theCUBE Live At #OOW14

After unloading the bulk of the updates to its core portfolio during the opening day of OpenWorld 2014, Oracle Corp. is shifting gears with a second batch of product reveals that moves the focus beyond traditional corporate apps to mobile workers, developers and vertical industries. .

Mobile-first

The poster child for the new direction is the new Oracle Alta User Interface, a sleek design system that takes aim at the challenge of providing not only consistent but also compelling services for all the different devices that have infiltrated the corporate network. The database giant boasts that the platform has already been proven internally, having helped its engineers implement the layouts for the latest releases of the Oracle Fusion enterprise resource management suite and dozens of other products.

The company says that the service is aimed at empowering enterprise developers to embrace a more modern approach to visual design, which has traditionally been an afterthought in mission-critical software. Oracle also wants to put that power directly into the hands of the business users with a graphic development environment that takes the self-service model to a whole new level.

Currently in preview, the Mobile Application Accelerator promises to enable everyday knowledge workers without any coding experience to put together simple mobile apps for filling specific needs that their IT organizations lack the resources to address. Software produced in the editor is compatible with both iOS and Android as well as the dozens of solutions in the company’s dramatically expanded portfolio of back-end services. 

Tearing down technical boundaries

In case a user requires a feature that they can’t add on their own, developers can inject custom code into their application using Oracle’s existing development framework for smartphones and tablets, which also received a major upgrade at the event. Standing out from the many improvements is enhanced integration with the database maker’s Mobile Security Suite.

The update allows developers to take full advantage of the capabilities in the toolkit, which Oracle says include encryption, authentication, single sign on and other standard administrative functions as well as more advanced features like automatic protection against data leaks. Yet while it may be convenient for mobile development, the traditional bolt-on approach to security no longer cuts it for the backend applications powering corporate operations. That fact has not escaped the vendor’s attention.

To help customers better address the new reality of the threat landscape, Oracle is rolling out an emulation service that provides a set of capabilities that secure software from the ground up.

A specific solution to a specific problem

Oracle Software in Silicon Cloud provides a virtual machine configured to display the characteristics of a Solaris environment running its forthcoming M7 processors. The simulation makes it possible to test applications for security bugs and other kinds of vulnerabilities at the hardware level without having to pay an arm and a leg for the physical infrastructure that would be needed to support the same functionality.

Larry Ellison’s firm is touting a similar value proposition for the latest version of its cloud-based PeopleSoft Human Capital Management platform, another vertical solution geared towards a narrow but vital aspect of business operations. Falling into step with Oracle’s newly found passion for user experience design, the latest release of the suite packs a mobile-optimized look that sports more than 50 new features ranging from minor tweaks such as tiled home pages to much-needed centralization and customization options.

Extending its vertical focus beyond specific areas of business to entire industries, Oracle is also introducing an updated version of its FLEXCUBE kit for the financial sector with personal financial management capabilities that banks can ship as-is to their customers. The release is joined by an upgrade to the company’s s Diameter Signaling Router that allows telecoms to integrate 2G and 3G network equipment with LTE gear and an expanded government cloud lineup.