Field Notes from Oracle OpenWorld
So I’m wrapping up at Oracle OpenWorld with Jim Borne, one of our Client Executives, 
where I’ve been asked to be the subject matter expert for PeopleSoft Maintenance Management. I’ve been at the Utilities Industry kiosk, and while the name might not get you fired up, there’s been a ton of attention around the Maintenance Management offering.
(Gratuitous horn-honking: MiPro has been the only consultant involved with every Maintenance Management deployment in North America. It’s been a fun journey and I’ve learned a lot, and I’m pretty thrilled that we’re in the position that we are.)
Anyway, in no particular order because I’m exhausted and getting ready to hop a red-eye, here are some recap thoughts of the conference:
- The Oracle Fusion applications are really coming along. If you’re planning on being an early adopter of this stuff in 2009, you’ve gotta check this out.
- Lots of buzz about Oracle Beehive, a brand new, built-from-scratch collaboration tool. It gives users a very slick way to communicate and work together, and does an excellent job of tying together email client, IM programs, calendars, VM and conferencing. It does all this behind the scenes so users can easily share (and collaboratively edit) documents, emails, etc. Pretty cool stuff.
- The show is downright huge, which, no matter how often I come to it, always sort of startles me. All the products seem mixed-up, the grounds are confusing, and in general it’s hard to find what you’re looking for.
- The general mood is very positive: there are lots of comments and good juju about the continual improvement of the Oracle products and the future of Oracle apps. Pretty exciting stuff. Nice break from the dour headlines.
- PeopleSoft customers: you’ve got to be on the lookout for PeopleTools 8.5. There are some major usability improvements in the app itself and the web 2.0 applications.
- Mobility is one of the huge themes here, and many companies are grabbing hold of this sucker and seeing where it takes them. Most notable supporters in this area are companies like RIM (BlackBerry), Bluedot Solutions, HighJump, DSI and tons more. It’s going to be huge.
That’s all for now. Off to the airport. Will post more from BlackBerry if I get a chance.
