Collaborate ‘08 is fast approaching, and Oracle Enterprise Content Management (ECM) users can look forward to several ECM sessions, including Collaborate’s ‘Conference Within a Conference’ that will focus specifically on Oracle’s content management past, present and future.

All and all, there will be over 30 sessions on a variety of ECM topics, including: “Exciting New Features of Universal Content Management,” “50 Ways to Integrate with Universal Content Management,” and “Oracle Content Management Roadmap.”

This announcement also comes as Oracle’s Universal Content Management system was given the 2008 Technology of the Year Award by Infoworld. It looks like Oracle’s ECM acquisitions — such as Stellent and last month’s announced acquisition of Captovation – are proving to be very worthwhile.

There’s always room for improvement, though, especially if you ask SAP, which has been circulating a new press release saying that SAP is taking Hyperion ECM customers away from Oracle. It even names some of those customers. Longtime industry analyst and blogger Josh Greenbaum had some very interesting things to say about SAP’s claims, by the way. 

What features would you like to see added (or dropped) in Oracle’s content management products? And if you had to choose between Oracle and SAP ECM, who would you pick and why? Let us know.

After nearly eight trips around the Sun, covering just about every technological topic from ABAP to zSeries, it’s my last week at TechTarget and SearchOracle.com. And as my time here comes to an end, I find myself thinking of the tremendous amount of help that IT professionals like you have given me over the years.

I started at TechTarget during the height of the dot com bubble — a time when a rash of ill-conceived and ultimately doomed Internet companies let stock options fly like wedding rice while encouraging employees to wear roller skates to work. Back then, I didn’t even really know what an operating system was, and I thought the Love Bug worm was something you cured with penicillin.

Then the bubble burst and, at first, I feared my newfound career in technology journalism would meet an untimely end. But TechTarget survived the fallout and actually continued to grow at a rapid pace. It soon became clear that my new career would continue — if I could manage to learn more about the world of IT. And that’s where you came in.

From the Oracle DBAs in the trenches who taught me the meaning of ‘SQL Query,’ to the CIOs in the corner offices who schooled me on the necessity of ROI, you were always there, always patient and always willing to help, even if it meant answering embarrassingly basic questions like: Could you explain that to me again like I’m a three-year-old?  
 
For all your help, I just wanted to say thanks. I leave this job knowing that the Oracle user community and larger IT marketplace is filled with unbelievably intelligent people — people who taught me a great deal.   

Remember, SearchOracle.com will remain the number one stop on the Internet for Oracle professionals long after I’m gone. For now, however, please send those Oracle-related tips, comments, story ideas and feedback to news director Barney Beal.

As for me, I’ll be trading in my pen for a meat slicer and an apron. Hopefully my new customers will be as supportive as you’ve been. But somehow I doubt that’s possible.

Take care of yourselves.

– Mark

Oracle just announced that its Database Vault product is now certified to work with Oracle E-Business Suite applications, including Oracle Human Capital Management, Oracle Financial Management, Oracle Supply Chain Management and Oracle Customer Relationship Management.

E-Business Suite users can now count on Database Vault to help them better address security and regulatory challenges, according to Oracle.

Unveiled in 2006, Database Vault defends against unauthorized access to application data and harmful database changes by any users, including those with permission to access the data. According to Oracle, it can be used to enforce separation of duties within the database and to consolidate application databases.

I’d be interested to hear from Database Vault users out there. How do you like this product? What, if anything, would you change about it? Also, Database Vault is often marketed in conjunction with Oracle Secure Backup, so what do you think about that product?

U.S. district court judge Martin J. Jenkins has ordered that Oracle’s lawsuit against SAP and its TomorrowNow arm be sent to mediation, according to a court document posted on http://www.tnlawsuit.com/.

Oracle filed suit against SAP-TomorrowNow last year, alleging that TomorrowNow workers unlawfully downloaded data from one of Oracle’s support Web sites. Oracle’s original complaint alleged “corporate theft on a grand scale.”

Judge Jenkins ordered the case sent to mediation following a case management conference on Tuesday, according to reports.

With neither company willing to confirm nor deny, we can only speculate as to whether the rumored buyout of Salesforce.com by Oracle holds any truth to it. And there has been no shortage of such speculation ever since Tom Foremski, a former Financial Times reporter, posted in his Silicon Valley Watcher blog:  

“I’m hearing from a reliable source that Salesforce.com has approached Oracle to gauge if there is any interest in a sale at $75 a share.”

That single statement has sparked reaction in both the blogosphere and the stock market, with yesterday’s Salesforce.com stock shooting up almost 10%, closing out the day at $54.45 a share.

Many agree with Foremski that such a deal would make sense for Oracle. For some, this idea isn’t new — back in November, Mary Hayes Weier posted “Five Reasons Why I Think Oracle Will Buy Salesforce.com” on InformationWeek.com’s CIO blog. She points out that what Salesforce.com lacks in profit margin it makes up for in mindshare and customers. Foremski writes that by acquiring Salesforce.com, Oracle could build on its online apps and software as a service offerings, improving itself as an SAP competitor (though one could easily argue that SAP could make a bid for Salesforce.com as well).

But is this enough to convince Oracle head Larry Ellison (who already holds a majority share in Salesforce.com competitor NetSuite) to make the deal?

Cowen and Co. analyst Peter Goldmacher surely doesn’t think so. In a note to investors, he writes:

“While we would not be surprised if Salesforce made such an overture, we would be very surprised if Oracle didn’t laugh them out of the building.”

Maybe Oracle will surprise us with an announcement in the coming weeks. But it seems almost just as likely that this rumor is just that — a rumor — and will quietly fade into the background. If Oracle doesn’t buy Salesforce.com in the near future, it may be very likely that someone else will (think SAP, Google, or Microsoft). After all, Oracle is done acquiring all the large companies…right?

A new report from Forrester Research Inc. predicts that Oracle, IBM and other large vendors are done making major acquisitions and will instead set their sites on smaller fish.Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ll believe it when I see it.

Of course, maybe I’m just in bitter denial. It’s just that I have grown accustomed to waking up, thinking I’m going to have an easy day at work, and then suddenly having to go crazy coming up with coverage and analysis of Oracle’s latest major buy.

If Forrester is correct, however, then it appears those adrenaline-filled days are over.

Say it ain’t so, Larry.

The Oracle Accelerate program appears to be making some forward progress.

According to Oracle, Oracle partners have created 49 new industry-specific application bundles through the program within the last five months. That brings the total number of Oracle Accelerate bundles to 90, for those that are keeping count.

The Oracle Accelerate program is geared toward midsize businesses and government entities that require low-cost and pre-configured applications that are can be deployed quickly. The vertically oriented Accelerate offerings are created by Oracle partners or resellers and then reviewed and approved by Oracle itself.

Oracle Partners are delivering the bundles across multiple industries including aerospace and defense, consumer products, automotive, engineering and construction, high-technology, industrial manufacturing, financial services, life sciences, media and entertainment, natural resources, professional services, oil and gas, public sector, travel, retail, and transportation and utilities.

The 49 new Oracle Accelerate solutions include ABS, ATOS Origin GmbH, BizTech, Business & Decision, C3, Cedar HR, Conacent, Crocus, DCS, E-Frontech, Explorer, Fusion5, Hand, Hexaware, ICE, Intelligroup, ISP3, Lucidity, Percipient, pharmasol, Pyxis Consulting Group GmbH, RCM, Satyam, Solbourne, Sonata, Terillium and Zanett, according to Oracle.