Oracle related rants (and lots of off-topic stuff)…
This month I’ll be doing some PL/SQL Masterclasses for Oracle University. The following dates have been confirmed:
For more details contact Oracle University here.
Originally there was an extra session in Hong Kong, but this has now been cancelled.
In November the following dates are scheduled:
Cheers
Tim…
Day 4 & 5 followed pretty much the same pattern for me. Lots of time in The Zone, a few presentations and lots of chatting.
On Wednesday I met up with a former colleague from the UK, now based in Denmark. He’s an Aston Villa fan, but I try not to hold that against him. Last time we met up was in Copenhagen and I blame him for me being very ill the next day. š
Wednesday evening was the Bloggers meet up, which was very busy. It’s good to be able to put a face to blogs you read.
I missed the wrap party on Thursday as I had to fly home. The trip home was not be best because I didn’t have an aisle seat. When I don’t have an aisle seat I get really fidgety because I am nervous about having to ask the person next to me to repeatedly let me out. As a result I usually have to stand for the whole trip. I was forced to sit through three bouts of turbulence, but the rest of the flight I stood at the back of the plane. I guess I was standing for about 8-9 hours. Never mind.
Thanks for everyone at OTN and the ACE program for another great OOW.
Cheers
Tim…
This years OpenWorld has been a little unusual for a couple of reasons. First, in previous years the OTN Lounge (now The Zone) and the Unconference have been in Moscone West, which meant it was really easy to bounce between those and the database sessions in Moscone. This year The Zone and the Unconference venue are near the Hilton, which make for a lot of walking and clashing sessions for anyone with a database focus. I guess the extra walking will do us all good. š
Second, the wifi this year has been really bad. There are always glitches, and don’t get me started on the schedule builder, but this year the wifi has been unusable for extended periods of time. In fact, I’ve never managed to get on it in Moscone South yet. It makes life very difficult when you are trying to use an online schedule builder. š
Enough of the moaning. Let’s focus on the good…
The best thing about being at OpenWorld is all the cool people you meet. Lots of new faces and lots of old friends. I’ve also really enjoyed The Zone this year. At first the location and layout felt a little odd, but I’m now used to it and it feels even more relaxing than previous years. I’ve been hanging around there a lot, chatting to people rather than trying to attend every conference session on my agenda. Most importantly I won the Google sponsored Lego competition today. I play with Lego a lot with my nephews, so I felt like I had an unfair advantage. š
I’ve been quite selective about the sessions I’ve attended, picking speakers I enjoy listening to more than specific topics. With so many conferences under my belt over the last couple of years it’s getting harder to find sessions with new content, but that’s a nice problem to have. š
The evenings have been as fun as ever.Ā The ACE dinner was on a boat this year. Food, drink and unsteady footing didn’t sound like the best idea. As it turned out it was really good fun. Especially since the water was calm. The OTN party was a food fest. I’m sure other things were happening, but all I can really remember was eating. š Tonight was a quick trip out with some of the guys, then back to the hotel to catch up with the blogging.
Cheers
Tim…
PS. I bought an iPad. More to come on that as I learn how to use it, or not…
I posted yesterday about the start of my trip to OpenWorld. I arrived late, so I never got around to posting about the second half of my trip so here goes…
Frankfurt to San Francisco
I was in a pretty bad mood when it came to boarding. We were 4+ hours late and the boarding process was a complete disaster. Nobody could hear the announcements, so we were all in queues to ask what the hell was going on. Even so, nobody on the desk thought to just come and shout out what to do. As a result, boarding was like a rugby scrum, with people from all classes, seating zones and people who had not cleared security all thrown together. I don’t remember ever taking so long to board. Sigh.
I got on the plane and was instantly more miserable. It was one of those planes where you all have to watch the same films on shared screens. Sigh. I watched:
The food came along and guess what? I wasn’t on the list of vegetarians. Sigh. Luckily, they had extra so it wasn’t a big deal, just another thing to “brighten” my day.
I was seated next to the galley so I got to hear a lot of the gossip from the cabin crew. They do talk rather loud. š One woman seemed to be hitting the assistance button continually, which was getting on their nerves (and mine because I could hear the dinging). It seems the maintenance crew had left one of the internal panels off, which was mentioned by a passenger 2 hours before landing. HELLO! Don’t you think you might want to mention that to someone before you take off ? You are sitting next to a ruddy great hole on an 11+ hour flight! The cabin attendant told the woman to keep her seat belt on. š I’m sure it was just a cosmetic thing.
All in all, the flight was ok. The cabin crew were pretty good, which offset most of my gripes.
In the update to yesterdays post I mentionedĀ Hajo Normann andĀ Andrejus Baranovskis were on an later flight from Frankfurt. I think it was scheduled to leave about 3 hours after mine. Their flight wasn’t delayed, so they actually left over an hour before me. When I landed at SFO I saw Hajo in the customs queue. It turns out they were in a holding pattern for over an hour so we landed at about the same time. š
It has been mentioned several times by friends and family that I never seem to have a straight forward trip anywhere. My response is, this is the reality of international travel. There is no enjoyment involved. It’s a matter of endurance and anger management. Can someone hurry up and invent a teleport system already!
Cheers
Tim…
Birmingham Airport
Whilst people watching in Birmingham Airport I discovered a new category of traveller I had never noticed before, namely the ācontrol freakā.
The person in question was an older gentleman having a bit of a tizzy because he didnāt think the allocated 25 minutes boarding time was enough to get everyone on the plane. During the next few minutes, the sky was apparently falling in because of thisĀ disastrousĀ planning by the airport. I can only conclude that:
Birmingham to Frankfurt
We boarded in plenty of time. It seems 25 minutes was actually more than enough. The cabin doors were shut, then the captain announced that flights to Frankfurt were delayed because of the wind. Frankfurt was apparently down to 2/3 capacity, so that meant a 60 minute wait on the ground in Birmingham. Sigh. Of course, 60 minutes became 70 minutes before we took off. This meant we would land at the same time as boarding was planned to start for my connection to San Francisco.
I arrived in Frankfurt to the good news I hadn’t missed my flight. Joy quickly turned to misery when I was told my flight had been delayed by 4 hours. š On the plus side I did get a ā¬10 food voucher, which IĀ accidentallyĀ spent on loads of diet coke and chocolate. In my defence, the lady in the shop wasn’t too happy about me spending less than ā¬10, so she kept telling me to pick up more items. For the sake of international relations my only option was to take her advice and fill my bag with chocolate.
I’ve been collared by security twice in Frankfurt Airport. The first time focused mainly on my sachets of Lemsip. I’m not sure if they were hoping to confiscate my cold cure, thereby saving themselves about Ā£5 at the pharmacy, or whether they thought it was something naughty. The second encounter was random check to see if I was carrying weapons. I’m not sure quite how I could manage that after going through security in Birmingham and Frankfurt, but I would rather they tried too hard, than not hard enough. I wasn’t sure if they vast quantity of chocolate I was carrying qualified as a deadly weapon or not. It’s certainly going to kill me if I don’t give it up.
It’s a couple more hours until I fly…
Cheers
Tim…
Update: Just bumped into Hajo Normann and Andrejus Baranovskis. They were just about to board their flight to SFO that was running on time. I’m still waiting for mine, even though it was meant to leave 3 hours before theirs. š
The incredible disappearing patch set has reappeared on MOS. Download it quick before it gets pulled again. š
Cheers
Tim…
PS. Remember, read the patch note before you download it. You don’t need all 4.8G. Also, check out the new recommended patching instructions.
Last week there was a little episode where the 11.2.0.2 patchset was released, as noted here:
Many of us started downloading it. Some (like me) got a full download, while others got cut off part way through when the patch was pulled from MOS. Someone on twitter mentioned the patch is scheduled for an October release (can’t find the tweet now), so I guess it was put live by accident. Who knows what changes, if any, will happen between now and then, so I would suggest that anyone who managed to get hold of the patch redownload it when it is eventually released, just in case they miss something important. Having said that, the OUI now checks for updates, so it is probably safe.
Even though the patch set is not on general release at the moment, there is plenty of information available to get yourself ready for it.
Cheers
Tim…
One of the things that continually annoys me is that to get the latest version of the database you have to install the base release and then instantly patch it to the latest patch set. Not any more.
“Starting with the 11.2.0.2 patch set, Oracle Database patch sets are full installations of the Oracle Database software. This means that you do not need to install Oracle Database 11g Release 2 (11.2.0.1) before installing Oracle Database 11g Release 2 (11.2.0.2).”
You don’t understand how happy this makes me. In addition, the installer also downloads and applies madatory patches, so even when you’re mid-way through the lifecycle of a patchset, your new installations are still up to date. š
There is a bunch of new functionality already listed in the new features manual:
Happy downloading and upgrading.
Notes.
Cheers
Tim…
It’s a little over a month before I start a run of four PL/SQL Masterclasses in the Asia Pacific region.
If you are interested, contact Oracle and get booked on. The details are here: APAC Seminars.
Cheers
Tim…
The APPEND_VALUESļ»æ hint is new to 11gR2 and allows you to use direct-path inserts from “INSERT INTO … VALUES” type statements. Pretty neat if you are doing inserts in a FORALL statement and need the extra punch.
Cheers
Tim…