QR codes for upcoming conference presentations

If you don't know what a QR code is, you might want to ignore the lengthy explanation on Wikipedia and simply pop out your smartphone and scan the following images.



   
You can download apps such as ShopSavvy or Barcode Scanner and simply scan any of the images above

Instead of forwarding you to a useless site (which most QR codes do), these ones contain details on the title, date, time, and venue of my upcoming presentations.

Want to generate your own QR codes? Check out http://qrcode.kaywa.com/

ReloadProcess in AIA Foundation Pack 11g

Problem:
Sometimes, some composites show in an unknown state in Oracle SOA Suite 11g as shown by the clock image below:

This is due to one of the following reasons:

• Coding issue
• Infrastructure issue
• Restart issue (if a composite references another composite but is loaded out of sequence, it may result in an unknown status) (you have no control over the order in which composites are loaded)

Solution:

If it is not a coding issue, many times if you bounce, it would resolve the problem. If you have the Oracle AIA Foundation Pack 11g, the other option to consider before bouncing is to use the "ReloadProcess" to manually reload the process instead of having to wait 20 minutes to start up SOA Suite.

1. Log in to the EM console using your "weblogic" account

2. Expand Farm_soa_domain --> SOA --> soa-infra (soa_server1) --> default

3. Click on "ReloadProcess"

4. Click on the "Test" button

5. Choose "XML View" from the dropdown

6. In the payload, add the path of the deployed composite in the MDS as shown. For example:

/deployed-composites/default/AIAReadJMSNotificationProcess_rev1.0

7. Click on the "Test Web Service" button

8. When you navigate to the instance, you can confirm whether the reload process is successful

9. By navigating to the BPEL component, you will see that an embedded Java activity called 'ReloadFileFromMDS' was executed which successfully reloaded the process

Applicable Versions:

• Oracle SOA Suite 11g (11.1.1.x)

Finding and resubmitting "rejected" messages in SOA Suite 11g

Problem:

You navigate to an instance that has faulted.

From the screenshot below, it is a system fault which is unclear. There appears to have been an issue while consuming a message from the JMS queue.

There is no way to resubmit this. Even though our fault policy is configured to retry, it did not. And our audit level is set to 'production', so we don't have the payload to manually resubmit.

What do you do?

Before proceeding, make note of the last update time of the composite instance, as shown above.


Solution:

1. Navigate to your composite.

2. Click on the "Faults and Rejected Messages" tab.

3. Scroll down and find the same timestamp of the instance.

4. Immediately above it, you will notice another faulted instance with a Composite Instance ID of "Unavailable". You will also notice that a checkmark in the "Rejected Message" column is available.

 5. On the screenshot above, click on the actual "Error Message" on the leftmost column.

6. A popup window comes up. Click on "Show payload...".

7. Copy the payload (which does not include the SOAP headers).

8. Now that you have the payload, navigate to the composite and click on "Test". Then insert the payload above in between the SOAP body as shown.

That's it!

Please note that in SOA Suite 11g, there is a difference between "recoverable" messages and "rejected" messages. I'll post the difference later on.

Applicable Versions:

• Oracle SOA Suite 11g (11.1.1.x)

Oracle WebLogic Server 11g Administration Handbook just released

The Oracle WebLogic Server 11g Administration Handbook: Install, Configure, Manage, and Secure Oracle WebLogic Server 11g by my colleague Sam Alapati, an Oracle ACE, has recently been published.

I was privileged to be one of the two technical editors on this book, and recommend it to those wanting to learn more about administering WebLogic Server 11g, with topics benefiting both the novice and experienced administrator.

More information can be found here:

• http://www.mhprofessional.com/product.php?isbn=0071774254&cat=7
• http://www.amazon.com/Oracle-WebLogic-Administration-Handbook-Osborne/dp/0071774254/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1316219263&sr=8-1

I am proud to have my profile published in this ORACLE Press Series book:

Oracle WebLogic Server is definitely an exciting product with a lot to learn.

Emails received... emails responded to...

If you now notice on the right column, I have added two lines below the 'Submit' button:

Emails received: X
Emails responded to: Y

These numbers are valid as of September 2011, and are meant to offer a higher level of transparency and to keep our support team honest. There was a period of time where I was personally unable to respond to many of the inquiries that I receive, and this will no doubt force me to respond... or face the ugly truth.

And yes, rest assured that these are true and actual values.

Raastech talks about 100% SOA Suite 11g uptime at UKOUG

Ahmed Aboulnaga, Technical Director at Raastech, will be presenting a topic focusing on upgrading to SOA Suite 11g while maintaining 100% uptime at the upcoming UK Oracle User Group Conference 2011 in Birmingham, United Kingdom.

UKOUG 2011 is the United Kingdom's largest Oracle Technology & E-Business Suite conference, taking place between 5-7 December at the International Convention Centre (ICC) in Birmingham. For more information, check out http://2011.ukoug.org.

Maintaining the uptime and availability of your integration infrastructure has become more and more critical for many organizations. Upgrading Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Application Integration Architecture (AIA) Foundation Pack to their 11g equivalents is a non-trivial effort, particularly in a global implementation of 52 production servers. Learn how the upgrade of both the entire codeset and infrastructure was planned and implemented while maintaining 100% uptime and simultaneously introducing additional SOA governance tools such as Oracle Enterprise Repository (OER) 11g, Oracle Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) 11g, and Oracle Service Registry (OSR) 11g.

Title	Upgrading to Oracle SOA Suite 11g While Maintaining 100% Uptime
Date	December 6, 2011
Time	14:40-15:25
Paper ID	6589
Address	International Convention Centre (ICC) Broad Street Birmingham, B1 2EA United Kingdom

We look forward to seeing you there.

Raastech presenting AIA for Communications at UKOUG

Ahmed Aboulnaga, Technical Director at Raastech, will be presenting a topic on Oracle Application Integration Architecture (AIA) for Communications at the upcoming UK Oracle User Group Conference 2011 in Birmingham, United Kingdom.

UKOUG 2011 is the United Kingdom's largest Oracle Technology & E-Business Suite conference, taking place between 5-7 December at the International Convention Centre (ICC) in Birmingham. For more information, check out http://2011.ukoug.org.

Integration is no easy task and almost always requires numerous technology sets to be implemented. But integrating seven different Oracle applications, six non-Oracle applications, and external applications, presents an entirely different set of challenges and issues. Oracle offers Oracle AIA for Communications as a central integration layer to simplify cross-application business process integration using a productized integration solution designed for reusability and configurability. Oracle AIA for Communications was the right choice for the integration solution at a large telco customer which tied Oracle Siebel Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Oracle Billing & Revenue Management (BRM), Oracle Supply Chain Management (SCM), Oracle Point-of-Sale (POS), Oracle Unified Inventory Management (UIM), Oracle Automatic Service Activation Program (ASAP), and Oracle Communications Services Gatekeeper (OCSG). This presentation will provide an overview of Oracle AIA for Communications, describe why it was the ideal integration solution for this implementation, and discuss lessons learned and challenges faced.

Title	Anatomy of a Successful Oracle AIA for Communications Implementation
Date	December 5, 2011
Time	16:35-17:35
Paper ID	6590
Address	International Convention Centre (ICC) Broad Street Birmingham, B1 2EA United Kingdom

We look forward to seeing you there.

Instance states for SOA Suite 11g

The Oracle SOA Suite 11g product development team has decided to confuse the heck out of everyone out there with the codes they use to designate the state of composites and components.

Composite states can be found in the following schema/table/column:

<env>_soainfra.composite_instance.state

BPEL component states can be found here:

<env>_soainfra.cube_instance.state

Mediator component states can be found here:

<env>_soainfra.mediator_instance.component_state

This table maps, to the best of my ability, the various states. It is nowhere near complete, and still requires clarification, but it is the most complete mapping out there to date.

State	COMPOSITE_INSTANCE	CUBE_INSTANCE	MEDIATOR_INSTANCE
Open and Running	0	1	8
Open and Suspended	8	2
Open and Faulted	34	3	2
Closed and Aborted		8
Closed and Cancelled		7
Closed and Completed	1	5	0
Closed and Faulted	2 / 3	6
Closed and Pending/Cancel		4
Closed and Stale	64	9	16
Initiated	0
Terminated			16 / 48 / 50
Recovery Required	4 / 5 / 7		4
Non-Recoverable		10
Unknown	32

If you have any additions or corrections to the table above, please leave a comment below and I'll update it.

Raastech presenting AIA at DOAG Conference 2011

Ahmed Aboulnaga, Technical Director at Raastech, will be presenting a one-of-a-kind topic on Oracle Application Integration Architecture (AIA) at the upcoming DOAG Conference + Exhibition 2011 conference in Nürnberg, Germany.

The title of the presentation is Oracle AIA - Does it deliver on it's integration promise? IPN Web leverages years of experience and relationships within the Oracle AIA space to deliver a presentation that explains the advantages of AIA, what to use, and what to avoid.

Title	Oracle AIA - Does it deliver on it's integration promise?
Date	November 15, 2011
Time	13:00-13:45
Room	Riga
Presentation #	149
Stream	SOA/BPM
Address	CCN CongressCenter Nürnberg Ost Messezentrum 1 90471 Nürnberg Germany

Aside from explaining AIA in a manner largely different then how it is normally presented, several customer use cases are offered, and a "Truth Meter" based on actual data will also be presented, putting Oracle's claims about AIA to the test.

We look forward to seeing you there.