Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Quiet Christmas

I had a few emails, texts and calls today from people who are available for work. Good Siebel Analytics / OBIEE consultants who may be having an extended xmas holiday!

If you have a need for someone for short or long term please get in touch and I'll forward their details on.

You may have noticed me being busy on LinkedIn recently. I have managed to build a good network of OBIEE consultants, and even started a group specifically for Oracle Business Intelligence consultants. This should benefit us all when it comes to project requirements.
Go to http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/43109/526A0219C124 and I'll add you in (I only add in OBI consultants and related workers).

I have also been busy on the Oracle OBIEE forum, reading the issues that people have. It annoys me when someone clearly hasn't read the manual or even tried to find the answer to something before posting a request.

Each day I always check out Venkats postings on his blog. He has a great job - he just gets to play with OBIEE all day and write about the new stuff.

Talking of new stuff, the new functionality in 10.1.3.3.xyz, which allows you to call Oracle functions will be a greta boost for the product. Up until now I have seriously wondered by you need a BLOB in an Analytics but now we get to put pictures from a database in you reports.

I was sceptical about the time series functions, particularly as they were causing some people problems, but I have now converted over completely and so far so good. Let me know what you think.

Have you noticed that when you use the functions editor you now get something more useful when you add the function - it actually now tells you what arguments it requires instead of <>. I tended to copy the contents of the edit box into TextPad but may start using the editor more now.

I notice there are more and more companies that are offering OBIEE and Siebel Analytics consultancy. Those of us that were using the product over 4 years ago are seeing others trying to muscle in. All I can say is How much do you really know?? There are so many stories at conference from clients that say their implementation failed due to the integrator not having the right skills. We ALL need to make sure the product is not undermined by consultants who frankly do not have a clue. If you are in a pitch to a client sell your real experience and don't let beginners run your project.

I am still building the OBIEE information website, if you would like to have a listing just let me know.

That's all for now Folks!

1 comment:

Christian Berg said...

Hi Adrian,

I just came back from giving the first 10g course and have to say...thank god for time series functions. Explaining and demoing the "old way" was a real pain compared to today. Piece of cake and the people really appreciate it.

Regarding 10.1.3.3.1 (yeah, I know...versioning): you know what the single most important feature for clients is? The Office Plug-In. I'm dead serious.
And to top that and to include your mentioning BLOBs...I had the first request to integrate Google Earth. Oracle Spatial here I come.

Regarding the whole consultancy issue: the amount of bullsh****ing going on is amazing. People with one project and about 6 months experience are being sold as Senior Consultants and with 1 1/2 years you can expect them to roll in as Principals.
What I consider a big part of the problem is the lack of awareness and visibility from the side of the clients. They tend to "play save" (from their perspective of course) and believe the sales consultants of big integrators. They still haven't learned that "it's a big established company, so they will deliver" doesn't hold true these days since they just don't have the know-how.

I'm raising this issue in every project I walk into and every course I give, but there's still a lot of work to be done. All those headhunters running around and wildly claiming whatever comes to their mind doesn't really help the situation either. I'm seriously starting to cut byck my contact with them since they huer the business more than they do actual good!

My 10 cents...

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