DOAG 2014 – Oracle Forms is alive and well in Germany

Last week I did a quick hop, skip, and a jump across the pond to Nuremberg, Germany for the DOAG usergroup conference. Although I was only there for a total of 54 hours, I’m so glad I made the effort to attend. I was especially honored to go to represent ODTUG as we further attempt to increase cooperation and connect with fellow user groups around the world.

My trip got off to a roaring start when I landed in Nuremberg at 9:30am on Tuesday, when the conference was already in full swing. I had to hustle over to the conference so I wouldn’t miss Michael Ferrante’s (Oracle Forms Product Manager) session, “Oracle Forms – Your Application Isn’t Dead, It’s Just Tired”. It was fun to be greeted by Michael’s friendly face; he is always my brother in arms at these conferences.

Full house at my DOAG session!             Standing room only.

My first session, “The Next 2 years: What should I do NOW with my Oracle Forms Systems?”  went great considering jet lag was looming it’s ugly head. We had quite a big audience and there were even people standing in the back row. The session was an overview of all you need to know to preserve your Oracle Forms investment in the short term to prepare for your long term strategy. You can download the session slides here.

After the session, I was busy all afternoon manning the ODTUG corner of the Usergroup booth, handing out some ODTUG swag and promoting our Mobile Day that’s happening just around the corner, on April 23, 2015 in Utrecht, The Netherlands. You can get more information about this Mobile Day here.

Dinner with the DOAG group!

At the end of a chaotic but successful first day in Germany I finally got to relax and have a drink at dinner with the DOAG crew at the international speakers dinner. It was great to catch up with some old friends and the DOAG team really knows how to treat their guests like royalty.

Wednesday was once again packed with meetings including some interesting developments and partnerships. I had a great talk with Peter Raganitsch, a fellow Oracle ACE Director, CEO of FOEX and I am happy to announce that FOEX is going to work with AuraPlayer to do a webinar about Forms to APEX integration that will hopefully result in a great whitepaper about modernizing Forms with APEX integration. It will be an end-to-end demo featuring the sweet spot of each tool, beginning with using Oracle Forms to generate a word doc on the client side, and then using AuraPlayer to expose the system as a Webservice to be used as a REST service component to create a FOEX user interface. Stay tuned to find out when the webinar will be taking place. Another interesting meeting I attended was a round table with the heads of many European Oracle User Groups. I was so impressed with the passion, cooperation and creative ideas of this close knit bunch. I look forward to working together with them and the rest of the ODTUG board to bring even more value to the Oracle developer public in Europe.

My final day at DOAG started bright and early with prep for my second session, “Evolving from Legacy to Mobile and Beyond.” It was another great session where I discussed all the challenges, opportunities and considerations for going mobile. You can view the session slides here.

After my session was over I had to rush back to the airport to catch my flight home. The trip was a whirlwind of activity, as these big conferences always are, but it was also a lot of fun. I want to say a big dankeschon to the DOAG user group, and especially Fried and Ralf, for giving me such a spectacular welcome at their great event. Additionally I owe a huge thanks to ODTUG who sent me to Germany to represent them to our new European collaborators. I can’t wait for next year’s DOAG conference!