I wanted to give a quick shout-out to my new-found friends in LA (Latin America, not Los Angeles!) for their hospitality and professionalism during my two sessions in Bogota, Colombia and Quito, Ecuador. As the first person in my family to ever tread on South American soil, I was thrilled to visit places I’d only read about before.
My reception in Bogota was simply wonderful! I did two sessions on the newest features of Oracle Database 12c to a welcoming crowd who were kind enough to listen to me carefully even when my translators struggled to keep up with my rapid-fire delivery. Giovanna Paez and her ASUOC team did a great job keeping everything moving along. The university campus was an oasis of beauty in the midst of a classic South American city, and our hosts kept us revved up to present with the real thing: true Colombian coffee, leche only on request.
Landing in Quito was an experience – some of the roughest turbulence I’ve ever encountered in my travels, then a mild temblor in the 3.5 Richter scale, followed by a drive through some of the more precarious highways I’ve ever seen – but my driver’s skills would’ve shamed those of any NASCAR driver. Paola Pullas and her ECUOUG team in Quito were top-notch, and all of my presentations on Oracle 12c went off without a hitch. I did get a chance to see Quito intimately, especially the fantastic Virgen de Quito.
And Paola’s team made sure that none of us were ever hungry. I have never seen an empenada larger than my head until our dinner at Los Geranios (“The House of Geraniums”) in the old colonial section of Quito.
I sincerely thank both the ASUOC and ECUOUG teams for an extremely warm reception! I hope I was able to transfer my enthusiasm to the eager participants of both venues, and I promise that by next year, my conversational Spanish will have improved enough to understand the questions I’m asked during my presentations. Until then, my colleagues, hasta la vista!
I’ve spent the last week feverishly preparing a new chapter for our upcoming book on Oracle Database Migration, Transformation and Tuning. The Cross-Platform Transportable Tablespaces (XTTS) feature set is looking to be an awesome tool for migrating tablespaces en masse between platforms … especially when migrating to Oracle 12c!
In the midst of all my XTTS research and experimentation, I found out that I’m officially going to attend the last two legs of the OTN Latin America North Tour in Bogota, Colombia on August 15-16 and in Quito, Ecuador on August 18-19. I’m absolutely thrilled to finally visit places in South America that I’d only read about while translating Spanish literature to English in high school sometime during the last millennium. A warning to my Colombian and Ecuadorean colleagues: Por favor digame tus preguntas mas despaciamente! I promise to slow down my usual rapid delivery of the English language as well during my four presentations.
The first-ever OTN Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Tour is finished at last, and it was one of the most invigorating conferences I’ve ever attended and participated in. Many of my fellow Oracle ACEs and ACE Directors crossed 12 time zones to spend seven days in five cities on two continents to share our knowledge of all things Oracle with young and enthusiastic attendees at every stop.
The Tour
Our first stop on the tour was Bizerte, the oldest city in Tunisia not far from Tunis, the capital of Tunisia and the site of ancient Carthage. Tunisia is the country that ignited the “Arab Spring” in 2010, and the country is still healing its wounds from that conflict.
Our team and hosts reconnoiter the ruins at Dougga, the best-preserved set of Roman ruins in North Africa. Humbling and stunning!
But the enthusiasm of the young IT professionals in Bizrete and the rural city of Beja, “City of Wheat” and the second stop on our tour, was infectious. The magnificent coastlines and spectacular seaside views took everyone’s breath away, and the hospitality of our new Tunisian comrades showed us was humbling and endearing. We even had a chance to walk the best-preserved set of ancient Roman ruins in all of North Africa in Dougga.
The IT workers, students, and teachers we met in Tunisia inspired us because even in what most of us in the West might call a developing country, the reach of IT technology is impressive, as every attendee at both conferences had at least one mobile device. Tunisia’s future certainly seems bright, and we hope our passion for IT left our attendees with the confidence to pursue their dreams for themselves as well as their nascent country and economy.
The IT professionals in Beja were young, questioning everything. Inspiring!
Riyadh, the capital of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and our third stop, gave us a deep look into Saudi culture and its people. The young IT professionals there were hungry for our team’s knowledge. They showed us unbounded hospitality, displayed a proud passion for their Muslim culture, and picked our Oracle ACE brains on everything until almost 0200 the next morning.
Kingdom Tower, 100 stories high, dominates the skyline of Riyadh. We saw the city from the skybridge at the top – magnificent!
Jeddah, our fourth stop on the tour, is a bustling commercial seaport that is also closest to Mecca and thus closest to the hearts of my newfound Muslim brothers and sisters. A young crowd of IT professionals braved a humid weekend morning to hear us speak all too briefly before leaving the KSA.
In a single word: Dubai is magnificent. It was a fitting final venue for our tour because its sudden emergence from a desert in less than 20 years mirrors the growing importance of an IT industry that truly dominates all people and cultures in every corner of the world. Its futuristic skyline was second only to all the young professionals from the ARABOUG user group that took the time to join us for the outstanding final day of the tour; it gave us our best look at the future of IT in the far Middle East.
Our Cast of Characters
We happy few … after closing the tour in Dubai. (From L-R: Bjoern Rost, myself, Joel Perez, Osama Mustafa, Mike Ault)
Mike Ault, our most senior ACE, was discomfited by illness for most of the tour and did most of the speaking anyway. Mike’s deep experience with performance tuning gave attendees a deep look under the covers of Oracle databases. But it was his perseverance that inspired all of us to “keep calm and carry on” even when presentations ran over, travel plans went awry, or taxis were too small.
Bjoern Rost, a veteran of several ACE tours, brought his unique perspective to every venue and gathering. And contrary to world opinion, Germans do have a wicked sense of humor… even when his only response to our best jokes was, “That’s not funny.” Bjorn’s deep dives into Oracle 12c features were simply outstanding, and his emergency emcee-ing in Dubai made our final day of the tour a success.
Edward Roske crystallized exactly what Big Data is, how it’s still evolving, and why our attendees should care about it. His presentations were simply outstanding and I know I speak for our whole team that his verve and focus taught us all how to relate better with our audiences. Edward’s deep business knowledge and customer centricity also blew me away; I learned more in 20 minutes listening to him explain how to see business issues from our customer’s position than I’d learned from any formal class I’ve taken in the last 25 years.
Syed Jaffar Hussein presented on Oracle database security features – extremely important in a world where as much as 80% of data theft happens inside the firewall! – and gave us great hospitality in Riyadh. His enthusiasm for his town and culture added a lot to our enjoyment of Riyadh, especially our visit to the Kingdom Tower.
Imran Ullah Bukhari’s presentation on application and database performance tuning from the design phase forward made a great impression on our audience in Riyadh. His deep understanding of KSA’s culture helped us navigate what could’ve been potential disasters, and he truly embodied the tradition of hospitality in the Arab world.
Joel Perez, the lone South American ACE on the tour, presented on zero-downtime Oracle database migration strategies and captured our audience in Dubai with his energy and knowledge. His enthusiasm was infectious, and his passion for the perfect photo of our team after our final presentations that day tightened the bond between we happy few Oracle ACEs on our tour.
OsamaMustafa brought his ready smile and enthusiasm to Dubai as we wrapped up our tour there. His expertise on high availability principles for Oracle Middleware shone through his presentation, and I hope to learn even more from him during our next tours together.
Finally, I’ve got to acknowledge Tariq Farooq, our fearless leader, without whom this tour would’ve been impossible. Tariq’s knowledge of the region and its people, his ability to speak Arabic and negotiate our path to success even when the odds seemed against us, his deep reverence of Islam and the ways of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), and his undaunting sense of humor knitted us into a true “band of brothers.” When we look back at the 2015 MENA tour, its success will have been built upon the seeds that Tariq planted in the deserts, cities, towns, and OUG communities in Tunisia, KSA and Dubai in 2014. Until then, as my new Arab brothers and sisters say in almost every sentence: Insh’Allah.
At last, it is official: It will be my great honor to participate in Oracle Technology Network’s first-ever tour of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) starting this coming Monday, May 25th in Bizerte, Tunisia.
I’ll be speaking on five topics related to Oracle 12c Database – a reprise of the four presentations I did at IOUG COLLABORATE14 #C14LV in Las Vegas this past April 2014, as well as a brand-new presentation on how to leverage Oracle 12c’s two new histograms for even more efficient query execution when there are dramatically skewed data sources to be tackled.
The OTN MENA Tour will cross two continents – Africa and Asia – as we traverse most of North Africa and the near Middle East:
May 25: Bizerte, Tunisia
May 26: Beha, Tunisia
May 29: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
May 31: Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
June 1: Dubai, UAE
My travelling mates include several Oracle ACEs and ACE Directors from across the USA, South America, Asia, and of course MENA as well. To see full details of all the speakers and topics we’ll be covering, please be sure to peruse the Tour’s website.
If you have colleagues in the MENA area, be sure to let them know about the OTN Tour, as I’d love to make their personal acquaintance. I’ll report back as often as I can during the tour via Twitter (hashtag: ##OTNMENATOUR14) and LinkedIn.
And until I meet you all in person, my new MENA colleagues: As-salāmu `alaykum.
The OUG Norway 2014 Varseminar concluded this past April 5th as the crowd of 350 motivated Oracle professionals disembarked from the MS Color Magic. The two-day cruise between Oslo, Norway and Kiel, Germany offered me a chance to regain my “sea legs,” reconnect with my European colleagues, and transfer additional knowledge on the state of Oracle 12c “across the pond.”
This was my second time at OUGN in two years, and this year’s speakers were all excellent, including a unique keynote from Kellyn Pot’Vin and Tim Gorman on how IT professionals often make the wrong assumptions as we chase “tinsel monkeys” down rabbit holes when we’re trying to solve performance problems. I thoroughly enjoyed rendering my two presentations on Oracle 12c Database’s ILM features. Eight separate tracks made for more intimate venues for each presentation, but everyone who participated was enthusiastic about finding out how to best leverage these new capabilities.
Between our flights home, my colleague and friend Luis Campos and I also explored Oslo’s residential district and visited Frogner Park, a huge open space that’s home to some of the most unique sculpture gardens in the midst of one of the most beautiful capitals in Europe. The brisk April air barely penetrated my new Oracle ACE Director windbreaker – which needed a good break-in anyway. No wonder Norwegians always seem so happy!
My latest Oracle 12c article on is now available in print as well as the IOUG SELECT Journal website: It’s all about those pesky frequency distributions that the Oracle optimizer can use to make extremely short work of skewed data.
And if you haven’t seen my ongoing 12c Database features series at IOUG SELECT, my able colleagues at IOUG have permitted me to place PDF copies of my articles on my blog site so that you can all ramp up your Oracle 12c skills. You can find these articles from previous IOUG SELECT Journal editions on this blog’s new Articles page.
Please be sure to check out these new articles – they may just provide enough ammunition for explaining exactly why now is a great time for your organization to consider the efiicacy and efficiency of Oracle 12c when compared to your current Oracle database release.
Just in time for the OUGN Varseminar 2014 and IOUG COLLABORATE14, I’ve learned that Oracle Corporation has awarded me the status of Oracle ACE Director. I’m extremely humbled and honored to receive this acknowledgment of my passion for all things Oracle Database, and I look forward to participating in the ACE Director program to the fullest possible extent of my abilities.
You can now view the on-demand session from my February 4, 2014 presentation on Oracle 12c Automatic Data Optimization (ADO) features, thanks to my most excellent colleagues at the Oracle Technology Network (OTN). (Many of the folks that attended the live presentation encountered severe difficulty traversing the whole presentation after the 5-minute mark. I apologize once again for the issues, but they are now repaired.)
In my presentation I showed exactly how simple it is to implement ADO in Oracle 12c, including some actual code samples of using ADO for both non-partitioned and partitioned tables, and the resulting potential performance improvement for queries.
Here’s a link to the OTN registration page for this event:
As the last day of November wanes and the shadows of winter grow long upon our beautiful snow-covered lake here in Wisconsin, my thoughts naturally turn to the upcoming New Year and what it’s bringing: some excellent opportunities to spread the word on Oracle Database 12c‘s latest elegant, powerful features.
For the first time in my Oracle evangelizing career, I’m honored and humbled to have been selected to present at Hotsos Symposium 2014 on March 3 – 5, 2014 in Irving, TX. My topic, How Hot Is My Data? Leveraging Automatic Database Optimization (ADO) Features in Oracle 12c Database For Dramatic Performance Improvements, will focus on new Oracle 12c features that make it possible to migrate data dynamically and automatically from one level of storage and compression to another as data gets “colder” over time. I’ll be demonstrating how 12c uses heat maps and data optimization policies to make the most of Tier 0, 1, and 2 level storage, Advanced Compression, and Hybrid Columnar Compression.
I’m also happy to report that I’ll be at IOUG’s COLLABORATE14 conference on April 7-11, 2014 in Las Vegas, NV. I’ve got three main topics I’ll be presenting:
Session 185 will be a reprise of my Hotsos Symposium 2014 presentation on Automatic Database Optimization (ADO) features in Oracle 12c.
Session 186 is titled Blink and You’ll Miss It: Migrating, Cloning and Recovering Oracle 12c Databases At Warp Speed. Among other topics, I’ll be discussing and demonstrating several new methods for migrating pre-12c databases to Oracle 12c, cloning 12c‘s new Pluggable Databases (PDBs) at blinding speed, and how Recovery Manager makes it possible for uber-fast backups with 12c‘s support of multi-piece backups for datafile image copies.
Session 187, Something Old, Something New: Leveraging Oracle 12c’s Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) Features for Improved Database Performance, will look at two revolutionary new features in 12c,In-Database Archiving (IDA) and Temporal Validity (TV), that will now make it possible to store multiple versions of the same row within a segment separated only by time.
As usual, there will be a cornucopia of other top-notch speakers at both Hotsos Symposium 2014 and COLLABORATE14, including Tom Kyte, Maria Colgan, Bryn Llewellyn, Cary Milsap, Kerry Osborne, and many other rising stars in the Oracle knowledge universe. I hope you can make the time and commitment to increase your technical know-how of all things Oracle at one or more of these conferences … because that’s why I attend them as well. I look forward to seeing you there!
My colleagues at Confio have just published my first article in a three-part series on the myriad new features of Oracle Database 12c Release 1 (12cR1) via Confio’s venerable portal, LogicalRead.
This first article focuses on some of the new security features in Oracle 12cR1, including:
The new system privileges specific to RMAN backups, TDE, and Data Guard administration
The new options for recreating a database’s password file to accommodate these new system privileges
The capability to identify excessively powerful system and object privileges that might have been GRANTed by mistake … even those which have never been used
This new article series also includes code samples on how to leverage these new features immediately in an Oracle 12cR1 environment. Please be sure to take a peek at peek at this information – it may just revolutionize the way you’ve been using the SYSDBA role in your day-to-day Oracle database administration activities.
