Kscope13, day 1

Introduction

Monday is the first “real” day of the conference.  All very, very cool and for the first three sessions I am also room ambassador.  Alas, this does not mean that I shall be henceforth be referred to as “Your Excellency” although I am totally okay with that form of address in future.  You decide.

And the content is…

I was the ambassador for the first three sessions.  That means I passed out evaluation slips, was a microphone monkey, and got cool pins I get to attach to my conference lanyard.

Essbase and Planning Calculation Basics

What’s worse than having an 8:30 session?  Why it’s having Oracle Essbase development kibitz on your session and offer improvements to your content.  But it was all in spirit of helpfulness and John Booth was able to recover.

Essbase New and Upcoming Features

Super cool stuff.  You really, really, really should have been there.  Maybe I will update with details if allowed to.  Watch this space.  

Btw, if I am not allowed to, then all I can tell you is that Gabby Rubin, Essbase Product Manager, talked about some really interesting futures for Essbase.  And oh yeah, you should have been there.

Introducing the Outline Extractor NG (Next Generation)

I was on the beta for Tim’s latest and greatest version tool and was very possibly the worst beta participant although I did at least find one bug.  It was very exciting to see the tool actually on display for the world to see.

The Outline Extractor that Applied OLAP has maintained throughout the years has been incredibly useful.  I understand that the single largest downloader, based on domain name is none other than Oracle, so it was perhaps no surprise to see Oracle development staff in the room.  

Top Six Advanced Planning Tips

This is a session Jessica Cordova and I gave – she was the senior and I the junior.  And of course we lied – we didn’t actually do six tips, but instead three, which is sort of not what was promised.  We lied (well, we did, didn’t we?) because we had so much awesome stuff that we couldn’t possibly do all of it in a single session and instead have pinky promised to do the balance in an ODTUG webinar.  It took a lot of pressure off and we still had good content.  

Advanced Essbase Studio Tips and Tricks

This is a session given by my not-actually-related-in-any-way-and-in-fact-he-denies-the-whole-thing older brother Glenn Schwartzberg.  Glenn always does quality work and I wish oh wish oh wish I could have been there but unfortunately I got pulled away by other things.  Sorry big bro, but I’m sure I’m the worse off for not being there.

Keynote

This was really quite good.  Doc Hendley, of the Wine Into Water foundation, did a fantastic job.  A very inspiring and humble man who is determined to do good in this all too imperfect world.

ODTUG also announced that Kscope14 will be in Seattle, Washington.  My parents lived there back in the early 1960s in a basement apartment that had constantly moldy walls, no matter what my mother did to clean them.  My mother, who hasn’t returned to Seattle since 1961, also said, “It was a nice little town.”  I wonder if it has grown any since then.  :)

Conclusion

As always, Kscope is great, Kscope is exhausting, Kscope is the place you ought to be if you care at all about your overall knowledge and of course a chance to meet and great all of your fellow Oracle geeks.

Be seeing you in New Orleans.

Kscope13, day -1

Introduction

For the last two years at Kscope I have live-blogged during the conference; Kscope13 will be no different.  This is both a fun and difficult task/duty.  Sometimes I am really, really, really busy and cannot blog during the day – I will do my best, but no promises.  And with that slightly deflating disclaimer, off we go.

Where oh where am I?

Why on the 31st floor of the Sheraton New Orleans.  Yes, that’s the Mississippi.  The view is pretty spectacular at night.

Volunteer day kickoff

The EPM (Essbase only, actually) started its relationship with ODTUG at Kaleidoscope 2008.  2008 was also the first volunteer event at the then Kaleidoscope and was in fact in a school.  We were back at a school, this time the Charles Easton Charter High School, in the Mid City/Bayou St. John districts of New Orleans.  

We did the usual back breaking (but welcome) work:  moving, painting, sanding, cleaning, etc.  Here we are in the cafeteria about to split up to our respective tasks.

Like a fool (I think I mentioned this in my last post), and yes, with me that is redundancy, I “knew” that indoors was hot, and outdoors was…less hot.  Hmm, I did not count on the working airconditioning but as I ignored my way out of the work I should have done and instead went to the outdoors work, you can guess it was hot, really hot.  And what did I do?  Sanded wood to make it available for picnic tables and benches.  Here’s William Booth hard at work.  Hot work, indeed.

Here’s a view of the painting.  We were busy, busy, busy.

You can see the lumber pile to the right – it’s just a fraction of what we sanded by hand.  

There was a bit of a spanner thrown into the works because of a rainstorm that happened in the middle of the outdoors work but we simply covered up and jumped back outside the moment the rain stopped.

The payoff and a warning

The school was really very nice about thanking we ODTUGers (not the official name but one I like) for the hard work we did.  It really is a pleasure and one of the things that differentiates Kscope from every other conference.

Back at the hotel, as I made my way up to my room, wet, smelly, and utterly wringed out, two women asked, “What’s an Od-Tug”.  I explained that we are an Oracle software conference (I passed by the whole the user conference marketing moment although perhaps I shouldn’t have) and that we always kick off with a volunteer day.  They were pretty surprised and said that it was really awesome we gave back to whatever town hosts our conference.  

It is really awesome and as I wrote, it makes Kscope unlike any other conference.

And now the warning

Hey, when the NOPD tells you not to bring a gun onto school property, they really mean it.  Hey, it’s only up to five years of hard labor in a chain gang; think how well you’ll be able to hone your Cool Hand Luke impersonation.  Happily I was only armed with my rapier wit.

There’s still the Welcome Reception to come later tonight.  

I hope to be seeing you all at Kscope13.