Your Oracle wish list

At one time or another, most of you have probably checked out the Ask Tom Web site. Like our own Ask the Expert feature, Tom Kyte’s Ask Tom site is a go-to when you’re stumped by an Oracle problem, like resolving an error or writing a complex SQL query. All the old questions are archived, and frequently, answers continue to be updated years after the questions were originally asked.

For example, in September 2005, an Ask Tom user, Alex, asked Tom the following:

I was wondering if there are some things you don’t like about Oracle? I personally wish more things came set up out of the box such as autotrace, intermedia text, scott schema etc. Any thoughts on this?

Tom named some gripes (he called for better error messages, for instance) and then wrote, “I’ll publish this to see what others add.”

Many, many Oracle users have added to the list since then. Some of the problems have already been resolved — one of the first to comment requested better cross-platform data file compatibility. 10gR2 now allows cross-platform full database transports with the same endianness.

The most recent complaint was added just a few days ago. Tim Kessler requested a polling option in SQL*Plus to continually execute a SQL statement for a given interval for monitoring functions.

What about you? What’s on your Oracle wish list? What bug slows you down? What one feature would make your life as an Oracle DBA easier?

-Elisa, Assistant Editor

Oracle’s open source aspirations

Oracle made some open source headlines this week at the EclipseCon Eclipse Foundation conference, announcing that it had open sourced Oracle TopLink, the database giant’s Java persistence framework. Oracle also announced that it had risen to the level of board member of Eclipse – an open source community formed to create and innovate an open source development platform – and said they’re also proposing that TopLink make up the foundation of a new project aimed at providing a comprehensive, open source persistence platform.  

Now I’m no expert on open source projects. In fact, I’m not much of an expert on anything, save for Star Trek and Ring Dings. But I think it’s clear that there is some significance here — especially if you think about what Oracle’s ongoing support for an open source development framework could one day mean for Microsoft’s .Net platform.  

Oracle seems to have endless resources at its fingertips.  If the company continues to support Eclipse, and if open source in general continues to grow its appeal to enterprises, it’s not hard to imagine Eclipse one day coming up with a viable alternative to .Net. At the very least they should at least be able to come up with something that’s steals at least some of that market share from Redmond.

Could an open source development project steal customers from Microsoft? Is Oracle’s growing support of open source going to make a difference in the long run? Let’s hear what you think.

 – Mark Brunelli, News Editor

Who’s next?

If you’re keeping track, the purchase of Hyperion is the 24th acquisition by Oracle in the company’s three-year buying binge.

Rumors and predictions of a BI-related acquisition by Oracle have been rampant for months but the name most often mentioned was Cognos. The popular Oracle BI blogger Mark Rittman agreed that the Hyperion deal was unexpected:

Whilst many of us were caught by surprise by the move (including most people within Oracle, I suspect) the business logic does in fact look pretty compelling, and I think this is a hugely positive move by Oracle.

The acquisition is also likely to put other BI vendors at risk and may set off a domino effect on the market as other large vendors seek to compete, according to Ray Wang at Forrester Research:

IBM may buy Cognos, HP might end up buying Business Objects or Business Objects may buy another competitor. There will be a lot of pressure on these vendors to react to this acquisition.

What will Oracle’s arch-rival SAP do? Many observers think that the Hyperion purchase is a way for Oracle to get access to CFOs, many of which use SAP BI software. With the addition of Hyperion’s 1,900-person sales force — not to mention its 12,000 customers worldwide — you would think that SAP might be a little worried. However, if you believe comments from spokesperson Matt Carrington, SAP doesn’t have a care in the world:

Oracle’s strategy, limited by its inability to grow on its own, has resorted to attempting to acquire customers. This latest acquisition only further muddies Oracle’s already cluttered application landscape.

SAP has made the “Project Confusion” argument before, which certainly has it merits, but Oracle has seemingly no problem pressing forward with its strategy. Rittman notes:

What this is really about is Oracle vs. SAP — all Oracle does now, strategically, is framed in it’s desire to be the number one enterprise software vendor, which means being the number one ERP vendor, as all else flows from that. Oracle now is an ERP vendor with a nice sideline in databases and development tools, not the other way around, and they’ll happily live with a more heterogeneous tools and technology environment if it means they can get closer to that goal.

A SearchOracle.com member who wrote me yesterday insinuates that it’s all just an ego trip for Larry Ellison: “build me an empire seems to be the present game.”

Will the Oracle-Hyperion deal hurt SAP?

The Web is abuzz with different takes on Oracle’s plan to acquire Santa Clara, Calif.-based business intelligence (BI) software provider Hyperion Solutions Corp. for $3.3 billion. But the two lines of thought on the topic that intrigue me the most have to do with (1) Oracle’s desire to get closer to the chief financial officers (CFOs) of some very large firms and (2) Oracle’s desire to steal customers away from its chief rival, enterprise resource planning (ERP) giant SAP AG.
 
In a conference call this morning, Oracle president Charles Phillips said the deal for Hyperion, which among other things makes BI software that aggregates financial data into handy dashboards, will make Oracle the leader in the corporate performance management (CPM) market and prop up its growing BI business. He also said the Hyperion deal will give Oracle critical analytical applications including a new enterprise planning system, a powerful financial consolidation product, a strong OLAP engine and a large field sales organization.
 
According to blogger Larry Dignan, the biggest takeaway from today’s Oracle-Hyperion conference call relates to Hyperion’s 1,900 strong sales force. Hyperion serves the financial analytics space, therefore that sales organization has a lot of experience dealing directly with CFOs. And CFOs ultimately make the buying decisions for their companies. During the call, Phillips indicated that Oracle may be able to build on that relationship and upsell those CFOs on other Oracle applications.
 
What’s more, many of those CFOs work for companies that use SAP products. Building a good relationship with them — and then upselling them on Oracle’s SAP alternatives — could eventually Oracle chip away at SAP’s customer base. (Incidentally, shares of SAP fell considerably today on word of the  Oracle-Hyperion deal, according to published reports.)
 
Additionally, says Forrester Research analyst Ray Wang, the acquisiton could set off a string of acquisitions in the BI space as larger vendors like IBM, SAP and HP seek to compete with Oracle’s new BI prowess. That means specialty BI vendors like Cognos and Business Objects need to watch their backs.
 
It remains to be seen whether Oracle’s plan will be successful. Will they find that back door to SAP’s installed customer base? Will SAP react by acquiring a BI vendor of its own? How happy will these CFO’s be dealing with Oracle now instead of Hyperion. These are all things we at SearchOracle.com will be keeping an eye on — and things we want to hear your opinion about. So post your comments here. And stay tuned for a news analysis piece on what the Oracle-Hyperion deal means for Oracle’s Project Fusion initiative. Also, be sure to take our Oracle-Hyperion reader reaction survey. We’ll likely highlight the survey results in upcoming Oracle-Hyperion coverage.

– Mark Brunelli, News Editor

Does anybody really like SQL? Part 2

Following up on a post from last week, our resident SQL guru Rudy Limeback provides some more thoughts on the matter of what’s so bad (or so good) about SQL:

Yes, I ♥ SQL, primarily because knowledge of this ubiquitous language allows me to be immediately productive in working with so many different database systems.

Imagine if each time you wanted to obtain information from a different database system, you had to learn a completely different language.

Instead, all that is necessary is to learn the small, inconsequential differences between one database system’s implementation of SQL and the next.

MySQL  
T-SQL  
UDB SQL  
PostgreSQL  
PL/SQL

This is due in no small part to the effort of many people and vendors to define the SQL standard. That so few database systems faithfully support all aspects of the standard is no serious knock against the advantages of having a standard language.

Further, SQL is drop dead simple. There are only a few basic clauses:

SELECT

FROM

WHERE

GROUP BY

HAVING

ORDER BY

As well, you’ll need some simple concepts like INNER and OUTER JOINs, UNIONs, and subqueries. With these basic tools, you can solve even the most
complex data retrieval problems.

That said, it’s a lot like chess. You can learn the basic moves in half an hour, but you need to invest the necessary time to improve your skills. Practice, practice, practice.

It looks like we’re making some progress toward debunking the “SQL sucks” myth!

-Elisa Gabbert

Is DST the next Y2K? For Oracle shops, maybe it is…

If you read the mainstream media, the Daylight Savings Time bug will lead to the apocalypse that Y2K never was.

Hype, obviously, but nevertheless DST is a serious problem that all Oracle shops need to address. Besides the operating system problems, architect Chris Foote points out what the DST bug affects in Oracle:

•  JVM
• Time zone files
• Grid Control agents
• E-Business Suite
• Application Server

Unfortunately, the quantity of rants in the blogosphere indicates that Oracle’s response to the DST problem has been muddled at best. For example, over at the Yet Another Oracle DBA blog, Herod writes:

Is it just me, or is Oracle’s effort towards the DST seem to be a convoluted mess of notes, readme’s, more notes and superseding items. Download this, this, this, this, and this, and possibly this but only if you have this and this. 

Sounds like fun, especially if you have dozens or hundreds of systems to patch, like this blogger, who writes:

As someone who was forced to write DST checking scripts for an Enterprise of 1500+ Oracle databases, let me just say how utterly weak it is that Oracle has identified a DST 2007 issues with their database and provided barely any tools to help sniff around for it. What have they provided? A script to tell you if you have affected rows… A couple of other rag tag scripts here and there if you dig hard enough…. Pathetic.

If you’re just tackling the problem now, you’re up the proverbial creek (Mike R. has a good list of Metalink resources to get you started). But for those who have already completed the task, how did it go?  Is it a non-issue or an emergency? Any tips or tools that are essential?

Cheers, Tim

Does anybody really like SQL?

The other day I stumbled across a blog post titled “In defense of SQL” — in this post, blogger Kenneth Downs asks, “So am I the only one who likes SQL?”

Is he? Apparently SQL has a bad rap among development languages — people tolerate it because they figure they have to, but they think it, well, sucks. Downs, however, lists a number of things to enjoy about SQL. For instance, it can be easily generated with other languages, and it’s easy to read and write.

I asked a couple of our site experts how they feel about the structured query language. Like Downs, Brian Peasland, DBA and expert in database design as well as backup and recovery, also has a soft spot in his heart for SQL:

I have always been a fan of SQL. When I was studying database theory, I was taught that there are three main operations in any database query: 1) selection, 2) projection and 3) joins. Think of a table as a grid with each record as a row in the grid and each attribute as a column in the grid. A “selection” is a vertical slicing of the grid. You simply indicate which columns you want. Not surprisingly, the selection is the entire purpose behind the SELECT clause of a typical SQL statement. A “projection” is a horizontal slicing of that grid. The projection defines which records you returned out of all possible records in the table. The projection is defined in the WHERE clause of the SQL statement. Many who know SQL already know that a “join” operation is taking more than one table and stitching them together. The FROM clause defines the join operation … or the table(s) to find the data. So at its basic level, a simple SQL statement looks like the following:

SELECT the_columns_you_want_to_see
FROM the_tables_that_contain_the_data
WHERE some_conditions_are_true;

Once you know the basic tenet above, reading and writing SQL statements becomes much easier. The FROM clause tells you where to pull the data *from* and the WHERE clause tells you which rows to pull out of your data source. Once you know the rows of data to be returned, we only show what the user SELECTed. Once I learned the basics of SQL and started thinking of SQL similar to the above, it really made things easy for me. And it just makes sense. I agree that one can get some convoluted SQL statements which do require some analysis before truly understanding what is going on, but most SQL statements are not that complicated.

One other thing that I think is great with SQL is its standardization. I have worked in Oracle for a very long time. When I first started working with SQL Server, I did not have to learn an entirely new query language. This was huge! Granted, not all SQL statements work in both systems, but many do. Some things are different, but I just had to learn a few things to easily rewrite my query. For instance, the substring function in Oracle is SUBSTR, while in SQL Server, it is SUBSTRING. In Oracle, you use INSTR, but the similar function in SQL Server is CHARINDEX. So a few non-standardized functions are different. But for the most part, my SQL queries work well in both.

I am well aware of the ANSI SQL standards and that each RDBMS vendor does not implement all of the standards, so not all SQL statements work the same in every database. But the point is that even if the SQL statement works in SQL Server but not in Oracle, I do not have to redo everything to get that SQL statement to work in Oracle. I just have to tweak it a little to get the statement to execute.

Finally, most of the people that I have worked with that do not like SQL are those who did not really get a chance to learn it. They were taught the simplest of SQL statements and then let loose to code their application. As their application became more complex, coding a SQL statement became tougher, and more frustrating. But those I have seen take a 1-week course on SQL for their RDBMS of choice do not have this same attitude. I think this speaks volumes about why some hate SQL and others like it.

All you other DBAs and developers out there: what do you think? Is SQL not so bad or does it deserve its nasty reputation?

(Stay tuned for remarks from SQL guru Rudy Limeback on this topic.)

-Elisa

Oracle Fusion: Is your company ready?

The first round of Oracle Fusion applications will enter the market in 2008. Is your company ready?

According to Oracle executives, industry analysts and several published reports and blogs, there are numerous things to consider as companies decide whether or not to upgrade to Fusion — Oracle’s plan to overhaul all of its existing and newly acquired applications to run on Oracle Fusion Middleware.

Reasons to upgrade

If your firm is committed to services oriented architecture (SOA), then experts say Oracle Fusion is the way to go. In fact that’s the main goal of the redesign — to give Oracle customers a Java based, modular platform upon which to build an SOA.

Experts say another benefit of Fusion is that companies will be getting the “best of the best” features and functionality that Oracle has acquired in recent years. That means the best of PeopleSoft, Siebel, JD Edwards and about 20 other acquired companies.

Another reason to be keen on Fusion is that the host of newly designed applications will incorporate business intelligence and other analytical software giving users a better understanding of their respective businesses.

Reasons to wait

On the other hand, as with most new software releases, many companies will opt to hold off on Fusion while the early adopters iron out the kinks.

Also, Oracle has promised unlimited support for all of its acquired applications regardless of whether or not people upgrade to Fusion. Although some doubt that Oracle can keep innovating these standalone apps forever, Oracle says it will be no problem. If your company only really needs one of these apps, then maybe Fusion isn’t worth it to you.

Finally, those in the know point out that Oracle Fusion experts will be few and far between and expensive to employ. It may also be costly to train existing employees on how to effectively manage and make use of Fusion applications.

What say you?

Is your company steadfast in it’s march toward Fusion, or does it plan to play a game of wait-and-see? I’d like to hear your opinions on this topic for a feature story I’m writing. Tell me about your Fusion plans and concerns and I’ll talk to some experts to get a response. And remember, ready or not, Fusion is coming.

– Mark Brunelli, News Editor

BI 2.0

To paraphrase the Chinese aphorism, “Be careful what you mock, it just might come true.”

A few weeks ago, I declined to invent a “soon-to-be-hackneyed phrase like BI 2.0.”  How clever! Well, it seems that multiple pundits and analysts had already beaten me to it. Here is a sampling:

• BI 2.0: Pervasive, intelligent and timely
• BI 2.0: The next generation
• Business intelligence 2.0 and enterprise decision management
• In search of insight
• Business intelligence 2.0: Simpler, more accessible, inevitable
• Gartner: It’s business intelligence 2.0 time

So what is BI 2.0 anyway? Here’s one of several definitions:

The current [BI] offerings are based on a personal, desktop-based metaphor of a one-to-one relationship between an analyst and retrospective view of information with a hoped-for direct link to decisive action, but such instances are rare. BI 2.0 is positioned to be proactive, real-time, operational and integrated with business processes that can extend beyond the firewall as easily as providing simple, personal analytical tools on an as needed basis with a minimal footprint and cost.

As with all trendy technologies, the goals of BI 2.0 are laudable but  easier said than done (much easier!). Nonetheless, “proactive, real-time, operational and integrated” sounds like music to the ears of many a user, so this buzzword might actually have some legs.  I’ll try to refrain from mocking it and give it a chance… for now.

Cheers, Tim 2.0

Is Oracle afraid of Google?

Oracle and other major software vendors like SAP, IBM and Microsoft are either making or planning to make a big deal about Web 2.0. And, according to one prominent industry analyst, a primary motivation for this may be their desire to stave off an impending attack from search engine giant Google.

Google, says Jim Murphy, an analyst with Boston, Mass.-based AMR Research, has started putting together a suite of collaborative enterprise applications. And while no one knows exactly what the suite will look like, Murphy says it’s a safe bet that it will incorporate so called Web 2.0 technologies like blogs, wikis, and RSS feeds.

“Google is poised to introduce an alternative to the traditional way of getting at enterprise information,” Murphy said. “They’ve been demonstrating this capability on the external consumer Web for some time and, if you’re talking about Web 2.0 types of trends, [some] of the expectations really come from the Google experience.”

Oracle this week introduced its new WebCenter Suite, a set of tools that adds an interaction layer to Oracle applications, giving users the ability to collaborate via blogs, wikis and RSS feeds. Oracle says WebCenter will serve as the foundation of the user interface to Oracle’s Fusion Applications when they debut beginning in 2008.

And while providing insight into the user interface is a significant step forward on the road to Fusion, says Murphy, it’s not Oracle’s only motivation.

“They’re all trying to fend off Google,” he said.

What do you think? Does Oracle have something to fear from Google? What about IBM and SAP, or Microsoft for that matter?

– Mark