Category Archives: Technology

More Articles Published Elsewhere

03 Monday Jul 2017

Posted by in chatbots, Cloud, General, Oracle, Technology

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So it has been a busy week in terms of seeing articles published that I’ve at least contributed to. It’s funny the gap between writing and publishing can be several weeks. So whilst we’re thinking about new things we see the twitter pickup etc or work several weeks old.

Anyway, first up was a contribution to Leon Smiers‘ blog on integrating chatbots. The latest in a series of excellent blog posts looking at  the capabilities a chatbot solution needs etc. The latest post is about integration, hence my contribution. My contributions to the blog series go back to the conversations Leon and I had whilst at the Oracle Partner event earlier this year. Since then, I have helped Leon by providing a critical eye and offering suggestions.

The big event, has been to have an article published on Oracle Technology Network(OTN). This is a bit of an honour as we where invited to write. My piece can be found at here. It is actually a part of a pair of articles written for OTN. With article was written by Luis Weir, and is the parent article about API management.

My article came about as a result several discussions with Luis whilst travelling to and from a client about the relationship between between microservice registries, load balancers and API Gateways. Particularly as API Gateways have a natural relationship with microservices. I’ll say no more, go read the article.

Mindmaps Update

31 Wednesday May 2017

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mindmap-4I have relocated my mindmaps to a new location – WiseMapping which presents the maps in a far more consumable manner than XMind. I’ve setup the links to now bounce through bitly so if things move again the links wont break. The maps available can be found using the following links:

OracleCode London 2017

21 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by in General, Oracle, Technology

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My colleague & boss Ace Director Luis Weir and I were invited to present at Thursday 20th’s Oracle Code London.

oracle_codeThe request to present came late as we where needed to cover someone who had to cancel (not that we aren’t grateful for the opportunity). This did mean getting the presentation together was a little bit of a scramble, unfortunately I missed a couple of sessions as I needed to assemble an environment, work out how I wanted to explain the point Luis’ slides where communicating as this was the first time presenting with Luis as a double act. Add to that address the day to day work demands.

Despite these challenges, I think the presentation went very smoothly (and we’re looking forward to receiving the feedback). The slides can be found here …

I did catch a few presentations, including the keynote by Adam Bien, Tim Hall‘s presentation on exposing databases using REST services, Lucas Jemella‘s microservices and eventing backbone and finally CQRS by Sebastian Daschner. All presentations  where all top notch, loaded with useful information.  I’ve been fortunate to see both Lucas and Tim presenting before so knew I would in for a really good presentations.  So if you ever want to know about Oracle DB stuff with practical honest insights I’d recommend looking Tim up.  Like wise in the middleware space for Lucas.

Seeing the presentations and different presenting styles was interesting. Those presenters with a Java Rockstar background vs those from an Oracle Ace background. The Java guys taking a very minimalist (if any) slides and all code / demo – but blink and you’ll miss it, where as the Ace community (of which I am fortunate enough to be a member) with slides that are often visually very strong and still supported by demos.

Whilst I’ve attended Oracle Open World, I’ve not yet seen the parrallel Java One conference in San Francisco. That said, the feel of the day’s event (and presumably the goal) is what I’d expect Java One to be like. I have in the past attended similar RedHat events, whilst the venue has a similar feel (not unsurprising as both have used SkillsMatter venues), what was different between the Oracle and RedHat events was that the atmosphere felt a lot friendlier and communial at Oracle Code. This maybe down in part to the fact that I know more of the people both Aces and Oracle employees, although that can’t be the only reason as when I was involved in the RedHat environment I had known senior people within the organisation and encountered presenters.

My last observation, more technical is the fact that JavaEE was mentioned a lot more than I’d expected, even those much maligned EJBs got a mention. Is JavaEE making a reassurgence?

So, if you get a chance to attend OracleCode – as an architect or developer I’d recommend that you take the opportunity. Whilst Devox maybe bigger with the really big name speakers, the day was both informative, engaging and rewarding.

25-04-17 UPDATE: Oracle have just made all the OracleCode London sessions available on YouTube here, and our session specifically here.

Journey to the Clouds with UKOUG

26 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by in Cloud, General, Technology

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I recently along with several colleagues presented at the UKOUG event called Journey to the Cloud.  I thought I’d share the slides from the event. These reflect the genera technical strategic thinking and factors that need to be taken on board when adopting a cloud approach. Although these slides focus on an Oracle ecosystem, they could be easily adapted to any contentxt.

 

Building Microservices

18 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by in Books, General, mindmap, Technology

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When I read a technical book from cover to cover I usually build a mind map so that I can use it as a memory jogger in the future if I need to return to get key points such as arguments or facts. With the ferstive break I have had time to finish reading Sam Newman’s Building Microservices. The following is a static image, but clicking on it can take you the dynamic site provided through WiseMapping, it does take a moment or two as the map is large (or click here).

microservices

Many of the points made in this excellent book are true to software design and development generally, but given a Microservices spin. For example, monitoring and security should be incorporated into any good design.

 

Packt Book Promotion

18 Sunday Dec 2016

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Packt’s Christmas Book promotion has been launched again – all books or videos for $5 = £4.74

5dollar2016-home-front

This includes the pre-order of our book (Implementing Oracle Cloud Integration), which will be out in a matter of weeks now.

 

UKOUG Tech16 Presentation Slides, Apex & Oracle Cloud

15 Thursday Dec 2016

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My presentation for UKOUG Tech 16 can be seen by following the link – Introduction to SOA CS. or see below   It was a tremendous 4 days (if you include the Tech stream’s Super Sunday).  If you are a UKOUG member and didn’t make it to the conference I’d look out for the material to be become available.

Whilst I’m not a big Apex fan (stitching business logic into the persistence layer feels wrong to a middleware person), i did attend the keynote session which covered Apex’s history and future direction, and there are some very exiciting things coming and if everything materialises as I understand it then some big steps to getting developers engaged with Oracle cloud offerings.

Oracle has done a lot of work on the middleware layer with apps container (using common Docker configurations without needing to worry about Docker), Kafka, Node.js and others to engage developers and provide the means to offer a polyglot microservices platform that is not just attractive to  the traditional Oracle customer base but also those wanting the middle ground of supported open source. What Oracle are missing is the means to get developers trying the technology and being creative with it. Amazon and Red Hat have got this by offering limited footprints for a long time. Oracle offer 30 day trials which is fine to do a project sponsored PoC. But to hook grass roots users you need a lengthy period where people in spare time can built some cool/geeky solutions.

Now this maybe down to the fact that Oracle cloud is built on their Exa machines with clever on silicon security features, and Oracle can’t manufacture it quick enough. Whereas other cloud providers work with largely commodity components. But if they want to challenge Amazon as Ellison says they need to change this.

 

UKOUG Oracle Scene – Another Article Published

16 Wednesday Nov 2016

Posted by in Cloud, General, Oracle, Technology

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The latest edition of the UK Oracle User Group (UKOUG) Oracle Scene Journal is out now with another article from me, in addition to some great content from other contributors. This article builds upon and updates an article previously published in the Oracle Apps User Group about 18 months ago. We updated and republished as part of the run up to the UKOUG special Event in March next year which will be fully announced at the conference in a couple of weeks. You can see it here Oracle Scene Edition 62 – Journey to the Cloud

 

 

Oracle 2 Minute Tech Tip

06 Sunday Nov 2016

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The Oracle Technology Network (OTN) promote/encourage people to submit short videos as 2 minute tech tips – you can check my 1st attempt out …

OTN Appreciation Day : OMCS Push Listeners

11 Tuesday Oct 2016

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The background to this post, and the OTN Appreciation Day can be seen at Oracle-Base.

Oracle Messaging Cloud Service (OMCS) is I think an overlooked gem of Oracle iPaaS portfolio.  I say this as it offers a JMS 1.1 compliant Java library but at the same time provides a means through which integration through REST APIs can be performed.  This means it is possible to pretty transparently connect legacy JMS based integrations with new REST based products.  The magic sauce (and therefore my favourite feature) is the concept of the Push Listener. Through the REST API it is possible to register a REST URL as a target for queues and topics to have messages sent to. Once registered when a message appears on the queue or topic it will get passed on as a REST call. Whilst is is possible to do with with a little bit of Java code. the Push Listener simplifies the job to a REST call with a bit of XML configuration.

There is one small challenge that makes the integration completely transparent to the recipient of the PushListener today, and that is it currently demands that authentication process take place on initial contact. This is not a complicated or challenging thing to address, but does require a tiny bit of code to address.