Thankyou Roel for Making me Think about the value of ODTUG

I really enjoyed reading Roel Hartman’s blog on how ODTUG / KSCOPE can change your life, and saw a number of similarities. I first spoke (deliberately) to a technical audience at KSCOPE in New Orleans the same year as Roel, and although I was a confident speaker they gave me the new opportunity to talk to developers about the business benefits of what they are doing.

Like Roel I am an ACE Director which came about from me linking the technical and functional sides of Fusion Middleware. ODTUG are the best forum for this (outside of my own user group UKOUG obviously), because they have dedicated FMW tracks supported by Oracle Product management, and the excellent Sunday Symposiums.

This year I am submitted a paper on when and how you would extend Fusion Applications and really look forward to having the discussion this presentation has. We have over the years said that applications should not be customized and yet Fusion Applications are written in such a way, using metadata to deliver what the user sees that we can extend them.

I am also helping Susan Duncan with a presentation on ADF Mobile development, showing has this has been used in Fusion applications which are the ultimate shop window for FMW.

I recently visited Australia with my job at Fujitsu and the timing corresponded with the ODTUG Seriously Practical BI & EPM event and I was honored to be asked to speak there. I talked about how BI & EPM are usedin Fusion Apps. ODTUG members are using the technology that underpins these applications and knowing how they are used makes these members a valuable commodity. I was even more honored when I was asked to add this to my Kscope sessions.

So attending KSCOPE can change your life but it defiantly changes other peoples’ lives through community service days. I have painted schools, cleared weeds and cleaned classrooms as part of these events and boy does it set you up for a week of learning at the conference. I am really looking forward to being part of this year’s endeavors.  When you leave a conference you take away great memories but the community days ensures  you to leave something behind of value.