user group | Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog

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magazine, OAUG, Oracle, OUG, Scene, user group

We’ve just passed the submission deadline for the next edition of Oracle Scene. So the submitted articles have been shared with the review team. I have to admit, I look forward the week after the deadline, a chance to read the raw articles before all the art work is applied, layout applied etc.

Each article teaches you something new and you’re reminded just how big the Oracle ecosystem is (something that is easy to forget when you’re working day to day in your own specialism).

The review process does throw up the odd bump – the occasional article that reads more like an Infomercial (which usually result in a recommendation not to include) and occasionally the article where you’re not entirely sure what the author is trying to get across. But these later scenarios, the reviewers will make suggestions on how to refine a submission.

The sense of joy and reward in reviewing is easily beaten by submitting an article and seeing it published and feeling the published article in printed form. Don’t just take my word for it – Martin Widlake writes about it on his blog here.

I os58cover ‘ve had 1 proper article in Oracle Scene here and a couple of smaller pieces such as book reviews included. The reward of being published can only be topped by your article being used to inform the cover art. I have been fortunate enough to have achieved that with an article for the Oracle Apps User Group (OAUG) with an article called Journey To The Cloud. The only down side is OAUG are more restrictive on access, and you have to be a member to see the article.

So go on, write an article – I hope that i’ll be reviewing it in the near future.

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Oracle, OUG, SIG, user group

I am fortunate enough to have an employer who promotes the idea of community participation both internally but also with communities relating to our technology vendors such as Oracle. As a result manage our membership of the UK Oracle User Group.

The original motivation for membership was that membership effectively paid for attendance to the big annual conferences, given the chance of attending Oracle Open World was a lot less likely.

In addition to the conference opportunity, part of our membership is the opportunity to participate in Special Interest Group (SIG) sessions. There are SIGs covering different aspects of Oracle’s portfolio from middleware and development technologies (my specialisms) through to Supply Chain and JD Edwards and obviously database tech. I have to admit I didn’t have great expectations when I attended my first SIG. But actually the first SIG and subsequent ones I have attended have been gold mines of useful information. The sessions cover a range of topics and the presentations come from customers, partners as well as Oracle and are typically very conversational as a result you pickup insight into a lot of practical aspects not just theory as you’d commonly get in say a training session.

As Oracle support the SIGs by having representation at the SIGs which means there is potential opportunities to pick an SME’s brains – 15 minutes of free consultancy over coffee (something that doesn’t come often with Oracle 😉 ). Not to mention time given in the day to chew the fat with partners and other customers. For example on my 2nd SIG session I ended up discussing experiences of working with Packt Publishing with an Oracle Partner (not necessarily directly related, but interesting to see what the experience was like from an author’s perspective).

I know from talking with other colleagues where I work who have attended SIGs have come away feeling that it was a day well used (and have also encouraged other to participate). It would also seem that many people who attend also participate on a regular basis suggesting they to get a lot out of the sessions (all lending towards a bit of a community spirit as well).

Based on my experiences, and those shared with me I would strongly recommend finding an excuse (or making the time as if is for me) to get out of the office a take advantage of your membership (or even joining UKOUG). Justify it as cheap training if need be; but getting yourself along to one of Oracle’s offices (who lend their facilities to support the user group) in London, Reading or Solihull I’m sure you’ll find it will be very worthwhile even if the travel is a bit of a bind.

I would also like to take the time to thank people like Simon Haslam at Veriton who put their time and effort in organising their particular SIG sessions.