ORACLE FUSION APPLICATIONS
Delivered as a complete suite of
modular applications, Oracle Fusion
Applications—the next generation of
Oracle’s business applications—coexist with
existing Oracle Applications, and include
more than 100 modules in seven different
product families for a range of industries and
geographies, including financial management; procurement and sourcing; project
and portfolio management; human capital
management; customer relationship management; supply chain management; and
governance risk and compliance modules.
“Oracle Fusion Applications are built
using industry standards–based Java
middleware, and integrated with business
intelligence [BI], not just process automa-
tion,” said Ellison, outlining the key design
principles. “The user experience is modern,
consistent, and productive, with Web 2.0,
social networking, and collaboration built in.
And they’re SOA based, to simplify integra-
tion, and SaaS [software as a service] ready.”
Ellison, who described the launch of Oracle
Fusion Applications as the largest in Oracle’s
history, detailed the three key benefits of
Oracle Fusion Applications: a SOA, which
gives users the ability to manage functions
across a heterogeneous environment; a role-
based user experience; and embedded BI.
“Oracle Fusion Applications bring a new era
of application software and technology investments going forward,” said Steve Miranda,
senior vice president of application development at Oracle, during his keynote address.
“[They] define how organizations innovate,
work, and adopt technology.”
“The newest Exadata system, X2-8, has all
of the advantages of the current Exadata,
but more. . . . The advantage is speed.”
—Oracle President Mark Hurd at Oracle Open World 2010 in San Francisco
enhancements to Linux,” said Ellison. “As
we build these high-end Linux machines, we
can’t afford to be four years behind in software.” While Oracle continues to offer a Red
Hat Enterprise Linux–compatible kernel, the
new Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel is built
and tested to run Oracle hardware, databases,
and middleware with the best Linux performance and reliability available. “It’s now the
only Linux kernel Oracle recommends for use
with Oracle software,” said Ellison.
In tests versus a Red Hat–compatible
kernel, the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel
boosts OLTP performance more than 75
percent, accelerates InfiniBand messaging
200 percent, and is 137 percent faster in
solid-state disk access. It provides optimizations for large Non-Uniform Memory Access
(NUMA) servers, improved power management and energy efficiency, and fine-grained
CPU and memory resource control.
productivity, and lower operational costs,
Kurian said.
Oracle is also planning an enhanced programming model that combines the power
of Java with the ease of JavaFX to deliver
advanced 2-D, 3-D, and vector graphics;
high-fidelity media; and the best HTML 5,
JavaScript, and CSS Web capabilities—along
with native Java platform support.
Oracle is supporting the evolution of
Java EE to make application servers more
modular and programming more efficient,
with improvements such as dependency
injection and reduced configuration requirements. Oracle is also working to modernize
the Java mobile platform by delivering Java
with Web support to consumer devices.
“We are really excited about Java,”
Kurian concluded. “We are committed to
giving you the world’s best programming
language, the world’s most popular deployment platform, and the ability to build
really amazing graphics and other kinds of
clients, all in Java.”
Rich Schwerin is
Oracle Magazine’s
features editor.
Previously he was senior
product marketing
manager for Linux and
open source at Oracle.
ORACLE’S UNBREAKABLE ENTERPRISE
KERNEL FOR ORACLE LINUX
Oracle’s Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel for
Oracle Linux—a fast, modern, reliable Linux
kernel that is optimized for Oracle software
and hardware—is based on the combined
efforts of Oracle’s Linux, database, middleware, and hardware engineering teams.
Both Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud and the
Exadata Database Machine X2-8 rely on the
Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel for extreme
Linux performance.
“We spend considerable effort to find
and repair regressions, and we do a lot of
JAVA ROADMAP
At his JavaOne keynote address, Thomas
Kurian, executive vice president of product
development at Oracle, outlined plans for the
future of the Java platform and demonstrated
the latest Java technology innovations.
“With our increased investment in the
Java platform, a sharp focus on features
that deliver value to the community, and a
relentless focus on performance, the Java
language and platform have a bright future,”
said Kurian. “Oracle remains committed to
OpenJDK as the best open source Java imple-
mentation, and we will continue to improve
OpenJDK and welcome external contributors.”
Kurian’s presentation and product dem-
onstrations highlighted four key areas of Java
technology: Java Platform, Standard Edition
(Java SE); Java on the client; Java Platform,
Enterprise Edition (Java EE); and Java on
devices. Oracle is advancing the Java platform
and optimizing it for new application models
and hardware, including extended support
for scripting languages, increased developer
NEXT STEPS
LEARN more about
Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud
oracle.com/exalogic
Oracle’s Exadata Database Machine X2-8
oracle.com/exadata
Oracle Fusion Applications
oracle.com/fusion
Oracle’s Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel for
Oracle Linux
oracle.com/linux
Java
oracle.com/java
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2010
ORACLE.COM/ORACLEMAGAZINE
