UKOUG Techfest19

05/12/2019

I’ve just returned from Techfest19 – the UKOUG Flagship Oracle Tech conference – and it was simply excellent.

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Amazing Sunset from the Grand

It was held at The Grand Hotel in Brighton, and it was grand. If you missed it, you really missed out. 250 mostly amazing presentations.

I did 2 main ones about Oracle Statistics, and also MC’d the Jonathan Lewis Optimizer Panel, alongside Martin Widlake. The highlight of my conference was asking a left-field question of an Oracle Architect about Full Table Scans, which has resulted in the potential for a change to the code to make them (possibly slightly) more efficient. Thank you for listening Roger!

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Oracle ACE Dinner

If you missed my 2 sessions on Database Statistics, you can find a webinar and a Blair-Witch style video of each of them here on my website:

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UKOUG Guest Speaker, before the party

Filed under UKOUG Tagged with ace, oracle, presentation, statistics, techfest19, ukoug

Oracle Tech Conferences

16/11/2019 Leave a comment

It’s mid-November 2019. The leaves have mostly fallen and the nights are drawing in. That can only mean… it’s time for Europes 2 biggest Independent Oracle User Groups to have their conferences.

The first, starting Tuesday 18th November, is DOAG – the German Oracle User Group – in Nuremberg. I’m flying out there a couple of days beforehand as I have meetings, and it’s nice to travel and chill out too. This year I’m speaking about Oracle Database Statistics at both conferences, but I only have time for the “basics” talk at DOAG so I’ll try to get some Unconference time to talk about when it gets harder.

Then, from the 1st to the 4th December, it’s the UKOUG Techfest 2019. This is slightly different this year as we have split the main conference, comprising Tech, Business Apps and JDE into 3 separate components at different times of the year. The Tech-only conference has stayed in the December slot (with Business Apps moving to June).

We have also moved the conference to Brighton. New location, Great town.

I’ll be talking about Oracle Database Statistics, but this time in 2 slots, Database Stats #1. Doing it Right, the Easy Way (Monday 2nd December 09:00), then in a bit more depth I’ll do Database Stats #2. Doing it Right, When it’s Harder (Wednesday 4th December 11:00)

For a UKOUG “conference survival guide”, I recommend brighton-autumn UKOUG Techfest Survival Guide 2019. All you need to know about getting the most out of 3.5 days of Tech shenanigans. Turn up, learn, but also try to meet people and have fun! I hope to see you at one of both of these conferences, maybe have a coffee or somethings stronger – easy on the stalking though (read Martins Survival Guide first)

If you have not registered for Techfest 2019, you can do that here: UKOUG TechFest 2019!

There a full agenda of around 250 Oracle-related Tech talks. The problem isn’t trying to work out if there’s enough to see, but trying to work out how to prioritise all of them!

See you there!

Filed under doag, UKOUG Tagged with conference, database, doag, oracle, statistics, ukoug

UKOUG Oracle Conferences – why bother?

21/11/2018 1 Comment

The excellent DOAG Oracle conference is currently taking place in Nuremberg in Germany.

I’ve been thinking about the UKOUG Conference due to take place in Liverpool on 3rd-5th December 2018. About 2 weeks away.

Why would you bother paying to attend these conferences? Why should I, or my company, use our money to attend? Oracle provide free conferences and 1-day events around the world talking about the Oracle product set. Oracle Partners also provide free events with their speakers too. They are FREE! FREE! FREE!

I only need to convince my boss to take time out of the office. They don’t need to raid their budget – they just need to let me out!

BUT! Those events are effectively a sales pitch. If you are not paying in cash you are paying in other ways, with partners and Oracle looking for you to adopt them and pay them via licensing, support and consultancy. I’m not saying those events are not without worth; learning about Oracle’s new product and partner offerings certainly has value and I would encourage people to attend those events. But what are they not offering? Running those events isn’t free and large corporations are not known for their philanthropy.

An Independent User Group, like the UKOUG, doesn’t do sales pitches. It has speakers from around the world coming to share their SUCCESSES AND FAILURES! They talk about what worked, and what didn’t. They talk about the limitations and the excellence of the software and services which you are being sold.

If you want to know what happens AFTER you’ve bought the software. AFTER you’ve seen the amazing new features and where they ACTUALLY WORK or FAIL, you need to talk to people who are doing it, not those who are selling it.

And you can talk to them, and me, at the UKOUG. There are networking events; you can look into the eyes of the speaker who just told you something was great and ask them a question about how they know it’s great and how it could be great for you! And the networking events are, above all, FUN. It’s not all work. It’s also play. Have a drink, a meal, a chat, a coffee, a beer with like-minded individuals.

The event is in Liverpool, well known as somewhere to enjoy yourself as well as seeing the historic buildings and great sports teams. It’s just over 2 hours to get there on the train from London. Not as far as you might think!

See past the sales? See you there!

Filed under UKOUG Tagged with enjoy, fun, learn, liverpool, oracle, teach, tech18, ukoug

UKOUG Call For Papers: Tech18, Apps18 and JDE18

28/05/2018 Leave a comment

The call for papers for Tech18, Apps18 and JDE18 is now open until Monday 4th June at 09:00. You have until then to submit an abstract for whatever you would like to talk about!

What would you like to talk about? You’re telling me you have nothing? I don’t believe you. Everybody has a story to tell. Your work has value an your experiences and wisdom will help others avoid your mistakes and follow your successes.

Telling others about your experiences will help your career and enhance your knowledge – the only time I learn more then preparing a talk is when it’s all broken (after which I usually do a presentation about why it was a problem, how we fixed it and what we have done to prevent it happening all over again!)

And don’t forget, you only need to submit an abstract today – a couple of paragraphs describing the presentation. You only have to actually write the talk if it gets accepted! 🙂

Yes, I know you’re a bit nervous, standing up in front of people. So am I. That’s normal. Don’t worry! We are here to help. First time speaker? Got a talk accepted and would like some help? I can put you in contact with an experienced speaker to provide some guidance and reassurance. You can do it! What are you waiting for?

Filed under UKOUG Tagged with apps18, call for papers, cfp, conference, jde18, oracle, tech18, ukoug

See me in Riga!

18/05/2018 Leave a comment

I will be speaking about the Oracle Optimizer in Riga, at Riga Dev Days! The biggest tech conference in the Baltic states takes place on the 29th/30th/31st May – click on the logo below for full conference details.

I really hope to see you there

Filed under UKOUG Tagged with conferece, days, dev, developer, latvia, lvoug, rdd, riga, ukoug

UKOUG Member Advocate: sorted!

26/03/2018 Leave a comment

I received an email from the UKOUG last week.

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It turns out that I have won the vote to become the next Member Advocate for the UKOUG. I will (eventually) be joined on the board by Martin Widlake – who won the vote for the position of President Elect – a position whereby Martin will shadow the current UKOUG President before taking office on the Board. He has written about it here.

I would very much like to thank everyone who voted for me. I hope I can live up to your expectations. If you did not vote for me, that’s OK – I’ll represent you and your interests just the same as everybody else! Looks like I’m going to have to spend time getting up to speed with the Apps community, and re-acquainting myself with my old JDE friends.

Here’s to moving the User Group forward to meet the challenges of the changing face of our industry. See you all soon, and Cheers Everyone!

(sorry – would have posted this sooner but I was at the OUG Ireland User Group giving a couple of presentations and taking part in a Q&A panel about “18c and everything else!” – fantastic conference and lovely people there!)

Filed under Administration, UKOUG Tagged with advocate, board, member, oracle, ukoug, vote

UKOUG M.A. Voting Hots Up!

27/02/2018 Leave a comment

It’s getting hotter!

After many years volunteering at the UKOUG I am standing to be the Member Advocate at the UKOUG, representing the members on the board.

Do you think I will represent the membership well? Yes. VOTE FOR ME!

Oh, you must be the main UKOUG membership contact, or know who is, to vote.

One twist in the election is that Steve Davis has withdrawn from the vote due to business commitments, leaving a straightforward race between myself and Andy Nellis. That’s a shame as I think Steve would have made a good Member Advocate had he been voted in. Andy is unknown to me so I cannot comment on his suitability as a UKOUG volunteer or board member.

I’d really appreciate your vote – I know that many of you have voted for me already, but I want ALL of you to give me a strong mandate to improve the user group.

VOTE HERE

Filed under Administration, UKOUG Tagged with board, member advocate, oracle, ukoug, vote

Oracle ACE Director

08/12/2017 4 Comments

I was at UKOUG Tech17 this week in my capacity at both Speaker and Tech Lead (organizing and selecting the agenda, drinks, parties, etc – although the heavy lifting is done by the @UKOUG office)

There was rather a nice surprise waiting for me. Jennifer from the Oracle ACE Program upgraded my Oracle ACE to Oracle ACE Director.

This is a wonderful honour and reflects the many many days dedicated each year to the Oracle community through presenting at conferences around the world, helping on forums, writing magazine articles, arranging SIG’s and meetups, as well as the aforementioned Tech Lead at #UKOUG_TECH17

Thank you Oracle ACE Program!

As for Tech17? Here’s a few images of this year’s event!

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Filed under Administration, UKOUG Tagged with ace, aced, chandler, dba, director, orace, tech17, ukoug, ukoug_tech17

UKOUG Northern Technology Summit

06/11/2017 1 Comment

Here at the UKOUG, we’ve just announced that we will be holding a 1-day UKOUG Northern Technology Summit in the North of England on 18th April 2018.

It will be in Leeds, at the Park Plaza!

This is a 5-stream 1 day event, with around 30 talks! We’d call it a conference – it’s bigger than some European national conferences! – but we don’t want to have any confusion with our sexy flagship conference, UKOUG Tech17 (or, indeed Tech18 in Liverpool!)

The Call For Papers is now Open, and we are looking for talks in relation to Database, RAC, Cloud, Apex, Development and Engineered Systems. A full list can be found on the CfP page, linked here.

Tweet about it with the hashtag #UKOUG_ntech

Filed under Administration, sig, UKOUG Tagged with call for papers, cfp, ntech, oracle, sig, ukoug

Appearances 2017

28/08/2017 Leave a comment

and wp

I’ve not written a post in a while. I’ve been a bit busy organizing several UKOUG events, including several Special Interest Groups 1-day events and Tech17 (and doing paid work for clients!)

I have been accepted to speak at a number of conferences over the next couple of months so I though I would share that with you and hope you’ll be there to learn, share, network and enjoy the conferences.

Events

1st-2nd September 2017. POUG (Pint with Oracle User Group) Krakow, Poland

27th September 2017. UKOUG RAC Cloud Infrastructure and Availability SIG. London, UK
(note: I’m not speaking at the SIG, just the Chairperson)

16th-18th October 2017. SiOUG. Portorož, Slovenija

18th-20th October 2017. HrOUG. Rovinj, Croatia

21st-24th November 2017. DOAG. Nuremberg, Germany

3rd-6th December 2017. UKOUG Tech17, Birmingham, UK.

Previous Appearances 2017

23rd Feb 2017. UKOUG RAC & Database joint SIG. London, UK

23rd-24th March 2017. UKOUG Ireland Conference. Dublin, Ireland

27th April 2017. UKOUG Northern Technical SIG. Manchester, UK (Chair Only)

8th June 2017 UKOUG RAC & DAtabase joint SIG. Reading, UK (Chair Only)