Driving 2.0 - Socializing The Freeway

I drive from San Francisco down the Highway 101 to Oracle HQ everyday (sometimes on a Saturday too), I sometimes see people I know on the freeway, I often see the same cars, I certainly see people do (IMHO) idiotic things and I occasionally see people do (IMHO) courteous and considerate things.

So an idea came to me as I passed the ebay commuter bus the other day. Why can't I rate the drivers on the freeway just like I rate sellers and buyers on ebay? You cut me up, you get a thumbs down, I see you driving whilst eating a bowl of cereal thumbs down for you, if you let me change lane safely I can give a thumbs up. Sound like fantasy land?  Well it could be easily done, I can see your registration easily enough I snap a picture of

The end of US GAAP?

As reported in the Wall Street Journal today, the SEC is proposing to pull the plug on US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and move to the International Financial Reporting Standards(IFRS) which is used in many countries around there world already, notably in Europe. A few weeks ago I blogged about this change that's been brewing for some time and plugged the IFRS Oracle Mix group, the power of my blog increased membership by over 65%. Yes, there are now 5 members up from from 3. Why am I surprised people are not excited about accounting standards?

If you're sitting around wondering if Oracle is going to release an IFRS patch, that won't be necessary, Release 12 has all the tools you will need and Oracle has a White Paper explaining what tools it has to get you ready for IFRS, which I recommend as a good starting point.

If you want more join the mix group, I'll post information there as I find it and the members though small in number are all top notch including Sanjit Anand who you may know from Oracle Apps Hub, one of the richest sources of information on Oracle Financials.

Advanced Global Intercompany System R12 White Paper

There is a white paper available on metalink (metalink note 418649.1) that describes in detail each set up step you need to perform to set up AGIS.  It is a very nice document with screen shots to show you every step of the way and there are also some viewlets that show you the set up in progress.

This is a pretty good starting point if you are setting up AGIS

Pull up a chair

[caption id="attachment_194" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Have a seat"][/caption]

As Meg mentioned last week, we've been clearing out old chairs and sprucing up our offices in 300 building at HQ over the last few months.  I am very pleased with my office move and the view is pretty good.

The other morning I took this snap as they unloaded an entire truck full of office chairs, one of these Meg is enjoying now and giving thanks for.

Fixed Assests Intercompany in R12

[caption id="attachment_182" align="alignleft" width="258" caption="Fixed Asset?"][/caption]

Something I often forget to mention is the enhancement of Intercompany functionality in Fixed Assets (FA) that has been provided in R12. So here is my attempt to explain it, based on an old email discussion with the FA team, I wouldn't describe myslef as an FA expert, but if there are any comments or questions I might be able to find an FA expert to get an answer. :)

In 11i FA stores reference accounts in two setup entities; Book Controls and Categories. The intercompany Payables and Receivables accounts were stored directly on the book, only the natural accounts segment were stored for these two accounts. The Account Generator definition would combine the natural account with other sources to get a full account combination. Out of the box, those sources were a default ccid which is also on the book and a ccid from the asset assignment. So the balancing segment is derived from the asset assignment, the natural account from the values on the book, and other segments from the default account.

The intercompany would kick in for two transaction types "Transfer" and "Unit Adjustment". However, other transactions could result in intercompany impacts, but they would not be generated in FA so GL would do the balancing when the accounting was posted there.

So in R12 FA uses the AGIS Intercompany balancing feature, which is

The Freakonomics of Coffee and Elevators

I've been reading Freakonomics recently (the book and the blog) I love the way that they come up with interesting theories or questions and imagine how we might get data to investigate or answer them.

I often find myself doing this type of thing too, in those quite moments such as waiting in for for the elevator. So here is one Freakonomics type theory I have.

People who are highly stressed/cafinated/busy tend to push the elevator call button or door close buuton multiple times in a attempt to make the elevator move faster. So if we had access to the maintenance records for some of the large elevator companies we could look for patterns in the data

Photos from Wordpress iPhone

Just taken a picture from my office window of the Americas Cup yacht that is now afloat in the lake at Oracle HQ.

I'm using wordpress iPhone app to post this, which seems to be a nice way to write short text based blog posts and post pictures (assuming this works ok).



UPDATE : When I view the post - the photo didn't get uploaded correctly, looking into that now.

UPDATE 2 : I did nothing and now the photo is there, I think it is just a timing issue, seems the text appears before the photo has finished transferring to the blog.  Anyhow, if I am patient it works :)

Wordpress for iPhone

I just downloaded worpress for the iPhone, looks like I can write blog posts from my iPhone quite easily. However it doesn't have a lot of formatting features, not sure I can even insert a hyperlink. Might be good for drafting posts when I have few moments.

International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS)

International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) is a set of standards that are gaining momentum. There is market pressure to have a single language for companies to communicate financial results, globalization of companies and markets make this inevitable. There is also some regulatory pressure likely to come in the US as the SEC are having a round table today, the Wall Street Journal discusses it today too.

I notice the group on Oracle Mix to discuss IFRS has just three members, so I wonder if this is on the radar of the Oracle community yet.

Interesting R12 Upgrade Session at Open World

A session I hope to attend at Open World is the one by Nayyar about Oracle's internal upgrade to R12.  I spent some time working with Nayyar and his team earlier this year and it was a good experience, at times it was very tough but it's been very valuable. Oracle has a lot of