Oracle BIWA User Community

Can you run SQLPLUS from Windows without a TNSNAMES.ora entry? Oracle 11g comes bundled with SQL Developer (just like OWB is part of the Oracle 11g database typical install). actually 11g is much more application centric and even the default folder for install is called apps. Anyways, try out the SQL Developer that is bundled with the 11g RDBS install. It uses JDBC to connect to the database. You can run SQLPLUS as well from SQL Developer by pointing to the SQLPLUS.exe as the external executable and it will use the JDBC information to connect to the external database (even a 10G).

Visit the below url to download the Windows version of 11g: http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/products/database/oracle11g/111060_win32soft.html The Linux version was out for a while but the Windows version is out just ahead of the Openworld 2007 next month in San Francisco. The Windows version usually gives a good means to test out new features of the database on the desktop itself.

At BIWA Summit, there was a panel of BI experts. One of the panelist commented that his "wish" was that SAP buys Business Object . Why? It will be fun to see the dynamics of a German Company buy a French company. Well as of the last hour that news is history: http://www.businessweek.com/ap_working/financialnews/D8S4K2580.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_top+story While the industry is still digesting the Hyperion acquistion by Oracle, this is another big one that will impact the future of BI. The panelists at BIWA Summit had predicted that the pure play BI vendors will find it hard to survive unless it is some niche open source players (Pentaho and the likes). With these recent developments, it leaves Congnos as the next "eligible bachelor" waiting to get hitched in the BI space.

Inaugural year, 40+ sessions/workshops, 300+ attendees, 10+ Platinum Sponsors/Exhibitors, sold out conference ... are a few phrases to explain the BIWA Summit . Generally speaking everything went as planned, thanks to all the help and support of various the stakeholders. And please join me in congratulating John Haydu for the "BIWA Key Contributor Award" for the year. John was resposible for most of the registration related activities, and managing the show with around 350 registrants was not a trivial task. All the stakeholders deserve an applause, be it the conference attendees who enthusiatically attended the event over the two days, the Platinum sponsors who helped to keep the attendee cost down, the speakers who mostly flew in from the different parts of the countries or the BIWA BoD that made it all happen. Next year for BIWA Summit 2008 , we will head to Oracle HQ to Redwood Shores, just South of San Francisco on Dec 2-3, 2008. Meanwhile, watch out for the upload

So finally it is the day of the BIWA Summit, the day we all worked very hard for. Some of the BIWA BoD members and volunteers have been working over the weekend to get it all going, getting the session rooms, classrooms ready. Attendees started arriving as early as 7:00AM to collect their badges and get the premiun seating in the stadium style Auditorium. Over 300 registrants and the conference got sold out. After the kick-off session at 8:30AM, Matt Rittman delivered the first keynote session. Keep tuned....more to come. Thanks