Weblog for the AMIS Technology corner
Posts tagged Fusion Applications
ADF 11g: contextInfo to implement a common Fusion Applications pattern
Nov 26th
Oracle Fusion Applications are on the move. They were demonstrated at Oracle Open World 2009, they are current being tested with dozens if not hundreds of organizations and they have been promised for general availability later in 2010. Screenshots of selected modules are available on the internet, for example at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/oracleopenworld09/sets/72157622462805751/.
Fusion Applications are of interest to any ADF developer, as Oracle teams have worked hard – in close collaboration with the ADF development teams – to come up with UI patterns, ways of leading the end user through the application, presenting data and currently available actions in intuitive or at least consistent ways that would most likely work for most of our applications as well. And since we have the same technology stack at our disposal as the Fusion Apps teams have, we can see whether their best practices work for us too.
A recent addition to the catalog of ADF Faces components was the contextInfo component. It is quite heavily used in Fusion Apps for one such consistent pattern. The next screenshot illustrates this component:
The little orange markers in the upper lefthand corner of the Project Name fields – that is the manifestation of the contextInfo component. The popup you see for Stark Industries BI Rollout is the effect of activating the component. And it demonstrates its purposed rather nicely and effectively: whenever the user sees a contextInfo marker (the little oracle square) she knows that additional information associated with that field is available. The user can click on the marker and the context information is presented in whatever way the developer feels is most appropriate, though usually a popup will be used.
Oracle Fusion Applications – it is for real! (and impressive too)
Jun 23rd
When Oracle started acquiring companies in the ERP space, they unfolded (the outline of) the Fusion strategy. With three aspects to it as I understood it: the Fusion Middleware stack, the integration of the acquired companies into the Oracle fold and the development of the next generation of Enterprise applications, duped Fusion Applications.
After some intial excitement and quite high expectations, the buzz subsided and Oracle became somewhat quiet. They did embed PeopleSoft, Siebel, Retek, JDEdwards and many others. They also went on developing and releasing Fusion Middleware. But the Fusion Applications were never heard about again. Or so it seemed. People even started to wonder whether they were for real. With the Applications Unlimited program – that guarantuess virtual everlasting support on all of the Oracle Apps products – and the AIA (Application Integration Architecture) that makes all Oracle Apps products work together, the necessity for Fusion Applications seemed somewhat less urgent. And indeed, no serious progress (or anything at all really) was visible at Oracle Open World 2008, even though in 2007 Larry had announced the first modules shipping in the Spring of 2008.
Here at the ODTUG 2009 conference, I have learned that Fusion Applications are for real. And I have seen them as well. And I was impressed. After several years of hearing, interpreting and to some extent telling the Fusion stories, now it all seems to come together. Next week (July 1st) we will have the big launch of Oracle Fusion Middleware 11g – with among other things the SOA Suite 11g, WebCenter 11g (Spaces, Framework, Services, Composer), WebLogic Server 10.3.1 and the next level of ADF 11g – and the Fusion Applications products are coming together rapidly as well. Oracle also has started to expose the Fusion Apps, recently at the Collaborate conference and this week also at ODTUG.
