Collaborate Regional Conferences - First is Feb. 23-24 in NJ

OAUG Connection Point - EPM Regional Conferences

There is apparently a name for the 3 regional 2-day conferences on Hyperion/EPM/BI that OAUG is putting on in 2010. It's "Oracle Connection Point - Enterprise Performance Management" regional conferences. The first one of these (per Kerdock Consulting's blog) is going to be held February 23-24, 2010 in Jersey City, NJ at the Grand Hyatt.

I don't know any details yet on when the call for speakers is going out nor when they'll have more details on vendor information. As soon as I know it, I'll do an update. It can't be far off, because the conference is less than 4 months away.

There are supposed to be 2 more of these regional conferences in 2010, but I have no details at present on where or when these will be. I get the impression that OAUG is waiting to see how well the first one goes before making a commitment to the others.

Kaleidoscope Speaker Submission Extended to November 10

ODTUG Kaleidoscope is, as mentioned previously, the main national Hyperion/EPM conference for 2010. It will have content for all types of users on Essbase, Hyperion Planning, HFM, the Hyperion & OBIEE reporting tools, and more. There are 4 tracks entirely devoted to Hyperion & Essbase and as this the replacement (at least in 2010) for the old Hyperion Solutions conference, you'll definitely want to be there.

So since you're going, let's get you a free pass if we can. The easiest way to get a pass to K'Scope is to speak at the conference. Though the original deadline was October 27, they've just extended the deadline to November 10. Visit http://odtugkaleidoscope.com/ if you want to submit something by the 10th. The two tracks that could use more submissions are the Essbase and Hardcore Hyperion areas but also feel free to submit more in the Hyperion Applications and Hyperion Reporting Tools tracks as well.

While K'Scope is still looking for the advanced/guru/expert content they've offered in the past, this year they've expanded their tracks to have enough rooms to also have some more introductory and intermediate content. So if you want to present on something at a beginning level like a case study or success story of Hyperion or EPM at your company, please feel free. There will be room for all levels at K'Scope 2010. I hope to see you there even if you're not accepted as a speaker.

2010 Conferences - Speaker Deadlines Coming Up

If you want to be a speaker at either Kaleidoscope or Collaborate in 2010, the deadlines for submitting session topics for consideration are almost up. I know, it seems way too early to me too, but I guess Collaborate is only 6 months away.

Like most conferences, Collab & K'Scope will give a free pass to the conference to any accepted speaker. This makes it a lot easier to convince your boss to send you since these national conferences usually run upwards of $2,000 USD per person.

OAUG/IOUG/Quest Collaborate: Deadline is October 20

Collaborate will be held April 18-22, 2010 in Las Vegas at the Mandalay Bay. Yes, the deadline is tomorrow. Don't feel bad if you don't have time to get a paper together. Word on the street has it that OAUG (the main driver of Hyperion and Oracle EPM content at Collaborate) has reduced the number of Hyperion presentations to only 30. So not only are the odds of getting one of the slots pretty slim, most Hyperion attendees will be avoiding Collaborate in 2010 in favor of one of OAUG's regional Hyperion conferences (which will have more content than the national one anyway).

There are two good reasons to go to Collaborate: either you like gambling in Vegas (and face it, who doesn't?) or you're going for non-Hyperion content too. If you are going, you might as well get a free pass, so submit a presentation and hopefully get a free pass. The track you'll want to submit under is "BI/Data Warehousing/EPM":

http://oaug.collaborate10.com/presenterinfo/

The call for papers for the regional conferences isn't out yet, but I'll blog it when it's announced.

ODTUG Kaleidoscope: Deadline is October 27

Kaleidoscope will be held June 27-July 1, 2010 in Washington DC at the Marriott Wardman Park. As I mentioned in an earlier post, this is the national conference you'll want to be attending in 2010 (and I'm not just saying that because I'm the Essbase/Hyperion Content Leader for Kaleidoscope '10). The call for speakers for Kaleidoscope has been going on since the end of September, but the deadline for submitting your abstract is Tuesday of next week.

There are 4 topic areas with Hyperion and Oracle EPM content in them at Kaleidoscope:

• Essbase. Looking for Essbase content? Whether you’re a developer or an administrator, a novice or a guru, this track will is your home for Essbase information in all forms. Whether it’s sessions on tips and tricks, optimization, Essbase ASO, calc scripts, workarounds, Essbase success stories or Essbase esoteric, the “Essbase track” is your Essbase home.
• Hyperion Applications. Hyperion Planning, Hyperion Financial Management, Hyperion Profitability and Cost Management, Hyperion Strategic Finance and the rest of the Oracle EPM (formerly Hyperion) packaged applications are found in the “Hyperion Applications” track. Everything from case studies in implementing specific applications up through tips, tricks, and best practices for developing, administering, or using the Hyperion applications will be covered here.
• Oracle Business Intelligence & Hyperion Reporting Tools. The Hyperion community is used to Financial Reporting, Web Analysis, Interactive Reporting, SQR Production Reporting, Smart View, and Workspace. The Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition developers have been using OBIEE Answers, Dashboards, Publisher, Delivers, Business Indicators, and the OBI Server. Oracle is bringing these products together, so we’re merging the content. Whether you’ve been doing OBIEE or Hyperion front-end development, this track will show you the future of Oracle’s combined reporting technologies.
• Hardcore Hyperion. If you’re looking for case studies, then this is not the track for you. You’ve asked for even more advanced, guru, hardcore, expert, “Top Gun” Hyperion content, and your wishes have been answered. The “Hacking Hyperion” track is your home for content that you won’t find anywhere else the entire year. If you have secret optimizations, ideas for modifying underlying tables and source code, tuning tips that you haven’t heard anywhere else, or any other content that would tickle the fancy of a seasoned Essbase, Hyperion Planning, HFM, or other Hyperion app developer, then join us as we enter the undocumented (and probably unsupported) world of Hyperion.

If you want to speak at Kaleidoscope, visit:

http://www.technicalconferencesolutions.com/pls/caat/caat_abstracts_upd.main?conference_id=68

You don't need to go to Oracle World ever again and death to SAP!

Usually, you schedule out your trip and haul a bunch of stuff across the country and cope with jet lag, an unfamiliar bed, continental breakfasts and long lines to everything from registration to shuttles. You spend 3-5 days traveling, scheduling and sitting in sessions.  Typically you walk what seems to your unsuspecting arches and heels hundreds of miles and sleep little either due to what you picked up probably on the airplane over or from being hosted by eager sales reps hoping to influence you into agreeing to the next big sale for the next quarter.  Inevitably there is a moment one morning where you wake up and realize you are not sure what city you are in but you are sure you had a few drinks too many last night. Finally, when all this is done and over you need to get back into the rat race and likely are expected to deliver a report over what happened and catch up on all the work you missed while you were gone.

Well now there is a solution; Oracle OpenWorld Live!
Actually, Oracle has really embraced social networking and messaging technology in an unprecedented way.
You can live stream a video feed and watch sessions from any decent internet connection.  You can Tweet with attendees and fans about the feed and other events.  You can even join a Facebook group for Oracle open World fans. Not to mention integration and links with Linkedin, YouTube, OracleMix and RSS feeds.

After the show, popular presentations can be viewed by attendees by simpy logging back into the Oracle Open World site and for those that could not attend, they can access the presentations for a small fee and receive full access to all the recorded presentations.

So why attend the conference at all? Well, the truth is that there are still many reasons to continue attending the show in person, but for those of us that can't.  This is much better than waiting another year or getting second hand stories of what happened from your peers and reading Blogs.  There is still no technology that replaces the human need to connect completely.  This is pretty close though and definitely effective.  I plan to go back and sit in on the sessions I missed and a few that I liked to make sure my notes are complete and accurate.

A sign of what is to come with more and more conferences and such.  I promise, I'll still be there even when it's considered "old school" to attend in person when at Oracle Open World 2025, Larry announces Oracle's latest acquisitions. Quite possibly something like the Moon itself or Air.  We will all cheer since everyone attending will be an Oracle employee anyway and drinking Kool-Aid will be encouraged since it's an Oracle product. This will be announced as the final death blow to SAP by finally executing their strategy and refusing to Post Optionssupply Air to SAP and it's users and not allowing them to flee to the moon since we own it too.  Check mate SAP in 2025.

Oracle Announces Availability of EPM 11.1.1.3 - Two Months After It's Released

It must have been a slow news day at OpenWorld for Oracle EPM. Though 11.1.1.3 was released on August 6 and I blogged about the new 11.1.1.3 features a month ago, Oracle decided to put out a press release on the new functionality on October 12. Well, better late than never.

If you want to see Oracle's comments on what's new in 11.1.1.3 and a brief discussion of the new HFM Financial Close module they're developing, visit here:

http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Oracle-Corporation-NASDAQ-ORCL-1058232.html

In related news, I heard that tomorrow Oracle will be announcing the release of a brand-new product called Essbase (pronounced S-base) that's supposed to be some sort of "multi-dimensional database." I guess it's been in beta since 1992. Multi-dimensional databases? Could these be the next big thing? Discuss in the comments.