My ODTUG webinar cup runneth over

You’d think they’d know better, wouldn’t you?

Over the next three weeks I will be participating in two webinars for ODTUG.  Whether this strikes joy, terror, or simply gives you a bad case of avoir le cafard I cannot say.  

I will share with you that actually writing the content for these sessions has been a bit of an exercise in pain but I am now all done and if I do say so myself, what I have is not half bad.

All kidding aside, I am very excited about this opportunity to share some of what I know and the subjects are two that are near and dear to my Oracle EPM heart.

The Most Awesome Planning Calculation Manager Hack the World Has Ever Seen

The most awesome? World-beating? That's mighty big talk for a webinar. Is this presentation hyperbole or fact? It's fact--cold, hard, “Just the facts, ma'am,” fact. This webinar deserves those adjectives because it will demonstrate the incredibly clever Planning Calculation Manager hack that Christian Musci and his team invented. It answers the problem the common Planning Focused Aggregation technique could never resolve--Focused Aggregations based on Planning form row and column selections. Did I mention it is a hack? And that it is awesome because it solves a problem that had no solution? And that the hackiness and the awesomeness combine and become a must-see webinar? Maybe I just did.

Join me as I explain the genesis of my understanding of the Focused Aggregation technique, a step-by-step illustration of how it works, its superiority to generic aggregations, the seemingly insolvable problem of Planning not passing row and column selections to Calculation Manager, and finally the beyond-awesome hack that solves this problem. It is an awesome hack; I may have mentioned that previously.  Maybe.

With this last bit of the Focused Aggregation puzzle, applications that simply couldn't work, or could only work in a crippled manner through administrative aggregations that robbed Planning of its real-time nature, now quite simply do work. Yes, it's that good and it's easy. All will be revealed in a step-by-step process that will allow you to make your "too big" Planning application "just right.”

Yes, I have covered this subject in this blog and (somewhat) at conferences but this is the first time where I present on the theory behind the technique, show comparisons in performance against other code techniques, and then show off a totally awesome hack that makes it all worthwhile all at once.  This is a deep, deep, deep dive into the technique.  If you are not using this technique, or not using the latest version of it, you really should block off the hour to hear about how this works.

The when and the where

25 February 2014, 2 to 3 pm, Eastern

Sign up right here.

Getting (even more) Serious about Data Quality and Governance

A few things I must mention right off:

1. This is a webinar panel, not a traditional presentation like the above one on Focused Aggregations in Calculation Manager.
2. I am but 1/3 of the team.  Ron Moore and Joe Caserta are the heavy hitters.  Think of me as the comic relief.

Nothing is more important than data quality. But if the steps to insure high data quality aren’t fast and easy people won’t do them – or at least they won’t do enough of them. It was always a difficult job and it consumes a lot of resources even with traditional data sources such as ERP that are relatively well behaved. Now analytics is spreading to more users and to data that’s far less well behaved. What should we be doing and how can we make it as fast and easy as possible?

In this webinar we will put those questions to our panelists and we will invite your opinions and questions. Some of our topics will include:

• Is data quality really a problem? Where and how much?
• Who has responsibility for data quality?
• What techniques can we apply at the data source?
• What techniques can we apply within Essbase and Planning?
• Can we adopt some “simple stupid rules” for DQ?
• What is the role of documentation?
• What documentation is effective and worth the effort?

The when and the where

11 March 2014, 3 to 4 pm, Eastern.

Sign up right here.

That’s all for now

The topics are interesting, the content is good, and as always ODTUG provides all of this to you for free, nothing, zero, zilch, etc.  How can’t you win?

Join us, won’t you?

Two Planning updates this week

Introduction

Two exciting (okay, I may be stretching the meaning of the word “exciting”) bits of Planning news this week.

Updated Planning security queries

I have expanded and modified part two and three of my Planning security query series.  Would you believe that I conceived of the modifications whilst shoveling gravel to fill in potholes?  No, this was not part of my prison-release program (note to everyone – that’s a joke, I have never been arrested, let alone convicted of anything, except being an Essbase/Dodeca/ODI/SQL geek and I am judge, jury, and executioner on that sentence), but instead what my bored mind was doing as I was trying to see if my shoulder really would separate if I picked up enough gravel with a shovel.  Note – so far, no replacement shoulder, so that gym time has paid off.  

In any case, as I was putting in my geeks-who-do-yardwork-for-other-people time, I had nothing much to actually think about (some call it thinking) and I started naturally (?) thinking about what the queries I had written for this series.  And then I realized – hey, I can improve these quite a bit by changing some of the CTEs and making the queries that much better.  And so I have.  Go back and take a look – I hope you’ll agree that the output is now more useful.

Changed time for Too Big for Kscope13 – Part 2 of Six Advanced Planning Topics

Continuing the theme of me not thinking (something I appear to be quite good at), this webinar was originally scheduled for tomorrow, 13 August 2013 at 12 noon Eastern – it is now scheduled for Wednesday, 14 August 2013 at 12 noon Eastern.  In other words, it is being held a day later.  And that’s my fault.  Oops.

I am travelling to my client (yes, I work and for some reason clients pay me for it) on Tuesday.  I completely forgot about this altered travel pattern (my usual on site schedule is Monday through Thursday but this was a client-requested exception) when I agreed to the webinar date.  However, I did oh-so-cleverly manage to remember this in the middle of a haircut last week.  What do you think about during a haircut?  Not much, right?  Well, in case you ever have the same brainwave, do not jump up in the middle of a haircut with an, “Oh, crap!” exclamation or you will receive the same, “WTH is your problem, Cameron?” response.  Oops again.

Hopefully you were there for Part 1 where Jessica and I covered general Planning implementation good practices, inherited security, and bringing metaread filters to Essbase datasources in Planining.

Part 2 should be just as interesting as it will cover:

• Melding and Managing Forms, Task Lists, and Process Management
• Making Planning Aggregations Better With Focused Aggregations
• Automated LCM Migrations

I hope you can all make it to the slightly changed time and sorry to all for any inconvenience.

What’s next and a question

There’s one more Planning security query on offer – the creation of ASO (well, it could be for BSO but why?) reporting cube filters.   Hopefully that will be out in the next few weeks.

And I have a question for you, gentle reader, about a potential Kscope14 session.  Would you be interested in a session that goes under the covers of EPM and pulls out all kinds of information?  By that I mean I would include Planning but I’d also go after Shared Services, BI+ (Financial Reports), Calculation Manager, and EPMA.  The session would be a series of use cases, code examples (with the bits that were a total PIT-you-know-what highlighted), and sample output.  Is this something the ODTUG world would be interested in?  Let me know care of this blog.

A very different kind of ODTUG webinar

Marketing introduction

The ODTUG virtual panel series goes from strength to strength. (What, marketing? You promised me a rose garden a marketing-free blog.   Yes, but this isn't marketing for me, so relax. My self-marketing ineptitude continues apace.)

 

Stuff you actually care about goes right here

What do I mean? None other than Chet Justice, aka ORACLENERD is moderating an ODTUG virtual panel in the form of a webinar.

Wait, ODUTG , virtual panels, ORACLENERD? Is Essbase involved somehow?   No.   Cameron, is it time to get some sleep? Why yes it is, but before I hit the hay, let me pull it all together:

1. ODTUG is having another one of their successful-beyond-our-dreams virtual panels
2. Chet is the moderator
3. The speakers are: Cary Millsap, Dominic Delmolino, and Kris Rice.
4. The webinar's subject is "Software Development in the Oracle Eco-System". Essbase is absent, but so what?
5. The time and date are Thursday, May 30, 2013 3:00 PM - 4:30 PM EDST

See here: https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/759087318

Where's the beef?

Okay, that's all very interesting but why should a bunch of (mostly, or maybe exclusively if you're reading this blog) EPM people attend a webinar on something that is pretty obviously not EPM-related?

1. Because these guys are good.   I heard Cary speak last year at the Kscope12 keynote.   Did you?   He was fantastic.   Inspirational even.   I don't know the other speakers (blush, my EPM-centricity shows yet again) but I have a sneaking suspicion they are really, really, really, insightful speakers.
2. They are covering a subject (development, its frustrations and triumphs, and how to have more of the latter than the former) that all of us, each and every one, do to some extent or another.   Isn't the point of ODTUG to find learn from others and occasionally share something with them?   That's pretty much why I'm involved.   Here is your chance to do that with some Really Big Names in the Oracle world.
3. It's free.   Think about how much you would pay to get trained by these guys.   Yeah, I couldn't afford it either.

What a nice way to end an undoubtedly hectic week.

I guess that's it, and it ought to be enough. I'm signed up. Are you?

For more gen

If you want to get a feel for them, check out their blogs.

Chet: http://www.oraclenerd.com/

Cary: http://www.oraclemusings.com/

Dominic: http://www.oraclemusings.com/

Kris: http://krisrice.blogspot.com/

There is some really good stuff there -- I love it (not that I ever do it myself) when geeks muse about why they do something as opposed to how although of course the how is important too.   I think this webinar/panel will be in that vein and I am really looking forward to it.

Be seeing (listening to because remember, this is a panel and you can participate?) you on 3 pm EDST, 30 May 2013. 

Will the 13th be a lucky day

Nope, I am not becoming superstitious

Oh, I never walk on a crack, lest I crack my mother’s back (you have to see the pavement heaving in my town – I blame all those lovely trees), nor do I walk under ladders (having fallen off a tall one – yeah, that explains a lot, doesn’t it? – I know what is up will eventually come down, maybe on my head), and I never throw my hat on a hotel bed (when I am wearing one of my boonies, I am more likely to be near a sleeping pad and bag), so no, I am not becoming superstitious in my old age.  And 13 December is not Friday the 13th,  so really, what could possibly go wrong?  Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, Or what's a heaven for?

I am hoping for luck, however, because it will be required

Why?  Because I (I should say we, as in ODTUG) am going to participate in something new, innovative, quite possibly very rewarding, and also very possibly a bit of a stress-inducer.  What oh what oh what am I talking about?  Nothing other than the first ever ODTUG virtual experts panel.

Panel beating

I have participated in, and moderated a few Kscope panels (I leave it up to the reader to decide if yr. obdnt. srvnt. deserved to be up front – I have to say I sometimes wonder) and I know how much fun and yet informative they can be.  From a preparation perspective, all one needs to do is bring knowledge and experience, and a healthy desire to chime in – the rest is magic.  And from an audience perspective panels are an opportunity to get some (hopefully) knowledgeable opinion on technical matters from a variety of perspectives and experience.  Did I mention that moderating these things is like trying to herd autistic cats?  Fun all around.  

Kscope (like Christmas) comes but once a year, but the need and desire for panels happens the other 51 weeks.  What to do?  Enter a brainstorming IM session between John Booth and myself.  We were kicking around the idea of doing something like the show these two morons/idiots/geniuses/very funny guys do for the automotive world, but for EPM world when one of us (I know not which, but I suspect it was John) said, “Why can’t we do a panel?”  And thus the ODTUG virtual experts panel was born.  (If you follow the link, replace Chemical X with very strong coffee.)

Not just EPM

One thing to note – as John and I talked about this idea, we realized that to limit this just to EPM was silly.  You will note that two out of the four panelists are NOT from the EPM world at all, but the larger data integration and business intelligence communities.  I am particularly excited about this (and excited that we were able to go outside of the US and get people many, many, many hours ahead of the States to participate) because Oracle’s tools are crossing disciplines.  We chose Oracle Data Integrator because it is an exemplar of a tool that does just that.  Given ODI’s read-from-anywhere, write-to-anything nature, looking at ODI from an EPM perspective simply didn’t make sense.  And so we are not.

The vision

The way this is going to work is:

1. ODTUG is going to scour the world for the best practitioners in a given field.  In our first go round, focusing on ODI, we have Matthias Heilos, Gurcan Orhan, Mark Rittman, and (somehow) yr. obdnt. srvnt, up on the panel.
2. You, dear audience, will connect to ODTUG’s GoToWebinar session and listen to John kick off the panel.
3. You will listen to our witty yet wise banter and repartee and this dialog will spur ODI questions.
4. You will send questions to the ODTUG GoToWebinar administrator via G2W’s (I am not typing that out any more) chat feature.
5. The ODTUG G2W (hi, Lori Lorusso) admin will collate the questions and pass them to John and John will ask the panel the question.  Btw, this approach is because moderating a panel and running a webinar is akin to rubbing your stomach and patting your head at the same time.
6. Chaos/genius/a cacophony of panelist voices will ensue, and hopefully your question will be answered.
7. This will all be a great success (bar some inevitable minor logistical SNAFUs as we climb the learning curve, and yes we have rehearsed it beforehand, but there will be stress for we panelists, not you the audience) and you will see many more virtual panel webinars from ODTUG.  Did I mention this will be great?

Be a part of it

A panel differs from a presentation in its spontaneity and improvised content.  In other words, while this webinar will be recorded, it does not follow a set path and you most certainly can and will influence what we talk about.  But of course you have to be there to impact it.

Here’s the gen

What:  ODTUG Expert’s Panel Webinar - Oracle Data Integrator (ODI)
When:  13 December 2012, 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm Eastern (US) Standard Time
How:  https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/270041222

Join us, won’t you?