Today, Oracle University is still going strong, but we also have Google, blogs, Twitter, and, of course, User Groups. With this wealth of knowledge we can find just about anything at any time. The question then becomes, is this the best answer, or just an answer. This is where I feel that the User Groups set ourselves apart. Not only is the information there, but it is being written, presented, and discussed by the thought leaders. IOUG is participating in three events that really underline this point.
As I write today, I am attending the International Oracle User Community User Group Leaders' Summit. This is an event that is sponsored by Oracle and takes place on the Oracle campus in Redwood Shores. This meeting is a mini conference for leaders of the Oracle Community. There is some great information shared by Oracle here, but the bigger reason to attend is to talk with other leaders to find out what they are doing and what has been successful. There is a large focus this year on MySQL and Java given the Sun acquisition that was finalized at this time last year. We are all still learning from each other and it is exciting to get to know two entirely new user communities. I will be taking a lot of this information back to IOUG and working on growing our community, but I will also take some of the new information back to my day job.
The next, very exciting, event that we are involved in was just recently announced. This new event is called "IOUG Presents A Day of Real World Performance with Tom Kyte, Andrew Holdsworth and Graham Wood". This is going to be a full day of performance engineering with the three biggest experts within Oracle. These Oracle experts will debate, discuss and delineate the best practices for designing hardware architectures, deploying Oracle databases, and developing applications that deliver the fastest possible performance for your business. This is going to be an excellent way to learn directly from the experts and have an opportunity to ask direct questions. There are four sessions currently scheduled on the West Coast, but we are working on scheduling more sessions throughout the country. Check out the information Real World Performance Tuning page at ioug.org to see the currently scheduled dates and check back soon for future dates. Also, let me know if you are interested helping with this event in your area and I will get you in touch with our scheduling people.
Finally, our annual conference planning is in full swing for Collaborate 11. IOUG, OAUG and Quest International user communities come together annually to put on the on of the leading, user based, Oracle technology conference in the United States. I am currently working on two papers, including one that will be part of the Oracle RAC Boot Camp. Going back to our roots, you will find a DBA 101 Boot Camp along with BI, Development, Manageability and many others. The other exciting news from Collaborate this year is MySQL. With Oracle's acquisition of Sun last year, the MySQL Community is now part of the Oracle Community. IOUG is offering over 50 sessions just on MySQL. Those of you that are multi database shops can now come to Collaborate and get all your answers. I am excited about being a part of Collaborate again this year. We are going to have our best show ever.
The User Community is busier than ever with more opportunities to learn and get involved. Join us for a Real World Performance session or at Collaborate. I look forward to seeing a lot of people that I see once a year and meeting many more.
