Oracle adds Google Maps to Field Service
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(InfoWorld) - OracleÂ is integrating one of its applications with Google's mapping service to help service providers locate customers more quickly. On Tuesday, Oracle said it had integrated the API (application programming interface) for Google Maps for Enterprise with the Field Service piece of Oracle E-Business Suite 12. Field Service helps companies manage the process of sending staff on service calls and predict when those employees will arrive at the customer sites. Using the Google Maps API, dispatchers should now also be able to find routes for their field service personnel to reach customers more quickly. At the same time, technicians can get a better sense of the location of their jobs by viewing those destinations on Google's map or its satellite images Bringing together content from a number of sources in an application or a Web site is proving very popular among software vendors and is often referred to as a mashup. Google Maps is one of the most frequently used APIs in mashups since it adds a useful visual element to applications. Oracle began theÂ rollout of E-Business Suite 12Â in January. Other new features in Field Service 12 include support for tasks lasting multiple days and the ability to track customers confirming their service appointments. There's also an administrator's portal to assist schedulers in handling jobs assigned to in-house or to third parties across time zones and geographies. The Google Maps integration is also available for Oracle Field Service 11.5.10. In other Oracle news, the vendor announced Symantec is an enterprise storage management partner for its Unbreakable Linux support program. The program providesÂ support for users of Red Hat's Enterprise LinuxÂ distribution, regardless of whether they are Oracle software users, at aggressive pricepoints. Oracle and Symantec have certified Symantec's Veritas data center software with Oracle Enterprise Linux and guaranteed to provide enterprise-level support for both the storage and the Linux offerings. The agreement covers six Veritas products -- Storage Foundation 5.0, Storage Foundation for Oracle 5.0, Storage Foundation Cluster File System 5.0, Cluster Server 5.0, NetBackup 6.0 Client and i3. While Oracle claims demand is growing for its support program, the vendor has yet to provide precise figures on user uptake. In March,Â Oracle CEO Larry Ellison saidÂ publicly that Unbreakable Linux had got off to a "very strong start" and committed his company to building a Linux business, while cautioning that such a process would take time. Â
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(InfoWorld) - Google introduced a new service for small businesses that allows visitors to search within their Web sites on a customized search page. The product, Custom Business Search Edition, adds to Google'sÂ growing portfolio of paid servicesÂ for businesses. It builds on Google'sÂ Custom Search Engine, a free, ad-supported product launched last October for searching within a predefined group of Web sites. A key difference with the paid edition is that businesses can customize the search page with their own logo and color scheme. They can also modify results by manipulating an XML (Extensible Markup Language) feed of the raw search results, to guide visitors toward products the company wants to sell, for example. The service is priced at $100 per year for Web sites with up to 500 pages, and $500 for up to 50,000 pages, Google said on its Web site. Custom Business Search Edition uses the same index Google uses to deliver its other search results, and Google's own servers are used for searches. To set up the service, customers follow a set-up wizard and copy a small amount of code to their Web site. They get access to a reporting graph with daily and monthly views of how many times people used the search engine and what search terms they used. The service provides an option for businesses who want to bring Google's powerful search technology into their organization but without paying for more expensive products. The company already sells the Google Search Appliance, starting at $30,000 for 500,000 documents, which indexes material in file servers, content management systems, databases and other sources. It also offers the Mini Search Appliance starting at $1,995 for 50,000 documents. Along with English, Google's Custom Search Business Edition supports Bulgarian, simplified and traditional Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish. Â
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Blog: Google launches Maps feature that lets you customize driving directions by clicking and dragging the route to other spots on the map
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(InfoWorld) - Oracle Tuesday announced plans to extend the capability of its system management software to offer monitoring and management for SAP AG applications through a partnership with Nimsoft. The company also unveiled Release 3 of Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g and new plug-ins for the product that enable it to manage third-party software. Additionally, Senior Vice President Richard Sarwal made his debut as the executive in charge of stepping up efforts to promote the product as a management system for heterogenous environments. Oracle and Nimsoft are working jointly to integrate the NimBUS SAP R/3 plug-in with Oracle Enterprise Manager 10G so that customers can monitor and manage SAP applications. The plug-in should be available in the second quarter of 2007, according to Nimsoft. Through new plug-ins for BMC Remedy Service Desk and IBM WebSphere MQ versions 5.3 and 6.0 introduced Tuesday, Oracle also added performance monitoring of those third-party products in Oracle Enterprise Manager 10G. All of this is part of Oracle's plan to focus on making enterprise management one of its core product offerings not just for Oracle environments, but across IT systems with products from multiple vendors, said Oracle president Charles Phillips on a conference call Tuesday. "We've undersold this product," he said of Oracle's system management suite. Phillips acknowledged that in the past, Oracle Enterprise Manager 10G has primarily been useful for managing environments that run Oracle software and has been sold along with more popular Oracle products such as its database and applications. However, now that it can support more third-party products, such as JBoss Application Server and IBM WebSphere Application Server along with those unveiled Tuesday, it is a more viable option to compete with rivals such as IBM's Tivoli suite and Hewlett-Packard's OpenView suite. "We were narrowly focused in the past," Phillips said. "Now we have become more complete and more open." To promote this new attitude toward enterprise management, Oracle now has a dedicated sales force paid to sell only Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g, and the company also is training its database and application-server sales representatives so that they can push the product in the marketplace, he said. During the conference call, Sarwal pointed to Oracle's expertise across multiple software infrastructure products, such as database, application server, and business applications, as a strength the company has to offer comprehensive systems management. "We have a unique view of how to manage all of that stack," he said. In addition to its new plug-ins, Oracle Enterprise Manager 10G Release 3 also includes enhanced provisioning capabilities across Oracle's various application offerings and the ability to bring to the surface business metrics from Oracle applications to perform business diagnostics, Sarwal said. Oracle Enterprise Manager 10G Release 3 is available on Linux and Windows. Business customers can evaluate the product for free by downloading it from Oracle's Web site. The new plug-ins also are available now for use only with Release 3.
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Google Inc. said on Tuesday it was introducing street-level map views of various U.S. cities, giving Web users a panoramic, 360-degree images as well as the overhead views Google Maps has offered.
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Google Inc. on Friday will join the crowded field of services registering Web site addresses in a move aimed at encouraging more usage of the online search leader's free software products.
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Google Inc. launched an initiative yesterday to help non profit groups use maps and satellite images to raise awareness, recruit volunteers, and encourage donations.
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By The Associated Press  MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - Google Inc. on Friday will join the crowded field of services registering Web site addresses in a move aimed at encouraging more usage of the online search leader's free software products.
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After struggling with it for a good while, Maggie Nelson finally figured out the answer to her problems with Oracle, PDO and CLOBs - they're just not supported.   LOB support was added to PDO_OCI in PHP 5.1. This is really cool, however, it appears that the LOB support really means BLOB support. After much investigation and self-doubt (e.g. "what if we're using streams incorrectly?"), we found out that PDO_OCI does not currently support CLOBs (BLOBs only!).   The bug's already been documented and remains open, but Maggie encourages all of the Oracle developers out there with the fact that Chris Jones (of Oracle) knows about the issue and plans to correct it in the next release of the extension.
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Google Inc. has added a feature to Google Maps that lets users watch edits made to locations in real time.
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(InfoWorld) - Intuit Inc. will integrate into QuickBooks 2007 various search and marketing services from Google Inc., a move intended to help small business users of the Intuit accounting software promote themselves online. QuickBooks 2007, due in the fourth quarter, will contain shortcuts and links to Google's AdWords advertising program, Maps Web site and Base product listing service, the companies announced Wednesday. QuickBooks 2007 customers will get US$50 in credits for AdWords, Google's massive search-based, pay-per-click advertising program, the driver of most of Google's revenue. Meanwhile, QuickBooks 2007 will link to Google Maps, where users can create a business listing that will be mapped on the Web site. With technology from StepUp Commerce Inc., which Intuit acquired, QuickBooks 2007 will automate the process of feeding product-listing information to Google Base. QuickBooks 2007 will also come with the Google Desktop application for indexing and searching PC hard drives.The Google products and services will be featured in a variety of QuickBooks 2007 versions. The chief executive officers of the companies will hold a conference call Wednesday afternoon local time to discuss the partnership's details. The move is Google's latest to bundle and integrate its products and services into third-party applications and hardware devices. This partnership with Intuit also opens up another front in the wide-ranging and rabid battle between Google and Microsoft Corp., as each vendor moves aggressively into the other's core markets. Google, a leader in Web search, has been moving into office productivity software and Web portal services, Microsoft's core markets. Meanwhile, Microsoft is trying to encroach on Google's Web search turf. Microsoft is also an Intuit enemy in the market for small business accounting software.ADVERTISEMENTMAKE SOA REAL WITH IBM WEBSPHERE PODCASTStreamline processes and maximize efficiency within a proven service oriented architecture. Take back control of your business processes with IBM WebSphere.
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Blog: Google street-level view on maps can help San Franciscans avoid parking tickets by remotely monitoring street signs
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SAN FRANCISCO -- Google Inc. bills the latest twist on its online maps as "Street View," but it looks a bit like "Candid Camera" as you cruise through the panorama of pictures that captured fleeting moments in neighborhoods scattered across the country.
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Blog: At an event in New York, Google announces Google Earth Outreach initiative to help nonprofit organizations use the 3D mapping tool to aid their education and advocay missions.
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Yahoo Maps gets a great new upgrade that helps users re-route their driving directions.
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Google on Wednesday plans to deliver an update to its Google Earth application that includes content from a number of premium sources. The features are overlaid atop areas in a map so users can learn about their significance. Photos: View images of the Google Earth features
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Google Inc. launched an initiative Tuesday to help charities and other non-profit groups use maps and satellite images to raise awareness, recruit volunteers and encourage donations.