Thursday Thought: Look all around you

A current pleasure of mine after getting home while the sun is still pleasant is to take my (currently) nine eighteen month 5 year old for a stroll in her pram. It's been a while since I drafted this, time to tidy up the backlog...

We were lucky enough to live opposite some bushland, big enough where you can do a 30 minute loop and enjoy a mostly native tree/scrub area. There are obvious trails that are no problem for a pram, but still give plenty of bumps for the young one to practice her vocals.

Through the right combination of events - since coincidence has such amazing potential, I decided to walk down a dead end trail I rarely walk through and enjoyed it so much I had to share.

We recently had some short but hard rain - a nearby corridor of suburbia experienced some freakish hail. This made the ground a little firmer, and soon after some maintenance vehicles travelled this particular trail. That left it ripe to preserve footprints in such a way that I'm sure left a tale that I'm far from being able to fully interpret.

It made me think back to our ancestors and their reliance on the ability to interpret such information in a way to live longer. To know how long since predators passed by, and how long ago; follow prey in the right direction; recognise footsteps from strangers.

All I could do was recognise big dogs, small dogs, kangaroos - though it's been a while since I've seen them. I saw smaller prints that could be rabbits, cats, or both. A few bike tracks, human shoe prints over the tyre tracks - all in a variety of orders.

The dog tracks were erratic, kangaroos had an obvious direction - and where very far apart! I also considered what I couldn't see - any snake trails. I know plenty of other reptiles live in there, there's no reason to think I couldn't find any dugites or maybe even tiger snakes if I know where to look.

Earlier today as I left work the first thing I saw in the sky was a contrail that split the sky. The tropospheric winds must have been relatively still because the start of the trail was still quite defined. I enjoyed a little giggle at the chemtrail conspiracy theorists that think it must be poisoning day - they don't happen very often in Perth thanks to local conditions.

As I arrived home the perspective had changed, and by the time I was on my walk the vapour dissipated into such an amazing pattern, covering the setting sun.

I thought it best to try describe the nature I enjoyed this afternoon rather than post a few cool pictures. Partially because I thought my writing skills might benefit, and more profoundly - I think contemporary society needs to remember to take time out from technology and let the brain do it's work behind the scenes. Process the information of the day, enjoy the current surroundings, think about the most bizarre succession of thoughts that take you some place far from the present - or one of the favourite things I heard a former martial arts teacher say: find your thoughts, then lose them.

If you enjoy occasional ramblings like this that might provoke a few related thoughts in your own noggin, you might also enjoy Steven Feuerstein's personal blog -> feuerthoughts.blogspot.com, though he seems to have another major project on the go since I drafted this post.
You can also try using the Thursday Thought, Science and/or the Friday Fun labels on my blog.

Thursday Thought: Imposter!

Ever feel like you're struggling to keep up? With anything at all?

I'm feeling a bit of that with APEX right now.

Partially because I've been at a site that is a version or so behind, but who isn't, right?

But those fine specimens on the Oracle APEX team keep producing so many nifty things, I'm finding it increasing difficult to keep up. Same with the database itself. So many great new practical development features in 18.x.

Time to buy?

I'm sure I'm not the only one, and the fact I'm writing this 6 months after I noted the idea kind of illustrates my point. It was spurred a little bit from Tim Hall's post about the little funk he's feeling. Some of the issues he's been feeling resonate with my own. Work has been good and bad, my presentation game is a little off, and I'm not blogging as much. Heck, sometimes I used to schedule a few posts in advance, instead of posting a flurry.

There are a few major factors involved, including, but not limited to:

1. Managing a house containing a little human learning to communicate
   
   
2. Moving house
   
   
3. Needing to work hard to prove what seems blazingly obvious to us - that building enterprise applications with APEX is an advantage.

They're all positives in their own right, just a little disruptive if you're used to having a little extra time to learn on the side.

However, as I'm sure I've moaned before, I miss the writing. The learning process of breaking something down enough to try explain the topic in a blog post - mostly so future me can remember how something worked, then replicate/adopt it for my new problem. "Oracle Things I Got to Remember Not to Forget"
It frees my mind a little, knowing I can let it go because I've noted this resource effectively for the future.

I also like sharing with the community. Let's wreck this together, right? If we're all helping each other, we're all building better applications, we're all pleasing our customers, we're all sustaining our careers.

Point 3 has a richer story I can't share here, but it is still great for learning how to build applications with a rich user experience. I think my UX & logic building is currently on point, but I'm seeing posts from people like Adrian, Morten, & Vincent just killing it, exploring new avenues, doing funky things.

Not that's really been my bag here on my blog, I've always been focussed on practical solutions with any feature available to us. Features that anyone could be using, possibly shown in a way you may not have seen before, or reinforcing and idea you have. So worrying what others are doing just feeds doubt.

So I'd like to tie this rambling back to learning APEX, and whatever funk may be nearby.

I feel my progress using this development tool has shown a reasonable learning curve, punctuated by a few events - such as the availability of the Page Designer, introduction of the Universal Theme, and understanding how to effectively use Dynamic Actions.

And when I use the term punctuated, I mean I might be working effectively with the tools I'm aware for some time, learn a new trick, gain a new feature, then things improve dramatically for a time.

And just as I started to write this post, I found an article (whatever he's selling aside) that really nailed what I was thinking. I recommend the read, by anyone with a career: https://taylorpearson.me/punctuated/

So if you're feeling in a funk, maybe it's just status-quo.
The next interesting development may be just around the corner.

If you still feeling a little of the imposter syndrome, particularly if you're currently working in a small team, I recommend considering the comments on this tweet from tech commentator @SwiftOnSecurity.

Of course, one solution to my problems is less Twitter, but... input.

Happy new year!

Oracle APEX Self Improvement

There was a slide I considered in my Exploring AJAX presentation that was a little tangential, but I left it in as a little extra positivity for APEX.

I think this concept was explored in some facet during my 2015 Kscope visit, possibly even in a Marc Sewtz talk.

Forms has a ceiling. APEX has room to grow.

Oracle Forms, as wonderful as it is/was, was never used by the people who built it.

Ever built a back-end application you use youself? You get rid of all the little annoying things, don't you?

Now think about the packaged applications. They grow, extend, take advantage of new features. The APEX team need build these applications using the product they're developing. Heck, even APEX is built using APEX.

At some point long ago, there was a chicken and egg conundrum, solved with mod_plsql. ie, hand-write PL/SQL to generate a cute UI, that you can then use to build your meta-data with, and future pages rendered from the data.

Again, I think Marc described this piece of history far more elegantly with Juergen on The Oracle APEX Talk Show (apex.press), which I'm far behind on. Science podcasts are too irresistable.

Just recently, Scott (of the Spendolini variety) noted the top 4 collection of technologies in the (skewed) 2018 StackOverFlow survey are exactly what makes Oracle APEX tick.

Quick take on the @stackoverflow developer survey: top 4 technologies used are essentially what makes up #orclapex pic.twitter.com/bWhmiV5eAT

— Scott Spendolini (@sspendol) March 13, 2018

So now, the APEX team build APEX applications for APEX developers to build APEX applications, using core internet technologies.
There is a feedback loop here that can only be good for the future of the product.

And all this happens within the browser.
Driven from data in the database.
That's winning, across a short, yet effective hardware stack.

I wonder if other contemporary IDEs are similar?

How did you get into programming in the first place?

If you want a sanity check on programming life, I recommend you follow @ThePracticalDev in some form.

Recently a question was posed regarding we all got into programming in the first place.
https://dev.to/ben/how-did-you-get-into-programming-in-the-first-place/comments
There are a few interesting posts, here is my submission.

The Vic-20 was the first introduction, using BASIC pokes recorded on tape, but I think it was seeing the use of a variable in a simple Pascal programme over the shoulder of another student in year 9 that sparked something for my career choice. Ada at university, then PL/SQL with Oracle databases.

I often forget those first years, in between playing some form of space invaders, where I could follow a spiral bound manual to write simple BASIC programs, recording them onto a magnetic tape recorder.

Vic-20 "Datasette"

Insert many years of playing with DOS and autoexec.bat; playing Dune, Civilisation, and any number of cold war games & flight simulators, I found myself in a computing class when I was early teens. In maybe our second workshop I noticed the nerd in front of me doing something interesting with a 'variable'. No doubt my memory has warped this moment over time, but I vividly recall contemplating the creative implications of this temporary memory storage.

This nerd & I became friends, we created a cool little character-based word-sleuth game using Pascal, and I think I was kidding myself thinking of a career in Architecture.

It helped that Ada was the language of choice at the time in university. Look familiar? We finished our project work using Oracle, and I found myself at an Oracle client site instead of building internal systems for Collins class submarines...

Now I blog stuff about a revolutionary front end IDE built on top of amazing database technology.

What will we all be programming in three more decades time?

Thursday Thought: Boredom

Do you ever get bored? I do.

What do you do when you're bored? I eat. I think. I watch.

Sometimes I play on my phone. I whip it out, play some quizzes, read some feeds, send a text.

What I prefer to do is watch the world. There's plenty going on, I walk through a nearby bush regularly and sometimes it's almost like I'm absorbing pleasantness, contentment.

I saw a commercial a few months ago that made me sigh a little. I can't find a link, but it was basically a person at a bus stop, waiting for the bus but had nothing to do. The alternate was to "beat boredom" by getting connected, so he grabbed his phone, dropped his head and played. That was the slogan: beat boredom.

I think boredom is something we should all have and experience. Some of the best ideas probably came out of a state of boredom. It helps us think, helps our brains consolidate information, and rest.

Today I saw another advert, this one for the Apple watch. I don't see it in this list, but it was essentially the same thing. Beat boredom by having a device that's always attached to your arm that at any moment in time you can simply lift your arm up and see a computer screen.

Aren't we all consciously fighting that impulse with our smartphones?

At least the videos in the link show the device in mostly functional uses, though it's a big commitment, and to then not have it - though realistically, anything a watch can do, a phone can do, better.

And I also hear that, not surprisingly, Android gear and software are ahead of the game, not that I'm interested.

I remember giving up wearing a watch not long after I started my professional career, not that I was a big wearer anyway. I love the wrist freedom, in the same way I'm not looking forward to ever wearing glasses. I love not knowing the time, a fact further engrained after experiencing martial arts.

I think I'll wait a few generations until the wearable is much less intrusive, offering real gain.

All that being said, I'm sure there's niche markets to be filled, such as the medical industry where monitoring patients from a distance can free many hospital beds. I'm sure there's a few million dollar ideas to be had.

Maybe try walking amongst the trees.

Thursday Thought - History & Creativity

My sister sent me this video not long after my daughter was born earlier this year - I finally watched it while cleaning up e-mails and I'm glad I did - I highly recommend you all take 2 minutes aside and just let these images of history wash through your brain.



If you think the first half had an air of familiarity, you might be thinking of this video from Carl Sagan - I certainly was.

Now consider this was a project by a 17 year old at high school. This is the kind of creativity technology kids are creating at school now - awesome.

Note in the about section of the video he states he doesn't own rights to the images or song - if you think laws can sometimes strangle creativity then you might be interested in this TED talk by Larry Lessig.

If you like the video, and like the concept of looking back through time as life on this planet evolved - there is a great segment in one of my favourite fiction books that explores this concept - The Light of Other Days, by two science fiction greats Arthur C Clarke & Stephen Baxter.

Scott.

The web we want

I'm not a huge user of Firefox anymore. My exodus from IE brought me to Firefox, but then Chrome came along and I've been happy ever since.

That's quite analogous to my mobile telephone experience - starting with Nokia, big jump to first generation iPhone, now happy with Android.

I still use Firefox, but only so I can have a separate browser with an independent development builder session for Oracle APEX development. The FireFTP extension was pretty good, too. It doesn't render our tablet application very well, though - has trouble with some JavaScript libraries.

Anyway, I upgraded today and the Firefox team is asking the world what kind of web we want. It has a short, clever video using young children asking us to think know about the internet of things we make for our future generations, then asks us we want from our web from a choice of seven options :

• Creates opportunity
• Safeguards privacy
• Inspires learning
• Is available to all
• Puts me in control
• Promotes freedom

Personally, I chose "Inspires learning" because I feel that grassroots education is very important and these other aspects will be borne from an educated young.

The most interesting part was looking at the world map showing the percentages distributed by continent. I think it highlights the geo-politcal boundaries we currently face, relevant to each region.

The continents that value learning 

I think the learning map shows the people who want it the most probably don't have the best access to quality education.

Check it out, look at the maps for the other options and have a think about what is important to you.

ps - I'd also like a web with bigger "refresh" buttons, just like Chrome.

Thursday Thought: Are web clients getting thick?

I stumbled across this great post from a non-Oracle specific developer, and I thought I'd mention it here because it's worth a read.

http://zderadicka.eu/web-clients-are-getting-thick/

I've re-posted my comment here because they were thoughts rattling in my brain that I was going to rabble on about one day.

I've been thinking the same thing recently in regard to requests for Oracle APEX pages to not rely on connection to the database in order to operate for a time - using HTML5 storage in the meantime, then synchronising once connection is established. 

Essentially native mobile app behaviour in a web/hybrid application. 

I've also noticed issues in performance during my general mobile usage, particularly when it comes to web surfing. If you visit a news site in desktop format with your smartphone (particularly earlier models) it takes a while to render, yet open the same pages on your laptop using the phone as a data tether (to facilitate same download speed) - I've noticed rendering is much faster. 

The front end will also have to do rendering work, and browsers have been competing against each other for rendering speed for ages, but yes - they're getting thick again.

Is this the circle of life?

Thursday Thought - Look up & avoid boring

In the last slot of last year's Perth user group conference, my boss Penny Cookson & I presented a talk that was originally written by Tim Daniell in Queensland. It was called "Being Productive in IT", and it was an interesting, light-hearted comparison of how the human brain works using analogies with computers systems.

One of the lessons learnt was allowing yourself to be bored. Even to the point of doing some menial task while letting your creative side go nuts. It's kind of how rubber ducking works.

And it's also why the advert I'm seeing on Australian television for a mobile company really irritates me.

In the age we live we're all doing our best to close the laptop lids, put the smartphone in the pocket (even leave it at home occasionally) and turn the music players off - and we get an advert telling us to "avoid boring.". Click on that link to check out the ad.

No doubt many will tell me I'm just David vs the goliath marketing engine, but don't you think we should allow ourselves some time to sit at the bus stop and look around - or as Dr Karl or Neil Tyson would say... look up, even during the day. You'll never know what you'll see... or what you'll think of.

APOD

Thursday thought: How can you read that?

Every website that has some form of feed needs this option:

Thanks Google+

This sort of responsive web layout isn't always cool, IMHO - it's like watching a tennis match.

Google Web Designer - a HTML5 development tool

So, in the coming months Google will be launching a HTML5 web development tool targeted at creative agencies and designers.

My geeky mind thought about that, remembered geocities and thought - boy we've come a long way.

My APEX mind read that and thought - I wonder how many similarities this may have with a tool like Oracle Application Express, and I wonder what we might be able to learn from it?

I wonder what sort of databases could be attached to it, or maybe a good API into further enhanced HTML5 storage capabilities will make other databases superfluous in this instance?

There are a number of tools out there today that probably do whatever Google is going to do, but with Google's brand and inertia, we might just give the crazies an even more effective tool for duping the masses.

I'm also interested what it might mean for bloggers...?

Thursday thought - QR codes

Have you ever played with QR codes?

We used them at our SAGE booth at the Perth conference to link to our conference beta mobile application. I stumbled across one idea recently, possibly via Martin - my electronic signature

My nail in the head? #matrixreference

This gave me a sobering thought - it's another brick in the wall towards a world where we communicate with each other with a twitter-esque environment but with a tightly coupling of electronics & biology, and this is the stamp on our painting, so to speak, detailing whatever information will be required to identify us.

Too much?

What if Google went bust?

Ever consider that? What would you lose?

During life we put a spectrum of trust in different areas, depending on our own risk assessment. We originally entrusted our tribe members to help protect the community. Now, we might give a dollar to a little boy to fetch us something, and we might not get it back. Who cares? it's a buck.
We trust out mortgage to the banks because they have a proven history of money management.

So what about your data? I trust Google with a lot of my content. In fact, not really content, but information. Dates, numbers, links, hints, prompts, memories...
It's hard to back up because it's a network of information. A lattice that Google so elegantly lets you search.

We occasionally joke about our reliance on these modern devices when an old fashioned diary will do - but what happens when you lose that? I was listening to an interesting podcast recently from our public broadcaster ABC, a program called "All in the mind". A recent discussion on memory suggested we've been using these aids in various forms to help us remember from computers to paper to papyrus to cavern walls - so what's the matter with using this tool aiming for a device harmoniously engineered for bio & robotics. Well, maybe I added some thoughts in the description - but a program well worth a listen.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/allinthemind/new-document/4420956

On a slight tangent (ba-dum), searching is an interesting topic itself - what if all information humanity knows about the universe was in a cube the size of a dice? Search facilitation would have to be impeccable. Search companies are never going to die (altavista? well, companies that aren't a verb in the Oxford English Dictionary)

If Google went bust, I'd be in the doo doo.

So what about your personal finance software? What if that went bust? or your hard disk died? laptop stolen? fire?
How much information would you lose? How easy is to backup? Copy the export to a disk, thumbdrive, cloud service, cd - somewhere off-site.

And know how to get it back.

Risk vs benefit vs simplicity.

I have what I feel is a very strong password - that's all you need, right? Remember the TV show "Weakest Link", think about that with your security. Cars used to be hot-wired, now they can't so criminals steal keys out of houses.

Heck, what happens when our cars start integrating via bluetooth with more intelligence to other aspects of your life? Smartphone applications getting more advanced and integrated than Google's My Tracks or Angry Birds.

People are being asked to put passwords everywhere now right? People using simpler passwords and not caring about that added security because it's too hard an unnecessary - who would be interested in me, right?

Shit happens and sometimes it gets up your nostrils. People might start to take notice - sites are providing shared authentication through a number of accounts - google, facebook, twitter - so the closer we get to one-size-fits-all authentication, we can perhaps think about just having one good, strong, but easy to remember password.

So, passwords is too strong for a super duper force of networked computers to hack? well try basic social engineering.

I think everyone should read the story of Mat Honan, a man who's heavily invested digital life was destroyed with a simple phone call.
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/08/apple-amazon-mat-honan-hacking/all/

He lost all his information, and tells the horrible story of someone gaining access to a single point of his online identity, then trail blazed from there - just by someone pretending to be him on a phone, getting a password reset. All because they liked his 3 letter twitter handle.

I've had this rambling drafted for a while, and now I encounter the perfect concept to take away from this - Google has now announced a war on the password.
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/01/google-password/

I've always had interests in various security aspects of computer science, and I think this will be an interesting part of the journey. I wonder which science fiction writers ended up being right in helping us imagine the future we encounter?

When will we close a year of technology and comment on the general disappearance of the common password, gone like the day of the 3.5" disk that fits perfectly in your starched shirt chest pocket?

Thursday Thought: Helicopters, batteries & squid

First of all, this photograph was difficult to take.

Second of all, this is one of the most fun inventions ever.

And I have a greater respect for helicopter pilots. I found an even better backdrop, but this little thing is highly sensitive to wind.

The question I'd like to ask is - when are scientists going to make even moderate gains in battery efficiency? This thing last less than 20 minutes per USB charge.

Update 2013-1-24
I have some data points - only 3, but better than a guess.
MI:SS

08:44 - in garage, wind affected,  charged previous day, left to drain?
16:13 - inside home, occasional breaze, longer flight times, recent charge, flying lights on - did I write down total, not lap time?
07:30 - inside home, occasional breaze, longer flight times, recent charge, flying lights off

04:47 - inside home, light breeze, mostly flying, charged previous day, left to drain? 
07:26 - inside home, light breeze, mostly flying, just charged

I've gathered no data as yet on charge times.

I want a bigger copter ;-)

Imagine what scaling down battery size, the way microcomputers and hard disks have paved a path to miniature. After healthcare, of course, think about what you might like to do?

Think exploratory devices - for caves you could use perhaps like the ones I just saw in Prometheus, but as quadcopters? Clever people are already using these to map rooms and find things, good steps towards disaster relief efforts.

But my number one would be the oceans.

Who shall I quote talking about how much we know about astronomy and cosmology, compared to the dark, inhabitable depths of the world's ocean. 95% of ocean ready to be explored - the other, final frontier.

All this seeded by the announcement of footage of a giant squid airing recently on NHK - I can't wait to see that footage on Discovery.

Impressive as this is, finding a kraken would be the one cryptid I'd like come true!

Who knows what other discoveries could be made by an autonomous, sensor laden, self propelling robot with the capacity to last for days?

Thursday Thought: YouTube video statistics

Ever watch a YouTube video and check out the statistics to see how it ended up on your screen?

I did this recently with an amazing video taken on a scary looking bridge in Norway (Slartibartfast would be happy)

Mobile is on the brain, so what initially struck me was the amount of views reported by a mobile device vs something like Facebook.

Looking further, what really got the graph moving was when it was first embedded in yahoo web mail. I interpret this as when it really started to spread between family & friends and traveled through the regions of Norway, Poland & Canada.

Despite the younger generation, social media, and views of some - email still has a long way to go before dying. Ever tried to set up any form of account for kids? Everything needs an e-mail address!

And don't underestimate where mobile is going. It hit Zynga fast, crippling a company that had it all.

Thursday Thought: Pacifism

Of course the many forms of internet media are rife with commentary on the tragedy of Sandy Hook, and this morning after reading a relatively objective article by someone I admire - Steve Novella, and I felt compelled to add an observation on the taboo, gun control.

I'll start with the reason I find Steve's opinions worthy, particularly those relating to his medical profession - the and the fact he seems to know facts about everything!
When he starts assessing gun control:

I just want to make the point that it is reasonable to address this issue, the discussion should be evidence-based, we currently need more and better evidence, meanwhile we can make some rational decisions based on the evidence we have.

I think it comes down to attitude. Another piece of the puzzle to my epiphany:

US attitude to gun control

I think many Australians (a culture I'm familiar with) think less guns all around, less chance of something horrible occurring. All firearms must be licensed for particular uses only and kept in a secure safe. Notably, with the exception of Northern Ireland, UK police force don't carry guns.

So I take this to a logical conclusion - each side always needs the bigger gun. You end up with a cold war, which lead to humanity realising it must stop or reach mutually assured destruction.
Conflict in the regions around the world continue, sustained often by revenge or vengeance, or other similar retaliation.

Call me a pacifist (a word I learnt watching the classic Hunt for the Red October), but can't we do this to the lowest denominator we can go? Trained properly, police could defend themselves from most crime incidents with a three or six foot wooden pole.

On a lighter note, if you are interested I encountered a small piece from PZ Myers inspired by Victoria Soto praising teachers around the world for their contribution to human interest.

Finally, both Steve & PZ are on distant wings ends on the spectrum of secularism. I dare not mention some of the horrid things I saw on the ends of other spectra, perhaps I just don't understand them.

What turned out to be a rant, over.

Thursday Thought - A continuously wondrous age

Forget for a moment the Internet exists. Can you do that?

Recently when I was talking with my Dad, I suggested I'd love the opportunity to experience perhaps a week of the 1950's - just to try to comprehend what life was really like 50 years ago without the presumptions of today. This could really apply to many decades in history, some of which I think would really enable people to understand why certain achievements haven't been repeated because of the climate of the day (I'm thinking moon landing here...)

These thoughts were drifting through my head has I played with my new toy - a Samsung Galaxy 3. Compared with previous smart phones, this thing is quite big - the perspective shown with the pen here doesn't do it any justice. The screen alone is about the same size as the current iPhone.

In particular, I was having a look at the battery settings, and I took a screenshot because I was admiring the wealth of information provided in that 4.8in screen, and the technology it probably takes to obtain it.

From the top, I have a notification from my wife ready for me to make a move in our scrabble-esque game; a notification to update some applications; my alarm ready to wake me tomorrow; wifi action going on; battery percentage remaining; the time - and this is all in the top line.

I wonder what it takes to gather individual application data regarding battery usage!

Back to my opening line, imagine this device without the Internet - what would you have? Perhaps compare it to the first computer you ever owned (and I'm thinking people of at least my vintage here - remember Commodore 64 or perhaps an IBM XT using DOS 3.x)

I'd see myself holding in my hand a device that can take high quality photos; high definition video; operate various time keeping options; an alarm; a torch; calendar; diary; journal; book reader; road map; calculator; gaming device; audio player... oh, and a telephone!

I wonder what people from the '50s would think of a device that did all that, without even comprehending what all the features having Internet access can provide. Kudos to those in history who imagined a potential world. It's getting harder though - what are we going to have in the next few decades?

Regardless, sometimes I think we have to remember how lucky we are to have what we have.

Happy days,

Scott.

Thursday Thought - Legacy errors

The other day I was writing a query for my Apex application and I required an outer join. In this case I decided to use the ANSI syntax, and out of habit I used a scalar subquery to reference an application item:

select col1, col2
from my_table a
left outer join my_other_table b
on a.id = b.id
and b.sub_id = (SELECT v('F_SUB_ID') FROM DUAL)

I received the following error, which was fair enough - but what I did not expect to see was a reference to what I presume to be Oracle V6.

ORA-01799: a column may not be outer-joined to a subquery

Cause: <expression>(+) <relop> (<subquery>) is not allowed.

Action: Either remove the (+) or make a view out of the subquery. In V6 and before, the (+) was just ignored in this case.

I don't suppose anyone is still on Oracle6 out there?!

Thursday's Thought - APEX 4.2

During a conversation with a colleague I had thought regarding potential release date for Oracle Application Express 4.2

I know this is really comparing apples to oranges, but at least it gives a ball park ;-)

APEX 4.1 early adopter was released in May last year.
http://joelkallman.blogspot.com.au/2011/05/application-express-41-early-adopter-1.html
... and was released in August.
http://dgielis.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/upgraded-to-apex-41-successfully.html

So perhaps we shall expect 4.2 in September? Perhaps we'll just see how things go... :-p

Update: It was released in mid-October - not bad for such a major release!

Scott

Thursday Thought - Busy busy busy

Over the next month or so, my posts may slow down a touch.

One exciting reason involves this little device pictured. I won't let too much out of the bag just yet, but an opportunity presented itself and I just had to take it.

This means I need to start prioritising a few things.

I've been trying to do a technical post every Wednesday, and this has been assisted by a flurry of posts I wrote earlier in the year that I scheduled over the weeks, with the occasional scheduling mistake - a couple of posts per day. The scheduling interface could be better, but I won't complain.

Unfortunately, these pre-written posts are drying up, I have plenty of e-mails tagged ready to write about, but the task involving the pictured device will take priority. When I get ahead on that schedule, I'll make sure my presentations for the conferences this year are on track, then I'll write some more posts - because I'm enjoying it quite a lot, and I'm also finding my own blog quite useful as a self-reference. It seems the quickest way to find information is to search where you now exactly how/where to look!

Further down on the list, I also want to re-design my blog re-design, especially after following what that Jeff Smith has been up to recently. I would like to ease the clutter and modernise a little more.

Oh, and I have my regular day job, not like some people ;-)

I'll also probably be somewhat quiet in the social media arena for a while. Partially to limit the consumption of information and keep focus, and (fortunately for me) I'll be on staggered holidays over the next month.

I hope all of you aren't working too hard, and I'll see you on the other side.

Scott.