OracleAppsBlog

A day in the life of an Oracle Applications Consultant

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Monday, August 16, 2004

11i Upgrade Project - a move from 11.0.3 to 11.5.9

This post contains a link to the Financial Information Systems Upgrade site at University College London (UCT) and also gives an overview of the upgrade documentation prepared for this organisation.

In a previous post I discussed the Financials Systems Project site at the University College London (UCT). One portion of this site that I think is particularly useful is the section that talks about Upgrading to Version 11i. It provides the following documentation relating to upgrades: -

Business Case

I’m a personal advocate of making sure that a value proposition is prepared for any major IT projects you are going to perfom in your business. This business case contains a summary according to the following points: -

• Fit with UCL Strategy
• Demand for change
• Alternative Options
• Reasons for the Upgrade
• Costs
• Expected Benefits
• Investment Appraisal

It then provides more detail for the business case and then outlines what Functional and Other improvements will be made. Lastly it speculates as to when Future Upgrades will need to take place.

11i Communications Plan

According to this document: -

The aim of this plan is to identify the stakeholders of the 11i upgrade project, to identify the information needs they have, and to provide a plan to provide up to date and accurate information in the most effective format and medium and in the most timely way.

Clear, timely and effective communications will enable the project team to:

• Ensure that all principal stakeholders are aware of and in support of the reasons for undertaking the project, have realistic expectations of it and are prepared for it.
• Communicate information needed by other departments or organisations who are affected by or need to know about the project’s progress towards its outcomes, enable them to prepare (e.g. with appropriate training and equipment) and enlist their support.
• Communicate to users the direct requirements for using the system.
• Keep up to date at all times with users’ requirements and make sure the project aims continue to meet these right from the beginning and continue to do so in the light both changes to users’ needs and new information apparent as the project develops.
• Inform advisors and consultants of the project of all progress and developments so that the best available help can be received when required.
• Enable appropriate action to be taken on an informed basis by those responsible for managing the project so that appropriate decisions can be made and the best level of support can be offered to the project at the right time and in the right way.

11i Project Initiation Document

This is a fairly comprehensive document and according to the site, it’s purpose is to: -

Define the 11i Upgrade project, to form the basis for its management and to help with the assessment of the project’s overall success. The two primary uses of the PID are:

• To provide a baseline document against which the Project Board and Project Manager can assess progress, project issues and on-going viability
• To ensure that the project has a sound basis before asking the Project Board to make any major commitment to this project

The document is structured as follows: -

1. Background
2. Business Case
• Business Case Summary
• Budget
3. Project Definition
• Objectives
• Scope and Exclusions
• Project Deliverables
• Approach
• Constraints
• Dependencies
• Assumptions
4. Project Plan
• Project Plan Summary
5. Project Structure
• Project Organisation
• Outline of Roles
• Project Meeting Structure
6. Communication Plan
7. Issue and Risk Logs
8. Change Control

PC Specification for Version 11i

This document lists the hardware and software requirements for PC’s being used to access Oracle 11i.

Wednesday, August 11, 2004

Oracle E-Business Suite R11.5.10 (11i.10)

This post contains a short description of what is expected to be released in the next version of Oracle Applications and speculates as to when it might be released.

The Oracle Applications community eagerly awaits the release of 11i10 which was rumoured to be scheduled for release in June 2004. However, it now looks more likely that it will be released closer to November 2004. Don’t expect any official confirmation from Oracle though, I’ve looked for release information on their site and there’s hardly any. Apparently this new release will have dozens of new functions for industries such as manufacturing, health care, aerospace and utilities. It will also include support for transportation planning and transactions based on radio frequency identification tags in manufacturing.

The Fall 2004 Issue of the OAUG Insight Magazine has a short article by John Wookey (Senior Vice President, Applications Development, Oracle) entitled “Oracle E-Business Suite 11.5.10 Powers Revenue Driven Enterprise: New release builds on Oracle Applications foundation to propel higher revenues”. In the article, John talks about how organizations have for several years been focusing on controlling costs and argues that improving economic indicators have now shifted attention towards revenue growth. He states that in 11.5.10, Oracle has oriented their CRM applications capabilities to measurements that reveal what drives revenue and profitability. This helps companies create an information based selling environment with clear visibility into the sales process. The intention of this new release is to create a solution for E-Business Suite Customers that clears the way to building a revenue driven infrastructure, something that is essential for an organizations success.

I would be interested in receiving comments from any readers who have additional information on this release.

Tuesday, August 03, 2004

The Oracle Financial Information Systems (FIS) Project at University College London (UCT)

This post contains a link to the Oracle Financial Information Systems (FIS) website at University College London (UCT) and also mentions the key features of the site.

The Financials Systems Project site at the University College London (UCT) provides readers with a comprehensive understanding of what it takes to implement an Oracle Applications System. The site gives readers a holistic view of all the aspects of Enterprise Systems Implementations. UCT initially implemented the following modules of Oracle Application 11.0.3 and later upgraded to 11i : -

• General Ledger
• Accounts Payable
• Purchase Ordering
• Accounts Receivable
• Grants ( including Project Costing and Project Billing)
• Fixed Assets
• Inventory

Following is a review of the key areas of the site:

FIS Project

This section of the site provides an overview of what the FIS project and has related information categorised as follows: -

• Information on the use of the site
• What is the FIS Project?
• FIS Team Members
• Useful Contact Information
• Migration Plan
• FIS Service Times
• FIS Users Group
• 11.0.3 Enhancement Stage Plan
• FIS Technical and Business Consultancy 2003
• Upgrade to Version 11i
• FIS Newsletters
• FIS Training Dates

Procedures, User Guides and General Reference

This particular section of the site is probably one of the most useful areas as it contains project documentation which has been categorised in to the following areas: -

• General Reference and Procedural Notes
• User Guides for the following modules: -
• Accounts Payable
• Accounts Receivable
• Fixed Assets
• General Ledger
• Grants
• Inventory
• Purchase Ordering
• Other User Guides
• Technical Guidance
• How To…?

Thursday, July 29, 2004

Download Oracle Documentation

This post contains a link to a site where you can download a comprehensive range of Oracle Documentation.

Certainly I might be stating the obvious but I thought it would be good to have the information on this site. This Oracle Technology Network (OTN) page contains Oracle Documentation for the following key technology areas: -

• Database
• Development Tools
• Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence
• On Demand
• System Management
• Application Server
• Oracle Collaboration Suite
• Technologies / Utilities
• Applications / E-Business Suite

Of interest to Oracle Apps users will be the online documentation CD which can be downloaded for each release of Oracle E-Business Suite from R11 to R11.5.9

Sunday, July 25, 2004

New Oracle Presentations from the OpenWorld Conference in Melbourne

After a bit of a wait it now seems that the Oracle OpenWorld Melbourne Presentations are now available in pdf format (sorry to those people who like copying and pasting). This post lists the key areas covered and also reviews the presentations delivered for some of the Oracle E-Business Suite 11i Tracks.

You can download presentations for the Oracle OpenWorld Australia and New Zealand Conference here. According to the site: -

There were over 100 Sessions to choose from over the course of the OpenWorld conference. They were delivered via 10 concurrent Tracks - focussing on Oracle’s entire range of business solutions and technologies.

Following is a complete listing of all the tracks as well as some personal reviews I have prepared: -

Keynote Presentations

Charles Phillips presentation on Creating Corporate Value - Information Matters contains a short but interesting look at Oracle’s financial performance. I was interested to see that Oracle Applications Sales have grown by 4% in the last 12 months. The competitors didn’t do so well - SAP (-6%), Peoplesoft (-17%), Siebel (-31%). The only software company beating Oracle’s operating profit margins is Microsoft. I must be in the right business - at least for now anyway! The session goes on to discuss the Oracle Strategy a large component of which seems to be helping organizations Standardize IT in the following areas: -

• Processes 
• Data
• Architecture
• Infrastructure

Keith Kellogg’s presentation on Oracle’s Perspective on Homeland Security gives a nice high level view of the

Oracle E-Security Suite

solution bundle.

The presentation I like the most was by John Wookey on the Information Driven Organization. Firstly it ask’s the question, what defines the information driven organization - to which the answer is: -

• Alignment - encourage behaviour that supports organizational objectives through communication, consistency and incentives.
• Effectiveness - drive enerprise information and enterprise business processes into every aspect of your business.
• Collaberation - coordinate processes across direct, partner, supplier and online channels through distributed access, integrated processes and shared information.

He then defines the Oracle Solution for the Information Driven Organization by outlining the key features of the new 11i release (namely 11i.10 or 11.5.10) which are: -

• Integrated Business Driven Intelligence
• Continued Aggressive product extensions
• Best in Proven Technology
• Broad Industry Investments
• Opening of the E-Business Suite: -
• Integration Services
• Customer Data Hub

The presentation outlines Oracle Solutions for Specific Industries and then goes on to explain the three paths to higher quality information, which are: -

1. Full E-Business Suite right away - best information, lowest cost.
2. E-Business Suite with Integration to Legacy Apps - More graceful on-ramp to E-Business Suite.
3. Data Hub - Retain Legacy Apps; benefit from single data model.

I like the presentation because although it does mention Oracle Specific Solutions, it gives a good idea of what organizations are trying to achieve and how IT is helping them meet their business goals.

Oracle Database 10g - Tracks A & B

Oracle Application Server 10g and Application Development - Tracks A & B

Oracle Collaboration Suite Track

Business Intelligence & Data Warehousing Track

Enterprise Resource Management - (Oracle E-Business Suite 11i) - Tracks A & B

Certainly the best presentation in this category was The Enterprise Iceberg - a hidden resource or a hazard to business by John Julian. The presentation relates to the University Systems Project (named Themis) undertaken at the University of Melbourne. It’s quite a lengthy presentation but makes good reading and will provide you with a really good understanding of all aspects of ERP implementation. The presentation begins with a project overview and states why the University needed to change. One of the strong points of the presentation is that it clearly outlines the hardware and software architecture being used. A comprehensive listing of all the costs involved as well as the quantifiable benefits is also given. Lastly, the presentation mentions how you can avoid implementation disaster and goes on to mention several good books that you can read relating to enterprise systems implementations.

A presentation I was certainly interested in reading was E-Business Suite Special Edition - benefits for small and medium sized enterprises. Oracle E-Business Suite Special Edition is Oracle’s Packaged Solution for midsize businesses. Key features are: -

• Pre-configured E-Business Suite 11i modules (packaged but tailorable)
• Rapid, fixed price, fixed scope implementation
• Ready to expand when you are 

The presentation contains a case study for Sunny Queen (Pty) Ltd - the largest egg supplier in Queensland. I’m hoping at a later point to try and provide readers with a bit more information on this release, in the mean time you can read more about E-Business Suite Special Edition at this Oracle Page

Another presentation of interest was Leadership in Leasing by Brett Kennedy. The presentation discussed the leasing industry in Australia, the leasing lifecycle and the platform and then finally took a look at the Oracle Lease Management Solution. I was interested in the presentation primarily because I didn’t realise Oracle had a solution for Lease Management. After reading the presentation it became clear to me that this was only released in 11.5.8. The presentation states Oracle’s commitment to leasing as follows: -

• First Production Release 11.5.8, Dec 2002
• Joint Development with GE
• Current Release 11.5.9
• New functionality - syndications, asset terminations. Multi-GAAP
• Australian Launch of Lease Management, Feb 2004
• Local Training, Implementation and Support Capability
• Next Major Release 11.5.10, due mid 2004
• Significant Resources
 
• Effort has been underway since 1999
• Deep Leasing Experience on Oracle Development Team
• Many Enhancements to Existing Products
• Significant Investment by Oracle Consulting and Partners Since Inception

I liked the Value Proposition slide which had an interesting “graph” and states: -

A lease management solution delivers significant profitability improvement, through cost reduction and better operational control, scale economies for future growth and reductions in the cost of capital.

The presentation also clearly outlines the lease business flows.

I was interested to see the screen shots of the Oracle Lease Management solution as most of the interface seem to be web based (using Java Server Pages - JSP’s) which makes me think that Oracle is moving more towards a web based solution than using forms. The very last section of the presentation also has some cool looking Oracle Discoverer reports.

Customer Relationship Management - (Oracle E-Business Suite 11i) Track

Supply Chain Management - (Oracle E-Business Suite 11i) Track