The PeopleSoft Tipster Blog

UKOUG PeopleSoft Roadshow 2013 April 30, 2013

Last week – along with others from Succeed – I attended the UKOUG PeopleSoft Roadshow. Although it’s just a single day event (where the Apps Conference is spread over two days) it does have the benefit of Senior Oracle US speakers – Jeff Robbins and Marc Weintraub.

As we have for a few years now, Succeed sponsored the event/the post event drinks.

We also took out a stand, here’s John and I attempting to charm some delegates:

There’s many reasons why I enjoy attending these events. It’s great to catch up with friends I’ve worked with previously, it’s great to meet new people who we might be able to help in some way, and it’s always a treat to hear what innovations are coming down the line in recently released and future versions of PeopleSoft and PeopleTools.

So, other than the exhibition, what did we learn?

From Jeff, (other than what we’ve previously discussed on Tools 8.53) we found out:

– the release frequency of PeopleTools is now around every 12-18 months, so Tools 8.54 would be mid-2014.

– Tools 8.54 is fully defined scope-wise and the developers are almost done with it. About half of the scope for 8.55 is done.

– the way PeopleTools handles mobile devices is changing, allowing it to be much more responsive to the resolution of the requesting browser based on templates (so a page would have different templates, a large and graphically rich one for PCs on the LAN, a smaller resolution graphically leaner template for mobiles etc).

– the new Update Manager Tool isn’t that new. It’s something that Oracle/PeopleSoft have been using internally for a decade, so it should be stable and mature already.

– there’s a new ‘Mastering PeopleTools’ scheme that is starting, enabling everyone easier access to Best Practice and to make sure that customers aren’t just upgrading to stay supported, but gain genuine value from the new functionality

Jeff also flashed up some brief glimpses of something that his team are trying with Tools 8.54. They’re changing the UI a little more – and it’s a tile-based layout (more akin to Windows 8 or Pinterest, I guess). This is the landing page:

Also, to access the menu you’d hit the orange button on the right:

Finally, there were a host of other ‘coming soon’ areas, like In Memory Processing, TimesTen for nVision and a ‘TCO lower than SaaS’ which will be really interesting to see how it’s done. Jeff actually said PeopleSoft will have the lowest TCO in the market, bar none, which we’ll all really look forward to.

One of the most interesting take-aways for me wasn’t something that was said, but was more of a general feeling. A couple of years ago when Oracle said “we’re still investing in PeopleSoft” I don’t think many people believed them – I was certainly sceptical. However with the content in the latest Tools and App releases their claim is much more credible. There were certainly a lot of customers that I spoke to who were either planning a 9.2 upgrade or had it on their roadmap.

The first two photos are from the UKOUG Facebook page which contains many more photos of the event.