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Nov 19 2007   12:23PM GMT

OpenWorld wrap-up



Posted by: Tim DiChiara
Oracle database administration, Managing an Oracle shop, Oracle applications

The dust has settled and the blogosphere is taking stock of the OpenWorld show in San Francisco last week. Opinions run the gamut, from:

Pure magic: DBA Chen Shapira writes, “I spend most of my days in a mundane DBA world . . . And then, for one magical week, Oracle becomes exciting again. You meet people who are excited about what they do with Oracle. . . . In the Oracle Magic Kingdom, everything works. All the new features have no bugs, all patches install easily according to metalink instructions, Oracle support listens to your problems and has the right answers, you have sufficient maintenance windows to perform all your tasks, and performance issues are interesting and yet can be resolved within 45 minutes. Magic.”

to…

A firehose: Blogger Ontario Emporer writes, “Oracle doesn’t provide a clear agenda for anybody, which is why I refer to Oracle OpenWorld as a firehose. Even with my limited technological background and my laser interest in a particular portion of Oracle’s product line, I had to make some difficult session attend/non-attend decisions, especially in the first days of the conference. As a result, I missed the entire Unconference; there was too much Conference stuff going on. Add to this all of the private meetings, and it’s impossible to have a clear agenda.”

If you missed the information overload, don’t fret: Oracle’s OpenWorld page has many webcasts to imbibe. (And there were even Stevie Nicks fans there filming her performance, if you’re interested…)

So, what did you think about the show (the actual conference, that is)? Is it time for Oracle to split this monstrosity up into smaller, more topic-specific events? Or is the deluge of geeks and PowerPoints just what makes it great? Let’s hear your thoughts!

Cheers, Tim

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Ontario Emperor  |   Nov 19 2007   1:03PM GMT

I doubt that Oracle itself would want to split up the conference, since it obviously wants to sell new capabilities to its existing customers, and would therefore prefer to get everybody in a single location. And frankly, even a “database-only” conference could be potentially overwhelming, so I don’t know that we’d gain that much by splitting things up into smaller chunks.


 

mashford  |   Nov 19 2007   3:11PM GMT

OpenWorld was like drinking from a fire hose …
-I would prefer a more focused agenda.
-With sessions being spread out across the city, it was hard to bounce into another session when you had made the wrong choice (the Hilton was a long walk and the shuttles took to much time)
-It was dominated by keynotes that seemed more executive overviews than specific views of technology and the future … it was a same because some of the speaker were the sage of IT
-One had to choose between technical session and vendor information session that overlapped if you wanted to take advantage of the exhibition hall and its wealth of vendors
-I enjoyed talking with Oracle people (actual product developer) face-to-face and this I feel justified the price of admission
-40 some thousand attendees is too big to be efficient and meaningful
–Smaller would be better
-San Francisco is a great city, but traffic and crime make it less than advantageous for the number of attendees … tough to bring a guest or family and vouch for their safety
–I would prefer it moved to a smaller suburb like maybe Concord or Walnut Creek


 

Grant  |   Nov 19 2007   3:17PM GMT

OpenWorld was fantastic. There is more to see and do than time allows, but I prefer that to being bored. I’m fortunate to have a strong technical and functional background. With my background there were plenty of session choices. I do wish I had spent more time at the demo grounds.

Larry Ellison was terrible on Wednesday afternoon. He was not well prepared for the keynote address. He spoke extemporaneously about prepared slides, repeating certain points several times. By not being prepared, I thought he was arrogant. He was arrogant to not give a quality performance at HIS annual premier event. The mass exodus when Larry stepped off the stage (for the demo) spoke volumes to his performance.

Michael Dell was fantastic, I might even buy some of the stock.

Thanks.


 

Dennis J  |   Nov 21 2007   5:07PM GMT

Having been to 4 or 5 OpenWorld conferences I kind of long for the days when PeopleSoft had it’s own conference and OpenWorld was not so gigantic. In a lot of ways, 2007 seemed a lot like 2006. I’m a PeopleSoft Admin/Oracle DBA and there were so many areas I wanted to get to but couldn’t. It was a long week (busy) but a short week at the same time (was over very quickly). A couple of gripes on the logistics: lunch in the main tent was limited to 1 bottle of water per person and no choice of having a soda there. What’s up with that? The big event was nice but I’d rather see a little less flash and reduced registration costs. Maybe even lower my software license fees…


 

Debbie B  |   Nov 26 2007   1:43PM GMT

Since our company won’t foot the bill for travel from the East Coast to the West Coast, I have long felt that there should be an OpenWorld East Coast. I can talk my management into NY, Philly, or even DC but not much further. Though Orlando might be good if it happened during a vacation week like Easter break! I could take the family to Disney World and do Open World too!

An OpenWorld East Coast would reduce the number of people attending the West Coast version plus open it to a whole bunch of people who can’t make the trip to California.