “application-
aware” software that detects and responds intelligently to the
application on which it is running.
SnapManager for Oracle automates key DBA tasks and
enables DBAs to perform functions that were previously lim-
ited to storage administrators, including storage provisioning,
backup and restore functions, and even creation of clones.
Underlying SnapManager for Oracle is NetApp’s FlexClone
software, which dramatically speeds instant point-in-time
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT | www.netapp.com/partners/oracle/
JF08_11g_Advertorial.indd 41
copying of production data. As a result, developers can complete
testing, updating, and patching far more quickly than before.
“When you have to copy and distribute a terabyte of data
multiple times, the potential time and space savings that
FlexClone enables is huge,” says Rogers.
GROWING THE GRID
Many new features in Oracle Database 11g are designed to
further improve availability and performance of infrastructure
grids. Leveraging FlexVol technology, NetApp provides Oracle
Database 11g with virtualization capabilities that allow dynamic
pooling of storage resources, enabling customers to add or
shrink storage and meet the dynamic needs of the enterprise.
“NetApp FlexVol technology allows customers to grow their
grid environment,” says Rogers. Oracle has done it; they use
FlexVol to quickly provision and decommission systems and
rapidly repurpose assets.”
OPENING WINDOWS WITH DNFS
NetApp was a key partner in the development of Oracle
Database 11g most notably in developing, testing and optimizing
direct NFS (DNFS) performance and resiliency.
DNFS, a new feature in Oracle Database 11g, not only makes
it even simpler to run and manage a database and storage
system over an IP network, it also improves performance and
scalability through automatic link aggregation. And for the
first time, companies running Oracle Database 11g Standard
Edition can also run on Windows—a development that will
enable more small and medium businesses to leverage the
benefits of Oracle Database.
THE NEXT PHASE IN THE RELATIONSHIP
The relationship between NetApp and Oracle goes deeper
than most partnerships. It spans technical integration, services
and support, and sales and marketing, as well as executive
alignment. On Oracle E-Business Suite since 2001, NetApp is
also the standard storage platform for Oracle’s state-of-the-
art Austin Data Center. “Our shared goal is always to reduce
IT cost and complexity for Oracle customers,” adds Rogers.
11/19/07 11:46:31 AM
 42 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_APPS.indd 42 11/12/07 11:28:33 AM

 BY DAVID A. KE LLY

MAKING
ENTERPRISE
CHOICES
PICK THE ORACLE APPLICATIONS YOU NEED,
WHEN YOU NEED THEM.
ew standards, new business pressures, and the need
to deliver continuous value are redefining the benefit
of enterprise application upgrades and new integration
approaches. Oracle customers can choose both a road
map to a new generation of enterprise applications in the Oracle
Fusion Applications future and specific, continuous upgrades
and enhancements that deliver new technologies today.
“A lot of customers have had a desire and need to integrate
systems for a very long time, but up until the last year or so,
it’s been very hard to do in a scalable and cost-effective way
because of the lack of standards,” says Jesper Andersen, senior
vice president of applications strategy, Oracle. “But now with
service-oriented architecture [SOA] and the way that Oracle is
embracing it, it’s become a much easier goal to achieve.”
One way to achieve integration is through upgrading. With
investments in SOA and other standards-based technologies,
customers get new functionality and greater (and easier) integra-
PHIL SALTONSTALL/CORBIS

tion choices with every Oracle application upgrade. In addition,

upgrades let organizations leverage standardized best practices
and eliminate customizations from older versions.
“By upgrading, organizations can take advantage of new

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 43

JF08_APPS.indd 43 11/12/07 11:24:01 AM

 technologies—from Oracle Fusion
Middleware, including SOA and iden-
tity and access management—that are
integrated into newer versions of Oracle
Applications,” says Andersen. “In addi-
tion, customers have the security that the
solutions they’re investing in now will
move them along the path toward Oracle
Fusion Applications.”
Oracle Application Integration
Architecture helps this process because
it leverages all the thousands of Web ser-
vices that Oracle has built into its applica-
tion products. “It defines the objects that
you are integrating across—for example,
a customer object, an employee object,
a product object—as XML datatypes,”
says Andersen. “That makes everything
transparent, standards-based, and highly
extensible, which is really the key to Oracle
Application Integration Architecture.
That’s what a customer’s looking for in
integrations. And that also gives custom-
ers a much more evolutionary ability to
approach Oracle Fusion Applications.”
“Since we went to Oracle On Demand, we’ve seen a tremendous improvement in terms of performance,”
FOCUS ON THE CUSTOMER says Jacob Waah, director of information technology at Clopay. “User satisfaction has improved. Our move
For some companies, the need for greater to Oracle On Demand was a wise and strategic decision and has been very, very successful.”

application integration capabilities and faster

rollout of new functionality comes from the requirement to
focus on the customer. And Oracle Fusion integration technol-
ogy is a way to drive more value from existing applications,
says Rebecca Wettemann, vice president of research, Nucleus
Research, in Wellesley, Massachusetts. “In some cases, it’s
providing access to a broader set of users. In other cases,
it’s providing access to those outside the organization—for
example, to streamline collaboration and communication all
across the supply chain,” she says.
This is the situation with Clopay, a manufacturing
company located in Mason, Ohio. Clopay has three business
units, including one that is the largest garage door manu-
facturer in the United States. The corporate IT department is
“We were looking to improve customer satisfaction and cut
down on costs while delivering a better information technol-
ogy infrastructure and services to all our business users,” says
Jacob Waah, director of information technology at Clopay.
A few years ago, Clopay made the decision to move to
Oracle On Demand, and subsequently it has moved there
in a big way. Clopay has about 75 servers in its Oracle
On Demand hosted environment, with 20 of these servers
dedicated to supporting production activities. The architec-
ture has been designed to run between 30,000 and 70,000
concurrent jobs per day, servicing about 1,000 professional
online users and about 3,000 self-service users. Each manufac-
turing facility runs several Oracle enterprise databases, which
RICK ZAIDAN

built on a shared services model and is charged with manag- are housed internally and are part of a mission-critical applica-
ing IT infrastructure and technology services for the three tion that’s integrated with Clopay’s hosted Oracle E-Business
business units. Suite applications.

44 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

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 “We needed a robust architecture to handle the load as well as support multiple
strategic projects, and that was one of the key benefits we’ve received from
Oracle On Demand.”
—Jacob Waah, Director of Information Technology, Clopay

“Since we went to Oracle On Demand, we’ve seen a tre- would have been too involved for Clopay and, as a result,
mendous improvement in terms of performance. User satisfac- the company was considering upgrading the business unit to
tion has improved. We needed a robust architecture to handle Oracle E-Business Suite from JD Edwards. “It looks like Oracle
the load as well as support multiple strategic projects, and that Fusion Applications will integrate with JD Edwards, so we
was one of the key benefits we’ve received from Oracle On don’t have to migrate our JD Edwards business unit in a sepa-
Demand,” says Waah. “Our move to Oracle
On Demand was a wise and strategic deci-
sion and has been very, very successful.”
In a fast-growing company like Clopay,
planning for the future means finding ways
to streamline information flow, increase
customer satisfaction, and simplify the IT
environment. As a result, Clopay is working
on upgrading from Oracle E-Business Suite
Release 11.5.9 to Release 12, which pro-
vides the best of both worlds—technology
and business benefits today, with a clear
road map for the future.
“We’ll benefit from the live support that
comes with the new release, and it will help
us implement new projects like transpor-
tation management,” says Waah. “It will
also benefit us as well as prepare us for
the future and [Oracle] Fusion technology.
What’s nice is that customers that want to
be on Release 12 and benefit from the appli-
cations or integration that’s out there will
have lifetime support but won’t have to go
to Oracle Fusion Applications if they don’t
want to. At the same time, though, Release
12 comes with a lot of components that we
can integrate with other applications, as well
as Oracle Database 10g and all its perfor-
mance, security, and grid benefits.”
Enterprise application integration
capabilities were an important planning
consideration for Clopay, since one of its
business units primarily uses Oracle’s JD
Edwards to run its business. By upgrad-
ing to Release 12, Clopay will be on a path
to Oracle Fusion Applications, which will
RAFFI ALEXANDER

make it easier to integrate this JD Edwards

instance into its main Oracle E-Business
“We’re actively looking at our deployed solutions and trying to move everyone into organic
Suite deployment. functionality within Oracle to reduce support requirements for the applications,” says Frances Carlson,
Before Release 12, such an integration senior manager, information technology, Roll International.

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 45

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 rate step,” Waah says.
Another upgrade driver for Clopay was
the availability of lifetime support. “Oracle’s
Applications Unlimited and lifetime support
policy for JD Edwards, [Oracle] E-Business
Suite, PeopleSoft, and Siebel customers is
really beautiful,” says Waah. “If you don’t
want to go to Oracle Fusion, you can still
stay with the product families you have and
benefit from all the other functionalities that
Oracle is building. There’s nothing as good
as lifetime support.”

EASIER UPGRADES, CUSTOMIZATION

For many companies, upgrading their appli-
cation portfolios involves making decisions
around previous customizations to those
applications. However, more companies are
looking at application upgrades as a great
time to re-evaluate customization require-
ments and potentially streamline their
installation as well as reduce their mainte-
nance requirements. Dominic Martinelli, vice president of information technology at Rackable Systems, says that their appli-
Take the example of Roll International, cation stack needs to be flexible enough to handle specialized business processes. “We needed a CRM
a private holding company based in Los solution that would be comprehensive and that would integrate with Oracle E-Business Suite,” he says.

Angeles, which owns several businesses,

including Teleflora, Fiji Water, and Paramount Agribusiness
(a California grower and processor of nuts, citrus fruits,
and pomegranates).
“We’re actively looking at our deployed solutions and
trying to move everyone into organic functionality within
Oracle to reduce support requirements for the applications,”
says Frances Carlson, senior manager, information technology,
Roll International. “But in addition, from a growth and stabil-
ity standpoint, as well as looking down the road at Release 12
and [Oracle] Fusion, it makes it easier for us to upgrade and
keep the applications current as well as leverage new func-
tionality more efficiently.”
With operations around the world and 24/7 requirements,
simplifying makes a lot of sense. Roll is starting with a leg up,
since even with a variety of companies, it runs a global single
instance of Oracle On Demand (Release 11.5.10 of Oracle
E-Business Suite) for all its users.
The company depends on the full range of Oracle
E-Business Suite functionality—from financials through
order management, purchasing, discrete manufacturing,
Oracle’s Siebel applications.
“When we moved to 11.5.10, there was more functionality
available that wasn’t previously available, which meant that
there were some customizations that we could absorb,” says
Carlson. “Fewer customizations means less maintenance, more
stability in the system, and a decreased total cost of owner-
ship. We also gain better reporting because all of the data is in
the system instead of other databases.”
Like many companies, Roll International has built up
numerous custom-built interfaces for its enterprise applica-
tions. However, as part of its IT planning process and its
migration to Oracle On Demand, the company has begun to
take a closer look at those interfaces. “We are identifying and
targeting specific business processes and taking a look at the
latest version of Oracle E-Business Suite, trying to make life
easier,” says Carlson.
Taking advantage of advanced Oracle On Demand ser-
vices, Roll has partnered with Oracle over the entire software
ownership lifecycle to help realize its vision for IT and for
Roll’s businesses. In addition to improving business processes,
BOB ADLER

and more. In addition to Oracle E-Business Suite, Roll also using the best practices and business processes within Oracle
uses Oracle Discoverer, Oracle Business Intelligence, and E-Business Suite helps Roll reduce risk.

46 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_APPS.indd 46 11/12/07 11:24:08 AM

 “We needed something that would be very easy to use, easy to maintain, and easy to
customize—but also fully integrated with [Oracle] E-Business Suite. Oracle Application
Integration Architecture was the best choice to allow us to do that.”
—Dominic Martinelli, Vice President of
Information Technology, Rackable Systems

“Right now, any time we make a change for one business puts added pressure on IT—with a clear need for an applica-
unit, we have to regression-test everything to make sure we tion stack that’s flexible enough to handle its specialized
don’t adversely impact the other two businesses,” says Carlson. business processes.
“By reducing the complexity and number of customizations, “We needed a CRM [customer relationship management]
we can stabilize and reduce risk in our environment better.” solution that would be comprehensive and that would inte-
Because of Roll’s corporate structure, Carlson needs to be grate with Oracle E-Business Suite,” says Dominic Martinelli,
able to provide optimal support for vice president of information technol-
Roll’s individual businesses as well ogy at Rackable Systems. As a result,
as application environments that are
SNAP SHOTS Rackable Systems chose Siebel CRM
optimized for each company’s needs. On Demand for its entire sales team.
Clopay
For Carlson, that means that some www.clopay.com The company’s need to integrate its
of the businesses may be on different Location: Mason, Ohio business processes across applications
versions of Oracle E-Business Suite Annual Revenue: US$1 billion led to the choice of Oracle Application
and even different sets of applica- Oracle products: Oracle E-Business Suite (including Integration Architecture. Powered by
tions. Thus, the future release of Configurator, Order Management, iStore, Field Service, Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle
HR, Payroll, Financials, Advanced Supply Chain Planning),
Oracle Fusion is an important consid- Application Integration Architecture
Oracle On Demand, Oracle Database, Oracle Portal
eration for Roll. provides organizations with prebuilt
“I think [Oracle] Fusion will be Roll International integrations and business processes
important for us because we may www.roll.com that bridge traditional operational silos
be looking at using Siebel for one Location: Los Angeles, California and applications. For this fast-growing
of our business lines and perhaps Annual Revenue: US$1.48 billion server and storage provider, that
PeopleSoft for another,” says Carlson. Oracle products: Oracle E-Business Suite, Oracle On meant a prebuilt integration between
Demand, Oracle Discoverer, Oracle Business Intelligence,
“We’re always looking at new and Siebel CRM On Demand and Oracle
Siebel CRM
different ways to leverage our appli- E-Business Suite.
cations to support the business and Rackable Systems “We have a very small IT staff
help it grow.” www.terrascale.com with a limited budget, so we needed
Location: Fremont, California something that would be very easy to
UPGRADING THE BUSINESS Annual Revenue: US$360 million use, easy to maintain, and easy
Oracle products: Oracle E-Business Suite, Siebel CRM
Whatever upgrade and integration to customize—but also fully inte-
On Demand
strategy a company needs, for Oracle grated with [Oracle] E-Business
the ultimate goal is to give companies Suite,” says Martinelli. “Oracle
the choices they need to foster growth. Application Integration Architecture was the best choice to
“The key is that Oracle’s strategy is an evolutionary strategy allow us to do that.” O
and a strategy of choice,” says Oracle’s Andersen. “Our cus-
tomers can choose to stay on the existing product lines they’ve David A. Kelly (dkelly@upsideresearch.com) is a business, technology, and travel
already invested significantly in, and we will continue to bring writer who lives in West Newton, Massachusetts.
them incremental improvements that get them closer to Oracle
Fusion. But they also have the option of moving to the next-
generation, standards-based set of Oracle Fusion applications
once these become available.” READ more about Oracle Applications
These kinds of choices are especially important for com- oracle.com/applications
panies that have unique business models—especially since LEARN more about Oracle Technology
having a unique business model doesn’t make your IT oracle.com/applications/technology.html

requirements any simpler. Just ask Rackable Systems. Unlike DISCOVER Oracle On Demand
oracle.com/ondemand
competitors that sell off-the-shelf systems, Rackable Systems
specializes in highly efficient, cost-effective, build-to-order x86 FIND OUT more about Oracle Application
servers and storage customized for each customer’s unique Integration Architecture
oracle.com/technology/products/applications/aia/aia_index.html
data center needs. It’s a sound business strategy but one that

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 47

JF08_APPS.indd 47 11/12/07 11:24:10 AM

Application
Integration Architecture

Pre-packaged integration
between Oracle applications

Extensible to third party and

legacy applications

Common object model

across applications

Built completely on standard

middleware, SOA, and BPEL

Applications engineered to work together from

oracle.com/aia
or call 1.800.ORACLE.1

Copyright © 2007, Oracle. All rights reserved. Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its affiliates.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
 BY AL AN JOC H

DEFINITELY
Betty Brugger, Northwestern
University’s director of
information technology,
management systems, expects
that SOA technology will
simplify business processes
and customer experiences.

NOT OLD-SCHOOL
A leading university bets on service-oriented architecture to tame IT complexity, streamline
business processes, and improve services for its users.
hen Betty Brugger ticks off her top challenges,
the list matches that of any corporate IT manager:
manage costs more effectively, better satisfy
demanding users, strengthen LAN and WAN secu-
rity, modernize legacy applications, and optimize busi-
ness processes—all while serving the organization’s emerging
global strategy.
Except that Brugger doesn’t manage technology for a big
corporation; she’s the director of information technology, man-
agement systems, at Northwestern University. The challenges of
higher education add a layer of difficulty to the job, she says.
“The existence of many somewhat autonomous schools within
ANDREA MANDEL
To cope, Brugger and her staff are embracing a service-
oriented architecture (SOA) to a greater degree than most of
Northwestern’s higher-education counterparts. SOA’s ability to
string multiple Web services together into nimble applications
to address changing business needs quickly is just one attrac-
tion. Brugger says that Oracle SOA Suite and its Oracle BPEL
Process Manager—software they have started to implement
incrementally, beginning with Oracle’s PeopleSoft Financials
installations—will let Northwestern streamline its business pro-
cesses, tame IT complexity, and ultimately improve services for
end users. “We want to get real-time data to our people, and
we’re using Oracle SOA Suite to do that,” Brugger says.

the university creates a very complex environment for those

of us in IT,” she says. “If you chart our collection of disparate POWER TO END USERS
systems in terms of how they interface with each other, it looks Oracle SOA Suite—with its BPEL engine, a Web services regis-
like a huge spider web.” try, and Enterprise Service Bus—is only part of Northwestern’s

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 49

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 “We want to get real-time data to our people, and we’re using Oracle SOA Suite
to do that.”
—Betty Brugger,
Director, Information Technology, Management Systems, Northwestern University

SOA strategy. The university is also research and advisory services firm
taking advantage of the prebuilt Web SNAP SHOT Datamonitor. “Under an SOA approach,
services available with PeopleSoft Northwestern University
institutions can modify and tailor their
Financials 8.9, which the school www.northwestern.edu processes in much more flexible and
is now implementing to replace its Location: Evanston, Illinois cost-effective ways,” she says. “The fun-
outdated legacy financial application. Industry: Higher education damental value of SOA lies in its ability
“For the highly used transactions that Employees: 7,100 to let institutional processes drive tech-
are more end-user-facing, we wanted Oracle products and services: Oracle nology usage, as opposed to the tech-
SOA Suite, PeopleSoft Campus Solutions,
something friendlier,” Brugger says. nology solutions themselves dictating
PeopleSoft Human Capital Management,
“In a lot of ways, technologies PeopleSoft Financials, Oracle Database, what the institution can do.”
such as SOA are catching up to the Oracle Warehouse Builder, PeopleSoft She adds that organizations benefit
way universities do business,” notes Enterprise Performance Management from Oracle’s complete technology
Theo Bosnak, senior director of Oracle System, Oracle Portal, Oracle Application offerings, ranging from Oracle SOA
Higher Education. “SOA offers a way Server, Oracle Real Application Clusters, Suite to related middleware, applica-
Oracle Collaboration Suite, Oracle
to break down the silos of separate tions, and the database. “Having a
JDeveloper, Oracle Solution Support Center,
systems by separating those processes Oracle Professional Services
partner such as Oracle to put it all
into manageable components to together into a coherent whole and start
support unique ways of doing busi- the institution down the path of using
ness and supporting students. Not only does this apply SOA is a great way to begin,” she says.
to financial processes, but it is also key to enabling Northwestern’s Brugger agrees. She evaluated several
schools to improve recruiting, admissions, records, and SOA vendors and concluded that the comprehensive-
other student-related processes.” ness of Oracle’s technologies was unique. “We could
These advantages are particularly important for orga- have bought one component from here and one from
nizations that face the IT complexities of higher educa- there, but they wouldn’t have worked as well together,”
tion, according to Nicole Engelbert, lead analyst for she says.
education and vertical markets technology for market
PREBUILT SERVICES SPEED SOA RESULTS
Oracle provides applications such as PeopleSoft
NORTHWESTERN’S STRATEGY Financials with a wide range of prebuilt Web services,
FOR SOA SUCCESS which, when paired with the BPEL engine, enable orga-
Northwestern is creating new Web services and new types nizations to configure processes that are unique to their
of systems as well as using SOA to integrate and modernize enterprise. The PeopleSoft applications also include
existing applications. “We don’t have a lot of traditional legacy development capabilities to enable organizations to create
systems,” says the university’s Betty Brugger. “We have very little their own Web services. “There are some Web services
left on our mainframe.” Here’s how they plan to make their SOA that we can take advantage of out of the box, and if we
strategy work across the university system: want to develop additional services in the future, we can
O Start small by focusing on an application area
use the platform for that as well,” says Harry Samuels,
O Use the successful implementation to generate buy-in for
Northwestern’s applications systems manager responsible
other systems for the SOA implementation.
O Cultivate acceptance from end users who can communicate
Northwestern is taking advantage of PeopleSoft
benefits to peers Financials’ SOA savvy in its widely used Expense
O Reduce complexity and integration chores by choosing a
Journals application. SOA support means that
vendor with a comprehensive suite of SOA, middleware, appli- Northwestern can build end-user applications that are
cations, and database offerings easier for students and staff to use. “By pushing capabili-
O Find an implementation partner that can augment in-house
ties out to users, we’ll have better data integrity, put more
expertise, especially for a maturing area such as SOA power into their hands, and eliminate a lot of bureau-
O Team Web services with a BPEL engine to wring business-
cracy,” Brugger says.
process efficiencies from cross-system applications For example, in the old system, stacks of paper fun-
neled throughout the procurement workflow for order-

50 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

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Nitin Vengurlekar, Murali Vallath, & Rich Long
Build and manage a scalable, highly available
storage infrastructure with Oracle Automatic
Storage Management (ASM).
Jason Price
Access Oracle databases through SQL
statements, construct PL/SQL programs, and
use SQL Plus and SQL Developer in the new
database release.

AVAILABLE IN NOVEMBER
EVERYWHERE COMPUTER BOOKS ARE SOLD.
Join the Oracle Press Community to be the first to hear about new
Oracle Press releases and special offers at
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 “Oracle is investing in middleware and applications, and that’s a big deal. . . .
Oracle has the whole package.”
Director, Information Technology, Management Systems, Northwestern University
ing, approving, and paying for supplies. The SOA-based
alternative creates more-efficient electronic workflows
that eliminate this paper-based pain, Brugger says. “Self-
service brings us more into the modern age and in line
with our other enterprise systems,” she adds.
The SOA capabilities will tie together the financials
system with the school’s PeopleSoft Enterprise Campus
Solutions, Northwestern’s student management system,
as well as a Peoplesoft Enterprise Human Capital
Management (HCM) system and a new proposals tracking
system. Architecturally, each of Northwestern’s enterprise
systems is tightly integrated and runs on an Oracle data-
base. “For example,” Brugger says, “Campus Solutions
includes functions for financial aid, student financials,
student records, registration, transcriptions, and admis-
sions. Each one of those areas is complex in itself, and the
same is true for the HCM and core financials.”
Northwestern decided to go with Oracle for applica-
tions and middleware because of the functionality the
full stack offered, the university’s experience with Oracle
Database, and Oracle’s commitment to upgrades. “We
looked at the marketplace when we first got into the
architecture,” Brugger says. “When we looked at Oracle
Fusion and Oracle Fusion Middleware—and looked at
their future—we thought that that would be the best way
to go. Oracle is investing in middleware and applications,
and that’s a big deal. We didn’t see the other vendors as
having a total offering as much as Oracle has. Oracle has
the whole package.”
REAL-TIME DATA THRIVES
Right now Northwestern has implemented only the
first part of its overall SOA plan. Ultimately the IT team
plans to link systems across departments to achieve
faster and more-real-time processing. They expect to
improve the cross-system workflow for new employees,
which entails a wide range of approvals across depart-
ments for salary authorizations as well as access to
networks and business applications. Now this can be
a slow process. “Today, we use HR and our student
system as our systems of record, so we have to wait
until people are hired before we can provision them
and give them a network ID,” Brugger says.
The current process relies on nightly batch uploads
to the databases. “If we can do a Web service for this
workflow, we’re attaching to one system and sending
data over to another, transaction by transaction, rather
than batching the data at night. So we could get
52 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_NORTHWEST.indd 52
—Betty Brugger,
real-time access or real-time information or real-time
provisioning, if that’s what we’re doing with the BPEL
workflow,” Brugger says. “I won’t have to wait a couple of
days before all these databases are populated to give new
employees all the rights and access privileges they need.”
MEASURING SUCCESS
Brugger will judge the success of the SOA effort accord-
ing to what she calls “the illusion of simplicity it creates
for end users”—the staff and students who will take
advantage of new, real-time applications without con-
cerning themselves with the complexities of the back-end
systems that make it all possible. “We gauge the value by
how it streamlines business processes and satisfies the
users,” Brugger says.
In addition to saving time and increasing user satisfac-
tion, an SOA strategy can also save money. Maintenance
cost reductions are another benefit for SOA strategies
such as Northwestern’s, Oracle’s Bosnak says. Whether
organizations rely on prebuilt Web services or mix them
with their own custom services, SOA standards ensure
that the resulting processes will continue to work even
if vendors alter the underlying applications code. “You
won’t have to go in and change those extensions you
wrote. They’ll still connect to that underlying process
through this SOA architecture,” he says. “This means
you’re reducing the overall costs of maintaining your
systems, which is a huge challenge for universities,
because of the IT complexity.”
If universities can save money and take inefficiency
out of their systems, “the cost savings will add up,”
Bosnak says. “In turn, IT professionals can spend more
time on areas that are more mission-critical to the organi-
zation than just maintaining existing systems.” O
Alan Joch (ajoch@worldpath.net) is a technology writer based in New
England who specializes in enterprise, Web, and high-performance-
computing applications.
DOWNLOAD
Oracle SOA Suite
otn.oracle.com/software/tech/soa
Oracle Database 11g
otn.oracle.com/software/products/database
READ more about Oracle Applications technology
otn.oracle.com/products/applications/applications-technology.html
11/12/07 12:02:23 PM
 d e v e l o p e r FRAMEWORKS
Services with a Smile
Create data-centric Web services for SOA development in minutes.
n this third-anniversary column,
let’s take another look at the upcom-
ing Oracle JDeveloper/Application
Development Framework (Oracle
ADF) 11g release and explore a major
new feature that simplifies the creation
of data-centric Web services. With this
feature and a few mouse clicks, you can
turn any Oracle ADF application module
into a powerful Web service that interop-
erates with other standards-based clients
and services within a service-oriented
architecture (SOA).
To get started, make sure you are
using the Oracle JDeveloper 11.1.1.0
Technology Preview 2 release, which is
available as a free download on the Oracle
Technology Network (OTN) at otn.oracle
.com/products/jdev/11. Further, down-
load the starter workspace at otn.oracle
.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/o18frame.zip.
This starter workspace eliminates many of
the initial project steps we’ve performed
many times before in previous columns.
Extract the contents of the o18frame
.zip file to a path that doesn’t contain any
spaces (such as c:\jdeveloper). Then open
the FrameworksJanFeb2008.jws work-
space in Oracle JDeveloper. Note that the
starter workspace defines a familiar Emp
entity object, an Employee view object,
and an HRModule application module.
The Emp entity object is configured with
several declarative features, including a
TotalComp calculated attribute that com-
putes an employee’s total compensation,
a range validation rule on its Sal attribute
that enforces a value between 0 and
5000, and an alternate key on its Ename
attribute that enables easy employee
lookup by name. The Employee view
has a named query filter criterion—
EmployeesByDepartment—that can be
used to find employees in a department
with a specific department number. The
HRModule has one custom method—
JF08_FRAMEWORKS.indd 53
totalEmployeeCompensation()—that
returns the total compensation for an
employee, given that person’s name.
To finish the project setup, go
to Application Resources in the
Application Navigator and adjust the
properties of the database connection
named scott to ensure that you can suc-
cessfully test a connection to a SCOTT
schema. If you need to create the tables,
use the CreateDeptEmpTables.sql script
provided with the starter workspace.
ENABLING THE SERVICE INTERFACE
With SOA, different application systems
cooperate by invoking each other’s
application programming interfaces
(APIs). The service interface for your
application module enables other appli-
cations to interact with its data and
custom methods by using standard Web
services calls. In Oracle JDeveloper, the
service interface is a declaratively config-
ured feature of your application module.
To create a service interface, you simply
identify which view object instances in
your data model to expose to clients,
which built-in data access operations
you want each one to support, and
which custom methods you want to
make available.
Start by double-clicking the
HRModule application module to open
the editor. In the editor, click Data
Model and note that there is a single
view object instance named Employee
in the data model. Next, click Service
Interface and the green plus sign at
the right to create the service interface.
When the Create Service Interface screen
appears, change the Web Service Name
to HRService, leave Target Namespace at
its default value, and click Next. On the
Service Custom Methods screen, select
the totalEmployeeCompensation()
method from the Available list and click
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY STEVE MUENCH
Add (>) to add the custom method to
the Selected list. Then click Next.
On the Service View Instances screen,
select the Employee view instance on
the Available list and click Add (>) to
add the view instance to the Selected
list. Click the Employee view instance
in the Selected list, and note the set
of operations that appears in the View
Instance Operations table. This table
enables you to control which built-in
operations your service interface will
support. Resize the screen to be taller
to see more of the basic operations in
the table. Check the check boxes next
to the Create, Update, Delete, Merge,
GetByKey, and Find operations—you
may need to scroll down the table
to see all of them. The Process and
ProcessChangeSummary operations
are for more-advanced use cases, so
leave their check boxes unchecked
for this exercise. In the View Criteria
Find Operations table, click the green
plus sign to add a new find opera-
tion based on declarative view criteria.
When the Configure View Criteria Find
Operation dialog box appears, select
EmployeesByDepartment from the
View Criteria list, change the Operation
Name to findEmployeesByDepartment, and
click OK. Finally, click Finish to enable
the service interface. Be sure to save all
of your changes by selecting File -> Save
All from the main menu.
In the Application Navigator, expand
the HRModule node as well as the
serviceinterface folder it contains. Note
that Oracle JDeveloper has automati-
cally generated the artifacts necessary to
implement the service you configured.
HRService.java is the interface that repre-
sents the service contract for Java clients.
HRServiceImpl.java is an Enterprise
JavaBeans (EJB) 3.0 session bean that
implements this interface. The HRService
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 53
11/8/07 3:07:29 PM
 FRAMEWORKS
.wsdl and the HRService.xsd files are the
standards-based Web Services Description
Language (WSDL) and XML Schema doc-
uments that describe the service contract’s
methods and datatypes. In the future, if
you need to adjust your service interface
settings, you can click the yellow-pencil
edit button in the Service Interface editor,
and Oracle JDeveloper will automatically
keep your implementation files in sync
with changes you make in the Oracle
JDeveloper user interface.
TESTING THE SERVICE
As you might expect, it is very easy to
test your Web service interface by using
the embedded Oracle Application Server
Containers for Java (OC4J) server inside
Oracle JDeveloper. However, before
testing your service, verify the follow-
ing settings to ensure a successful result.
First, select Tools -> Preferences... from
the main menu. When the Preferences
dialog box appears, click Web Browser
and Proxy. Make sure the Use HTTP
Proxy Server check box is unchecked.
(You won’t need a browser proxy for
this exercise.) Next, click Deployment
and check the check box labeled Allow
Deployed Module access to OC4J
internal classes. Click OK to dismiss the
Preferences dialog box.
To test your service interface by
using the embedded OC4J server, go
to the serviceinterface folder in the
Applications Navigator, right-click
the HRServiceImpl.java file, and select
Run. You’ll know the service is ready
for testing when Running: Embedded
OC4J Server - Log displays the target
URL and Oracle Containers for J2EE 10g
(11.1.1.0.0) initialized. You can safely
ignore warning messages that might
appear due to known issues in the tech-
nology preview release.
Next to the target URL message,
note (but don’t click) the hyperlink. If
you were to click the link, you would
open the HTTP Analyzer in this preview
release (which isn’t what we want to
do). Instead, test the service in your
Web browser, by copying the target URL
and pasting it into the browser’s address
bar. If you haven’t changed your default
embedded OC4J server port numbers,
54 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_FRAMEWORKS.indd 54
the URL will be http://localhost:8988/
EJB-FrameworksJanFeb2008/HRService. You
should see an HRService endpoint Web
service test page appear in the browser.
To test the Web service in the
browser, using a sample parameter, select
getEmployee from the Operation list.
Then enter the value 7839 in the Empno
field in the Parameters area and click
the Invoke button. The Test Result page
should display the standard XML format
of the Web service’s result, and the
employee data for KING should be con-
tained in the data inside the tags. Note
that when the Web service is accessed
by programmatic clients, the XML-based
Web service requests and responses are
implementation details that guarantee
interoperability but don’t require any
manual processing.
Now click the Return to Test Page
link and select updateEmployee from
the Operation list. Enter 7839 in the
Empno field, enter 5005 in the Sal field,
and uncheck the Include in Message
check boxes for all of the other param-
eters so that they are not included in
the request. When you click Invoke,
you should see an XML-based exception
message with the fault string Salary must
be between 0 and 5000 on the Test Result
page. This operation fails whenever you
attempt an update that violates the range
validation rule on the Sal attribute of the
Emp entity object. Now try repeating
the updateEmployee test with a salary of
less than 5000. This time, the Test Result
page will confirm a successful update by
displaying the modified employee data.
To stop the embedded OC4J server,
in Oracle JDeveloper, click the red termi-
nate icon in the Log window toolbar or
select Run -> Terminate -> Embedded
OC4J Server from the main menu.
DEPLOYING THE SERVICE
Testing with the embedded OC4J server
can be useful while you’re developing
your service, but once you’re satis-
fied with it, you’ll need to deploy it on
an external application server. Using
the Oracle JDeveloper 11g Technology
Preview 2 release, you can launch the
embedded OC4J server in standalone
mode for this purpose. To start the
server, open a command shell window,
navigate to the ./jdev/bin subdirectory
of your Oracle JDeveloper 11g installa-
tion, and run the start_oc4j script. The
first time you run it, it will prompt you
to create and confirm the password for
the fmwadmin account. Remember this
password, because you will need it a bit
later. You can ignore any warning mes-
sages you may see while the server is
starting up. When the server is ready, it
will display the message Oracle Containers
for J2EE 10g (11.1.1.0.0) initialized.
Now that the OC4J server is running,
the next step is to define an applica-
tion server connection for this server.
In Oracle JDeveloper, select View ->
Resource Palette from the main menu.
In the Resource Palette, click the
folder with a plus-sign icon (to the left
of the search field), and select New
Connection -> Application Server from
the list that appears. On the Type page
of the Application Server Connection
Wizard, name the connection
localoc4j, leave the Connection Type
set at Standalone OC4J 11g, and click
Next. On the Authentication page, leave
Username set as fmwadmin, enter the
password you entered for this account
when you first started the embedded
OC4J server in standalone mode, and
click Next. On the Connection page,
leave the defaults and click Next.
Finally, on the Test page, click Test
Connection and wait for the Success!
message to appear in the Status area.
Click Finish to define the new applica-
tion server connection.
The next step is to create a busi-
ness components service interface
deployment profile, which defines
the set of files or runtime artifacts
required to deploy the service to an
external server. To create the profile,
right-click the Model project node in
the Application Navigator and select
New…. When the New Gallery dialog
box appears, expand the General cat-
egory, select Deployment Profiles, and
double-click Business Components
Service Interface. When the Create
Deployment Profile dialog box appears,
enter HRService for Deployment Profile
Name and click OK. The Project
11/8/07 3:10:37 PM
 Properties dialog box should then
appear, indicating where your project-
level deployment profiles can be found,
in case you need to modify them for any
reason. Click OK to close the Project
Properties dialog box.
Finally, deploy your service inter-
face project to the localoc4j application
server connection. To do so, right-click
the Model project in the Application
Navigator and select Deploy ->
HRService -> Deploy. When the
Deployment Plan dialog box appears,
click OK to begin the deployment by
using the default deployment plan. At
this point, the Deployment tab of the
Log window will show the progress of the
deployment. One important status line to
look for is Binding FrameworksJanFeb2008
web-module ... under context root
/FrameworksJanFeb2008.
The online version of this column,
at otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18frame.html, describes how to point
Can you imagine...
a world without children?
JF08_FRAMEWORKS.indd 55
your browser to the standalone OC4J
server and test the new Web service with
different queries.
Although we’ve only scratched the
surface of this powerful new feature,
I hope you can already appreciate
how handy it will be for your future
service-oriented architecture develop-
ment tasks. Whether the client of your
service interface is a .NET application,
a Business Process Execution Language
(BPEL) business process, or another Web
service, Oracle ADF 11g will make quick
work of the task. For more information
on this topic, see the “Integrating ADF
Applications with External Services”
chapter in the Release 11g version of
Oracle ADF Developer’s Guide. O
Steve Muench is a consulting product manager for
Oracle JDeveloper and an Oracle ACE. Since 1990 he
has developed and supported Oracle tools and XML
technologies and continues to evangelize them. Muench
coauthored the Oracle ADF Developer’s Guide for
ORACLE MAGAZINE
Forms/4GL Developers (Oracle, 2006), wrote Building
Oracle XML Applications (O’Reilly Media, 2000), and
shares tips and tricks on OTN (otn.oracle.com) and in his
Dive into ADF blog (radio.weblogs.com/0118231).
READ online-only column content
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18frame.html
READ more Frameworks
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/frameworks
READ more about
Oracle JDeveloper and Oracle ADF
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designpatterns
Oracle ADF Developer’s Guide
otn.oracle.com/documentation
DOWNLOAD
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Preview 2
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starter workspace for this column
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18frame.zip
Call now to help.
1-800-996-4100
www.stjude.org
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 55
11/8/07 3:07:29 PM
 Leader in
Middleware
“Oracle received the
highest scores across all
the scenarios we evaluated”
Independent Report: The Forrester Wave
Application Server Platforms, Q3 2007 1

Best in 15 of 20 Categories
SOA World Magazine
2007 Reader’s Choice Awards 2

Oracle Fusion Middleware from

oracle.com/middleware
or call 1.800.ORACLE.1

1.“The Forrester Wave™: Application Server Platforms, Q3 2007”, Forrester Research Inc., July 11, 2007.
2. SOA World Magazine 2007 Reader’s Choice Awards, July 3, 2007.

Copyright © 2007, Oracle. All rights reserved. Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its affiliates.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
 d e v e l o p e r BROWSER-BASED
Reporting from Your Browser
Publish high-fidelity business intelligence reports with Oracle Application Express.
eb applications are of
limited value if users can
view the information they
need on the screen but have
no way to put that information into a
suitable format for sharing with others.
If your application displays 15 records at
a time out of a total of 50 but users can’t
e-mail all 50 in a printable attachment
or distribute them in slick hard copy at
a critical meeting . . . Houston, we have
a problem! Oracle Application Express
solves this dilemma by tightly integrat-
ing with Oracle Business Intelligence
Publisher to provide high-fidelity
printing capabilities.
OVERVIEW
With Oracle Business Intelligence
Publisher installed, your Oracle
Application Express application can gen-
erate reports in Adobe PDF, Microsoft
Word, Microsoft Excel, and HTML
formats from any report region. You can
also define report templates and custom-
ize a report’s graphical aspects by
O
Adding headers, footers, colors, and
page sizing
O
Inserting logos
O
Fully controlling pagination and
other breaks
O
Embedding charts
O
Generating standard forms
These capabilities stem from Oracle
Business Intelligence Publisher’s ability to
reference report layouts you develop in
Microsoft Word with the Oracle Business
Intelligence Publisher Word Template
Builder plug-in. You then load the layout
documents into Oracle Application
Express and marry them with query
results to produce the desired output.
This column takes you through the
procedure for generating a report in
PDF format that includes an Oracle
Application Express report region and
JF08_BROWSER.indd 57
a pie chart. (Note that the report’s
Word-generated chart will not look
like online charts created using Adobe
Flash, because the charting engines are
not identical.)
You can run through the steps in this
column on the hosted instance of Oracle
Application Express at apex.oracle.com.
(You must request a free workspace to
use this hosted instance.) The hosted
instance includes Oracle Business
Intelligence Publisher, which is required
for the process described, but you must
install Oracle Business Intelligence
Publisher Desktop for Microsoft
Windows, which adds Oracle Business
Intelligence Publisher Word Template
Builder to your Microsoft Word instance.
You can also run through this col-
umn’s steps on a local instance of Oracle
Application Express, but Oracle Business
Intelligence Publisher must also be
installed. All Oracle Business Intelligence
Publisher downloads are available at otn
.oracle.com/software/products/publishing.
PRELIMINARY TABLE SETUP
This column’s example uses a table that
holds sales order data. To generate the
table, log in to an Oracle Application
Express workspace and run md_pdf_
orders_create.sql to create the MD_PDF_
ORDERS table. To run the script,
1. Click SQL Workshop.
2. Click SQL Scripts.
3. Click Upload.
4. Click Browse; select the md_pdf_
orders_create.sql script, available
with the sample code for this column
at otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/
08-jan/o18browser.zip; click Open;
and click Upload.
5. On the resulting page, click the md_
pdf_orders_create.sql icon.
6. Click Run, and then click Run on the
Confirmation screen.
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY DAVI D PEAKE
STEPS FOR GENERATING THE
EXAMPLE REPORT
The following steps describe how to
build a report template and generate an
example report.
Step 1: Create a report query. Define a
report query within Oracle Application
Express to incorporate the data you are
including in the report:
1. In your Oracle Application Express
workspace, select an existing application
from the Application Builder menu.
(You must start this process from within
an application.)
2. From the application’s Shared
Components menu, click Reports ->
Report Queries.
3. Click Create.
4. Enter Orders in the Name field,
and copy the following into the SQL
Query box:
SELECT ORDER_ID,
ORDER_DATE,
ORDER_MODE,
ORDER_STATUS,
CUSTOMER_NAME,
SALES_REP,
ORDER_TOTAL
FROM MD_PDF_ORDERS
5. Click Next to continue to the wiz-
ard’s Test Query Report page. If a report
query incorporates bind variables, they
appear as fields at the bottom of this
page. The query must retrieve at least
one record, so you must insert values
for any bind variable(s). (The example
doesn’t use bind variable values.)
6. Click Test Query to ensure that
at least one record is retrieved. (You
should see five retrieved records for this
example.) Close the results screen.
7. Click Next. If you need to include
additional session-state values in a
report (not necessary for this example),
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 57
11/8/07 1:16:32 PM
 BROWSER-BASED

you select them on this page 1. Go back into Oracle

from the list of values and
then click Add.
8. Click Next to bring up
the Create Report Query
Layout page. Select Standard
from the XML Structure
list, click Download XML,
and save the XML file to
disk. (The Advanced option
lets you include additional
information such as session-
state variables and applica-
tion items, which are not
required for this example.)
Don’t exit from the Report Figure 1: Microsoft Word document displaying the report template
Queries wizard, because you
must return to this same page in Step 5.
Step 2: Create a report template. Using
Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher
Word Template Builder, load the XML
data into a Word document:
1. Open a new blank document in
Microsoft Word. From the Oracle BI
Publisher menu in Word, select Data ->
Load Sample XML Data..., browse to the and save the template as an RTF file:
XML file you saved in Step 1, and click
Open. Word should display a success
message (but not the contents of the XML the Chart dialog box.
file). Click OK to close the message.
2. If you included additional elements
in your XML structure in Step 1, you
can incorporate them by selecting Insert Labels box.
-> Field from the Oracle BI Publisher
menu. (Otherwise, proceed to Step 3.)
In the Field dialog box, select each item option for Type, and enter Orders by
you want and click Insert. Then click
Close. All the fields you selected appear
in the document in a string, so separate
the fields and add labels, boxes, and so
on to suit your needs.
Step 3: Insert the table component. Use
the Table wizard to add a table to the
Word template:
1. From the Oracle BI Publisher menu, using standard Word capabilities to add
select Insert -> Table Wizard. Select
the Table option in the wizard, and
click Next.
2. For Grouping Field, select
ROWSET/ROW, and click Next.
3. The page that appears asks you to
select the fields you want to show in
the report. Select all the items, and then
click Finish. You should see the unpop-
ulated table structure at the top of the
Word document. (You’ve skipped the
wizard’s last two pages, which let you
specify, respectively, fields to group and
sort on and labels for each field. They’re
not necessary for this example.)
Step 4: Insert the chart component, and
finish the template. Add a pie chart
showing customer orders to the template,
1. Select Insert -> Chart from the
Oracle BI Publisher menu to bring up
2. From the Row folder in the Data
box on the left, drag Order Total to the
Values box and Customer Name to the
3. Select the Sum option for
Aggregation, select the Pie Chart
Customer in the Title box.
4. Click OK to both generate the “Orders
by Customer” pie chart and insert it into
the template. Assuming that you did not
insert any additional XML elements at
the end of Step 1, your template should
look like Figure 1.
5. Optionally, customize the report by
elements such as a company logo, a
watermark, or a header and/or a footer.
6. Select File -> Save As, enter Orders in
the File name box, select the Rich Text
Format (*.rtf) option for Save as type,
and click Save.
Step 5: Upload the RTF template file.
Relate the RTF template you saved in
Step 4 to the report query you created in
Oracle Application Express in Step 1:
Application Express to the
same wizard page you left
open at the end of Step 1.
2. Click the Browse button
to find the Orders.rtf file you
saved in Step 4. Click Next.
3. On the Create Shared
Query page, select PDF as the
Output Format. Click the
Test button to preview the
resulting PDF output.
The online version of this
column, at otn.oracle
.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18browser.html, looks at the
generated report and how to
link the report to your application.
CONCLUSION
Often when organizations implement
new applications, printing comes last
in the list of concerns. Yet even in the
internet age, printed reports remain
a key decision-making tool. With the
tight integration of Oracle Application
Express and Oracle Business Intelligence
Publisher, requirements for generating
attractive reports in PDF, Word, Excel,
and HTML formats can be fully satisfied
for Web applications. O
David Peake (david.peake@oracle.com) is a principal
product manager in Oracle’s Server Technologies
division. He has been with Oracle since 1993.
READ online-only column content
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18browser.html
READ more Browser-Based
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/browser
LEARN more about Oracle
Application Express
apex.oracle.com
DOWNLOAD
Oracle Application Express
otn.oracle.com/products/database/
application_express/download.html
Oracle Business
Intelligence Publisher
otn.oracle.com/software/products/publishing
sample code for this column
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18browser.zip

58 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_BROWSER.indd 58 12/4/07 1:06:44 PM

 t e c h n o l o g y DATABASE REPLAY
Better Workload, Better Testing
Use database replay to record and replay database activities for better testing.
ne of the most important pro-
cesses for testing the impact of
system changes—both hard-
ware and software—on a data-
base is setting up a test environment
that faithfully represents the database’s
actual workload. Although it’s possible
to write SQL statements that reflect
business functionality, it’s a task that
demands an enormous time commit-
ment and it’s very possible
that these SQL statements may
not represent the database
activities accurately. During
any environmental change, it
is important to run the actual
SQL statements—as opposed
to a sample of (hopefully)
representative statements—
against the proposed new
system configuration while
maintaining their concurrency
and load characteristics.
Oracle Database 11g
includes Oracle Real
Application Testing, a suite
of tools that record, replay,
and analyze actual database
transactions. One tool in the
suite—database replay—can
record transactions as they occur in the
database. Later the captured workload
can be replayed against a copy of the
database on the proposed new platform.
Most important, database replay can
replay with the exact timing, concur-
rency, and transaction characteristics of
the original workload.
Figure 1 shows the capture and replay
processes of database replay. When
database replay is activated, the capture
process records the database operations
ENRIQUE FAJARDO
as they occur (1) in several Workload
Capture (WC) files. These files are stored
in a directory specified by the DBA (2).
Later, after the capture is complete, the
JF08_DATA_REPLAY.indd 59
files are moved to the remote system by
some mechanism such as FTP (3). When
activated, a replay driver (4) reads the
WC files and a replay client replays them
against the target database (5).
CAPTURING
Database replay can be used via
both the command line and Oracle
Enterprise Manager. To use database
replay from Oracle Enterprise Manager,
1. First create a directory object in the
database where these capture files will
be stored. For example,
create directory replaydir as
‘/home/oracle/replaydir’;
2. Open the Oracle Enterprise Manager
Database Control, and click the
Software and Support tab, as shown
in Figure 2. On that page, click the
Database Replay link (under Real
Application Testing).
3. The main Database Replay page
displays the three high-level tasks—
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY A RU P N A N DA
Capture Workload, Preprocess Captured
Workload, and Replay Workload—as
shown in Figure 3. Click the Capture
Workload task.
4. On the next page, answer questions
such as whether you want to shut down
the database before capturing. Shutting
down is not necessary but is recom-
mended, because it prevents transac-
tions from being captured in midflight
and allows for a clean starting
point for capture. Also enter
the directory—REPLAYDIR,
in this example—that will
be used to store the capture
files. Set a filter so that activi-
ties by certain users such as
SYS and SYSMAN and certain
commands such as perl and
sqlplus are excluded. You can
filter out activities based on
program, users, module, and
so on. Conversely, you can
also record specific types
of activities.
5. Click Submit to submit
the capture job. The next
screen shows the status of the
capture as “In Progress.” The
activities on the database are
being captured now. Note the starting
time for the capture; in this example,
the starting time is 11:30:04 a.m. on
July 11, 2007.
6. Let the process run long enough for
most, if not all, activities to be captured.
In this example, a period of two days is
likely to be enough.
7. Navigate to the Database Replay main
page (as shown in step 2), and click the
link for the current workload. Click Stop
to stop the recording for the capture.
8. Navigate to the /home/oracle/
replaydir directory. The captured work-
load files are located here. Transfer the
files to the target system (using FTP or
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 59
11/9/07 2:34:33 PM
 DATABASE REPLAY

some other means). The database takes codeLISTING 1: Replay clients

two Automatic Workload Repository
(AWR) snapshots—one before and
one after the capture process—and
exports them at the end of the capture
process automatically.
$ wrc userid=system password=<Password> replaydir=/home/oracle/replay
Workload Replay Client: Release 11.1.0.6.0 - Production on ....
Copyright (c) 1982, 2007, Oracle. All rights reserved.
Wait for the replay to start (02:50:03)
Replay started (02:51:34)

REPLAYING Production System Test System

While the capture is going on, create a
Database
copy of the production database on the Database
Capture Capture
target system. Restore a backup from the Files Copy/FTP Files
production database, and recover it up 3
Capture Directory Replay Directory
to the minute the capture started—in
this example, July 11, 2007 11:30:04 Capture Replay
1 2 4 5
a.m.—using Recovery Manager (RMAN), Process Process

as follows:
Figure 1: Architecture of database replay

Figure 2: Main Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Control page, Software and Support tab

RMAN> run {
2> set until time ‘2007-07-11 11:30:04’;
3> restore database;
4> recover database;
5> }

After the recovery completes, the

database on the target system is exactly
as the production database was when
the workload capture started. Now
replay the captured workload, as
described in the following steps: Figure 3: Main Database Replay page
1. First, preprocess the captured files.
Preprocess is required only once per
capture; it gets the captured files ready to
be replayed. Bring up Oracle Enterprise
Manager on the new server, and navigate
to the main Database Replay page, as
shown in step 2 of the capture. From
the Oracle Enterprise Manager screen
shown in Figure 3, choose Preprocess
Captured Workload (the second task).
Provide the information requested— Figure 4: Start of the replay driver

60 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_DATA_REPLAY.indd 60 11/9/07 2:34:33 PM

 Figure 5: Key metrics on the old and new systems
including the directory name, the OS
username (“oracle,” most likely), OS
password, database userid and password,
and so on—and click Submit. The pre-
processing is done by a job, and once the
job completes, the workload displays as
“preprocessed” and ready for replay.
2. Navigate to the Database Replay main
page, and choose Replay Workload (the
third task). Answer the same types of
questions as in the preprocessing step,
and click Submit at the end.
3. The database is now ready for
replay. The screen appears as shown in
Figure 4. This screen indicates that the
replay driver has been started but the
actual replay has not.
4. The replay runs in a process called
a replay client. Start a replay client
from the command line, using the wrc
command, as shown in Listing 1.
5. When the replay finishes, the replay
client displays
Replay finished (04:53:03)
Oracle Enterprise Manager shows the
status as “Completed.” Click Report
to show statistics about the capture
and replay.
ANALYSIS
Now that the workload captured earlier
has been replayed on the target system,
check for errors. To do so, click View
Workload Replay Report. Examine
the report for any errors due to bugs or
other factors. Once that is done, note
how the new system’s performance com-
pares to the old one’s.
To compare the old and new systems,
compare the AWR reports for the periods
of capture and replay. AWR reports show
JF08_DATA_REPLAY.indd 61
various performance metrics of the data-
base over a period of time. In Oracle
Enterprise Manager, navigate to the
Performance tab (shown in Figure 2),
select the snapshots for the capture and
replay times, and perform a side-by-side
comparison of the two periods. Figure
5 is part of the AWR report, showing
events taking the highest percentage of
database time side by side.
This comparison shows a simple
analysis of the performance of the
new and the old systems. Key metrics
include CPU time, which is only 8.47
percent of the database time on the new
system, compared to almost 18 percent
on the old. The db file sequential read
is about 11 percent of the database time
on the new system, compared to about
19 percent on the old. These metrics are
key indicators of how the new system
performed, and all the metrics are based
on the actual operations of the produc-
tion database, not synthetic operations,
so it can be said with a very high degree
of confidence that the new system will
outperform the old.
MORE CHANGES
If you want to make changes to the new
system and retest, you can replay the
captured workload. There is no need to
recapture the workload or perform the
preprocessing again. For example, first
create a restore point:
create restore point pre_change;
Now make the changes to the new
system, and finally run the replay on
the new system. If, after analyzing the
results of the new replay, you need to
further modify the new system and run
ORACLE MAGAZINE
another replay, first roll back all the
changes, by issuing
flashback database to restore point
pre_change;
You can perform this change/analyze/
rollback cycle as many times as you
need to until you determine the best
configuration for your specific workload.
CONCLUSION
Change is inevitable—parameters
change, patches need to be applied,
hardware is replaced, and on and on.
Like death and taxes, change is unavoid-
able, but that’s where the analogy stops.
If the exact outcome of a change can
be predicted with certainty, the risk of
implementation disappears or at least
drops significantly to an acceptable
level. Database replay enables DBAs,
without involving any other group, to
assess the exact impact of a change with
a few simple commands while using the
actual database workload. The reduction
in risk allows for a true high-availability
infrastructure. O
Arup Nanda (arup@proligence.com) has been an
Oracle DBA for more than 12 years. He was Oracle
Magazine’s DBA of the Year in 2003.
READ more about
Oracle Real Application Testing
otn.oracle.com/products/manageability/database
Database replay
Oracle Database Performance Tuning Guide
download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B28359_01/server.111/
b28274/wcr.htm#BABCAABF
otn.oracle.com/pub/articles/oracle-database-11g-top-
features/11g-replay.html
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 61
12/4/07 12:14:39 PM


 










 






 
 

 
  


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 t e c h n o l o g y IDENTITY
Intelligence and Identity
Integrating Oracle Business Intelligence and Oracle Identity Management
hen you are deploying
Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition, how you
handle identity management
is as important as query speed and the
quality of your data. A well-architected
identity management solu-
tion ensures that your
users are set up automati-
cally when they first join
the organization, that they
can quickly access applica-
tions and data appropriate
for their varied roles, and
that personal details and
access privileges can be
easily managed.
This article focuses on
integrating Oracle Business
Intelligence Enterprise
Edition with two of Oracle’s
flagship identity manage-
ment tools: Oracle Internet
Directory and Oracle
Application Server Single
Sign-On. You’ll see how to
combine the security features of Oracle
Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition
and Oracle Identity Management to
provide granular, secure access to data.
IDENTITY MANAGEMENT IN FOCUS
User identity has its own lifecycle,
beginning with the initial hire, continu-
ing through promotions and changes
of department or role, and ending
when the staff member leaves and that
person’s application access is removed.
Over time, employees typically need
access to multiple systems, and their
requirement for data access will change
with their roles.
Oracle Identity Management is a
broad set of products that provides
STEPHRIC
standards-based identity management
tools, including Oracle Access Manager,
JF08_BI_IDM.indd 63
Oracle Application Server Single Sign-
On, Oracle Enterprise Single Sign-On
Suite, Oracle Identity Federation, Oracle
Identity Manager, Oracle Internet
Directory, Oracle Virtual Directory, and
Oracle Web Services Manager. Oracle
Internet Directory is an LDAP v.3 direc-
tory that leverages the scalability and
high availability of Oracle Database to
store user and group profiles. Oracle
Internet Directory is widely used within
Oracle’s own applications and middle-
ware tools to provide a single store
of identity information. (For an over-
view of identity management concepts
and Oracle Identity Management, see
“Access Granted” in the July/August
2006 issue of Oracle Magazine.)
Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition has its own secu-
rity infrastructure for user and group
management and control of access to
datasources, but it can also be integrated
with numerous other industry-standard
identity management implementations,
including Oracle Identity Management.
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY M A RK RITTMAN
A N D JO EL CRI SP
Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition includes Oracle
Business Intelligence Server, Oracle
Business Intelligence Presentation
Services, and the Oracle Business
Intelligence Administration Tool, plus
several other server and
desktop applications.
Oracle Business
Intelligence Server has a
local repository that con-
tains information about
the many datasources (data
warehouses, data marts,
packaged applications,
and so on) that business
users will have access to via
Oracle Business Intelligence
Interactive Dashboards.
Oracle Business
Intelligence Presentation
Services has its own sepa-
rate security infrastructure
of users and groups stored
in a separate reposi-
tory, known as the Web
Catalog. Oracle Business Intelligence
Interactive Dashboard is the main user
interface provided by Oracle Business
Intelligence Presentation Services.
When users log in to their respective
dashboards, Oracle Business Intelligence
Server authenticates their credentials. If
an account does not already exist in the
Web Catalog, one is created for them.
If a user is a member of any groups
that have corresponding Web Catalog
entries, the user is granted access to
these Web Catalog groups and any dash-
boards to which that person has access.
As you’ll see later in this article, the
user and group information contained
in Oracle Internet Directory can be used
to facilitate the same access scenarios.
Oracle Business Intelligence Server
makes it possible for privileged users
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 63
11/12/07 12:10:35 PM
 IDENTITY
to “impersonate” other users—this
functionality is used by Oracle Business
Intelligence Presentation Services to
implement single-sign-on functional-
ity in various scenarios, including one
demonstrated later in this article.
For more information, see Oracle
Business Intelligence Presentation Services
Administration Guide (chapter 8) and
Oracle Business Intelligence Server
Administration Guide (chapter 15), avail-
able on Oracle Technology Network.
BRINGING IDENTITY MANAGEMENT TOGETHER
Organizations that have deployed
Oracle Identity Management can easily
use it to provide Oracle Business
Intelligence Enterprise Edition with an
integrated, scalable identity manage-
ment solution across all their reporting
needs. This article provides three inte-
gration scenarios that demonstrate how
to take advantage of powerful features
in both products.
Example 1: Leverage Oracle Internet
Directory for Oracle Business Intelligence
Interactive Dashboard Security steps
you through enabling users of Oracle
Business Intelligence Interactive
Dashboard to connect to their dash-
boards by using their Oracle Internet
Directory logins and passwords.
Example 2: Augment Oracle Internet
Directory User Identity with Oracle Business
Intelligence Server Security Features
shows you how the features in Oracle
Business Intelligence Server can provide
granular, row-level control over report
data to users authenticated with Oracle
Internet Directory.
Example 3: Streamline Access to Oracle
Business Intelligence by Using Oracle Single
Sign-On steps you through configuring
Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise
Edition to leverage Oracle Application
Server Single Sign-On as a partner appli-
cation. Business users will then be able
to access Oracle Business Intelligence
Server functionality by using the same
user account as for other applications
and will be able to access their Oracle
Business Intelligence Server dashboards
based on group membership.
The examples in this article are based
on these specific releases:
64 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_BI_IDM.indd 64
Figure 1: Create a new initialization block in Oracle Business Intelligence Administration Tool Variable Manager
O
Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise
Edition 10.1.3.2, installed with the
Advanced Security option, which
enables the necessary components (Web
Bridge servlet, JMX Bean Server, and
Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher)
to be installed in Oracle Application
Server 10.1.3 (rather than the default
Oracle Containers for J2EE [OC4J]).
In general, Oracle Application Server
is recommended for Oracle Business
Intelligence Enterprise Edition running
in production environments.
O Oracle Identity Management and
Oracle Application Server Metadata
Repository, installed as part of an
Oracle Application Server 10.1.2 infra-
structure deployment. (Oracle Identity
Management 10.1.4.0.1 includes
many enhancements and bug fixes
and is bundled as a single download
of all installation components—Oracle
Application Server infrastructure, Oracle
Database Server, and so on.)
In addition to the required products,
note these other requirements:
O
Servers on which the various compo-
nents are installed must have fully quali-
fied domain names (FQDNs) to support
the single-sign-on scenario.
O
If you are using dynamic host con-
figuration protocol (DHCP) for network
addresses on Microsoft Windows
platforms, be sure to configure the
Microsoft Loopback Network Adapter
before installing any of the software.
See the respective product installation
guides for details.
O
Before making changes to existing
configuration files (instanceconfig.xml,
for example) as described in any of the
examples, make a backup of the file
for safekeeping.
O
The examples assume that you have
an Oracle Internet Directory instance
installed and configured. To set up the
connection between Oracle Business
Intelligence Server authentication and
Oracle Internet Directory, the user
accounts must exist in Oracle Internet
Directory. To create user accounts,
1. From a Web browser, navigate
to the Oracle Identity Management
Provisioning Console:
http://yourservername:7777/oiddas/
2. Click the Directory tab to acti-
vate the user setup page. Set up user
accounts as necessary.
EXAMPLE 1: LEVERAGE ORACLE INTERNET
DIRECTORY FOR ORACLE BUSINESS
INTELLIGENCE INTERACTIVE DASHBOARD
SECURITY
In this first example, you connect
Oracle Business Intelligence Server to
Oracle Internet Directory, to enable your
Oracle Business Intelligence Interactive
Dashboard users to authenticate by
using their Oracle Internet Directory
login and password. At runtime,
when a business user tries to access
a report, Oracle Business Intelligence
Presentation Services will retrieve the
user’s group membership information
from Oracle Internet Directory.
This example is based on using
Oracle Internet Directory exclusively
to manage user IDs and group mem-
bership. You can, however, also use
Oracle Security Manager to import
11/12/07 12:10:36 PM
 details of users and groups
directly into the Oracle
Business Intelligence
Server repository and then
keep these details up to
date through either the
Oracle Security Manager
LDAP Synchronization
tool or Oracle Directory
Integration Platform, pro-
vided with Oracle Internet
Directory. (Oracle Directory
Integration Platform
enables you to create work-
flow that can add users
to the Oracle Business
Figure 2: Filtering access to different groups through Oracle Internet Directory
Intelligence Server reposi-
tory as soon as they are pro-
visioned in Oracle Internet Directory.)
See Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition Deployment Guide for
more details about various other con-
figuration options.
To enable authentication against
Oracle Internet Directory, you must
create an “initialization block” that
runs when the user logs in, retrieving
details from Oracle Internet Directory.
The initialization block runs at the
session level.
Oracle Business Intelligence
Administration Tool Variable Manager
enables you to define repository vari-
ables and session variables. We’ll use
the session variable to define a session-
level initialization block.
To create the initialization block,
use Oracle Business Intelligence Server
Administration to launch Variable
Manager, as follows:
1. Launch the Oracle Business
Intelligence Administration Tool.
(For example, click Start -> Programs
-> Oracle Business Intelligence ->
Administration.)
2. From the Manage menu, select
Variables... to launch Variable Manager.
3. In the left-hand pane, under Session, LDAP variables:
click Initialization Blocks.
4. In the right-hand pane of
Variable Manager, right-click New
Initialization Block… (see Figure
1) to display the Session Variable
Initialization Block editor.
5. Name the variable Authenticator.
JF08_BI_IDM.indd 65
6. Click Edit Data Source… to create a
new LDAP datasource.
7. Using the LDAP Server dialog box,
enter the following connection details:
Host name = name of server hosting Oracle
Internet Director
Port = 389
Base DN = dc=<oid_domain_name>,
dc=<oid_tld>
Bind DN = cn=orcladmin
Bind Password = <orcladmin_password>
LDAP Version = 3
8. Click Test Connection to ensure that 7. Check the Required for
everything is working correctly.
After establishing the connection
to Oracle Internet Directory, you must
map Oracle Business Intelligence Server
internal variables to Oracle Internet
Directory LDAP variables, as follows:
1. Return to the Session Variable
Initialization Block editor.
2. Click Edit Data Target….
3. Using the Session Variable
Initialization Block Data Target dialog
box, map these three Oracle Business
Intelligence Server variables to their
respective Oracle Internet Directory
USER = uid
GROUP = departmentnumber
PASSWORD = userpassword
You can disregard the warning
messages that appear when you are
ORACLE MAGAZINE
using the variable names USER and
PASSWORD (password is optional). The
warnings are generated because we are
directly supplying values for these inter-
nal Oracle Business Intelligence Server
variables—something you would never
do in a production
environment.
4. Click OK to save
the variable target
definition.
5. Click OK again to
create the initialization
block.
Note that instead
of using the LDAP uid
attribute to establish a
user’s identity, you can
use the orclguid attribute, which guar-
antees uniqueness even when a user is
deleted from Oracle Internet Directory
and another one is created with the
same name. However, for the example,
we use the uid attribute, which makes
Web Catalog paths a little more read-
able (at the risk of new users colliding
with deleted users). You can also create
additional variable bindings for the
user’s e-mail address (MAIL) or other
LDAP attributes.
6. Click OK to redisplay the Server
Variable Initialization Block dialog box.
Authentication check box to require all
users (except for the administrator user)
to authenticate via the Oracle Internet
Directory server. (If you leave the check
box deselected, users not held in Oracle
Internet Directory will still be able to
authenticate if their details are present
in the Oracle Business Intelligence
Server repository.)
8. Restart Oracle Business Intelligence
Server.
Test the setup, by having one of
your users log on to Oracle Business
Intelligence Interactive Dashboard
by using his or her Oracle Internet
Directory credentials. The user should
be granted access to Oracle Business
Intelligence Interactive Dashboard
according to Oracle Business
Intelligence Presentation Services Web
Catalog group memberships listed in
the Oracle Internet Directory profile.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 65
11/12/07 12:10:36 PM
 IDENTITY
Figure 3: Viewing only Eastern group data
EXAMPLE 2: AUGMENT ORACLE INTERNET
DIRECTORY USER IDENTITY WITH ORACLE
BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE SERVER
SECURITY FEATURES
In this example, you create groups
within Oracle Business Intelligence
Server and apply row-level security to
the groups so that users have role-based
data access, regardless of how they
log on (through Security Manager or
through Oracle Internet Directory).
First, create the groups in Oracle
Business Intelligence Server, by using
the Oracle Business Intelligence
Administration Tool.
1. From the Oracle Business
Intelligence Administration Tool main
menu, select Manage -> Security to
launch Security Manager.
2. From within the left-hand pane of
Security Manager, select Groups.
3. Add the name of a group that
matches the group set up in Oracle
Internet Directory.
4. Create groups that match the groups
already created in the Oracle Business
Intelligence Presentation Services Web
Catalog and that match the group names
used within Oracle Internet Directory.
5. Once you have created the groups,
use the User Group/Permissions dialog
box to create and apply one or more
filters to the tables available to each
group, thus limiting access.
66 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008
JF08_BI_IDM.indd 66
For example, you can create a filter
to limit members of the Eastern group
so that they see data on customers
from New York and Massachusetts
only (see Figure 2). Each filter defines
the data the user can see. Filters are
cumulative: users belonging to both
the Northern and Eastern groups will
see data for customers in states in the
north and the east.
However, users without any filters
applied to a specific table in the repos-
itory will be able to see all of the data
in that table.
When someone from the Eastern
group logs in, that person will see data
for that region (see Figure 3); if he
or she also belongs to another group
or other users log in who belong to a
different group, they will see data for
those particular states.
The online version of this article,
at otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-
jan/o18biidm.html, describes how to
build Example 3: Streamline Access to
Oracle Business Intelligence by Using
Oracle Single Sign-On.
SUMMARY
When putting together an application
based on Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition, how you handle
the issue of identity management is as
important as the quality of your data
ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
and the performance of your reports.
Users should have a single profile
within their organization that grants
them access to both their applications
and their reports, with a simple-to-
administer provisioning process that
handles their identity management
lifecycle, from hiring to promotion
to departure.
Oracle Application Server
10g, through the use of
Oracle Identity Management
tools—Oracle Internet
Directory, Oracle Delegated
Administration Services, and
Oracle Application Server
Single Sign-On—provides a
solution based on widely used
standards. Oracle Business Intelligence
Enterprise Edition leverages these
standards and enables you to create a
single identity management solution
across your line-of-business and
reporting applications. O
Mark Rittman is an Oracle ACE director and
cofounder of Rittman Mead Consulting, a U.K.-
based Oracle Partner providing specialized business
intelligence and data warehousing solutions. Joel
Crisp is a principal engineer for Oracle who works on
the Oracle Business Intelligence Suite.
READ
online-only article content
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/o18biidm.html
“Access Granted”
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/06-jul/
o46identity.html
Oracle documentation
Oracle Business Intelligence Presentation
Services Administration Guide
Oracle Business Intelligence Server
Administration Guide
Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition
Deployment Guide
otn.oracle.com/documentation
LEARN more about
Oracle Identity Management
otn.oracle.com/products/id_mgmt
Oracle Business Intelligence
otn.oracle.com/products/bi
EXPLORE Oracle by Example
Creating a Repository Using the Oracle Business
Intelligence Administration Tool
otn.oracle.com/obe/obe_bi/bi_ee_1013/bi_admin/
biadmin.html
11/12/07 12:10:36 PM
 t e c h n o l o g y INSIDE OCP
Become a Certified Expert
Oracle University offers Oracle Expert certification in Oracle Real Application Clusters.
he new Oracle Certified Expert
program provides opportunities
for Oracle professionals to earn
certifications in advanced, niche,
and specialty technology areas. The pro-
gram’s first advanced offering for DBAs is
the Oracle Database 10g: Administering
Oracle Real Application Clusters exam.
To earn the Oracle Real Application
Clusters Administrator Certified Expert
credential, you must pass this new exam
and meet one of the following additional
requirements: earn the Oracle Database
10g DBA Oracle Certified Professional
(OCP) credential or attend either the
Oracle Database 10g: Real Application
Clusters course or the Oracle Database
10g: Real Application Clusters for
Administrators Release 2 course.
This column discusses concepts relat-
ing to sequences, parallel execution,
virtual IP addresses (VIPs), and Oracle
Clusterware file management. It also
provides samples of the type of questions
that appear in the Oracle Database 10g:
Administering Oracle Real Application
Clusters exam. The sample questions
and code formats have been adjusted for
publication in this column.
SEQUENCES AND ORACLE RAC
The use of sequences in Oracle Real
Application Clusters (Oracle RAC) is
much the same as it is for single-instance
Oracle databases, but there are certain
Oracle RAC–specific issues. With two or
more database instances, sequences may
require coordination to guarantee that
the sequence numbers are allocated in
the correct order.
Which of the following are always true
regarding the use of sequences in an
Oracle 10g RAC database? (Pick two.)
A. It is not possible to use the CACHE
option, because each database has a
row cache.
JF08_OCP.indd 67
B. Sequence numbers may be out of
order if multiple instances run the appli-
cation program that uses the sequence.
C. Sequences add no extra overhead to
traffic over the interconnect.
D. Using the CACHE and NOORDER
options together results in the best per-
formance for a sequence.
The correct answers are B and D.
Answer B is correct because if the
CACHE option is used without the
ORDER option, each instance caches a
separate range of numbers and sequence
numbers may be assigned out of order
by the different instances. Answer D
is correct because the CACHE option
causes each instance to cache its own
range of numbers, thus reducing I/O
to the Oracle Data Dictionary, and the
NOORDER option eliminates message
traffic over the interconnect to coordi-
nate the sequential allocation of numbers
across all instances of the database.
Answer A is incorrect because even
though each instance has a row cache,
it is still possible to use the CACHE
option with sequences. In such a case,
each instance may cache numbers for
that sequence in its row cache. Answer
C is incorrect because if the CACHE
and ORDER options are used together,
all instances must allocate numbers in
order by coordinating the assignment of
the next value, using messages over the
interconnect, thereby increasing inter-
connect traffic in proportion to the fre-
quency of new-number assignment.
Adding the ORDER option requires
that sequence numbers be returned
in order.
How does Oracle Database coordinate
sequences with the CACHE and ORDER
options so that numbers are cached in
each instance’s row cache but are still
allocated in the correct order?
A. One instance acts as the mastering
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY H A R A LD VA N B REEDERO DE
A N D JOEL GOO DMAN
instance for the cached values.
B. Instances regularly send the
NEXTVALUE data for all CACHE and
ORDER sequences to other instances to
guarantee ordering.
C. The cache information is written and
read from the controlfile.
D. When an instance allocates a new
number from a CACHE and ORDER
sequence, it asks all other instances to
pass the NEXTVALUE over the intercon-
nect. The highest value for all instances,
including the requesting instance, is used.
The correct answer is D.
Answer D is correct because all
database instances know their own
NEXTVALUE, based on the last cached
value used in that instance. So the
NEXTVALUE used for a request from
any instance must be the highest
NEXTVALUE from any instance.
Answer A is incorrect because no
database instance masters the sequence
metadata for a specific sequence. Each
instance has row cache metadata for the
same sequence, provided that sequence
has been used in that instance. Answer
B is incorrect because instances do not
send this metadata regularly; they send it
only upon request from the instance cur-
rently allocating the next number in the
sequence. Answer C is incorrect because
the cache metadata is not stored in the
controlfile. It is stored in the row cache of
all instances that have used the sequence
since that instance started.
PARALLEL EXECUTION AND ORACLE RAC
Oracle RAC databases support parallel
execution of queries, data manipulation
language (DML), and data definition
language (DDL) in much the same way
as a single database instance, but there
are some special considerations regarding
performance and administration issues
that are unique to Oracle RAC.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 67
11/8/07 1:17:33 PM
 INSIDE OCP
INSIDE OCP
A two-instance Oracle RAC database has
the settings PARALLEL_MAX_SERVERS
= 100 and PARALLEL_MIN_PERCENT = 0
on each instance. The DBA has also set
PARALLEL_ADAPTIVE_MULTIUSER to false
on both instances. The DBA then logs in
to instance A and attempts to create a
large index in parallel, using the following
statement:
SQL> create index sh.sales_prod_cust
on SH.sales (prod_id, cust_id) parallel 10;
How are the parallel execution slave pro-
cesses allocated to build this index?
A. Five slaves are allocated from each
instance, and if either instance has fewer
than five slaves available, an error is
returned.
B. Ten slaves are allocated from instance
A, and if fewer than 10 are available in
instance A, an error is returned.
C. Ten slaves are allocated from instance
A, and if fewer are available, the creation
of the index proceeds with fewer slaves,
all on instance A.
D. Ten slaves are allocated from instance
A, if possible. If fewer are available,
slaves are requested from instance B.
If instance A and B together cannot
provide 10 slaves, the statement exe-
cutes with fewer slaves.
E. Ten slaves are allocated from instance
A, if possible. If fewer are available,
slaves are requested from instance B. If
instance A and B together cannot provide
10 slaves, the statement returns an error.
The correct answer is D.
Oracle Database attempts to allocate
all slaves on the instance where the coor-
dinator process is running, in this case
on instance A. If all slaves required are
available, they are allocated from this
instance, which reduces interconnect
overhead. If the coordinator instance is
unable to provide enough slaves because
some are already allocated or because the
parallel request exceeded PARALLEL_
MAX_SERVER for the requesting
instance, slaves are requested from other
instances. If all the instances together
are unable to provide enough slaves, the
statement will execute with a reduced
set of slaves, as would be the case in a
single-instance Oracle Database.
68 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_OCP.indd 68
Another important performance
issue related to parallel execution is
instance recovery.
A four-node Oracle RAC cluster has
an instance on each node. Instance C
fails due to node failure on node C. All
instances have the PARALLEL_MAX_
SERVER = 300 setting. How does the
DBA ensure that recovery for instance C
is done in parallel, thereby speeding up
the recovery?
A. No action is required, because
PARALLEL_MAX_SERVER is already set
on all instances.
B. Issue the recover command for
instance C, using the parallel option.
C. Make sure that the RECOVERY_
PARALLELISM parameter is greater
than or equal to 2 to guarantee parallel
recovery.
D. No action is required, because
PARALLEL_MAX_SERVER is set and
RECOVERY_PARALLELISM defaults
to 10.
The correct answer is C.
In Oracle Database 10g, the
RECOVERY_PARALLELISM parameter
defaults to CPU_COUNT –1, but the DBA
must assure that it has a nonzero value
and that the degree of parallelism used by
the recovery allows instance recovery to
complete within the required service-level
agreement for recovery. If RECOVERY_
PARALLELISM is set to a value less than
2, recovery will be done serially, not in
parallel. Note that other factors affecting
recovery speed—such as default buffer
cache size, which is outside the scope
of this article—are neither Oracle RAC–
specific nor related to parallelism.
Answer A is incorrect because
setting PARALLEL_MAX_SERVER to a
nonzero value is not enough to guar-
antee that recovery will be done in
parallel. If RECOVERY_PARALLELISM
either defaults to or is set to 0 or 1,
recovery will be done serially. Answer
B is incorrect because an Oracle RAC
recovery is performed by one of the
surviving instances automatically and
not by the DBAs issuing a recover
command. Answer D is incorrect because
RECOVERY_PARALLELISM defaults to
CPU_COUNT – 1. On a machine with
only one or two CPUs, this would mean
that the default is for recovery to be
serial, not parallel.
VIRTUAL IP ADDRESSES
Database clients use TNS descriptors
to contact a TNS listener on one of the
cluster nodes from a list of the listeners
on all cluster nodes. TNS descriptors
for Oracle RAC contain hostnames or IP
addresses of the public network inter-
faces on all cluster nodes.
When database clients attempt con-
nections to cluster databases, one of the
available hostnames in the TNS descrip-
tor is selected and a connection request is
made. If the selected instance or listener
on that host is unavailable, clients select
another hostname and try again until
they succeed in connecting. Although
this technique improves availability
when instances or listeners are down, a
network timeout is required to enable
clients to detect unavailable nodes.
Clients are therefore delayed by the TCP
timeout period before they attempt to
connect to another hostname, resulting in
slower network connection establishment
and lower availability of connections.
To circumvent these network time-
outs, Oracle Database 10g clusters use
VIPs, which respond in one of two
ways to connection requests made over
the public network interfaces. While a
cluster node is available, its associated
VIP is active on that node and inbound
connection requests are accepted by the
listener. If a node becomes unavailable,
its associated VIP is activated on one of
the remaining cluster nodes by Oracle
Clusterware, thereby enabling this other
node to reject connection requests
originally sent to the failed node.
This rejection of connection requests
results in immediate notification to the
requesting client, which immediately
selects another hostname from the TNS
descriptor. This results in faster network
connection establishment and higher
availability of connections.
Which statements are true about VIPs?
A. VIPs always accept connection
requests.
B. VIPs must be manually moved from
one node to another.
C. Clients should connect to the VIP
11/8/07 1:17:33 PM
 instead of the public hostname.
D. VIPs should be resolvable through
DNS.
E. VIPs are used to circumvent network
timeouts on the cluster interconnect.
The correct answers are C and D.
Answer C is correct because connect-
ing through VIPs prevents delays from
network timeouts. Answer D is correct
because clients must resolve IP addresses
of VIPs.
Answer A is incorrect because VIPs
accept connections only when the VIP
is used on its own node. Answer B is
incorrect because Oracle Clusterware
automatically relocates VIPs as required.
Answer E is incorrect because VIPs are
used for client connections made over
public network interfaces, not over the
interconnect, which is a private network
for the cluster.
Your company plans to switch from one
internet service provider (ISP) to another
ISP, which will result in new IP addresses
for your Oracle RAC VIPs. What must you
do to implement these new VIP addresses
for your Oracle RAC cluster?
A. You don’t need to do anything.
Oracle Clusterware will discover the
new VIPs automatically.
B. You make changes in DNS, and
Oracle Clusterware will determine the
new addresses automatically.
C. You must plan some scheduled
downtime for the whole cluster and
make the changes while all cluster soft-
ware is inactive.
D. You must stop all VIP-dependent
cluster components on one node;
change the VIP address, using the Server
Control (SRVCTL) utility; and restart
all VIP-dependent cluster components.
Then you repeat the same steps on all
cluster nodes, one at a time.
E. You need to reinstall Oracle
Clusterware from scratch.
The correct answer is D.
A crucial element of the Oracle RAC
high-availability architecture is support
for most maintenance activities in a
rolling fashion. This allows software on
one node to be shut down for mainte-
nance while other nodes continue to
operate normally. Upon completion of
the maintenance action, the node and
JF08_OCP.indd 69
the software are restarted and the same
steps are then carried out serially on the
remaining nodes.
Answer A is incorrect because Oracle
Clusterware cannot discover the new
VIPs automatically. Answer B is incorrect
because Oracle Clusterware stores VIPs
in its own metadata to avoid depen-
dency on DNS. Answers C and E are
incorrect because planned downtime
would compromise the Oracle RAC
high-availability architecture.
ORACLE CLUSTERWARE FILE MANAGEMENT
The two important Oracle Clusterware
file types are the Oracle Cluster Registry
(OCR) and the voting disk. The OCR
contains cluster configuration data such
as public and private node names, data-
base and instance names, IP and VIP
addresses, node applications, and voting
disk locations. The voting disk is a disk
device or file that plays an important
role during cluster reconfiguration activi-
ties such as nodes joining or leaving the
cluster and public or private network
failures. Multiplexing both the OCR and
the voting disks can protect them against
media failures, but making backups for
disaster recovery is still an important
activity for DBAs.
While evaluating your company’s backup-
and-recovery strategy, your IT manager asks
you to recommend a backup strategy for the
Oracle Clusterware voting disk. When would
you recommend that backups of the voting
disk be done? (Choose all that apply.)
A. Never, because there is nothing inside
the voting disk.
B. After a node is added to the cluster.
C. After a node is removed from the
cluster.
D. Never, because voting disk backups
are taken automatically by Oracle
Clusterware whenever database backups
are taken.
The correct answers are B and C.
Answer B is correct because a new
heartbeat area is created on the voting
disk when a new node is added to the
cluster. Answer C is correct because a
node heartbeat area is removed from the
voting disk whenever a node is removed
from the cluster. Answer A is incorrect
because each node has a heartbeat area
ORACLE MAGAZINE
on the voting disk. Answer D is incorrect
because although Oracle Clusterware
creates OCR backups automatically, it
does not do so for the voting disk.
Your system administrator informs you of
a disk failure in your Oracle RAC cluster
that necessitates a replacement disk. An
OCR mirror was located on the failed disk
and requires recovery. What is the best
way to resolve this issue?
A. Copy the remaining OCR to the mirror
location while the cluster is still running.
B. Restore the OCR from a backup
location.
C. Copy the remaining OCR to the mirror
location while the cluster is shut down.
D. Replace the OCR mirror by issuing
an OCRCONFIG –REPLACE command.
E. Repair the OCR mirror by issuing an
OCRCONFIG –REPAIR command.
The correct answer is D. OCRCONFIG
–REPLACE is the command for replacing
the OCR mirror.
Answer A is incorrect because Oracle
Clusterware prevents mirrors from being
copied while they are in use. Answer B
is incorrect because the backup OCR
will be out of sync with the remaining
OCR, and no logs exist to facilitate a
roll forward. Answer C is possible but
conflicts with high-availability objectives,
because the cluster would need to be shut
down, and is therefore not the best way
to resolve the issue. Answer E is incorrect
because the –REPAIR argument is used to
repair a broken /etc/oracle/ocr.loc file that
points to the OCR device location(s). O

Harald van Breederode (ocpexam_ww@oracle
.com) is the Linux technical advisor to the Oracle
Certification Exam development team and has worked
for Oracle University Netherlands since 1999. Joel
Goodman (ocpexam_ww@oracle.com) is the Oracle
Database technical advisor to the Oracle Certification
Exam development team and has worked for Oracle
University U.K. since 1997.
LEARN more about the Oracle
Certification Program and download a
free exam guide
oracle.com/education/certification
READ “Inside OCP” columns
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/ocp
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 69
11/8/07 1:17:33 PM
 Sometimes the
problem is obvious.

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the information you need.
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obvious, try a tool that can get you up to speed. One that pinpoints database
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Confio_FP_OracleAD_smoke.indd 1 10/24/07 1:11:25 PM

 t e c h n o l o g y ASK TOM
On Tuning by Tracing
Our technologist does a tune-up with SQL_TRACE.
y all-time favorite presenta-
tion is called “All About
Binds.” It takes me about
three hours to do the entire
talk—which covers performance,
memory utilization, scalability, security,
bind mismatches, bind variable peeking,
and cursor sharing—from start to finish.
Today, I got this message on Ask Tom
(asktom.oracle.com):
I have a query that runs slowly (it takes about
two minutes). So what do I do? I turn on tracing
(SQL_TRACE=TRUE) before running the query,
and consistently, 100 percent of the time,
without my changing anything else, when I
enable tracing the query comes back instantly!
This message on Ask Tom shows
exactly what I demonstrate in the “All
About Binds” presentation, during which
I say, “I’m going to show you how to
tune by setting SQL_TRACE=TRUE. You
are probably all thinking that I’m going
to run a query, observe it running slowly,
trace it, and then tune it. Well, I’m not
going to do that—all I’m going to do
is set SQL_TRACE=TRUE, and you’ll
observe that the query performance
and resource utilization are dramatically
affected—all for the better!”
I know exactly what is happening in
the Ask Tom scenario—it is a combina-
tion of two things:
O
When you set SQL_TRACE=TRUE,
you set up a new “parse environment”
(a made-up term). You have changed
your session in such a way that it will
not share any existing SQL that was not
parsed with SQL_TRACE enabled. So it
is highly likely that you will either hard-
parse a new version of the query or use
some existing child cursor that is differ-
ent from the one you would use with
SQL_TRACE disabled.
O
Bind variable peeking happens at
hard-parse time and may affect the plan
chosen by the optimizer.
JF08_ASK TOM.indd 71
BY TO M KYTE
codeLISTING 1: Different inputs, different plans
SQL> set autotrace traceonly explain
SQL> select * from t where id = 1;
Execution Plan
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | 1 | 96 | 2 (0) | 00:00:01 |
| 1 | TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID | T | 1 | 96 | 2 (0) | 00:00:01 |
|* 2 | INDEX RANGE SCAN | T_IDX | 1 | | 1 (0) | 00:00:01 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SQL> select * from t where id = 99;
Execution Plan
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | 50244 | 4710K | 235 (4) | 00:00:02 |
|* 1 | TABLE ACCESS FULL | T | 50244 | 4710K | 235 (4) | 00:00:02 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Let’s start with the setup script to will return all of the rest (about 50,000
demonstrate this phenomenon. I’ll set up records). Also, the optimizer is very aware
a very skewed set of data for emphasis: of this fact, because of the histograms in
place, and if we parse by using literals, we
SQL> create table t can definitely see different plans for differ-
2 as ent inputs, as shown in Listing 1.
3 select case when rownum = 1
4 then 1 else 99 end id, a.* ORACLE8i DATABASE RELEASE 3
5 from all_objects a AND EARLIER
6 / But what happens when we bind the ID
Table created. input—when we issue SELECT * FROM
t WHERE ID = :ID? Well, the answer
SQL> create index t_idx on t(id); depends on which release of Oracle
Index created. Database is being used. With Oracle8i
Database Release 3 and earlier, the
SQL> begin optimizer will more or less “guess.” It
2 dbms_stats.gather_table_stats will not have any information about the
3 ( user, ‘T’, WHERE ID = :ID clause. The informa-
4 method_opt=> tion it has is
5 ‘for all’|| O
ID has two values in the table: 1 and 99.
6 ‘indexed columns’|| O
There are 50,000 records in the table.
7 ‘size 254’ ); And because ID has only two values,
8 end; this old optimizer will guess that for
9 / any query on ID, about half of the table
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed. on average will be selected. And the
database would come up with one plan,
It is quite clear that WHERE ID=1 will regardless of the inputs. In this case, it
return one record and WHERE ID=99 would likely do a full scan of the table.
ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 71
11/9/07 9:56:06 AM
 ASK TOM

ORACLE9i DATABASE AND ORACLE codeLISTING 2: Using DBMS_XPLAN to show the plans for each child cursor
DATABASE 10g
SQL> select sql_id from v$sql where sql_text = ‘select * from t where id = :id’;
From Oracle9i Database Release 1
through Oracle Database 10g Release SQL_ID
2, Oracle Database will wait until the -----------------------------------
8s40hfjcbmxzk
cursor is opened to do the actual opti-
8s40hfjcbmxzk
mization of the query—it will wait for
the bind variable value to be supplied SQL> select * from table( dbms_xplan.display_cursor( ‘8s40hfjcbmxzk’, 0 ) );
by the application before figuring out
PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
the right way to optimize the query. This -------------------------------------------------
is called bind variable peeking, when the SQL_ID 8s40hfjcbmxzk, child number 0
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
optimizer first looks at the bind values
select * from t where id = :id
and then optimizes the query. In this
case, however, depending on which Plan hash value: 1601196873
inputs are used to first run the query, the
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
database will either choose a full scan or | Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
an index range scan plus table access by ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | | | 235 (100) | |
index rowid. And in Oracle9i Database
|* 1 | TABLE ACCESS FULL | T | 50250 | 4710K | 235 (4) | 00:00:02 |
Release 1 through Oracle Database 10g ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Release 2, that is the plan that will be
Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
used to execute the SELECT * FROM t
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WHERE ID = :ID query, regardless of the 1 - filter(“ID”=:ID)
subsequent bind values, until the query
18 rows selected.
is hard-parsed and optimized again.
I’ll address what happens in Oracle SQL> select * from table( dbms_xplan.display_cursor( ‘8s40hfjcbmxzk’, 1 ) );
Database 11g Release 1 in a minute, but
PLAN_TABLE_OUTPUT
first let’s take a look at what is happen-
-------------------------------------------------
ing to the person whose scenario on Ask SQL_ID 8s40hfjcbmxzk, child number 1
Tom inspired this discussion: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
select * from t where id = :id
1. Someone hard-parsed the query in
question, and the inputs used resulted in Plan hash value: 470836197
“Plan A.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Plan A was the best plan for that
| Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
person, given the inputs—it was the ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
most efficient plan. | 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | | | 2 (100) | |
| 1 | TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID | T | 1 | 96 | 2 (0) | 00:00:01 |
3. Later, someone else executed the same
|* 2 | INDEX RANGE SCAN | T_IDX | 1 | | 1 (0) | 00:00:01 |
query. Using shared SQL, this person ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
reused the plan generated by the other
Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
person (Plan A in No. 1), but the new
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
bind variable inputs were different and 2 - access(“ID”=:ID)
the plan generated for No. 1 was not the
19 rows selected.
best plan for these inputs. In fact, the
plan was miserable for these new inputs.
4. The person in No. 3 turned on SQL_
TRACE and executed the query with SQL> variable id number 4031 consistent gets
inputs from No. 3 again, but because
...

SQL> set autotrace traceonly statistics

SQL_TRACE was on, the query did not
share the SQL. The query was hard-
parsed—with the new inputs—and this
resulted in a very different plan, “Plan B,”
and given these inputs, Plan B was much
better than Plan A.
Using Oracle Database 10g Release
2, we can observe this easily. Consider
the following:
SQL> exec :id := 99 50254 rows processed
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
So we started off with ID=99 as the
SQL> select * from t where id = :id; bind, and the optimizer chose a full scan
50254 rows selected. (you can prove that via TKPROF by
looking at the row source operation if you
Statistics wish; I did. . . .) Therefore, regardless of
---------------------------------------------------------------- the bind value, the database will execute
a full scan from now on. For example,
...

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 SQL> exec :id : = 1
codeLISTING 3: Multiple plans with intelligent cursor sharing (Oracle Database 11g)
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
SQL> select sql_id
2 from v$sql
SQL> select * from t where id = :id;
3 where sql_text = ‘select * from T where id = :x’;
no rows selected
Statistics
SQL> declare
--------------------------------------------------------------
2 l_cursor sys_refcursor;
...

3 type array is table of number;

720 consistent gets 4 l_data array := array(99,1);
5 type data_array is table of T%rowtype;
...

6 l_recs data_array;
1 rows processed 7 begin
8 for i in 1 .. l_data.count
9 loop
This result demonstrates that it was 10 open l_cursor for ‘select * from T where id = :x’ using l_data( i );
unlikely that an index range scan/table 11 loop
access by index rowid was executed. In 12 fetch l_cursor bulk collect into l_recs limit 500;
13 exit when l_cursor%notfound;
such a case, we’d expect many fewer 14 end loop;
logical I/Os (consistent gets)—three or 15 close l_cursor;
four against an index and one against the 16 end loop;
17 end;
table. This result represents our “poorly 18 /
performing query.” Now we turn on PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
SQL_TRACE to find the performance
SQL> select sql_id
characteristics, and we observe 2 from v$sql
3 where sql_text = ‘select * from T where id = :x’;
SQL> alter session set sql_trace = true; SQL_ID
------------------------------------
Session altered.
gw1fks2wb4j2g
gw1fks2wb4j2g
SQL> select * from t where id = :id;
...

SQL> select * from table(dbms_xplan.display_cursor(‘gw1fks2wb4j2g’,0));

Statistics SQL_ID gw1fks2wb4j2g, child number 0

------------------------------------------------------------ -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
select * from T where id = :x
...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4 consistent gets | Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
...

| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | | | 292 (100) | |

1 rows processed
|* 1 | TABLE ACCESS FULL | T | 68207 | 6927K | 292 (2) | 00:00:04 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Apparently just setting SQL_
SQL> select * from table(dbms_xplan.display_cursor(‘gw1fks2wb4j2g’,1));
TRACE=TRUE is our tuning mechanism!
It isn’t really—bind peeking and hard SQL_ID gw1fks2wb4j2g, child number 1
parsing are what’s causing this result, but -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
select * from T where id = :x
unless you know that SQL_TRACE sets ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
up a child cursor and that bind peeking | Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU) | Time |
happens, this looks very mysterious, ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | | | 2 (100) | |
especially if you turn SQL_TRACE off: | 1 | TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID | T | 1 | 104 | 2 (0) | 00:00:01 |
|* 2 | INDEX RANGE SCAN | T_IDX | 1 | | 1 (0) | 00:00:01 |
SQL> alter session set sql_trace=false; ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Session altered.

SQL> select * from t where id = :id; See it run slowly (720 consistent gets). Statistics
And now that we’ve seen slow, turn ------------------------------------------------------------
SQL_TRACE on again:
...

Statistics
-------------------------------------------------------------- 4 consistent gets
...

...

SQL> alter session set sql_trace=true;

720 consistent gets Session altered. 1 rows processed
...

1 rows processed SQL> select * from t where id = :id; And see it go fast. It is not magic; it

ORACLE MAGAZINE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 73

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 ASK TOM

is bind peeking. To see the real plans, IF BIND VARIABLE PEEKING IS A PROBLEM
you can query V$SQL_PLAN / V$SQL_ Most of the time—almost all of the time,
PLAN_STATISTICS or use DBMS_ in fact—bind variable peeking works as
XPLAN to dump the plans for each child the designers of the feature intended: in
cursor, as shown in Listing 2. a positive, helpful manner. The query in
You can use V$SQL_SHARED_ the application uses bind values that drive
CURSOR and the SQL_ID from Listing it to one plan or the other consistently. It
2 to see why you have multiple child is only when the plan flip-flops between
cursors as well. For example, two radically different execution paths,
and for some segment of users, that you
SQL> select child_number, have a really bad plan. In such cases,
2 stats_row_mismatch Oracle Database 11g might be the right
3 from v$sql_shared_cursor answer for you, because it accommodates
4 where sql_id = ‘8s40hfjcbmxzk’ multiple plans.
5 / But when bind variable peeking
doesn’t work “nicely” and Oracle
CHILD_NUMBER STATS_ROW_MISMATCH Database 11g is not a viable solution
------------------------------------ ---------------------------------------------------- for you, what can you do to get around
0 N bind variable peeking? I’ll go through the
1 Y ideas one by one.
Don’t bind that query. Yes, you read that
That is what you would look for to correctly—don’t use a bind variable (yes,
verify that you were seeing an “it must be I wrote that—do not use a bind variable!)
SQL_TRACE creating a new child cursor In my example, ID has two values—1
and a hard parse with different binds” and 99. Let’s say ID wasn’t ID but rather
result. (The queries you run to verify this was PROCESSED_FLAG and had two
in Oracle9i Database are slightly different values—Y and N. Most of the records are
from the Oracle Database 10g Release 2 PROCESSED_FLAG=Y; some of them
queries above. If you are interested in the are N. Some people query the processed
Oracle9i Database queries, you can review records (Y=yes). They want a full scan.
tkyte.blogspot.com/2007/09/sqltracetrue- Others query the unprocessed records
part-two.html, where I worked the in order to process them (N=no). They
example through in that release.) want an index range scan.
Here my suggestion would be not
ORACLE DATABASE 11g RELEASE 1 to bind against PROCESSED_FLAG;
The current release of Oracle Database— instead, use literals. That way we have
Oracle Database 11g—changes the above two queries and two plans.
behavior for the better. A new feature— This is also why I do not like
intelligent cursor sharing—enables the CURSOR_SHARING=FORCE, because
optimizer to recognize that performance when a programmer does this (uses lit-
can be affected when a fixed, one-size- erals) and the DBA turns on CURSOR_
fits-all plan is used and come up with SHARING=FORCE, we are back to the
different plans for certain bind ranges. In original problem! Bind variable peeking
the following example, I simply used the comes into play once again—there is
without gathering histograms, the plan
would not flip-flop.
Use your domain knowledge of the data. If
you know that when a certain query is
executed with a date that falls within the
last 30 days, the volume of data would be
small and indexes would be used and that
if the date is way in the past, the volume
of data would be large and full scans
would be used, then just use if/then/else.
The online-only version of this
column, at otn.oracle.com/oramag/
oracle/08-jan/o18asktom.html, includes
example syntax for using if/then/else, as
well as information on using CURSOR_
SHARING=SIMILAR and stored outlines.
Disable the bind peeking feature. You
can disable bind peeking by using an
undocumented init.ora parameter, but—
because this really affects you only if
you have statistics that cause plans to
flip-flop—I would say, instead, that you
should stop gathering those statistics to save
the time and resources it takes, and you’ll
have achieved basically the same goal. O
Tom Kyte is a database evangelist in Oracle’s Server
Technology division and has worked for Oracle since
1993. He is the author of Expert Oracle Database
Architecture: 9i and 10g Programming Techniques
and Solutions (Apress, 2005) and Effective Oracle by
Design (Oracle Press, 2003), among others.
ASK Tom
Oracle Vice President Tom Kyte answers your most dif-
ficult technology questions. Highlights from that forum
appear in this column.
asktom.oracle.com
READ online-only column content
otn.oracle.com/oramag/oracle/08-jan/
o18asktom.html
READ more about
Oracle Database 11g
otn.oracle.com/products/database/oracle11g

schema from above—the copy of ALL_ one plan for all, and it depends on Intelligent cursor sharing
Oracle Database New Features Guide
OBJECTS, with one row having the value who runs the query first. (By the way, download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B28359_01/server.111/
ID=1, the index in place, and statistics CURSOR_SHARING=SIMILAR would b28279/chapter1.htm#FEATURENO07493
gathered. Then I ran a PL/SQL block not have this side effect. It would choose SQL_TRACE=TRUE
that would open a cursor by using one not to bind against PROCESSED_FLAG tkyte.blogspot.com/2007/09/sqltracetrue-
part-two.html
of two inputs—either 1 or 99. This time, based on the statistics).
instead of just one plan being generated, Don’t gather statistics that cause the plan READ more Tom
Expert Oracle Database Architecture: 9 i and 10g
we’ll see two. The optimizer recognized to flip-flop. If there is only one plan that Programming Techniques and Solutions
amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1590595300/
that one plan was not sufficient for all the optimizer would ever choose, then
inputs and allowed for multiple plans to bind variable peeking will have no effect. DOWNLOAD Oracle Database 11g
otn.oracle.com/software/products/database
be generated, as shown in Listing 3. If you were to execute the above example

74 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_ASK TOM.indd 74 11/9/07 9:48:52 AM

 Oracle PartnerNetwork Certified Advantage Partner Index

CERTIFIEDadvantage partner index

Partners able to demonstrate superior product knowledge, competence, and a commitment to doing business with Oracle qualify for the Oracle
PartnerNetwork (OPN) Certified Advantage Partner level. These partners receive the highest level of service, training, benefits, and resources from Oracle to
support them in delivering quality to customers. For more information on partners, please visit the OPN Solutions Catalog at solutions.oracle.com.

COMPANY NAME URL COMPANY NAME URL

Global PT Metrodata Electronics, Tbk. www.metrodata.co.id

Accenture www.accenture.com Pythis www.pythis.com
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. www.amd.com Red Rock Consulting www.redrock.net.au
Apple www.apple.com Samsung SDS www.sds.samsung.co.kr
BearingPoint www.bearingpoint.com Shanghai New Century High Tecnology Services Ltd. www.shsnc.com
Capgemini www.capgemini.com Shen Yang Neusoft Co., Ltd. www.neusoft.com
Cisco www.cisco.com Sierra Atlantic Pte Ltd. www.sierraatlantic.com
Computer Sciences Corporation www.csc.com Sonata Information Technology www.sonata-infotech.com
Dell Inc. www.dell.com Stark Technology Inc. www.stark.com.tw
Deloitte www.deloitte.com Sysage Technology Co., Ltd. www.sysage.com.tw
EDS www.eds.com Systex Corporation Taiwan www.systex.com.tw
EMC www.emc.com Systex Information (H.K.) Ltd. www.systex.com.hk
Fujitsu Group www.fujitsu.com Taiji Computer Corporation www.taiji.com.cn
HP www.hp.com TechAccess Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd. www.techaccesspak.com
IBM / IBM Global Business Services www.ibm.com Tietoenator Software Technologies Pvt Ltd. www.tietoenator.in
Infosys www.infosys.com Unisys www.unisys.com
Ingram Micro www.ingrammicro.com Unisys West Pty Ltd. www.unisyswest.com.au
Insight www.insight.com Unlimited Solutions Limited www.hkus1.com
Intel www.intel.com Wezoomtek Corporation www.wezoomtek.com
Microsoft www.microsoft.com World Distribution Nepal Pvt. Ltd. www.wdn.com.np
Network Appliance, Inc. www.netapp.com Canada
Satyam www.satyam.com Castek www.castek.com
Sun Microsystems www.sun.com Groupe LGS Inc. division Artefact Informatique www.lgs.com
Tata Consultancy Services www.tcs.com TietoEnator Canada Inc. www.tietoenator.com
TechData www.techdata.com Europe
Wipro www.wipro.com 2Cana Solutions (Pty) Ltd. www.2cana.co.za
Africa Actebis Peacock GmbH www.actebispeacock.de
2Cana Solutions (Pty) Ltd. www.2cana.co.za ACURE A/S www.acure.dk
Computer Warehouse Nigeria www.cwlgroup.com Afina Sistemas Informaticos www.afina.es
Corporate Software www.corporate.ma Alcatel Lucent www.alcatel-lucent.com
De Chazal Du Mee Consulting (DCDM) www.dcdm.biz Alcatel CIT www.alcatel.fr
EOH Consulting Services (Pty) Ltd. www.eoh.co.za Anelia SAS www.anelia.fr
Implementation Factory (Pty) Ltd. www.ifactory.co.za Application Lynx www.applicationlynx.co.uk
Integrated Tertiary Software (Pty) Ltd. www.its.co.za Ares www.ares.fr
New Dawn Technologies www.ndt.co.za Asseco Poland S.A. www.asseco.pl
Omnidata www.omnidata.co.ma Atos Origin IT Services UK www.atosorigin.com
or@dist www.oradist.com.tn Atos Origin Nederland BV www.atosorigin.com
RPC DATA LIMITED www.rpcdata.com B3iT Management AB www.b3it.se
State Informatics Ltd. (SIL) sil.intnet.mu Basilica Computing Limited www.basilica.co.uk
VESL www.vesltech.com Bell Microproducts Limited www.bellmicro.eu
Waymark Infotech (Pty) Ltd. www.waymark.co.za BMS Consulting www.bms-consulting.com
Asia Pacific Borlas IBC www.borlas.ru
Alcatel Australia Limited www.alcatel.com.au Business At Work www.b-a-w.com
Amazing Technologies Australia Pty Ltd. www.amazingtechnologies.com Capgemini Telecom Media und Networks GmbH www.de.cgey.com
Application Hosting Services Co., Ltd. www.a-host.co.th CBOSS www.cboss.ru
Applied Business Systems Sdn Bhd www.abs.com.my Cedar Consulting Ltd. www.cedarconsulting.co.uk
ASG (Asia Pacific) Pty Ltd. www.asggroup.com.au CGI Group Inc. www.cgi.com
Attain IT Pty Ltd. www.attainit.com.au Ciber UK www.ciber.com
Automated Systems (HK) Ltd. www.asl.com.hk Cnsys www.cnsys.bg
Beijing Futong Dong Fang Technology Co. Ltd. www.futong.com.cn ComArch S.A. www.comarch.pl
Beijing LBSSocial Insurance Information Technology Co., Ltd. www.bjlbs.com.cn CompelSolve Ltd. www.compel.co.uk
Beijing Teamsun Technology Co., Ltd. www.teamsun.com.cn CompIT Technologies www.compit-t.com.by
China National Software & Service Company Limited www.css.com.cn Computacenter AG & Co. OHG www.computacenter.de
CMG Online Sdn Bhd www.cmg.com.my ComputerLand S.A. www.computerland.pl
Datang Software Technologies Co., Ltd. www.cattsoft.com Comverse www.comverse.com
DataHeaven Co., Ltd. www.dataheaven.co.kr Consit A/S www.consit.dk
Dataone Asia (Thailand) Co. Ltd. www.diasia.co.th Convergys EMEA Ltd. www.convergys.com
Daesang Information Technology Co., Ltd. www.daesangit.com Cozum Bilgisayar www.cozumbil.com.tr
Digital China (China) Limited www.digitalchina.com.cn CROC Incorporated www.croc.ru
ECS International Trading (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. www.ecschina.com Cronos NV www.cronos.be
Electronic Data Systems (India) Pvt Ltd. www.eds.com Cronos Ibérica, S.A. www.cronosiberica.es
FPT Information System www.fis.com.vn CSC www.csc.com
Fujian Fujitsu Communication Software Co., Ltd. www.ffcs.cn CSG Systems (Silicon Iberia) www.csgsystems.com
Fusion5 Limited www.fusion5.co.nz Deutsche Post ITSolutions GmbH www.dp-itsolutions.de
FPT Corporation www.fpt.com.vn Developing World Systems Ltd. www.dwsonline.co.uk
HAND Enterprise Solutions Co., Ltd. www.hand-china.com DIGORA www.digora.com
Hitachi Data Systems www.hds.com DISTRILOGIE (France) www.distrilogie.com
HPT Vietnam Corporation www.hptvietnam.com DBConcepts Daten - und Informationsverarbeitungsges.m.b.H. www.dbconcepts.at
Huadi Computer Group Co., Ltd. www.huadi.com.cn Diligenta Limited www.diligenta.co.uk
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. www.huawei.com/cn DNS Hungary Ltd. www.dns-hungary.hu
IBCS Primax Software (Bangladesh) Ltd. www.ibcs-primax.com Ecletic Group Ltd. www.eclectic.co.uk
iCE Consulting Co Ltd. www.iceconsulting.co.th Edenbrook Limited www.edenbrook.co.uk
i-flex Solutions Limited www.iflexsolutions.com Engineering Ingegneria Informatica S.p.A. www.eng.it
Jigsaw Services Pty Ltd. www.jigsawservices.com.au EOH Mthombo (Pty) Ltd. www.navigor.co.za
LG CNS Co., Ltd. www.lgcns.com Everis Spain S.L. www.everis.com
L&S Information Technology Co. Ltd. www.lnsit.co.kr Explorer (UK) Limited www.explorer.uk.com
IT&C Co., Ltd. www.itnc.co.kr Experteam Consulting www.experteam.com.tr
KPMG Consulting Co Ltd. www.kpmg.com.tw Fadata www.fadata.bg
KOLON I’Networks Corp. www.kdc.kolon.co.kr FORS Development Center www.fdc.ru
Nucleus Software Exports Ltd. www.nucleussoftware.com Getronics PinkRoccade www.getronicspinkroccade.nl
Oakton Services Pty Ltd. www.oakton.com.au Global Services Aarhus A/S www.maerskdata.dk
Ora-Tech System Pvt. Ltd. www.ora-tech.com Global Services Copenhagen A/S www.maerskdata.dk
OED Technology Sdn Bhd www.patimas.com Groupe LGS France www.lgsrecrut.com
Propia Co., Ltd. www.propia.co.kr GWI Unternehmensgruppe www.gwi-ag.com
PT Computrade Technology International www.computradetech.com Horizon Clarity Technology Ltd. www.claritytechnology.co.uk

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 COMPANY NAME URL COMPANY NAME URL
Hunkler GmbH & Co. KG www.hunkler.biz Apply Solutions www.applysolutions.com.br
I-Teco www.i-teco.ru ASI Consultant www.asiconsultant.com
i-flex solutions bv www.iflexsolutions.com B2BR Business to Business Informatica do Brasil www.b2br.com.br
Implementation Factory (Pty) Ltd. www.ifactoryconsulting.co.za BGH, S.A. www.bgh.com.ar
Inatech Solutions Ltd. www.inatech.com BusinessMind S.A. www.businessmind.com.ec
INDRA Sistemas S.A. www.indra.es Casa de Software S/A www.casasoft.com.br
Industrial and Financial Systems, IFS AB www.ifsworld.com CFP3 Consultoria e Tecnologia www.commitconsultores.com.br
Ineum Consulting www.ineum.fr Compusoluciones y Asociados, S.A. de C.V. www.compusoluciones.com
Infor Global Solutions GmbH www.infor.de CONSULT SOFT S.A. www.consult-soft.com
Informacines Technologijos www.it.lt Datum www.datum.com
Excelsis S.A.C.I.G www.excelsis.com.py
Informatica El Cortes Ingles www.ieci.es
FYC Soluciones Integrales, C.A. www.fyccorp.com
Information Technologies Company www.it.ru
Ingenieria Condor S.A. DE C.V. www.i-condor.com
Intec Billing Ireland www.intecbilling.com
JFM Informática Ltda. www.jfm.com.br
Intec Telecom Systems www.intec-telecom-systems.com
Netix Distribuidores de Tecnologia, C.A. www.netixcorp.com
Integrated Tertiary Software (Pty) Ltd. www.its.co.za
Nexsys www.nexsysla.com
Inter Access B.V. www.interaccess.nl
Officer Distribuidora www.officer.com.br
IT Alise www.it-alise.com
Premier Soluciones de Centroamerica S.A. www.premierway.com
IT-eye www.it-eye.nl
Preteco www.preteco.com
KNAPP Systemintegration GmbH www.knapp.com
Recours Informatica Consultoria e Assessoria Ltda. www.recours.com.br
KPMG Consulting www.kpmg.be RedPartner, S.A. www.red-partner.com
Kvazar Micro Tekhno www.kvazar-micro.com Servicios, Tecnologia y Organizacion S.A. de C.V. (STO) www.stoconsulting.com
Kurt Salmon Associates www.kurtsalmon.com Sinergy Solutions, S.A. de C.V. www.sinergysolutions.com.mx
Leaves www.leaves.ru Soft Bolivar S.A. www.softbolivar.com
LGS France www.lgs.com Softcomex Informática Ltda. www.softcomex.com.br
LogicaCMG www.Logicacmg.com Solusoft www.solusoft.com
LOGIX www.logix.fr Sonda del Peru S.A. www.sonda.com
Mdtvision www.mdtvision.com SQL Technology S.A. www.sqltech.cl
Memorex Telex/EDS www.memorex.ie SSA Sistemas www.ssasis.com
Micros-Fidelio GmbH www.micros-fidelio.org Sunrising Desenvolvimento de Sistemas www.sunrising.com.br
Montora www.montora.com Sygnus S.A. www.sygnusconsulting.com
Morse Group Ltd. www.morse.com Sysdesign Consultoria Em Informatica Limitada www.sysdesign.com.br
Mphasis Ltd. www.mphasis.com Tilsor S.A. www.tilsor.com.uy
Msg Systems ag www.msg-systems.com Transistemas S.A. www.transistemas.com.ar
Network Centric Solutions Limited www.ncsltd.com TSnet S.A. www.tsnetglobal.com
Noetix www.noetix.com VTI Tecnologia da Informação Ltda. www.vti.com.br
Nokia Corporation www.nokia.com Middle East
Ordina www.Ordina.nl Bahwan Cybertek LLC www.bahwancybertek.com
Oficina de Cooperación Universitaria www.ocu.es Computer and Communications Systems www.ccs.com.jo
Computer Information Systems www.cis.com.lb
Open Technologies www.ot.ru
Computer and Engineering Bureau CEB www.ceb.com.jo
Opitz Consulting GmbH www.opitz-consulting.de
Districom www.cis.com.lb
Patech Solutions Limited www.patech-solutions.com
Emirates Computers Est www.emiratescomputers.co.ae
PC-Ware Information Technologies AG www.pc-ware.de
Giza Systems www.gizasystems.com
PDV-Systeme Erfurt Gesellschaft für Systemtechnik mbH www.pdv.de
Global Technology Services LLC www.gtsuae.com
Peak Systems Support Ltd. www.peaksystems.uk.com
Hyperlink www.hyperlink-me.com
Peter-Service www.billing.ru
Integrated Data Solutions www.idscomp.com
PITSS GmbH www.pitss.com
International Turnkey Systems (ITS) www.its.ws
Prodatis Consulting AG www.prodatis.com
Intracom Jordan www.intracom.jo
QAS Ltd. www.qas.com Mannai Trading Company Limited www.mannaicorp.com
Quantix Ltd. www.quantix-uk.com Mercator www.mercator.co.ae
RDTEX www.rdtex.ru Macro Software Systems LLC www.macro-soft.com
Rila Solutions www.rila.com Mindscape www.mindscapeit.com
RTC Real-Time Center AG www.rtc.ch Raya Gulf LLC www.rayaholding.com
Satyam Computer Services Ltd. www.satyam.com Royah www.royah.com
S.C. RomSoft S.R.L. www.romsoft.info United States
SCC PLC www.scc.com 170 Systems, Inc. www.170systems.com
Sddc www.sddc.fr Actuate Corporation www.actuate.com
SIV AG www.siv.de Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. www.amd.com
SIVECO Romania S.A. www.siveco.ro Apple Inc. www.apple.com
Service & Systems Solutions www.northgate-is.com Applied Biosystems www.sqllims.com
Softek Storage Solutions www.softek.com Applimation, Inc. www.applimation.com
Softman S.A. www.softman.pl Arrow Electronics, Inc. www.arrow.com
Software Design & Management AG www.sdm.de Avnet www.avnet.com
Sogeti Espana www.sogeti.biz Avnet, Inc. www.ats.avnet.com
Sopra Group www.sopragroup.com BMC Software, Inc. www.bmc.com
Sungard Front Arena www.sungard.com/frontarena Cdw Logistics, Inc. www.cdw.com
Symatrix Limited www.symatrix.co.uk Compuware Corporation www.compuware.com
Eastern Software Corporation www.easternsoftware.com
TEAM GmbH www.team-pb.de
Enterprise Business Solutions, LLC www.theebsgroup.com
Teamsolve www.teamsolve.co.uk
Hyperion Solutions www.hyperion.com
Tech Data Midrange GmbH www.tdmidrange.de
i-flex solutions inc. www.iflexsolutions.com
Technologica www.tlogica.com
INRANGE Consulting Corporation www.inrangeconsulting.com
Technology Reply Srl www.reply.it
Insight www.insight.com
Temenos www.temenos.com
Juniper Networks, Inc. www.juniper.net
Teta S.A. www.teta.com.pl
MSS Technologies, Inc. www.msstech.com
TietoEnator Corporation www.tietoenator.com
Mythics www.mythics.com
TimeStamp - Sistema de Informação www.timestamp.pt
NEC Corporation of America www.nec.com
T-Systems International GmbH www.t-systems.com Network Appliance www.netapp.com
Oy Unisys Ab www.unisys.com Noetix Corporation www.noetix.com
Up to Data, Professional Services GMBH www.uptodata.de Novell, Inc. www.novell.com
Vector Software SRL www.vectorsoftware.ro Palladium Group, Inc. www.palladiumes.com
Version 1 Software www.version1.com Red Hat, Inc. www.redhat.com
Visions Consulting www.visions.co.za SCT Corporation www.sungardhe.com
Waymark Infotech (Pty) Ltd. www.waymarkit.com SYSTIME www.systime.net
Whitehouse Consultants Ltd. www.whitehouse-consult.com Tech Data Product Management, Inc. www.techdata.com
WM-data Danmark A/S www.wmdata.com Terillium Inc. www.terillium.com
xpedia fusion www.xpedia.co.za Tomax Corporation www.tomax.com
Latin America US-Analytics Solutions Group, LLC www.us-analytics.com
Acao Informatica Brasil Ltda. www.acao.com.br Waters Corporation www.waters.com

76 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE

JF08_CAPindex.indd 76 11/19/07 12:59:29 PM

 c o m m e n t IN THE FIELD
Succeeding with Failure
Oracle Data Guard helps enable disaster recovery systems—and much more.
ailure is something you prob-
ably don’t like thinking about
much. After all, you work hard to
keep your system running 24/7, and
you want to avoid the idea of it failing.
Even if you’re among those few who can
imagine the unimaginable and plan for
the contingency of a site failure, how do
you sell the concept of a contingency
plan for failure to management?
The difficulty with thinking about
system failure is getting away from the
failure concept and the cost of imple-
menting a disaster recovery system.
Instead, try to picture your ecstatic
managers when, despite the massive
system failure that no one saw coming,
business goes on without a hitch. With
that happy image as a goal, you can
begin moving toward a disaster recovery
system—and sell it upstairs.
Oracle Data Guard, which guards
your data at a secondary target site in
case something bad happens to your
production site, is vital to such a sce-
nario. If calamity strikes at your produc-
tion site—be it electrical blackout, flood,
forced evacuation, or anything else you
see on the news every day—you want
the comfort of knowing that a remote
target site is waiting for you to flip the
switch and save the day.
Getting data to such a target site
used to be a logistical nightmare. You
needed to pack up a truckful of tapes,
physically move them to the alternate
site, and restore data from the tapes to
the standby system. And that was when
database sizes were fairly modest. With
today’s multiterabyte databases, you’d
need a fleet of trucks for your tapes.
Oracle Data Guard works differently.
It runs continuously in the background,
constantly moving data from the pro-
duction site to the target site. The catch,
of course, is that you still need to set
JF08_KAPLAN.indd 77
up at least one target site to receive the
data—a site that might never be used.
The cost of disaster recovery systems
is not always easy to justify. However,
I’ve worked with several companies that
have implemented disaster recovery
systems that get clear value beyond the
“insurance” of the target system. This
additional value has come when upper
management mandated a disaster recov-
ery system to meet some compliance
requirement—and IT looked at this idle
second system and wondered, “Hmm,
what if we . . .”
One use for the target system seems
obvious: to help with backups. Some
people might regard a disaster recov-
ery system as a substitute for backup,
but this is a mistake. Your real backup
system should be oriented toward
rapidly restoring lost or damaged indi-
vidual files or blocks. A disaster recovery
system takes over entirely for a failed
production system.
Some companies that I’ve helped
have leveraged their target systems for
backup in this way: they back up from
the target system instead of the produc-
tion system. The traditional method
slows down the production system and
interferes with real-time processing.
Doing backups from the target system
frees the production system from that
drag on performance.
Other companies I’ve worked with
have another convenient use for their
target system. They run reporting off the
target—not the production—system.
Gathering all the statistics, forecasting,
and business intelligence that databases
can provide is vital for reporting in an
organization. But gathering this data can
interfere with the transaction-handling
duties of the production system, some-
times significantly.
By running reports from the target
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY A R I K A P L A N
system, you again free up the produc-
tion system for real-time transactions. In
fact, you might be able to do more with
the target system, simply because you
can perform time-consuming analysis
you never would have dared with your
production system.
You can also use a target system to
enable planned maintenance on the
production system. You can perform a
planned failover to the target system and
let that handle the everyday database
chores. Meanwhile, you can perform
any necessary maintenance on the actual
production system—adding or replacing
hardware, upgrading operating systems,
applying patches, or whatever is neces-
sary. When the maintenance is done,
you sync the two systems again and let
the production system resume its usual
duties. It’s a simple solution to an often-
vexing IT problem.
These kinds of uses for your target
system should give you some talking
points in selling disaster recovery to
reluctant managers. So should the fact
that Oracle Data Guard is free with Oracle
Database Enterprise Edition. That makes
disaster recovery the kind of insurance
plan that pays you dividends, even while
you hope you never have to collect. O
Ari Kaplan (ari_kaplan@ioug.org) is president of the
Independent Oracle Users Group (IOUG) and a senior
consultant at Datalink. He founded Expand Beyond
Corporation, a leader in mobile IT software. He has been
involved in Oracle technology since 1992.
READ more about Oracle Data Guard
oracle.com/database/active-data-guard.html
DOWNLOAD Oracle Database 11g
oracle.com/technology/software/products/database
DISCUSS Oracle Data Guard
forums.oracle.com/forums/forum.jspa?forumID=61
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 77
11/7/07 3:27:57 PM

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07004066_Oracle_House_Full_Ad.indd 1 9/18/07 2:43:15 PM

 c o m m e n t ALL SECURE
Beyond Data Protection
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search and Oracle Information Rights Management protect information.
ne of the most worrisome trends
in security is the rise in orga-
nized crime seeking to access
large datasources. Coupled with
the actual increased accessibility of large
data stores (either by design or miscal-
culation), it’s no longer some teenage kid
with a keystroke logger trying to grab the
credit card number of a grandma from
Des Moines; it’s a criminal organization
going after the credit card numbers of
everybody in Des Moines.
Consider a recent headline-
grabbing breach involving an online
jobs company. The company’s search
engine was designed to allow inquiries
like “Find everyone who has ‘fluent
in Attic Greek’ on their résumé.” This
broad-ranging search capability (a nice
feature) was abused to return detailed
personal information that the Bad Guys
used to mount a spearphishing attack
(for example, sending a very convinc-
ing e-mail that looks like it came from
someone you really know, to trick
you into clicking a link that installs
something bad on your desktop). The
company wasn’t “hacked” per se: their
useful tools were just used against them.
Outside the enterprise, we use search
engines for everything from finding out
where a cool new movie is playing in our
neighborhood to reading obscure ancient
texts online. These search engines are
both promiscuous and dumb: you ask
for X, you get links to X returned.
Inside the enterprise, search engines
need to be smart and choosy: they
must help people find what they need,
without allowing them to snoop for what
they aren’t supposed to have. Oracle
Secure Enterprise Search was built to be
a “better mousetrap”: an intelligent,
security-aware search engine. For
example, suppose I am an evil-minded
employee at Company X who wants
advance information on mergers and
acquisitions so I can trade on that infor-
mation (which is both illegal and unethi-
cal). A dumb enterprise search engine,
when asked to search for “M&A [mergers
and acquisitions] Plans,” would happily
cough up those corporate secrets.
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search,
being a smart search engine, realizes
that because I am not in the M&A
department, I should not even know
that “M&A plan for Company Y” exists
(because the name of even a poten-
tial acquisition in the title makes the
document too sensitive to know about).
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search is also
smart enough to realize that someone
else might need to know that such a
plan exists but would need to get spe-
cific access rights to the plan. In other
words, search results are contextual,
based on who I am, what I am asking
to see, and other information, including
the nature of the document itself. Oracle
Secure Enterprise Search is program-
mable and configurable, so the answer
to my “Where is?” or “Can I see?” ques-
tion might not be black-and-white but
gray—a really nice shade of gray that
meshes with your corporation’s privacy
and security policies.
As the world has become more col-
laborative, there is an increasing amount
of information access from remote and
mobile devices outside the enterprise (for
example, smartphones). These devices
are now so flexible and the distinc-
tion between “inside” and “outside” the
network so mutable that companies must
be able to extend their security policies
beyond the enterprise. Otherwise, an
enterprise could potentially lose its
intellectual-property shirt and the cor-
porate crown jewels. Oracle Information
Rights Management can help organiza-
tions “seal” data from secondary uses,
ORACLE MAGAZINE
BY M A RY A N N DAVIDSO N
even outside the enterprise. For example,
if I have access to the M&A plan, I
cannot necessarily forward it to someone
else, e-mail it outside the company,
or even print it and hand a copy to
someone else. Furthermore, the M&A
plan might be so sensitive that any access
to it is centrally logged and monitored.
Not all information in an enterprise
needs such rigorous controls, but some
really and truly does.
We are entering the next generation
of internet-based technology, where orga-
nizations harness new tools to get the
best of “What’s out there?” and “Where
is?” and “Who has?” and “Can I see?”
collaboration while preventing collabora-
tive criminals. It’s not just data protection
anymore; it’s information protection. O
Mary Ann Davidson is the chief security officer at
Oracle, responsible for secure development practices,
security evaluations, and assessments. She represents
Oracle on the board of directors of the Information
Technology Information Security Analysis Center
(IT-ISAC) and the Defense Science Board and is on the
editorial review board of SC Magazine.
LEARN more about
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search
oracle.com/database/secure-enterprise-search.html
Oracle Information Rights
Management
oracle.com/products/middleware/content-
management/information-rights-management.html
READ more Davidson
blogs.oracle.com/maryanndavidson
DISCUSS Security
forums.oracle.com/forums/forum.jspa?forumID=51
DOWNLOAD
Oracle Secure Enterprise Search
oracle.com/technology/products/oses
Oracle Information Rights
Management
oracle.com/technology/products/content-
management/irm
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 79
 c o m m e n t ANALYST’S CORNER
Moving the Business Forward
Oracle Fusion Middleware and Oracle On Demand pave the way for application upgrades.
racle Magazine spoke with
Rebecca Wettemann, vice pres-
ident of research at Nucleus
Research, about the latest
trends in application software.
Oracle Magazine: What new technologies
are driving customers to upgrade their
enterprise applications?
Wettemann: From a technology perspec-
tive, there are two primary drivers.
First is the rise of standard integration
technology. We’re starting to see compa-
nies adopt service-oriented architecture
[SOA] to make integration less costly,
less risky, and more repeatable.
Second, from an application per-
spective, Web 2.0 technologies are
causing users to demand simplicity.
If people can find anything they want
on the internet, why can’t they find
the information they need within the
enterprise? That’s the issue.
Oracle Magazine: What do these changes
mean for application software vendors?
Wettemann: Vendors are making applica-
tions more modular, so they can make
specific functions available to users
without forcing them to install an
entire software package. There is also
a greater focus on ease-of-use, such as
minimizing training requirements and
making interfaces more intuitive.
Oracle Magazine: How do on-demand
solutions change our perspective on
software upgrades?
Wettemann: On-demand customers
are typically on “rolling upgrade”
paths, which deliver incremental
advancements rather than massive
upgrades marked by entirely new ver-
sions. Part of the appeal of this type
of deployment is the ability to gain
new capabilities without disrupting
the business. The software vendor or
hosting provider minimizes the cost
and effort associated with support-
80 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
JF08_ANALYST.indd 80
ing and upgrading applications, and
determines what customers need. For
example, with Oracle On Demand,
Oracle manages software upgrades
based on its innate familiarity with
the product road map and based on
the collective knowledge it gains from
supporting many different implementa-
tions. Oracle supports many different
customer environments and can lever-
age that knowledge across the entire
customer base.
Oracle Magazine: How does Oracle
address integration as part of this
deployment and upgrade cycle?
Wettemann: Oracle has recognized that
smooth integration is key to achieving
visibility across the supply chain. We
see this more and more as the Oracle
Fusion Middleware strategy evolves.
Part of this strategy is to help Oracle
customers drive more value from their
existing applications.
In some cases, Oracle provides access
to a broader set of users. In other cases,
it provides access to people outside
the organization by streamlining col-
laboration and communication. As part
of the Oracle Application Integration
Architecture, Oracle offers not just
integration tools but guidance and best
practices for integrating applications.
Oracle Magazine: How are companies
evaluating their Oracle Applications
upgrade choices?
Wettemann: Smart CIOs want to know
which upgrade paths deliver the
most value. Many of them will adopt
[Oracle] Fusion at some point, but
they are studying the product road
map to find the least risky and disrup-
tive path to follow.
Part of this involves deciding
whether they want to manage these
applications internally or have some of
them managed externally in an Oracle
BY DAVI D BAUM
On Demand environment. The upside
for them is that they have a lot of flex-
ibility. They can decide what they want
to keep in-house and what they want
to outsource.
Oracle Magazine: What finally motivates
CIOs to upgrade, extend, or outsource
their applications?
Wettemann: One big motivator is the
desire to simplify IT. Another one is
the desire to acquire standardized
integration technology like SOA. But
the biggest motivator is what users are
saying: they want the enterprise appli-
cation environment to be intuitive, not
disruptive or complicated.
The biggest challenge for today’s
CIOs is to make their applications easy
to access and as intuitive as possible.
The best CIOs have stopped talking
about IT and have started talking
about what they can do to develop
the business. O
David Baum (david@dbaumcomm.com) is a
freelance business writer who is based in Santa
Barbara, California.
Nucleus Research (www.nucleusresearch.com)
provides research and advisory services, including
financial modeling tools, deployment assessments,
and case studies.
READ more about
Oracle Fusion Applications
oracle.com/applications/fusion.html
Oracle Application
Integration Architecture
oracle.com/applications/oracle-application-
integration-architecture.html
Oracle On Demand
oracle.com/ondemand
LISTEN to Oracle Fusion AppCasts
oracle.com/applications/podcast-fusion.html
11/6/07 2:33:24 PM
 Oracle
Database 11g
Online upgrades and patching

Advanced partitioning and compression

Record and replay real workloads

Delegate jobs to a standby database

Query a database as it was a week ago

The Innovation Continues

oracle.com/database
or call 1.800.ORACLE.1

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