Content Contributed by Biju Narayanan

This post is the first in a series on Configuration Management

Configuration the Old Way

PeopleSoft system administrators have generally spent a good deal of time on manual, repetitive tasks while setting up and configuring their PeopleSoft system.  When you set up a new PeopleSoft demo environment or upgrade/clone environments, considerable effort is spent on configuration-related activities. This often involves going through hundreds of user interface pages to manually configure functional components like Integration Broker, Secure Enterprise Search, Process Scheduler, and so on.  Testing for correctness is also required. If you cloned or made copies of systems configurations, they needed to be redone. Host name entries are spread within many configurations from webserver to appserver tiers and in many objects within databases, which adds to the challenge.

What We've Done to Improve the Process

With PeopleSoft 8.55, configuration is centralized with the Cloud Deployment Architecture (CDA).  Deployment Packages (DPK) are a new delivery mechanism provided with PeopleTools 8.55 (for use with Linux and Windows operating systems). Deployment Packages contain all the software created by PeopleSoft as well as the required components pre-installed and fully patched, along with a deployment and configuration automation system. In addition, all Update Images delivered after 8.55 will also take advantage of the Deployment Framework, and will be comprised of Deployment Packages.  DPKs have three parts:

• Binaries based on platform: Middleware binaries for Application Server runtime Tuxedo, WebServers - Weblogic, PeopleSoft binaries (PS_HOME), database, Client binaries, etc.
• Puppet-based automation for installation and deployment of middleware - The PeopleSoft Puppet modules provide automation for setting up the middle ware, deployment of PeopleTools binaries and configuration of Application server and WebServer domains.  (For detailed information on Puppet see puppet.com, and docs.puppetlabs.com)
  
• ACM - Automated Configuration Manager to configure PeopleSoft components like Integration Broker, Secure Search, Process Scheduler etc.
  

With DPKs configuration is centralized in Pupprt configuration files, and can be customized by overriding configuration attributes in psft.customizations.yaml. 

Automating PeopleSoft Configuration Using ACM

Automated Configuration Manager (ACM) is a tool set available beginning with PeopleTools 8.54.  It is used to automate PeopleTools product configuration. ACM allows you to externalize product configuration as a template and then use the template to automate configurations across systems. ACM comes with graphical user interfaces,  command-line tools, and a suite of configuration plugins that help administrators configure the base PeopleSoft components.



Peopletools 8.55 delivers the following predefined templates that you can start with.

The other functional plugins include the following:

• Integration Broker
• Rename local node, purge messages
• Configure default local node, set target location, configure content/portal URI
• Configure gateway URL, load gateway connectors, configure nodes in the gateway
• Set advanced gateway properties like keystore password, proxy/non proxy information
• Activate IB Domains and Queues
• Cleanup
  

• Secure Enterprise Search
• Configure Search Instance
• Configure Identity plugin and proxy login
• Deploy/Undeploy, Index search definitions
• Cleanup Meta-data
  

• Process Scheduler
• Report Node configurations
• Server Definition configuration
  

• Cluster
• Network Node Registration
• Single Sign-On configuration
• Unified Navigation configuration, creation of remote folders
• Import SES search indexes to Portal environment
  

• Approvals
• Enable SSL configuration for MAP layouts
• MAP approval Svc Install configuration
• Introspection and Deployment of IB services
  

• Miscellaneous Utilities
• Performance Monitor Configurations
• Grant PTF roles to users
• Setting URL identifiers, url properties and its values
• Web Profile related configurations
  

Working with ACM

An administrator typically performs the following process to develop a configuration automation template. The template contains configuration units, and the sequence and dependencies in which the configuration has to be automated. After the template is developed, it is tested and used as a base version to automate other environments.

Pre-Requisites for Executing ACM

1. User should have "ACM Administrator" Role:  Navigate to Main Menu > PeopleTools > Security > User Profiles > User Profiles, then add the "ACM Administrator" role for the corresponding user.
2. The newly created Template should have sufficient privilege: Navigate to Main Menu > PeopleTools > Security > Permissions and Roles > Permission Lists, then choose permission list "PTPT4800", then add the newly created template to the list present in the "ACM Templates" tab.
   

The Process

1. Design a Template: Automate functional units of configuration. You can group configuration plugins, set configuration attributes and sequence then to automate functional parts. This can be done from PeopleTools > Automation Configuration Manager > Templates
   
   
   
   
2. Execute the Template: The template can be executed interactively in three ways:
   
   1. Interactive: Navigate to: Peopletools > Automation Configuration Manager > Templates
   2. Command line: Administrators generally prefers to automate configurations by running scripts. This is the recommended method for automating configurations.
      
      
      
      
   3. DPK Puppet: Set the configuration in Puppet modules prior running the deployment scripts. You can specify your entire configuration in the "/etc/puppet/data/psft_configuration.yaml" file, before running the DPK automation process. The code block below shows how to set IB Configuration in your deployment configuration.
      

integration_broker:
    run_control_id: intbroker
    os_user: '%{hiera(''domain_user'')}'
    db_settings: {
      db_name: '%{hiera(''db_name'')}',
      db_type: '%{hiera(''db_platform'')}',
      db_connect_id: '%{hiera(''db_connect_id'')}',
      db_connect_pwd: '%{hiera(''db_connect_pwd'')}'
    }
    acm_plugin_list:
      PTIBRenameNode: {
        env.default_local_node: '%{hiera(''gateway_node_name'')}',
        env.app_msg_purge_all_dms: true
      }
      PTIBConfigureDBNode: {
        env.pia_webserver_host: '%{::fqdn}',
        env.pia_webserver_port: '%{hiera(''pia_http_port'')}',
        env.pia_webserver_ssl_port: '%{hiera(''pia_https_port'')}',
        env.pia_site_name: '%{hiera(''pia_site_name'')}',

   4.  Test and Debug: After the execution you can monitor and debug the execution by  navigating to PeopleTools>Automation Configuration Manager>Monitor

After you generate a working version of the template, you can keep it as a configuration baseline and use it to clone configurations across multiple environments.  The template is the source of truth for configuration, and ACM allows you to re-run the configuration any number of times.

We reported in April that PeopleSoft is planning to offer Elasticsearch as an option.  Our original plan was to make Elasticsearch available with the first generally available release of PeopleTools 8.56.  We have since revised that plan.  We now plan to make Elasticsearch available with PeopleTools 8.55/Patch 10.  This will enable us to offer Elastic as an option a bit sooner.

Oracle-PeopleSoft will continue to support Oracle's Secure Enterprise Search (SES) with PeopleSoft through the support of PeopleTools 8.54 at a minimum.  We are evaluating whether to extend that support, and we'll announce further support plans in the near future.  It's important for customers to know that if they have deployed SES, they will be supported for some time until they make the transition to Elastic.  Elasticsearch will be the only option offered in PeopleTools 8.56.

As described in the original announcement, we plan to provide guidance on migration from SES to Elastic as well as deployment guidance to help with peformance tuning, load balancing and failover.  We are also planning to produce training for Elastic with PeopleSoft.  We are also presenting a session at Oracle Open World on Elasticsearch with PeopleSoft.  We want to make the move to Elasticsearch as quick and easy as possible for our customers.  Based on customer feedback, we believe Elastic will be embraced by PeopleSoft customers, and it will provide significant benefits.

Content provided by Balaji Pattabhiraman

PeopleSoft applications teams are delivering lots of great content in their images for the Fluid User experience.In addition, though, there are many things customers can do to enhance their applications to meet unique requirements.This post is the next in a series of capabilities that PeopleTools provides.

In this post we'll cover how to invoke javascript APIs to integrate third party elements within PeopleSoft Fluid pages.In this example, we're calling a google maps API for Resource location.PeopleTools 8.54 (and higher) provides the ability to create responsive Fluid components. In addition to making the layout responsive, PeopleTools provides developers with mechanisms to run any javascript API (your own or third party) within your PeopleSoft application.

We'll cover the following in this example:

• Build a sample fluid application with two panel layout. The left panel loads a set of projects along with details such as the number of resources. The right panel loads the map.
• Set a default so the user sees the map centered to the user's current location using HTML5 Geolocation.Resources nearby their current location are plotted on the map.
• Selecting a Project on the left panel updates the map and indicates where resources are located.
• Searching for a location (using the google places lookup API) centers the map to the selected location and shows the resources near the location in the map.

Note that this blog does not get into the details of the Google Maps or Places JavaScript API.Neither does Oracle PeopleSoft certify usage of Google maps. This is a technology demonstration on how to integrate PeopleSoft with third party JavaScript APIs. Please read the following on Custom JavaScript Guidelines.

First let’s look at the completed application and how it behaves for users, then we’ll show how you build a page to work like this.

Below is a PeopleSoft page.  When the page loads, the HTML5 geo location pops up asking for permission to use the user’s current location.  (If this is not granted, the map will center on the resource of the first project.)

Select Allow so that the map is centered based on the user's current location and the resources nearest that location.

Click on the caret tab to expand the left panel.  This shows us a list of projects.

In this scenario, we’ve selected the Implementation Project.  Notice that this project has 21 resources. The map now shows the resources by locations (using markers).

Clicking a marker (flag) shows the resource details.  In this case, we click on the Flag located on San Jose, CA, which shows us the 13 resources located at that location.

You can also search for resources at a different location using the Location box.This will use the Place Finder to suggest locations as you type.Here we’ve entered Tokyo,Japan.This loads the map centered on that location and the resources available nearest to the location.

In this example, the resource isn’t exactly geographically close!

So how did we achieve this?  The following are the high-level steps used to build this.

In App Designer, create a two panel layout using the delivered layout page PSL_TWOPANEL.  (Note that we provide many Fluid page templates in App Designer.)

This creates a default two panel layout page, where you can place your page fields.  Remember, in Fluid, designing a page no longer uses a WYSIWYG page design.  Instead, you have a series of group boxes into which you place your page elements.  The style sheets will take care of placement on the displayed screen.

Next we place the required fields on the page.  There are three main sections to consider:   1) A group box that will be the map field (named Map Canvas in the screen below)  2) A list grid that will hold the Project list, which is inside the subpage PC_MAP_PRJ_SBF, and 3) The section on top of the map (named PC_MAP_PNLHDR_SBF) that contains fields like the location.  We include them on the page illustrated below.  This example is available in a delivered Financials application (although it uses Oracle maps instead of Google maps).

Next we add the PeopleCode to load the list of project/resources and update the left panel with those details (list grid rows). The APIs to populate the grid rowset is as same as in Classic PeopleSoft, so we will skip those details in this blog.  In addition we can specify style classes to the page fields using the Fluid tab (Default Style Name) section on the form fields. These style classes can be delivered out of the box, or you can create your style sheet and include them for your page using the AddStyleSheet API in component post build. 

Now we get to the interesting part of populating the map.  First we define the JavaScript in an HTML file that will load the map initially or upon user action. You can write any JavaScript function routines.  You can look at example on google map JavaScript API doc here. These methods are defined in the HTML object PC_MAP_JS.  Here the method pc_loadMap is responsible for doing geo location, populating the map, enabling the places API and also calling the routine to set the markers.

The following lines enable the page's Location edit box (with page field name PACINPUT) as control for google places API input:

var input = document.getElementById('PACINPUT');
var searchBox = new google.maps.places.SearchBox(input);

The following lines associate the page's map canvas as the section for map. Initially, the map is centered by current location:

navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(function(position) { posGeo = { lat: position.coords.latitude, lng: position.coords.longitude };
var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('%formnamedivPC_MAP_NUI_WRK2_MAP_CANVAS'), {
center: posGeo,
zoom: 10,
mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
});

The following lines of code add the markers by looping through the resource details for a given project. The details are read from the database and stored in a page field in the component PeopleCode. It is read here in JavaScript to populate the markers:

for (var i = 0; i < gdata_PC_MAP_DATA_DVW$0.length; i++) {
var data = window.gdata_PC_MAP_DATA_DVW$0[i];
var marker = new google.maps.Marker({ position: {lat: parseFloat(resource[1]), lng: parseFloat(resource[2])}, map: map, icon: image, shape: shape, title: resource[5] });

The lines below associate the  event when you do a click a marker on the map to open the PeopleSoft modal page to display data. The openResourceInfoWindow will do a form submit (submitAction_%formname) to invoke the PeopleCode back from JavaScript to open the modal:

marker.addListener('click', function() {
     openResourceInfoWindow(marker, data[3],data[4], "M");
});
//Update the map and set the zoom level after adding the markers
map.setCenter(lasPos);
map.setZoom(5);

Now include the Style Sheet (if you have custom style classes applied on the page fields) and the JavaScript (we just defined) to be used for the component.

Now call the JavaScript function using AddOnLoadScript when the user selects a project on the left panel as part of the field change PeopleCode. (You can call JavaScript from PeopleCode events in fluid!).  This will reload the map.

You off and running!

There is a great new feature in the latest HCM and FSCM images.PeopleSoft now delivers sample PeopleSoft Test Framework (PTF) Scripts.This is a feature that many have asked for a long time, and we’re happy to make these available.

The scripts are available with FSCM Image 20 and HCM Image 19.The scripts for FSCM Image 20 are downloadable from MyOracleSupport (MOS).In future images, they will be included directly in the image.

You can find more information about the sample PTF scripts on MOS in document 2167721.1.Happy testing!

In an earlier post, we indicated that Elasticsearch would be available in the 8.55.10 of PeopleTools.  Instead, it will not be available with this specific PeopleTools patch. We are working on completing release requirements and we will update the exact 8.55 patch number when we make Elasticsearch generally available for PeopleSoft.  As mentioned previously, Elasticsearch will be the only Search engine supported in PeopleTools 8.56.

For those using SES and Verity...

• SES: We plan to support SES in PeopleTools 8.55 for 18 months after Elasticsearch is generally available.
• Verity: We plan to support Verity for our 9.1 application releases through September 2018. Note that Verity will not be supported in 8.56, which means that if customers wish to use Verity, they will need to stay on 8.55. We will do our best to support customers through the support policy of the 9.1 applications.

For those attending Oracle Open World this September, we offer a session on Elasticsearch that you should find interesting and informative. In the presentation, we will describe all the benefits of Elasticsearch integration for PeopleSoft including its ease of deployment, transition, and operations. Here are the session logistics:

Session ID: CON7066
Session Title: Getting the Most Out of PeopleSoft: Transitioning to Elasticsearch 
Room: Moscone West—2004
Date and Time: 09/21/16, 12:15:00 PM - 01:00:00 PM

Oracle's Open World conference is just around the corner (September 18-22).  PeopleSoft always has a significant presence at Open World, and this year we have lots of great sessions and exciting new things to announce.  If you are interested in PeopleSoft technology and how PeopleTools and related technology can provide value to your PeopleSoft ecosystem, consider attending some of these sessions. 

Our general sessions and keynotes are popular every year.  This year, Paco Aubrejuan PeopleSoft's Senior Vice President will give you an overview of all things PeopleSoft including how you can deploy PeopleSoft in the Cloud to achieve cost savings and business agility, while preserving your investment in PeopleSoft.  Jeff Robbins will once again be presenting the PeopleSoft Technology Roadmap, where you can learn how we increase the value of PeopleSoft applications with important technology innovations.  With all the talk about the Cloud these days, customers may not know about their options with PeopleSoft in the cloud.  To address that, we have several sessions dedicated to learning about PeopleSoft Cloud deployment.  Jeff Robbins will teach you how to use Oracle Cloud to efficiently manage Oracle’s PeopleSoft infrastructure. Whether it is development, test, training, demo, or production environments.  Biju Narayanan and Mark Hoernemann will tell you about the PeopleSoft Cloud Architecture and Deployment Framework as well as PeopleSoft’s upcoming Cloud Manager.  This new application can help customers and partners achieve higher service levels and greater automation in managing their PeopleSoft environments deployed to the Oracle Cloud.  Ravi Shankar will inform attendees about Oracle Managed Cloud Services and how they can help you manage Oracle’s PeopleSoft applications deployed on Oracle Cloud.  Mark Hoernemann will present the Platform and Infrastructure Overview, which provides the information you need to plan your PeopleSoft environments. 

Learn all about PeopleSoft's Fluid User Interface in several OpenWorld sessions.  Dave Bain will cover how to extend your Fluid applications.  Dave will also present with a customer who has deployed Oracle Fluid User Interface. You will learn about the customer’s experiences and discover what to do to prepare, deploy, and deliver PeopleSoft Fluid–based applications.  Matthew Haavisto and Pramod Agrawal will show you some simple configuration techniques that can enrich the Fluid content delivered by our Applications teams.  You will also hear from several of our customers, who will relate their experiences adopting Fluid.  Matthew and Ramasimha Rangaraju will also talk about PeopleSoft's move to use Elastic Search.  With Search becoming such an important part of the user experience, learn what the transition to Elastic means for you.

Security is always an important topic.  Greg Kelly will describe how to secure your PeopleSoft environments when deployed in the Cloud. In Greg's session you'll find out how to achieve the same levels of security and governance as you do on premise. Greg will also show you how to take advantage of the latest PeopleTools security features to protect against both internal and external threats to your systems and data. 

PeopleSoft has made some important advancements in Reporting and Analytics.  Matthew Haavisto and Jody Schnell offer a roadmap on PeopleSoft's rich set of tools for reporting and analytics, which are focused on enabling the end user to be more productive than ever. 

With so many new things happening in PeopleSoft, how does one learn about them after Open World?  In a live PeopleSoft Talk session, Greg Parikh discusses the many information sources Oracle offers for PeopleSoft, from videos and planning tools to concept portal pages and blogs. You will understand what resources exist, where to find them, and what to use them for.

Customers and Partners are also presenting many important and interesting sessions.  They cover everything from Selective Adoption and PeopleSoft's new life-cycle and delivery model, successful adoption of the Fluid UI, rapid deployment in the Cloud. 

We're offering several panel sessions featuring customers, partners, and Oracle staff.  In these lively sessions we'll also be talking about Selective Adoption and the new life-cycle, Cloud deployment, and adopting PeopleSoft's Fluid UI. 

For detailed information on all these sessions and many more--including the dates, times, and locations--see our Focus on PeopleSoft page located here.

We’ve been announcing for some time that Elasticsearch would be available for PeopleSoft, and that day has come!  Customers can now download a DPK from My Oracle Support and install and configure Elasticsearch for their PeopleSoft systems.  Elasticsearch is available for the PeopleTools 8.55.11 patch, and customers must be on PeopleTools 8.55.11 or higher to use Elasticsearch.  You can get the DPK from the PeopleTools Maintenance Page on MOS.  Elasticsearch DPKs are available for Linux and Windows.

There is also documentation to help with installation, deployment, and maintenance.  Visit the Elasticsearch Documentation Home Page on My Oracle Support.  If you are currently using Secure Enterprise Search (SES), we cover how to transition from SES to Elasticsearch.  If you are not using SES, we cover how to do a fresh install of Elasticsearch.  In the near future we will provide additional resources including Oracle University Training, a Spotlight Series video, and more.  Our Cumulative Feature Overview tool has been updated with Elasticsearch content.

All of our testing indicates that Elasticsearch will be significantly easier to install and maintain and will perform much better than SES both for indexing and results retrieval.  With this big improvement, we hope customers will take advantage of Elasticsearch and make searching an important part of their user experience.  Search can be especially valuable with the Fluid User Experience because the Fluid header—which includes the Search widget—is always available, so users will be able to initiate a search from any context and at any point of their process.

Note that Oracle Secure Enterprise Search (SES) will be supported until April 30, 2018, eighteen months after Elasticsearch is delivered in PeopleTools 8.55.11.

There is new technology available from PeopleSoft that makes it very easy to configure Fluid Approvals.It’s called Enterprise Common Components Page Composer or often referred to as just Page Composer.With Page Composer, administrators can modify the contents, layout and format of Fluid Approval Pages without having to customize the underlying PeopleTools managed objects (pages and records).

Fluid Approvals are often one of the first product areas that many of you distribute to users to use on mobile devices.They are also an area of the product that each organization likes to tweak to meet their needs.Previous versions of mobile-ready approvals were built with IScripts and Mobile Application Platform (MAP), so customizing the UI was difficult and required developers.Now with Page Composer, changes are made using a simple drag-drop UI that doesn’t require complex programming.

It’s important to point out that in order to use Page Composer, you must use the new Fluid Approvals that are built for use with Page Composer.  Application teams will make the first set of approvals available in the following PeopleSoft Update Images, FSCM image 20, HCM image 20, CRM image 12 and ELM image 15.It’s also important to mention that Page Composer only supports Fluid Approvals and is not something that can be used with any Fluid page.We’ll let you know if that changes.

So you've started adopting PeopleSoft's Fluid User Interface to provide a better experience and mobility for your user communities.  Great!  For those of you that are taking an extra step and are doing some of your own development in Fluid, we offer some guidelines to help with your development efforts.  These docs will help you create home pages, components, and navigation flows that are consistent with those delivered by PeopleSoft's application development teams. 

There is a compendium article on My Oracle Support that provides links to several useful guides:  FLUID UI: PeopleSoft Fluid User Interface Supplemental Documentation (Doc ID 1909955.1)

Here are some of the guides you'll find on this page:

• Cascading Style Sheet Guide for PeopleSoft Fluid:  Contains descriptions of delivered CSS styles. Using this information will be helpful for creating custom fluid applications as well as extending current CSS features delivered in your PeopleSoft applications.
• Pivot Grid Security:  Provides information about security for Real-time Component Search in the PeopleSoft Fluid User Interface mode.
• PeopleSoft Fluid User Interface Programming Fundamentals:  Covers advanced topics related to creating fluid applications.
• Converting Classic Components to PeopleSoft Fluid User Interface:  Provides descriptions of the steps involved in a sample scenario of converting a classic page to a fluid page, helping to illustrate the concepts of fluid development.
• Fluid User Interface and Navigation Standards:  A set of guidelines and standards for applying the recommended techniques of fluid application development.

In addition, there is a great Fluid User Interface Design Standards document available here.

If you want to insure that your applications perform optimally, check out this red paper on performance for Fluid.

Of course there is a lot of good information in PeopleBooks too, but these resources go further.

We have a nice slate of sessions planned for the Collaborate conference, which takes place from April 2nd-6th in Las Vegas.  This valuable conference is hosted by Quest, the Oracle user group.  Quest has posted a  PeopleSoft page for the conference, so if you are focused on PeopleSoft, this makes it easier to review the content and choose your agenda. Registration is open now, and you can save by registering before February 16th.

The PeopleTools team will provide several sessions focused on our three main subjects:

• Fluid User Interface
• Life-cycle, including Selective Adoption and PeopleSoft Test Framework
• Cloud deployment for PeopleSoft
  

We'll also be covering important subjects like security, Elasticsearch, and platforms, and we'll also be doing the ever-popular PeopleTools panel session, where you have the opportunity to ask us any questions you want regarding PeopleSoft Technology.

Of course our applications teams, partners, and customers are presenting many interesting sessions too.  Visit the PeopleSoft page for the conference and go to the Key Topics section.  This makes it easy to discover sessions by topic and focus your selections on the subjects of interest to you. 

Hope to see you there!

The latest image (Image 3) of the Interaction Hub is now available on My Oracle Support--PeopleSoft Update Manager Home Page.  To get the image, go to the PeopleSoft Update Images tab, then choose the Interaction Hub Update Images page.

This image contains a couple of beneficial features:

• Uptake of Elasticsearch   Elasticsearch is the new search engine used with PeopleSoft.  It provides many benefits over previous implementations of search technology.  When Search is used with the Interaction Hub, you can have federated searching across all PeopleSoft applications including the Hub.  This means that when you run a search, you can retrieve results from all content sources.  Learn more about Elasticsearch with PeopleSoft from our Key Concepts page on Search.
  
• Fluid Related Information for Content Management    This is functionally similar to Classic content management in Related Content.  There are three main aspects to this feature:  1) It enables users view all sorts of content from conventional articles, to videos or documents.  2) It provides a setup page for administrators to assign or update content, including context-specific content.  3) Enables administrators with extra privileges to create or update content management assignments, specify a role that can serve as content administrator, mark content as context sensitive, and turn on or off online content update capability. 
  
  Such managed content can be included in the Related Information from or in a page as embedded Related Information.  See PeopleBooks guidance on Related Information.
  

We’ve been talking about running PeopleSoft Applications on the Oracle Compute Cloud ever since the release of PeopleTools 8.55.  In release 8.55, we changed the way PeopleSoft is packaged and installed, using automated scripts for deployment and configuration.We call that the PeopleSoft Cloud Architecture.  Today, we make it even easier by automating processes like moving on premise environments to the cloud, provisioning of environments, defining topologies, cloning environments and maintaining application instances.  You could do these manually but that takes a lot of time and resources.  Now they are all automated by PeopleSoft Cloud Manager.

What are the basics?

This is not PeopleSoft running as a SaaS application.  There, got that out of the way.  This is you, moving your PeopleSoft Application from on premise to the Oracle Compute Cloud Service (also referred to as Oracle’s Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)).  You move the database, application tier, web tier, app sources, tools source, everything that makes up a PeopleSoft application and place it in the cloud.  You can do this for any of your instances, demo, dev, test, training, regression, sandbox, conference room pilot, and even production. Take it one step further, and you can put your database on the Database Cloud Service and let Oracle manage patching the database for you.  This is your application with your configurations, your customizations, your security profiles, and your data, and it’s running on the Oracle Cloud.  

PeopleSoft Cloud Manager

PeopleSoft Cloud Manager helps you run PeopleSoft Applications on the Oracle Compute Cloud.  You’ll find it on the Oracle Marketplace and it’s free of charge.  Just load it on to your Oracle Compute Cloud and start running. First thing you’ll want to do is get an environment.  That’s what ‘Lift and Shift’ is for.  'Lift and Shift' packages up your on premise environment and copies it to the Cloud.  Once there, define a topology to identify all the resources your application will use, and automatically deploy it.  From on premise to the cloud, fully automated, in a very short time. You don’t have to move all your PeopleSoft environments to the cloud.  Think of this as an extension of your data center.

Once you’ve got PeopleSoft Applications running on the Cloud, PeopleSoft Cloud Manager gives you a great collection of utilities and administrative features to manage them.  You can start and stop them (of course!).  If you don’t want one anymore, you can delete it.  If you want another copy of an environment, you can clone it.  And of course, none of this is worthwhile unless you can maintain them.  Simply subscribe to application and tools changes, and anytime PeopleSoft publishes a changed (PRP, PUM image, PeopleTools patch, PeopleTools release), it is automatically copied to your Cloud File Repository and ready to be applied.  No more poking around My Oracle Support waiting for changes to be posted!

If you’ve been thinking about moving some of your PeopleSoft operations to the cloud, you’ll want more information about Cloud Manager.  Of course, all of that can be found on thePeopleSoft Information Portal.  For more information about using the Oracle Compute Cloud and Database Cloud Services, talk to your Oracle Technology Sales Representative.

We're doing a lot to enhance PeopleTools, and we have many avenues for gathering requirements: focus groups, conferences, research, advisory boards, and so on.  One area that we would like to promote particularly is the PeopleSoft Idea pages.  There is an idea page for PeopleTools specifically.  We are monitoring these pages regularly, so if you have suggestions for enhancements regardless of size or complexity, please feel free to submit them here.  This is your chance to guide us in the direction of PeopleSoft technology.  In addition to submitting your own ideas, you can vote on the suggestions of others to give them more weight.  Take a look at these pages and submit your ideas and suggestions.  This area is really for ideas about any area of PeopleSoft technology, so if you have ideas about areas beyond PeopleTools--like Enterprise Components or the Interaction Hub, you can submit them here as well.

We've just posted a new Spotlight Series video on using Elasticsearch with PeopleSoft.  This video is the first in a series, and covers the following topics:

• What is Elasticsearch and why did PeopleSoft move to it for our search engine?
• What releases of PeopleTools and PeopleSoft applications are needed to deploy Elasticsearch?
• How do customers obtain it?  Are there any licensing implications?
• What are the advantages of Elasticsearch?

I addition to these points, the main purpose of the video is to provide an overview of the process for deploying Elasticsearch with your PeopleSoft environments.  We cover the overall process, and describe the scenarios that may apply to your enterprise.

We will be releasing additional videos on Elasticsearch with PeopleSoft in short order.  These videos will cover the following topics in greater detail:

• Transitioning to Elasticsearch from Oracle's Secure Enterprise Search
• Initial installation of Elasticsearch
• Administration and maintenance of Elasticsearch

All these videos will be posted on the PeopleSoft YouTube channel.

The Collaborate conference, hosted by a consortium of Oracle user groups (Quest, IOUG and OAUG), is being held April 2-6 in Las Vegas, NV.  This conference covers a broad spectrum of Oracle applications and technology, and PeopleSoft is well represented.  Quest has a web page focused on PeopleSoft at Collaborate that you will find useful.  It will help in planning for your PeopleSoft-related activities.  It highlights keynotes, important sessions and topics, educational opportunities, and workshops.  In short, it's a great tool for planning your complete conference agenda.

As the name of the conference implies, this is a great opportunity to collaborate with Oracle staff, fellow PeopleSoft customers, and partners.  You can also see PeopleSoft at the Oracle demo pods while visiting the Exhibit floor.

The PeopleTools and PeopleSoft Technology area is offering many interesting and valuable sessions.  Here are some topics/sessions you should consider:

General

• PeopleSoft Technology Road Map
• PeopleTools Panel Discussion
• Transitioning to Elasticsearch with PeopleSoft
  

Cloud

• Deploying PeopleSoft in the Oracle Cloud
• PeopleSoft Cloud Architecture and Cloud Manager
  

User Interface

• Adopting the PeopleSoft Fluid User Interface
• Simplified Analytics
• Page Composer/Approvals
  

Security

• PeopleSoft Security in the Cloud

This is just a sampling.  There are many wonderful sessions being offered by customers, partners, and the PeopleSoft applications teams.  Again, check www.peoplesoftcollaborate.com  and learn about everything PeopleSoft at the Collaborate conference.

Content provided by Balaji Pattabhiraman

PeopleSoft applications teams are delivering lots of greatcontent in their images for the Fluid User experience.In addition, though, there are many thingscustomers can do to enhance their applications to meet uniquerequirements.This post is the next in aseries of capabilities that PeopleTools provides.

In this post we'll cover how to invoke javascript APIs tointegrate third party elements within PeopleSoft Fluid pages.In this example, we're calling a google mapsAPI for Resource location.PeopleTools8.54 (and higher) provides the ability to create responsive Fluid components.In addition to making the layout responsive, PeopleTools provides developerswith mechanisms to run any javascript API (your own or third party) within yourPeopleSoft application.

We'll cover the following in this example:

• Build a sample fluid application with two panellayout. The left panel loads a set of projects along with details such as thenumber of resources. The right panel loads the map.
• Set a default so the user sees the map centeredto the user's current location using HTML5 Geolocation.Resources nearby their current location areplotted on the map.
• Selecting a Project on the left panel updatesthe map and indicates where resources are located.
• Searching for a location (using the googleplaces lookup API) centers the map to the selected location and shows theresources near the location in the map.

Note that this blog does not get into the details of theGoogle Maps or Places JavaScript API.Neither does Oracle PeopleSoft certify usage of Google maps. This is atechnology demonstration on how to integrate PeopleSoft with third partyJavaScript APIs. Please read the following on Custom JavaScriptGuidelines.

First let’s look at the completed application and how itbehaves for users, then we’ll show how you build a page to work like this.

Below is a PeopleSoft page.  When the page loads, the HTML5 geo location pops up asking for permission to use the user’s current location.  (If this is not granted, the map will center on the resource of the first project.)

Select Allow so that the map is centered based on the user's current location and the resources nearest that location.

Click on the caret tab to expand the left panel.  This shows us a list of projects.

In this scenario, we’ve selected the Implementation Project.  Notice that this project has 21 resources. The map now shows the resources by locations (using markers).

Clicking a marker (flag) shows the resource details.  In this case, we click on the Flag located on San Jose, CA, which shows us the 13 resources located at that location.

You can also search for resources at a different locationusing the Location box.This will usethe Place Finder to suggest locations as you type.Here we’ve entered Tokyo,Japan.This loads the map centered on that location and the resources availablenearest to the location.

In this example, the resource isn’t exactly geographically close!

So how did we achieve this?  The following are the high-level steps used to build this.

In App Designer, create a two panel layout using the delivered layout page PSL_TWOPANEL.  (Note that we provide many Fluid page templates in App Designer.)

This creates a default two panel layout page, where you can place your page fields.  Remember, in Fluid, designing a page no longer uses a WYSIWYG page design.  Instead, you have a series of group boxes into which you place your page elements.  The style sheets will take care of placement on the displayed screen.

Next we place the required fields on the page.  There are three main sections to consider:   1) A group box that will be the map field (named Map Canvas in the screen below)  2) A list grid that will hold the Project list, which is inside the subpage PC_MAP_PRJ_SBF, and 3) The section on top of the map (named PC_MAP_PNLHDR_SBF) that contains fields like the location.  We include them on the page illustrated below.  This example is available in a delivered Financials application (although it uses Oracle maps instead of Google maps).

Next we add the PeopleCode to load the list of project/resources and update the left panel with those details (list grid rows). The APIs to populate the grid rowset is as same as in Classic PeopleSoft, so we will skip those details in this blog.  In addition we can specify style classes to the page fields using the Fluid tab (Default Style Name) section on the form fields. These style classes can be delivered out of the box, or you can create your style sheet and include them for your page using the AddStyleSheet API in component post build. 

Now we get to the interesting part of populating the map.  First we define the JavaScript in an HTML file that will load the map initially or upon user action. You can write any JavaScript function routines.  You can look at example on google map JavaScript API doc here. These methods are defined in the HTML object PC_MAP_JS.  Here the method pc_loadMap is responsible for doing geo location, populating the map, enabling the places API and also calling the routine to set the markers.

The following lines enable the page's Location edit box (with page field name PACINPUT) as control for google places API input:

var input = document.getElementById('PACINPUT');
var searchBox = new google.maps.places.SearchBox(input);

The following lines associate the page's map canvas as the section for map. Initially, the map is centered by current location:

navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(function(position) { posGeo = { lat: position.coords.latitude, lng: position.coords.longitude };
var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('%formnamedivPC_MAP_NUI_WRK2_MAP_CANVAS'), {
center: posGeo,
zoom: 10,
mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
});

The following lines of code add the markers by looping through the resource details for a given project. The details are read from the database and stored in a page field in the component PeopleCode. It is read here in JavaScript to populate the markers:

for (var i = 0; i < gdata_PC_MAP_DATA_DVW$0.length; i++) {
var data = window.gdata_PC_MAP_DATA_DVW$0[i];
var marker = new google.maps.Marker({ position: {lat: parseFloat(resource[1]), lng: parseFloat(resource[2])}, map: map, icon: image, shape: shape, title: resource[5] });

The lines below associate the  event when you do a click a marker on the map to open the PeopleSoft modal page to display data. The openResourceInfoWindow will do a form submit (submitAction_%formname) to invoke the PeopleCode back from JavaScript to open the modal:

marker.addListener('click', function() {
     openResourceInfoWindow(marker, data[3],data[4], "M");
});
//Update the map and set the zoom level after adding the markers
map.setCenter(lasPos);
map.setZoom(5);

Now include the Style Sheet (if you have custom style classes applied on the page fields) and the JavaScript (we just defined) to be used for the component.

Now call the JavaScript function using AddOnLoadScript when the user selects a project on the left panel as part of the field change PeopleCode. (You can call JavaScript from PeopleCode events in fluid!).  This will reload the map.

You off and running!

There is a great new feature in the latest HCM and FSCMimages.PeopleSoft now delivers sample PeopleSoftTest Framework (PTF) Scripts.This is afeature that many have asked for a long time, and we’re happy to make theseavailable.

The scripts are available with FSCM Image 20 and HCM Image19.The scripts for FSCM Image 20 are downloadable from MyOracleSupport (MOS).Infuture images, they will be included directly in the image.

You can find more information about the sample PTF scripts onMOS in document 2167721.1.Happytesting!

In an earlier post, we indicated that Elasticsearch would be available in the 8.55.10 of PeopleTools.  Instead, it will not be available with this specific PeopleTools patch. We are working on completing release requirements and we will update the exact 8.55 patch number when we make Elasticsearch generally available for PeopleSoft.  As mentioned previously, Elasticsearch will be the only Search engine supported in PeopleTools 8.56.

For those using SES and Verity...

• SES: We plan to support SES in PeopleTools 8.55 for 18 months after Elasticsearch is generally available.
• Verity: We plan to support Verity for our 9.1 application releases through September 2018. Note that Verity will not be supported in 8.56, which means that if customers wish to use Verity, they will need to stay on 8.55. We will do our best to support customers through the support policy of the 9.1 applications.

For those attending Oracle Open World this September, we offer a session on Elasticsearch that you should find interesting and informative. In the presentation, we will describe all the benefits of Elasticsearch integration for PeopleSoft including its ease of deployment, transition, and operations. Here are the session logistics:

Session ID: CON7066
Session Title: Getting the Most Out of PeopleSoft: Transitioning to Elasticsearch 
Room: Moscone West—2004
Date and Time: 09/21/16, 12:15:00 PM - 01:00:00 PM

Oracle's Open World conference is just around the corner (September 18-22).  PeopleSoft always has a significant presence at Open World, and this year we have lots of great sessions and exciting new things to announce.  If you are interested in PeopleSoft technology and how PeopleTools and related technology can provide value to your PeopleSoft ecosystem, consider attending some of these sessions. 

Our general sessions and keynotes are popular every year.  This year, Paco Aubrejuan PeopleSoft's Senior Vice President will give you an overview of all things PeopleSoft including how you can deploy PeopleSoft in the Cloud to achieve cost savings and business agility, while preserving your investment in PeopleSoft.  Jeff Robbins will once again be presenting the PeopleSoft Technology Roadmap, where you can learn how we increase the value of PeopleSoft applications with important technology innovations.  With all the talk about the Cloud these days, customers may not know about their options with PeopleSoft in the cloud.  To address that, we have several sessions dedicated to learning about PeopleSoft Cloud deployment.  Jeff Robbins will teach you how to use Oracle Cloud to efficiently manage Oracle’s PeopleSoft infrastructure. Whether it is development, test, training, demo, or production environments.  Biju Narayanan and Mark Hoernemann will tell you about the PeopleSoft Cloud Architecture and Deployment Framework as well as PeopleSoft’s upcoming Cloud Manager.  This new application can help customers and partners achieve higher service levels and greater automation in managing their PeopleSoft environments deployed to the Oracle Cloud.  Ravi Shankar will inform attendees about Oracle Managed Cloud Services and how they can help you manage Oracle’s PeopleSoft applications deployed on Oracle Cloud.  Mark Hoernemann will present the Platform and Infrastructure Overview, which provides the information you need to plan your PeopleSoft environments. 

Learn all about PeopleSoft's Fluid User Interface in several OpenWorld sessions.  Dave Bain will cover how to extend your Fluid applications.  Dave will also present with a customer who has deployed Oracle Fluid User Interface. You will learn about the customer’s experiences and discover what to do to prepare, deploy, and deliver PeopleSoft Fluid–based applications.  Matthew Haavisto and Pramod Agrawal will show you some simple configuration techniques that can enrich the Fluid content delivered by our Applications teams.  You will also hear from several of our customers, who will relate their experiences adopting Fluid.  Matthew and Ramasimha Rangaraju will also talk about PeopleSoft's move to use Elastic Search.  With Search becoming such an important part of the user experience, learn what the transition to Elastic means for you.

Security is always an important topic.  Greg Kelly will describe how to secure your PeopleSoft environments when deployed in the Cloud. In Greg's session you'll find out how to achieve the same levels of security and governance as you do on premise. Greg will also show you how to take advantage of the latest PeopleTools security features to protect against both internal and external threats to your systems and data. 

PeopleSoft has made some important advancements in Reporting and Analytics.  Matthew Haavisto and Jody Schnell offer a roadmap on PeopleSoft's rich set of tools for reporting and analytics, which are focused on enabling the end user to be more productive than ever. 

With so many new things happening in PeopleSoft, how does one learn about them after Open World?  In a live PeopleSoft Talk session, Greg Parikh discusses the many information sources Oracle offers for PeopleSoft, from videos and planning tools to concept portal pages and blogs. You will understand what resources exist, where to find them, and what to use them for.

Customers and Partners are also presenting many important and interesting sessions.  They cover everything from Selective Adoption and PeopleSoft's new life-cycle and delivery model, successful adoption of the Fluid UI, rapid deployment in the Cloud. 

We're offering several panel sessions featuring customers, partners, and Oracle staff.  In these lively sessions we'll also be talking about Selective Adoption and the new life-cycle, Cloud deployment, and adopting PeopleSoft's Fluid UI. 

For detailed information on all these sessions and many more--including the dates, times, and locations--see our Focus on PeopleSoft page located here.