I’m speaking at Collaborate 17 in Las Vegas

This year will be my sixth year at Collaborate, according to my recollection I first presented there in 2011 and have only missed one year (2013) since then.  It’s going to be a shorter visit than usual, so apologies if I don’t get to connect with you or attend your session.  Here is where you can find me…

Monday

Two of the most knowledgeable speakers you will see are speaking at the same time, there should be a law against it.  I might shuttle between the two, because I don’t want to miss either presentations

2:45 PM– Jasmine H – Mohan Iyer

How do I know where to use – FAH, FAHRCS or SLA?

2: 45 – South Seas I – Thomas Simkiss

Tips and Tricks – Get the most out of Financial Reporting in the Oracle Cloud

4:15 Jasmine H – General Ledger SIG – Always a good knowledgeable crowd.

Tuesday

7am – Morning run

Join myself, Peter Care (@FXLoader) and hopefully quite a few others for as many laps of the Mandalay bay pool complex as you feel up to.  This is now officially an annual tradition, we ought to get OAUG to put it in the agenda.  Best way to blow away the cobwebs and energize yourself for the day ahead.

8:30am – Keynote –  Glenn Finch, IBM

I have been quietly spending a lot of time around blockchain for some time now, so this got my attention.  If you don’t know about blockchain you should, I’m happy to talk about it at any opportunity.  This excerpt from the description should give you an idea how big it really can be

“emerging technologies such as Blockchain, Cognitive and Quantum Computing will do more than change our businesses. They will transform industries and create their own ecosystems “

Expect to hear more from me about blockchain as the year goes on.

1:30pm – I’m speaking about @FAHRCS

Come see my session – 1:30 PM–2:30 PM South Seas G

How E-Business Suite Customers have achieved modern reporting in the cloud

2:15pm – Fintech Design Jam

I’m a mentor for this two hour Design Jam run by the Applications UX Innovation Events team.  If you have not registered not sure if there is time now, but if you already are I will see you there.  Our goal is to help the teams tell a story about how they would use Fintech in their work, helping them hone in on a manageable 3 minute story showcasing their design.

5pm – airport… (and breathe).

 

Accounting Hub Reporting Cloud Service

So what is this new service and why was it such a big focus at Oracle OpenWorld this year?

• It’s a very exciting opportunity to experience the powerful Financial Reporting innovations in our Cloud offerings without disruption to your existing ERP investments.
• It’s a way to take advantage of the Simplified Financials Report Center, optimized for easy access to reports on your choice of mobile device
• It includes the sunburst data visualization tool, which was my killer demo last week at OpenWorld (see screen shot)
• It’s a way to move to cloud in an incremental manner, realizing business benefits quickly without disruption to your existing business processes and systems.
• It has a companion EBusiness Suite feature (available on 12.1.3 and 12.2.4) that will push all your set up and GL Balances to your cloud service and generate reports automatically for you.  Giving you a zero configuration reporting solution for you EBS GL Balances data (watch out for more detailed posts on this soon)
• It has web services to load General Ledger data from PeopleSoft, JDE Edwards or any other ERP system.
• It’s a way to get your hands on the Oracle Social Network which is part of the platform our Cloud offerings are built on.

That’s a decent list to start with, but there are a few things that it isn’t which I should call out

• It is not(yet) the Accounting Hub Integration Platform with all the rule based accounting transformations provided by Subledger Accounting Architecture (SLA)
• It is not a new name designed to confuse you when we already have Financials Accounting Hub and Fusion Accounting Hub.

Look out for future posts going into more detail, or you can look at the cloud service page, which has important details such as pricing.

Focus on User Groups at Oracle OpenWorld

Anyone who reads my blog regularly might be tired of me praising user groups, but I believe it is worth repeating myself.  The type of information sharing you get from user groups is unique and very valuable, it is important for Oracle to support that, be aware of it, but not interfere.  I have been involved with the Oracle Apps User Group via the GL SIG for several years now but I will never push my agenda, I listen, provide information or presentations that are requested and I learn.  Many of my colleagues will tell you the same.  So Sunday is User Group day at OpenWorld and I look forward to seeing a lot of familiar faces and learning something new.  I have a bit of a schedule crunch this year, 12 months ago I committed to run the 5k “Dolphin Dash” School fundraiser with my 8 year old son, I didn’t think for a minute it would fall on the same date as OpenWorld.  So I have to run a 5k at 9am and then dash into San Francisco to present at the GL SIG for 11am, if I arrive in my running gear, still sweating please accept my apologies.  I will stay around for more of the sessions and always I will be active on twitter, so you can find me that way too.

At the GL SIG I’ll be talking about and briefly showing the new Accounting Hub Reporting Cloud Service, which I am very excited about.  You will also hear from Lakshmi Sampath from Dell about SLA on their upgrade to R12.  The full agenda is below, I hope to see a lot of you there.

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Agenda GL-SIG @ OpenWorld 2014 on Sunday, September 28^th, 11.00am
Location – Moscone W – 3005

Agenda

1. Introduction to the SIG
2. Proactive support presentation
3. Sponsor message (Excel4Apps)
4. Lakshmi (SLA on Upgrade @ Dell)
5. David Haimes new Accounting Hub Cloud Reporting Service
6. Open questions

We will be joined by our Oracle colleagues to tell us about ProActive support and their leading practices to deliver content and help to the Oracle user community.
Excel4Apps will be helping us by sponsoring the meeting at this conference.

In the past many oracle apps customers have looked elsewhere for their reporting needs – until now – see a preview of “Accounting Hub Reporting Cloud Service”. See how many finance users are using their favorite tools for reporting – Smartview, Cubes, and related functionality to get their financials.  Fusion Account Hub Reporting Cloud Service is a new subscription service provides out of the box integration with EBS R12 General Ledger for reporting.  This session will provide an introduction to the new service, how it connects, works with EBS data, the reporting capabilities available and what it does and does not support.  Come listen to David Haimes, Senior Director, Financials Product Development t alk about the new service.

Hear what Lakshmi Sampath from Dell has to say about their upgrade to R12. The presentation covers the R12 Upgrade Case-Study at Dell providing details on what happens during upgrade to R12 in various subledgers (PO, AP, AR, PA, FA) with respect to SLA. This presentation will also provide details on strategies for data conversion to SLA model during upgrade, and cover critical lessons learned during the upgrade @ DELL.

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Fusion Accounting Hub is the talk of Las Vegas

As I was planning my agenda for the Collaborate 14 (#C14LV) conference next week, I noticed a lot of sessions on Fusion Accounting Hub.  In my earlier post defining Fusion Accounting Hub (FAH) I introduced this idea of a reporting platform, it is a compelling reporting and consolidation solution and as such is gaining a a lot of attention, particularly when Coexisting with Ebusiness Suite, Peoplesoft or JD Edwards ERP systems.

I will be presenting Monday at Collaborate on Fusion Accounting Hub coexisting with E business Suite R12 and how it was used to implement a global chart of accounts.  The multinational SIG has a series on reporting and there are several other sessions from various customers and partners on Fusion Accounting Hub and Coexistence.  I’m listing them below so you can plan accordingly, I will be at most of these, look forward to seeing you there too.

 Monday 7th April

 Reaping the Benefits of Coexistence Strategy With Fusion Accounting Hub: A Case Study

1:00 PM-2:00 PM

Session ID: 14480
Room: Level 3, Murano – 3201
Abstract: Oracle’s Fusion Application provides organizations with the option of next generation of enterprise applications which can optimize their business user experience and productivity. With Fusion Applications, organizations now also have a choice to coexist with their existing IT investments. This session will focus on the Fusion Application Coexistence strategy with the use of Fusion Accounting Hub and show case a few case studies of how fusion accounting hub was used to integrate EBS, PeopleSoft and JD Edwards.

• Sujoy Hajra, Deloitte Consulting USA
• Ganesh Bhoominathan, Deloitte Consulting USA
• Rattan Singh, Deloitte Consulting USA

 E-Business Suite Coexistince With Fusion Accounting Hub and Implementing a Global Chart of Accounts

3:20 PM-4:20 PM

Session ID: 14977
Room: Level 1, Marco Polo – 805
Abstract: Hear how Oracle implemented Fusion Accounting Hub Coexisting with it’s R12 EBS Financials and transitioned to a new single Global Chart of Accounts in less than a year. You will learn the principles and process used to determine and reach agreement on the new chart of accounts as well as how the final result looks. In addition you will learn how over 100 ledgers are consolidated in Fusion Accounting Hub and the time to close reduced. We will discuss the best practice recommendations for Fusion Accounting Hub.

• David Haimes, Oracle

Tuesday April 8th

Fusion Financials Cloud & Fusion Accounting Hub

1:45 PM-2:45 PM

Session ID: 105810
Room: Level 3, Murano 3202
Abstract: Get up and running on Fusion Financials at the speed of Cloud using the Fusion Financials Implementation tools. Upload tools allow you to upload repetitive type entries directly from Excel to Fusion Financials Cloud, such as the chart of accounts. The Functional Setup Manager guides you through the essential steps to set up and configure your applications using the most common features and best practice considerations. Also discover how Oracle Fusion Accounting Hub address common problems such as integrating accounting from both Oracle and non-Oracle applications. All this will allow you to reap the benefits of Fusion on the Cloud or On Premise faster than ever before.

• Miller, Kim, Oracle Corp.

Making the Choice: E-Business Suite 12.1, 12.2 and/or Fusion

3:00 PM-4:00 PM

Session ID: 14953
Room: Sands, Level 1 – 307
Abstract: With the availability of E-Business Suite 12.1, 12.2, and Fusion, Oracle customers who are still on 11i have a whole host of choices to consider when migrating from their current 11i system. This presentation will outline both the benefits and risks in upgrading/implementing all three ERP systems and how you can develop a business case and migration strategy based on this knowledge. Fusion co-existence will also be discussed and considered within this roadmap.

• Alyssa Johnson, ROLTA

Co-Existence Versus Replacement, the Future of Global Implementations, a Multi-National User Panel

4:15 PM-5:15 PM

Session ID: 14436
Room: Sands, Level 1 – 307
Abstract: We need to do better! Global ERP implementations rarely have provided the expected business benefits and never seem completed. We need more flexibility, nimbleness, and adaptability to change:prepare for co-existence of systems, not just replacement. At the same time we need to promote multi-country compliance solutions and parallel multi-country integration.Rigorous focus on data validation, global process standards, and minimizing applications diversity are other corner stones. We will have a spirited discussion.

 

Thursday April 10th

Using Fusion Accounting Hub to Consolidate Third Party Accounting Systems into PeopleSoft Financials

1:00 PM-2:00 PM

Session ID: 108720
Room: Level 4, Lando 4303
Abstract: If you have many third party systems that require specific accounting rules and have built individual integrations into Oracle’s PeopleSoft Financials, then this session is for you. Let us show you how Oracle’s Fusion Accounting Hub can streamline the maintenance and creation of accounting from the many feeder systems. This session will also deep dive into the integration built between the accounting creation of the hub into PeopleSoft General Ledger. We will show you how you can use the power of PeopleSoft and the power of the Fusion Accounting Hub to reduce costs, maintain higher levels of controls and auditability.

• Morcos, Amira, Oracle Corp.

Friday April 11th

Fusion Accounting Hub: How to Maximize Your Existing Investment in Oracle Apps Unlimited Products?

09:45 AM-10:45 AM

Session ID: 14399
Room: Level 3, Murano – 3201
Abstract: Fusion Accounting Hub (FAH), provides a complete set of accounting tools. The product supports all financial management and analytical reporting needs. There are various approaches to adopting FAH in co-existence with various systems. Oracle has provided pre-built integrators using GoldenGate from EBS and via ODI from PeopleSoft to integrate to FAH. Non-Oracle sources can also be integrated. FAH offers the product’s full reporting, catalytic, drill down and integration capabilities to AU customers.

• Shince Francis, ROLTA
• Aparna Lingi, Rolta

Fusion Financials: How to leverage Fusion Financials ( New Implementation vs Coexistence)

12:15 PM-1:15 PM

Session ID: 15147
Room: Level 3, Murano – 3201
Abstract: This presentation will provide an overview of Fusion Financials. We will review the new functionality that exists in Fusion Financials and compare it to E-Business Suite. We will also review the implementation options and compare a new Financial Implementation with a Coexistence model alongside E-Business Suite.

• Eric Deering, Apps Associates
• Srinivas Pothireddy, Apps Associates

Oracle Ebusiness Suite Financials Books

I am often asked what book to read to learn Oracle Financials, there is no simple answer here.  If you get the concepts right everything else will drop into place much more easily than getting overwhelmed with specific details of how to configure every single feature click by click or what every single UI does in detail.  I have listed some of the books available below.  I have given some commentary, but I advise going to amazon and checking out the reviews there or looking in the comments of this post where I hope you will all share your thoughts on the ones you have read.

Oracle E-Business Suite Financials Handbook, Third Edition

I have the first edition of this book, it is very readable and goes over the concepts and major features of all the products in financials, a good starting point if you are new to financials.  It discusses how you would run an implementation project and does not concern itself with step by step guidance on how to set up specific features.  It’s a good book and well researched.

I have not read the third edition in detail yet, anyone who has please feel free to post comments on this post.

Oracle E-Business Suite Financials R12: A Functionality Guide

Full disclosure on this one.  Firstly I was given this book free by the publishers to review, secondly I know the author Mohan Iyer, who is chair of the OAUG GL Special Interest Group.

This book is not going to make you an expert in Oracle Financials and ready to get started on a major implementation right away, it does not get into the detailed steps of how to configure all the modules and features. It simply introduces the modules in a way that a business user can understand, diving into a little more detail in some places. I think it is intended to be a guide for a business user considering or already starting an implementation, so they can understand some of the options and choices available and I feel it mostly meets that goal well.

The Oracle General Ledger guide

I purchased this book and I’ve read most of it. It seems to be very comprehensive and accurate on the details but is not adding the value I’d hope for over and above the online help or product documentation.  I would have liked it to see some more concise overviews of features and business cases for using certain implementation choices over others.  That said I’m thrilled to a book on GL and am sure many people will find it useful.

Oracle E-Business Suite Development & Extensibility Guide

Not had a chance to read this one, but it contains information that many, many people will care a lot about.  Let me know if you have read it.

Shining a Light on the Release 12 World

The Solution Beacon crew have produced a number of good publications and have a lot of experience, they focus on what is new in R12 and what is in it for you.  It comes with a recommendation from Floyd Teter, who is a respected friend of this blog.  I have not read this one myself.

If you have any of these books, or maybe you are one of the authors of these books please share your thoughts with the community in the comments section.

EBusiness Suite Legal Entity FAQ

I’ve been preparing these for a presentation at Oracle OpenWorld next week, they were mostly taken from the questions asked by Alyssa Johnson in her comment, but they are very typical questions that I get asked a lot.

What is the difference between the 11i GRE/LE and R12 LE?

• GRE/LE is upgraded as an LE in R12
• In 11i GRE/LE was often a dummy LE, not real LE structure and had little use
• R12 LE has a more robust definition
• R12 LE is used more by processes and reports across financials

Where does the LE impact R12 processing?

• Short answer – Tax, Intercompany (AGIS), Global Features

Why should I assign BSVs to my LEs in the Ledger?

• It is optional, if your BSV is your company code, you have an implied LE there in your GL
• It helps with some LE derivation for transaction stamping
• Allows you to run reports by LE
• May make Intercompany rules easier to define

In 11i, the LE doesn’t really correspond to the true Legal Entities of the Organization (e.g. only one LE is setup even though there are multiple companies). What is going to break in R12 if I leave it that way?

• Nothing will break if you do nothing and stay with one ‘dummy’ LE
• You won’t get all the good stuff we talked about earlier

Is there a connection between the LE and the BU?

• If you map LE to Ledgers / BSV, there is an indirect LE-OU relationship
• There is a Default Legal Entity for an OU (Default Legal Context) which in some cases(1:1:1) it will be the only LE so it is a direct assingment

If you want to add anything to this, or have more questions then fine the comments section below…

Want more on Legal Entities?

I was perusing the statistics that wordpress.com provides for this blog and was interested to learn that the most commented on post, with a whopping 69 comments, is the classic from November 2007 – How do I define my Legal Entities? .  It has also received 18,449 page views which is the second most viewed post on this blog.  My conclusion is that people are interested in this topic and want to learn more, so I thought I would mention the OAUG GL SIG meeting at OpenWorld where I have been asked to make a short presentation about Legal Entities, essential details are:

 

Title:		OAUG General Ledger SIG
Time		Sunday, 04:00 PM, Moscone West – 3005
Length		1 Hour
Abstract:		The OAUG General Ledger SIG is a worldwide community of professionals engaged in the use of record-to-report business processes. Group members are business users, consultants, and support members engaged in the use of Oracle General Ledger. This session focuses on Oracle Fusion Financials’ General Ledger feature, the Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12+ update, and the Oracle Financials release roadmap.

I have just started to think about preparing slides and I thought that rather than actually work on them, I would blog and see if anyone had ideas on the type of thing I should talk about (the hip crowd would call it crowd sourcing).  It’s been almost 4 years since that post, so let me know in the comments what more information you would like on Legal Entities in Oracle Apps.

The comments section is just down below, past all the widgets asking you to like the post and share it…

A few GL R12 Ledger FAQ

Here are a few questions about R12 I have been asked a number of times, and if a few people asked me, I am guessing that even more people are searching from Google, (or maybe even Yahoo or Bing) looking for answers.

1) What is a Ledger?  What happened to my Sets of Books?

Your 11i Set of Books is now an R12 ledger, any 11i sets of books you had will be a ledger after you run the R12 upgrade.

2) Why did you change the name?

I am not fully aware of the history of the decision, but a Ledger is a much better description and matches the business terminology more closely.  Also with the introduction of Ledger Sets in R12, we’d have had a clumsy  ‘Set of Books Sets’ term to deal with.

3) Does the new table gl_ledgers replace gl_sets_of_books table.

Yes.

4) So what about my custom reports that query gl_sets_of_books table or gl_sets_of_books_v view

No need to change those.  For backward compatibility we created a view gl_sets_of_books which references the gl_ledgers table.  gl_sets_of_books_v is also modified to reference gl_ledgers table.

5) What happens to the sob_id, are these primary keys preserved?

Yes, the sob_id from 11i will become the ledger_id you see in R12

6) I see Ledger_id in the gl_interface table, do I have to update all my feeder programs that write to that to populate ledger_id instead of sob_id?

No.  GL_INTERFACE is backward compatible, the sob_id column is still there and ledger_id is optional, if Journal Import does not find any value in ledger_id it will use the sob_id

I have not got into any of the powerful new functionality that is introduced as part of the Ledger Architecture, or discussed what you can do with Ledger Sets, those items are for another day.  If you want to read about those now you should look at the document below.

Oracle Financials and Oracle Procurement Functional Upgrade Guide: Release 11i to Release 12 (Part No. B31543-01)

And General Ledger too

It’s been a busy week for me and I have a lot of homework to get through this weekend. I was asked to take on the General Ledger(GL) product ‘ownership’ in addition to Legal Entity and Intercompany.

I am a little uncomfortable calling myself owner of products, we use this to mean that the product management team and development team report to you. However I don’t own anything, I didn’t buy the product (like customers) I don’t own the source code (that would be the Oracle shareholders) I would say it is more like stewardship of the product.  However the fact of the matter is, I am the one people come looking for when there is a problem!

Taking on General Ledger is a big deal, it’s the oldest of the Oracle Apps and has a huge existing user base. Given the close integration of Intercompany and LE with GL it is a good fit to have all three I have a reasonable knowledge of the product and have worked with the development team a lot over the years. The development team I have inherited are very strong, so I’m looking forward to working with them. I’m also looking forward to getting my arms around the product and plan for Fusion.

The net result is I’m going to be very busy, but I am determined to keep the blogging going and I hope I will have some new insight into GL that I can share over the coming months.