Siebel Essentials

Mother's Little Helper: BI Publisher Template Viewer

2012-01-26T09:00:00.000+01:00

In the times of BIP 11g, online layout editing and frolicking free data modeling, a wee little tool is almost forgotten: The BI Publisher Template Viewer. Never heard of it? Well, read on then...

The template viewer is a handy little tool installed along the BI Publisher Desktop (aka Word Add-In or Template Builder). It's main purpose is to assist in debugging non-RTF templates such as eText or Excel templates but it can be used for any other template type (excluding the new .xpt templates built using the 11g online editor).

If you launch it from the respective Start menu item on your Windows workstation, it presents itself as a simple Java application.

The usage is plain simple, for example:

To debug a template you use the Browse... button to specify a working directory. The directory must contain at least one sample XML file and at least one template file. You could give it a first try with the sample folders delivered with the BI Publisher Desktop.
In the Data window, select the sample XML file to use.
In the Template window, select the template to use.
Specify an output format and locale and click the Start Processing button.

Depending on the log level (see below), verbose output is generated and finally the document viewer (such as Adobe Acrobat Reader) is launched to display the generated output document. Of course, errors are displayed in the output window if the template is buggy.

The debug level and report parameters can be set in the Setting (Default) tab:

In the above example, the log level is set to STATEMENT (Maximum Log).

have a nice day

@lex

Oracle UPK Pre-Built Content

2012-01-23T09:00:00.000+01:00

Recently, I visited the User Productivity Kit and Tutor product pack on Oracle's Software Delivery Cloud (aka E-Delivery) and was surprised by the great variety of available and ready-to-use UPKs (User Productivity Kits) produced by Oracle and provided to their customers.

The official product name is Oracle UPK Pre-Built Content. On the Oracle web site, you can find data sheets for all UPKs produced so far.

Here is a short but nonetheless impressive list of UPK Pre-Built Content by applications:

Oracle E-Business Suite 12.1 and 12
Oracle EPM 11.1.2 - Crystal Ball
Hyperion Financial Management Plus 11.1.2
Hyperion Planning Plus 11.1.2
Oracle Agile 9.3.1 and 9.3
JD Edwards World A9.2 and A9.1
JD Edwards EnterpriseOne 9.0, 8.12 and 8.11
Peoplesoft 9.1, 9.0, 8.9 and 8.8
PeopleTools 8.x
Siebel CRM 8.1 and 8.0
Demantra 7.3 and 7.1.1
Oracle Fusion Applications 11.1.1.5

The Siebel 8.1 package for example contains the following UPKs:

Order Management
Sales
Territory Management
Loyalty
Service
Marketing
Partner Manager
Oracle Customer Hub
Fundamentals

This represents a vast amount of information made public by the good people at Oracle. It is up to us to leverage these UPKs either for self-study or as a starting point to develop our own UPKs. In addition it is a valuable resource for those interested in Oracle applications standard business processes and functionality.

To download the UPKs, log on to E-Delivery as usual. Then navigate to the User Productivity Kit and Tutor product pack (select any platform). Click on the desired application package and download the individual UPKs as zip files to your local drive.

After unzipping the archive, navigate to the Publish/PlayerPackage directory and launch the play.exe file.

The UPK player starts and you can now select the modules.

The UPK Player with the Siebel 8.1 Customer Hub modules

UPK allows you to use the modules in various modes such as "See It", "Try It", "Know It?" or "Do It" as well as print a document from the module.

Screenshot of the Siebel 8.1 Customer Hub UPK.

If you're interested in how to create UPKs, you can download the product itself and get started here.
A nice introduction to Oracle UPK can be found here.

have a nice day

@lex

BI Publisher Online Reports in Siebel CRM - Follow Up

2012-01-19T09:00:00.000+01:00

This is a follow-up post on an article I wrote last summer about enabling a Siebel BI Publisher report for online viewing and displaying it in the Siebel CRM Web Client using the Portal Framework and symbolic URLs.

The article didn't go into too much detail on the symbolic URL configuration itself. As I demonstrated this earlier this month during a BI Publisher training class, I thought it worthwhile to deliver this information.

It might be a good idea to review the original article before reading further to get the general idea.

From the link to the BIP report, we can construct the arguments for the symbolic URL. One of the main issues is to provide a single-sign-on mechanism so that the end user does not have to re-enter her or his credentials again. The following screenshot shows the full set of symbolic URL arguments to display a BI Publisher report in a portal applet.

Click to enlarge

For your convenience here is the full set in clear text.

The base URL is similar to the following:

http://biphost/xmlpserver/SiebelCRMReports/OpptyOnline/OpptyOnline.xdo

The first five arguments (highlighted in the screenshot above) serve to implement the single-sign-on mechanism and can be used to integrate any BIP web page in Siebel CRM.

PreloadURL (Command): http://biphost/xmlpserver/login.jsp
PreloadURLPerSession (Command): True
anyname (Command): PostRequest
id (Field): BIPUser
passwd (Field): BIPPassword

The following set of arguments are generic to BIP and documented:

_xpt (Constant): 0
_xdo (Constant): (Path to .xdo file)
_xt (Constant): (Name of the default BIP Template)
_xf (Constant): (default output format such as pdf or html)
_xmode (Constant): (Controls the visual appearance; 2 is "without header")

The remaining arguments allow to control the value for the parameters passed to the BIP Data Service. They could be also passed from profile attributes.

NamedSearchSpec (Constant): (Name of a predefined query preceded by the text length and an asterisk; 0* means empty string)
SearchSpec (Constant): (search specification)
OutputIntObjectName (Constant): (name of an integration object)
ViewMode (Constant): (example: 9*Sales Rep)
LoginID (Profile Attribute): Me.Id

Note: Depending on the requirements it might not be necessary to provide all BIP Data Service parameters as they have default values in the BIP report definition.

And this is the result, BIP enlightenment in Siebel CRM using the Online Analyzer for opportunity data.

have a nice day

@lex

News from the Cloud

2012-01-16T09:00:00.000+01:00

After announcing the Oracle Public Cloud on Oracle OpenWorld 2011, the respective web pages have been providing only conceptual information about Oracle's cloud offerings such as Database, Java, APEX or Fusion CRM and Fusion HCM.

This has changed. Just recently, Oracle opened the site for registration. When you click the Register for Access button, you are prompted to log in with your oracle.com account. In the registration form, Oracle states that they "...will be provisioning Java and Database services in batches over the next months. Our Oracle Fusion Application services will be made available shortly after that."

So it seems that 2012 will really be an interesting year for Oracle-ites.

have a nice day

@lex

Oracle Customer Hub aka Siebel UCM 8.2

2012-01-12T09:00:00.000+01:00

Don't be fooled by the numbers...

This week I am preparing to deliver the Oracle Customer Hub (Siebel 8.2 UCM) training course. As Siebel 8.2.2 has been recently released, there is a significant potential for confusion regarding release numbers (lots of 8s and 2s).

Siebel 8.2 UCM (aka Oracle Customer Hub) is part of the Oracle Master Data Management solution offering and has been shipped in 2010. It is therefore built on top of the Siebel CRM 8.1.1 code line.

With Siebel CRM 8.2.2, a new version of Siebel UCM is available which is still named Siebel 8.2 UCM. The "What's New..." chapter in the 8.2.2. bookshelf guide on Oracle Customer Hub is a good starting point - as usual - to find out more about the latest Siebel UCM features.

To find out more about Oracle's Master Data Management strategy, click here.

have a nice day

@lex

Welcome back to BIP

2012-01-09T09:00:00.000+01:00

Oh my, another year has begun. I am sure it will be full with excitement around the main topics of this blog as have been the previous ones. Welcome back dear readers.

After a well deserved break, I start the new work year with delivering the Siebel 8.1.x BI Publisher course as a Live Virtual Class.

During this course, I often reference the following useful online resources to increase the general knowledge about "all things BIP" (hat tip and Happy New Year to Tim). A good reason to re-post them, so here we go:

Tim Dexter’s Blog
Kanichiro Nishida’s Blog
Ike Wiggins’ Blog
OTN Page for BI Publisher
BIP Forum
BIP Demo Library
BIP Youtube Channel
Deutsche BI Publisher Community (German)
BIP User Guide (online version)

have a nice day

@lex

Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year!

2011-12-23T09:00:00.000+01:00

It's Christmas time again in many parts of the world, so Siebel Essentials takes a break. It would be a pleasure to welcome you back in January 2012 for new high quality postings around and about Siebel CRM, Oracle BI and Oracle Fusion Applications.

Thank You for the great support!

I wish you a peaceful holiday season and a splendid New Year 2012.

have a nice day

@lex

Results are in: The Siebel Essentials Poll

2011-12-22T09:00:00.000+01:00

Oracle Product Management, are you reading this?

Some weeks ago, I thought it would be a good idea to solicit from the readership of this blog which Siebel CRM modules they use, that is which modules are in use in their Siebel CRM projects.

The feedback was very good with 128 votes cast. Thanks to all who took their time to check the boxes.

Without further ado, here are the results:

Let's take a few minutes to interpret the results for each module (under the assumption that all votes are valid, which I cannot guarantee):

Assignment Manager: Used in 44% of projects. Not as much as I would have expected but nonetheless the figure means, that there is a high probability you need some AM skills in your next project.

Audit Trail: 63% of Oracle Siebel customers use it. That is almost 2 projects in 3.

Siebel Remote: With ubiquitous internet access looming at every corner, the Mobile Web Client is still going somewhat strong with 17% coverage. Of course, Siebel Remote should have 100% because it is used to extract local developer databases ;-)

Data Validation Manager: A powerful tool, used by more than 50% of the projects.

State Model: 60%, very good score for this "oldie".

Personalization: As a consultant, you should be prepared to use this interesting module, because there is a 48% likelihood that your customer uses it.

Workflow (head on with Scripting): Siebel Workflow is "the" standard to for Siebel automation. Used by Oracle engineering and 85% of its customers alike (The remaining 15% are maybe not aware that they use it).

Task UI: A somewhat low adoption rate with only roughly a fourth of projects deploying it.

Browser Script: 60% usage, hopefully only to do stuff you can't accomplish with a nice workflow or server-side business service.

Server Script: With 85% adoption, very close to Workflow. Interesting to interpret here that 15% of all Siebel CRM projects are scriptless, which asks for further investigation.

Have a nice day

@lex

Siebel Server Manager Command Line Goodies

2011-12-19T09:00:00.000+01:00

Many of us are fans of the Siebel Server Manager command line tool which goes by the name of srvrmgr (brought to you by the knights who don't use vowels).

Apart from the usual commands issued at the command line, there are two lesser known ones which I would like to share with you in the following post.

1. Synchronize batch components from the command line

After a fresh install of a Siebel database and after creating or modifying batch component definitions, administrators must ensure that the data residing in the siebns.dat file (managed by the Siebel Gateway Name Server) is synchronized with data in the S_SRM_ACTION and S_SRM_ACT_PARAM tables in the Siebel database. This is typically accomplished by clicking the Synchronize button in the Synchronize view of the Administration - Server Configuration screen in the Siebel Web Client.

For administrators who want to automate the task using a script, you can issue the following command at the srvrmgr prompt:

sync comps

or alternatively

synchronize components

As a prerequisite you have to set the environment variable SIEBEL_DEBUG_FLAGS to a value of 16 (ideally as part of the script). Otherwise srvrmgr will just say "Synchronize is not available...".

2. Backup the siebns.dat file

In order to avoid trouble arising from corrupted siebns.dat files, we should create backup copies regularly and before each major modification of the Enterprise configuration.

The following command at the srvrmgr prompt allows us to create a backup copy of siebns.dat and specify a name for the new file. If the name is omitted, the file name will contain the current timestamp.

backup nameserver [filename]

have a nice day

@lex

Elementary Keys

2011-12-15T09:00:00.000+01:00

I often wonder how 'IT Professionals' get away with what they do without being able to execute the simplest computer tasks. Seeing a 200$/hour consultant fiddling with the mouse cursor, repeatedly missing keys and taking seemingly endless minutes just to log in to a Siebel application makes me cringe.

So I decided to post the obvious: Some basic keystrokes which every IT pro should be able to reproduce. This is just a basic list, please feel free to use the comments to expand it.

1. Highlighting Text

If a text appears like this

...then the word surrounded by a (usually) blue box has been highlighted. There is no need to highlight it again. Here is how you highlight text (applies to most applications and operating systems).

Drag the mouse cursor across the text.
Double-click a word to highlight the entire word.
Triple-click anywhere in a paragraph to highlight the entire paragraph.
To highlight a line of text, use the Home key to position the cursor before the first character, then press SHIFT + End.

2. Copy and Paste

I confess: "I am a PC", and on a PC you use CTRL+C to copy the highlighted text into your computer's clipboard. Use CTRL+V to paste the text where your cursor is currently located. I feel sad having to post this publicly but not using copy and paste has ruined too many evenings and weekends.

3. Switching between application windows

On Windows, the ALT+TAB key combination should replace ALL fiddling and fumbling across the task bar.

To switch between tabs (e.g in your browser or even Siebel Tools), use CTRL+TAB.

The TAB key in general should be used to navigate between fields in a form or list.

Combine them with the SHIFT key to navigate in reverse order (you probably have to play a musical instrument to be able to do that ;-)

4. Windows Magic

If your keyboard has a Windows key, then you should try to memorize the following combos:

Windows + D: Show the Desktop
Windows + M: Minimize all windows (shows the Desktop as well)
Windows + E: Open Windows Explorer

Some more here. As said above, please use the comments to add your tips for more efficiency at the workplace ;-).

5. Finally, typing less is more (spare time, that is)

Simple statistics shows that the more you type, the more errors you make (I wrote two books, so I know what I am talking about ;-). Have you ever spent an evening or a whole weekend looking for a missing semi-colon or a space where there shouldn't be any? I know I have.

The answer is: Type Less! For example, you can use copy and paste or when you enter a query you can use wildcards. Or when typing an URL in a browser, you don't need the http://. Most modern apps - including Siebel - support automatic completion of text, etc. Too simple? Good for you, but for some reason you continued to read until here.

have a nice day

@lex

DAC Execution Plan Visualizations

2011-12-12T09:00:00.000+01:00

Have you ever seen or even used the charts featured in the DAC client?

They remind me so much of my early days as a Java servlet programmer (back in the 90s) so that I found it worthwhile to share them with you in a wave of nostalgia.

When you right-click an execution plan in DAC's Execute view you find the Get Run information menu which allows you to select five different "reports". One is the DAC server log file, the second is a huge HTML report and the three below are graphical visualizations of the execution plan's tasks.

Let's have a look at the first one, the task chart. When you select a chart, you are prompted to enter the time interval, I chose 60 seconds for a rather short execution plan. The task chart is in fact a gantt chart which allows you to see when the task was beginning to be runnable (yellow bar) and actually started running (blue bar). It is a good way to check for tasks which might run but are kept runnable (or queued) maybe because of the maximum parallel tasks per Informatica server is a bit low (default is 10 tasks per server in parallel).

The phase chart displays a gantt diagram for the task phases:

The "graph..." is the only interactive chart in this group, allowing you to select four task states (Completed, Runnable, Pending and Running).

have a nice chart

@lex

Oracle BI Applications Version Overview (Updated)

2011-12-08T09:00:00.000+01:00

Update: Always good when Oracle colleagues are also blog readers. Thanks to Johan for pointing out the following important document regarding the end of support for Informatica 8.x on Dec, 31st 2011.

Document 1346738.1 on My Oracle Support contains detailed information for customers who currently use Informatica 8 or below. In short, depending on the service level, customers must either upgrade to the latest Oracle BI Application version (which uses Informatica 9.0.1 HF 2 out-of-the box) or upgrade their informatica software to 9.0.1 HF 2. (End of update).

I recently delivered one of my favorite courses, namely Oracle BI Applications 7.9: Develop a Data Warehouse. During class I discussed the various versions that have been shipped by Oracle since the Siebel acquisition.

As a result of the discussion we had a nice overview of the OBI Apps versions, the accompanying OBIEE platform version, the Informatica version (not dealing with Oracle Data Integrator at the moment) and the DAC version. I verified the list against the official Oracle documentation but please let me know - using the comments - if you find a number to be wrong.

Without further ado, here is the list for your convenience:

have a nice day

@lex

Siebel Modules Poll: Which of these do You use?

2011-12-05T09:00:00.000+01:00

I often deliver Siebel CRM training to people who have spent years in one or more Siebel projects. What I like most in meeting them is that they already know about Siebel features and how they are used at customer sites. In the classroom, I often do a short poll when I talk about e.g. State Model whether it is used in the project and if so, what are the typical requirements that led to the decision to use exactly that module.

So I thought, this would make a nice topic for a small poll (haven't had a poll for a long time now on Siebel Essentials, have we?).

So if you have a few seconds, please visit the poll gadget in the upper right area of this page and select the Siebel Modules that are in use in one of your projects.

Have a nice poll

@lex

Siebel CRM 8.2.2 Fly-by video series

2011-12-01T09:00:00.000+01:00

Please stand up and give Richard - fellow Siebelian and instructor - a hand for taking the time and effort to transport Siebel knowledge in the form of short videos.

Richard has already posted several fly-by videos on his screencast library. He kindly agreed that I share this content with you. Here are the links to the highly recommended videos he created for Siebel CRM 8.2.2:

Siebel CRM 8.2.2 Task UI Enhancements
Siebel CRM 8.2.2. State Model Enhancements
Siebel CRM 8.2.2 Effective Dating Introduction
Siebel CRM 8.2.2 Effective Dating - Child Business Components
Siebel CRM 8.2.2 Effective Dating - Extending to other business components
Siebel Public Sector 8.2.2 - Case Approval Templates and Inbox

Thank You Richard for this great contribution.

have a nice day

@lex

InvisibleStudio: An IDE for CRM Desktop

2011-11-28T09:00:00.000+01:00

The makers of CRM Desktop for Oracle Siebel CRM (aka OnPremise), CRM OnDemand and Fusion Applications, invisibleCRM has recently announced InvisibleStudio, an IDE for customizing the CRM Desktop application.

The announcement is accompanied by a sigh of relief from the developer community who has so far been left with manual editing of a bunch of XML files for example to add a new field.

InvisibleStudio is a .NET (4.0) application and is based on the SharpDevelop IDE. One of the main and much anticipated features is the visual layout editor for CRM Desktop forms which allows graphical editing of forms instead of having to manipulate the XML files manually.

InvisibleStudio UI Designer

A wizard supports the import of CRM Desktop packages as projects into InvisibleStudio. After modifying the configuration, the developer can run the project with a single click and verify the changes in MS Outlook. All files are validated before launching Outlook in test mode, so many errors can be captured and reported beforehand.

The built-in XML editor features auto-suggest and smart highlighting as well as a decent syntax check and XSD validation. The XML editor allows direct editing of the forms XML files as well as all other XML files within the CRM Desktop package.

InvisibleStudio XML Editor

Version 1 of InvisibleStudio is planned for Q4 2011 and will support Siebel CRM OnPremise and OnDemand. Further versions will support Oracle Fusion Applications as well.

For further (and pricing) information, please contact invisibleCRM.

have a nice day

@lex

Siebel Patches, MR Guides, ACRs, etc

2011-11-24T09:00:00.000+01:00

Installing Siebel CRM does not end after the so called base install of, say version 8.1.1.0. Oracle has found a somewhat half-yearly rhythm of releasing patch sets for Siebel CRM (the current at the time of writing being 8.1.1.6).

Patch sets are typically made available only to paying customers via My Oracle Support. Administrators and developers must be aware of the changes and additional effort that go along with each patch. This post's intention is to clarify things a bit by laying out the mandatory reading and other sources of information.

Before blindly downloading the patch set and installing it, it is mandatory to read the accompanying document, also known as Maintenance Release (MR) Guide. This is either a cumulative document or one document per patch (starting with 8.1.1.5, Oracle put the information in single documents). The MR Guide contains the Release Notes (known issues) for the patch as well as an overview of all so called quick fixes (QF) contained in the fix pack (which is another name for patch set).

Of course, the MR Guide specifies the enhancements and updates made to Siebel CRM functionality in the specific fix pack. The enhancements and new features are packaged into so called ACRs, an acronym which is mostly translated as "Advanced Change Request" (whoever knows what ACR really means, please comment). These ACRs are bundles of .sif files, workflow XML files and seed data which must be imported manually into the development environment by following the instructions in the MR Guide.

Because of the possibility of conflicts between customer configurations and changes made by Oracle engineering, especially in the workflow area, the implications of applying ACRs must be thoroughly evaluated and tested. This often means a significant amount of effort.

The MR Guide furthermore contains a list of resolved change requests (aka bugs) and installation instructions for the patch set itself.

It might also be very enlightening to check on the following sources of information:

Readme file: Not always but often the Readme file accompanying the download files contains some valuable information. That is especially the case for Siebel 8.2.2 where a quick look into the readme file puts all speculation about the target customer group to an end.

System Requirements and Supported Platforms: Some versions of Siebel CRM bring along changes in the support of third party software and operating systems. Therefore it is always good to peek into the SR&SP guide so you don't get caught by surprise.

Siebel Bookshelf: The guides are updated with each patch set and a look into the "What's New..." chapter or a (google) search for the patch version inside the bookshelf is never a bad idea. Impress your peers with your insight at the next meeting ;-)

Learning Library: Sometimes, tutorials or demos on new Siebel functionality are made publicly available in Oracle's Learning Library, a free source of self-study materials. For example, you can find an overview of the changes in Siebel 8.2.2 installation (now uses Oracle Universal Installer (OUI) for server side software) in the Learning Library.

Oracle University Knowledge Center: Cheap (or even free for partners) online training courses on new features of Siebel CRM are made available on Oracle's iLearning portal. Here is an example: Siebel 8.1.x COM: What's New in Product Configurator.

have a nice day

@lex

More on the CanInvokeMethod Applet User Property

2011-11-21T09:00:00.000+01:00

This has been written in a taxi while sitting through a traffic jam in Utrecht. Nevertheless the content should apply to all Siebel situations ;-)

From fellow instructor Michael, I got a requirement as follows:

Allow only certain users (or groups of users) to change multiple records in selected list applets.

We all know and love the Change Records feature in Siebel CRM which allows us to rapidly update up to four fields of all selected records in one go.

To limit access to this feature, it might be a good idea to deactivate the Change Records item in the Edit menu when the user is in a group which doesn't allow mass updates.

Deactivating menu items or buttons works fine through the CanInvokeMethod user property of the applet and groups of users can be easily defined using Responsibilities.

So here is how it goes:

1. Create a responsibility and assign users

This is really straightforward, so not laid out in detail here. We create a new responsibility named ABC_NO_CHANGE_RECORD and assign all users who shouldn't be allowed to use the Change Records feature. It is not necessesary to add views to the responsibility.

2. Set the CanInvokeMethod user property

For evaluation purposes, I choose the SIS Account List Applet. The following should work with all list applets although there could be surprises with specialized classes as usual ;-)

Create a new user property named CanInvokeMethod: ChangeRecords and set the following value:

GetProfileAttrAsList("Me.Responsibilities") NOT LIKE "*ABC_NO_CHANGE_RECORD*"

This will enable all menu items or buttons which expose the ChangeRecords method only when the ABC_NO_CHANGE_RECORD responsibility is NOT in the current user's list of responsibilites. The GetProfileAttrAsList() function works with multi value fields and returns a comma separated list of the field's values.

After compiling the applet, we can run a test with a demo user who has the aforementioned new responsibility. As we can see in the screenshot below, the Change Records item in the Edit menu is inactive.

An interesting fact is that the applet user property influences all menu items or buttons of the application even when they are not directly related to the applet. Such is the case with the Change Records item of the Edit menu which is now deactivated for all users who have the ABC_NO_CHANGE_RECORDS responsibility.

Thanks to Michael for the example.

have a nice day

@lex

State Model Enhancements in Siebel CRM 8.2.2

2011-11-17T09:00:00.000+01:00

One of the more general enhancements in Siebel 8.2.2 are found in the good ol' State Model realm. Before you read any further and take hasty decisions about an upgrade, please ensure that you understand Oracle's recommendations for using release 8.2.2.

The announcement of innovation packs for 2012 makes it likely that this functionality will also be made available in version 8.1.1 in the mid-term future (a guess of my own, no official record from Oracle at the moment).

There are three major enhancements to State Models in 8.2.2, namely:

Categories
No Invoke Method
Child Operation Restrictions

Let's have a closer look:

The new Categories sub-view allows administrators to create arbitrary categories. They can be used to categorize states in the States view (see screenshot below). After doing so, you can specify a "From Category" and a "To Category" in the Transitions view. This is especially useful if you have larger LOVs and general groups of values transitioning to other groups.

The No Invoke Method column is also new in 8.2.2 and allows to specify a comma separated list of methods which can not be invoked (that is buttons and menu items invoking the command will be greyed out) when the field controlled by the State Model has the specified value (or state).

Child Operation Restrictions is a new list applet in the States view and allows to specify a (State Model enabled) child BC and Link. For each child BC, the state of the field can control whether the child records can be deleted, updated or inserted or not. The Child Operation Restrictions can also work on methods invoked using the new No Invoke Method column.

The following screenshot shows a portion of the new States view with the Categories view tab, the Category Name and No Invoke Method column as well as eht Child Operation Restriction applet highlighted.

The next screenshot shows my favorite scenario for State Models, Expense Reports. The Status LOV is controlled by a sample State Model which I modified to use the new categories feature. The current state is Approved which I added to the "Manager" category. The next possible values shown in the dropdown list all belong to the "Operations" category. I did not have to (and was not allowed to) specify individual state transitions (e.g from Approved to Paid).

have a nice day

@lex

Siebel CRM Patchset 8.1.1.6

2011-11-14T09:00:00.000+01:00

As announced earlier on this blog, Oracle has released Siebel CRM Patchset 8.1.1.6 on My Oracle Support. Customers who use the modules mentioned below might find it interesting enough to download and evaluate.

ACR 560 provides support for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010, including the new AutoDiscover feature for Siebel Server Synch for Exchange (SSSE).
ACR 603 enhances Siebel Search (integration with Oracle Secure Enterprise Search) by providing support for indexing using HTTP or FTP. More information on Siebel Search enhancements in 8.1.1.6 can be found in the bookshelf guide.
ACR 628 Provides support for Microsoft Offfice 2010
ACR 700 Certifies Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2
ACR 719A Provides the following enhancements for Siebel Reports (with BI Publisher): SSL support and enhancements to the My Reports View.
ACR 753 Provides support for HP-UX Apache 3.0.3
ACR 754 Provides support for Oracle HTTP Server 11g

have a nice day

@lex

Fusion Applications Related Training - An Attempted List

2011-11-10T09:00:00.000+01:00

As promised earlier on this blog, here is a list of trainings for each individual building block of Oracle Fusion Applications.

The selection of modules is based on the official Oracle Fusion Application documentation and book list. This post is an attempt to list available Oracle University (in-class, online and free through Oracle Learning Library) and third-party training opportunities for interested technicians. It seems impossible to become an expert in every single product area but I hope the list serves as a starting point for your specialization.

Comments are most welcome as usual.

1. Core Application Technology and Programming

Here we find the Application Development Framework (ADF), JDeveloper, Java and - the official scripting language of Fusion Apps - Groovy. The following training modules serve to get a grip on these technologies.

The above courses apply for those who expect to dive deeper into JDeveloper as part of their developer role in Fusion Application on premise deployments.

2. Web Server Tier

Oracle Fusion Applications use Oracle WebCenter to provide portal functionality and of course rely on the Oracle HTTP Server. Here are some training courses which give you insight into these technologies:

3. Business Intelligence

Oracle BI EE 11g is an integral part of Oracle Fusion Applications. Analytics, Essbase, RTD and BI Publisher are just everywhere in the apps. So a solid training in OBIEE 11g is a must for the aspiring Fusion Applications Specialist

4. Fusion Middleware and WebLogic Server

The central powerhouse of Fusion Applications is Oracle WebLogic Server. Let's check out some foundational training:

Oracle WebLogic Server 11g: Administration Essentials (5 days)

Enterprise Manager 12c is the first product with the 12c on the hood. Courses are already available

Fusion Application Security is based on Oracle Identity Manager. I found some courses on the various services around OIM:

5. Enterprise Content Management Suite

Want to know more on Universal Content Management (UCM), Inbound Refinery or Imaging and Process Management?

6. SOA Suite

We continue with courses which cover famous SOA Suite modules like BPEL PM, BPMN, Business Rules, BAM, Human Workflow and Mediator (Yes, they're all part of Fusion Applications)

7. Secure Enterprise Search

"Google style search" capabilities for Fusion Applications are provided by good ol' OSES:

8. Data Integrator

To be honest, I am a bit insecure about the role of Oracle Data Integrator. Is it used for BI Apps or just for general data migration? Anyhow it is a key ingredient of the Fusion Applications infrastructure.

Summary

There is a lot to learn for the ambitious Fusion Applications developer/administrator/fanboy. And we haven't even listed the specific Fusion Apps training yet. Once they become available, I will definitely let you know.

have a nice day

@lex

New Siebel CRM Releases: 8.1.1.6 and 8.2.2

2011-11-07T09:00:00.000+01:00

Last week, Oracle released two versions of Siebel CRM.

Siebel Patchset 8.1.1.6 (ID: 13078549) is available for download on My Oracle Support.
The Maintenance Release Guide for Patchset 8.1.1.6 can be found as document 880452.1 here.

I will post an overview of the ACRs included in this patchset in the near future.

Much more buzz is to be expected from the general availability of Siebel CRM 8.2.2. Announced on Oracle OpenWorld 2011, this is one of the two releases (together with 8.1.1) which customers should see as their target version for slipping under the Applications Unlimited umbrella and take full advantage of the innovation packs announced for 2012. Siebel CRM 8.2.2 is intended for customers in the following areas or industries:

Public Sector
Loyalty for Travel and Transportation and Retail
Financial Services (with integration to Oracle FLEXCUBE Universal Banking)

As the readme file on E-Delivery states quite clearly:

**All others should continue to target the Siebel 8.1x code line for future maintenance and innovation plans.**

The download files for Siebel CRM 8.2.2 can be found at Oracle's Software Delivery Cloud (fka as E-Delivery). You have to look for 64 bit operating systems. As it seems, Siebel 8.2.2 is only available on these. The bookshelf for the latest member of the Siebel CRM family is here. It is highly recommended to browse the "What's New..." chapters in the various guide for a first impression of new features.

I am planning several posts which keep you informed on enhancements, changes and new features that come with Siebel CRM 8.2.2.

have a nice day

@lex

Fusion Applications Training or "Is it possible to become a Fusion Apps DBA?"

2011-11-03T09:00:00.000+01:00

Recently, I read an article by Yury Velikanov in which he declared the "Fusion Apps DBA" a rare animal. A Fusion Apps DBA is the successor of an Oracle Apps (translate to eBusiness Suite) DBA. It should be clear by now, that Fusion Applications are not in any way a new version of Oracle Applications (EBS) but a totally new stack of enterprise applications built Fusion Middleware.

If you're really technically interested in Oracle Fusion Applications, you might have already bookmarked, and even downloaded the official documentation (and maybe even started reading). The documentation library sports a book list which should shatter all illusions of becoming a Fusion Apps DBA in one life.

Part of the Fusion Applications Technology List of Books - scary, huh?

By reading the guide on Fusion Applications Concepts and just jotting down all the product names it mentions, we have a 'who's who' list of Oracle Middleware products. Here are the most prominent products and technologies used to build what we know as Fusion Applications:

Application Development Framework (ADF) and JDeveloper
Java
Fusion Middleware WebLogic Server
Oracle Enterprise Manager
Oracle Database
Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE)
Oracle BI Applications (OBIA)
Oracle WebCenter
Oracle Content Management
SOA Suite
BPM Suite
Secure Enterprise Search (SES)
HTTP Server/WebGate
Oracle Data Integrator (ODI)

This is not even a complete list.

I took the liberty of looking up fundamental training courses for each of the products and ended up with at least 16 weeks of training - and that's only for the fundamentals. Now consider the average amount of training days approved per year for the average developer (5 days if you're lucky...) and you know where this is going.

In the following post I will list these training courses. If you really want to be a Fusion Apps DBA, you're going to spend a lot of time in training classes during the coming years.

Or (much more likely) customers are opting for the cloud based version and leave most of the daily operations to Oracle.

have a nice day

@lex

Splash, Title and Text

2011-10-31T09:00:00.000+01:00

Classroom discussions recently included the question how to identify which object manager we are currently connected to. As many of the astute readers are aware, Siebel Native Load Balancing distributes sessions between object managers on different servers in a round-robin fashion. As a result, we cannot easily predict the object manager which hosts our session.

So the weary administrator whose task it is to clear some LOV cache or similar needs to know which object manager on what server he or she is currently connected to.

A very simple way to accomplish this is to change the Application Title parameter at the server component level for the object manager, similar to the example below:

change param CFGApplicationTitle="Call Center Object Manager (ENU) @ ousrvr" for comp sccobjmgr_enu

The above command can be issued through the Siebel Server Manager command line utility. The name after the @ sign is the logical server name where this object manager is assigned. We can repeat this command for all other servers which host the object manager in the load balancing scenario.

While we were discussing this, I played around with the Application Splash Text parameter, which controls the text that appears on the Siebel login web page. And if I say "playing around", I mean it ;-)...

change param CFGApplicationSplashText="Welcome to Siebel Call Center!<br><img src='images/applet_salutation1.jpg'><font color='blue'>" for comp sccobjmgr_enu

The result (also note the application title in IE's window title bar):

have a nice splash

@lex

GUIDs in Siebel CRM

2011-10-27T09:00:00.000+02:00

Recently I came across a YAUBS (Yet Another Useful Business Service) which is used by Siebel CRM standard to generate Globally Unique Identifiers (GUIDs) in the Siebel Universal Customer Master (UCM) realm.

So when you grow tired of Siebel ROW_IDs, you can use the GenerateID method of the FINS Teller Converter Extensions business service. The method has a mandatory input argument named IDType which must be set to a value of GUID.

The result is an output property set with a random generated 32 character hexadecimal GUID string in the Value property.

The above screenshot is taken from the Business Service Simulator which I used for a quick test drive of this hopefully useful business service method.

have a nice day

@lex

Hiding Controls (and List Columns) in Siebel CRM

2011-10-24T09:00:00.000+02:00

Recently I got involved (again) in Siebel Order Management. This is a vast area of highly specialized behaviour. Many large corporations use Siebel CRM with that module and frequently contribute to the development of the product by submitting change requests and general requirements to be solved in upcoming versions.

This might be one reason that we find truly special configuration options described in the Order Management Guide in the form of the Hide Control (and its sibling Hide List Column) applet user properties.

Whenever I want to find out more about a specific functionality in Siebel CRM, these are the steps I follow:

Google it
Query it in the Flat tab of the Siebel Tools Object Explorer

While google yields a good list of forum entries, blog posts and bookshelf pages, the Flat tab is priceless because it reveals real life usage scenarios from the Siebel standard repository.

The Hide Control N and Hide List Column N (the 'N' means you can have multiple instances with a number sequence) user properties are supported on a limited set of applet classes such as CSSSWEFrameListHC (personal guess: 'HC' might translate to 'Hide Control'...).

The syntax for the Value expression is as follows:

'Control Name', 'Expression'

The control or list column will be hidden from the applet when the expression evaluates to TRUE. For example you can use a Value like the following to conditionally hide the Delete button when the applet is displayed in a specific view:

'DeleteRecord', ' GetProfileAttr("ActiveViewName") = "CS CG Account Territories View" '

The above example is taken from the Territory List Applet.

Summary

To be honest, I often opted for browser script to conditionally hide controls from applets. I no longer will.

Have a nice day

@lex