UTOUG Training Days 2025: Full Schedule

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9:15am MDT

Introduction to GraphRAG: Enhance Generative AI Results with Graphs on Oracle Database 23ai

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT

Knowledge graphs store complex information by capturing relationships between data entities. Data represented in a graph provides additional insights, derived from how it connects to other entities. Instead of viewing data as standalone points, a graph data model sees it as a set of connected entities. This connection enables new, deeper insights. Capturing this data provides richer context for generative AI. Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) can be enhanced with graph-RAG. Join us to explore graphs, graph-RAG, and the power of combining graphs and generative AI. We'll demonstrate how easy it is to implement this using Graph and Vector technologies in Oracle Database.

Speakers

Rahul Tasker

Senior Product Manager, Oracle

Rahul is a senior product manager for Oracle Spatial and Graph. He defines product strategy and vision to drive revenue, growth, and market adoption, while also identifying technology products and features that meet customer needs.

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT
Room 224

Data (not database), Development

9:15am MDT

A Picture is Worth 1000 Words: Master Handling Images in APEX

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT

Room 105

A picture is worth a thousand words, but how can developers effectively manage images in APEX? With so many images come just as many questions: How do you load them? Where should they be stored? What are the best practices for displaying, downloading, editing, and updating images within APEX?

This session demystifies image handling in APEX by exploring a variety of recommended approaches—both declarative and code-based—for uploading, resizing, storing, and displaying images across different use cases, including APEX forms, various report types, and other components.

Attendees will gain a comprehensive understanding of common methods for incorporating images into APEX applications, along with practical insights and the confidence to seamlessly integrate images into their own projects.

Speakers

Karen Cannell

CTHO, TH Technology

Karen Cannell is the CTHO of TH Technology, a U.S.-based consulting firm specializing in Oracle technology solutions, particularly APEX. With more than 30 years of IT experience, she has served the government, engineering, healthcare, and fisheries industries. Karen is an Oracle ACE... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT
Room 105

Development

9:15am MDT

Application Performance Tuning Forum

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT

Room 209

Have you ever wished you could bring together four or five experts from different disciplines in one room to hear their top tips for application performance tuning and ask them questions? Since application performance depends on the collaboration of roles like DBA, developer, designer, and architect, you'd want to hear from representatives of each. You’d also want insights into techniques applicable to various technologies, as well as those specific to one technology.

You’ve found the right session to fulfill that wish. This session combines a series of lightning talks from well-known experts with a Q&A, where you can ask questions or share a tip you’ve found useful. Check out the panelists' biographies to get a sense of their expertise.

See you there!

Speakers

Peter Koletzke

Technical Director and Principal Instructor, Independent

Peter Koletzke is an Oracle ACE Director with over 39 years of experience in the IT industry. He has presented at more than 410 Oracle technology conferences worldwide and received over a dozen user group awards from ODTUG, NYOUG, UTOUG, and ECO/SEOUC. Koletzke is an Oracle Certified... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT
Room 209

Development

9:15am MDT

Automate and Bulletproof Your Data Guard

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT

Room 220

Learn how to set up Data Guard using best practices. This session begins with a brief history of Data Guard and how it evolved into its current form. We will then explore new features in Oracle Data Guard 12c Release 2, 18c, and 19c.

In addition to demonstrating how easy it is to set up Data Guard, this session will cover fundamental best practices and reference architectures that DBAs must know to protect their Oracle ecosystem. The author of the *Oracle Data Guard Handbook* will show how DBAs should set up, configure, and monitor mission-critical Data Guard environments, including Active Data Guard.

Come see Data Guard best practices in action. The session will focus on:
- Building the physical standby
- Monitoring and maintaining the physical standby
- Configuring Data Guard Broker
- Performing backup and recovery with RMAN
- Setting archive retention
- Switchover with refreshable PDBs
- Subset standbys with PDBs

Attendees will receive access to all scripts needed to automate the Data Guard configuration.

Speakers

Charles Kim

CEO, Viscosity North America

Charles Kim is an Oracle ACE Director, VMware vExpert, Oracle Certified DBA, and certified in Exadata, Oracle Linux, Oracle Cloud, and RAC. He joined the Oracle ACE Program in 2008 and became an Oracle ACE Director in 2009. Kim also became a VMware vExpert in 2013. He specializes... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT
Room 220

Infrastructure (including database)

9:15am MDT

Cloud Migration –Migrating Oracle Database to OCI/AWS/Azure

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT

Room 213

With the current trend being "Cloud migrations"-- understanding the steps and details of planning and designing a successful migration is highly impertive to our success. Oracle database migration to the cloud can be stressful when we have to consider multiple cloud provider. Trying to assess and evaluate multiple providers like OCI, AWS & Azure takes time and can delay the project timeline. My presentation details all the know how on the different providers and the pros and cons for the different options available when we consider cloud migration of Oracle This will be beneficial to all technical & business folks.
Learning Objectives:
1. Details on requirements to be gathered, technical steps to be planned and analyzed
2. Questions like : "Is Oracle RDS on AWS a good fit or should one go down the path of EC2 and Active database guard to set up resilience and redundancy " will be explored and analyzed.
3. Differences between the cloud providers –nuances to pay attention to help implement Oracle database migration successfully on OCI/AWS & AZURE
4. Common issues, shortcomings that need attention so as to avoid pitfalls.

What are the key steps to follow for successfully migrating oracle from on-prem to the cloud ( OCI/AWS/AZURE) Presentation will illustrate the tasks to follow while planning a migration of an Oracle database to the cloud. Based on each provider there are differences in what can and can not be done.
Questions like : "Is Oracle RDS on AWS a good fit or should one go down the path of EC2 and Active database guard to set up resilience and redundancy " will be explored and analyzed.
What are the Do's and Don’t based on specific cloud provider to ensure the migration is successful?
How do we ensure we have a cloud-based database that is performing at its optimal irrespective of the provider? Once migrated how do we ensure efficient performance.
Presentation will illustrate all the above and give pointers on important tasks to help DBAs plan and implement cloud migration successfully.

Speakers

Valli Ramanathan

Sr Manager Engineering, Freddie Mac

Valli Ramanathan is an Oracle ACE Associate and Oracle Certified Cloud Architect Professional with over 20 years of experience in managing teams and designing complex database solutions. She has led large DBA teams (local and offshore) to implement innovative, cost-effective solutions... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 9:15am - 10:00am MDT
Room 213

Infrastructure (including database), Development

10:15am MDT

Why Medallion Architecture Is the Best for Data Warehouses/Lakehouses

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT

Room 224

We chose a medallion architecture with bronze, silver, and gold layers for our data lakehouse design, and it has supported every use case we’ve needed perfectly. In this session, we’ll explain what medallion architecture is, how we implemented it, and how it has solved complex problems across various use cases.

Speakers

Michelle Hardwick

Chief Data Officer, University of California, Riverside

Michelle Hardwick is the current UTOUG president. She has presented at many Oracle and other tech events, including Oracle OpenWorld, Collaborate, and the Oracle OTN Latin America Tour.

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT
Room 224

Data (not database), Infrastructure (including database)

10:15am MDT

Expanding Your Javascript Reach Within Interactive Grids

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT

Room 105

To fully harness the potential of working with Interactive Grids in APEX, incorporating key JavaScript objects into your development is essential. This presentation will feature coding examples to enhance Interactive Grid functionality and elevate your JavaScript skills. Examples will range from novice to intermediate levels.

Speakers

Marty Booth

Senior DBA, Sports Medicine Research and Testing Laboratory

Marty enjoys working with data and designing database structures. An Oracle APEX enthusiast, he also has a passion for forecasting and monitoring weather conditions and playing the piano.

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT
Room 105

Development

10:15am MDT

How to Get Rid of Materialized Views Using Hashing in ELT/ETL

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT

Room 209

Materialized views are a robust Oracle Database feature, but they have some drawbacks. When we refresh the data and an incremental refresh (force refresh) doesn’t work, we need to fully reload the materialized view. While it’s refreshing, the data is inaccessible to business users. If it fails, we must rerun it, leaving the data inaccessible. Sometimes, the process simply takes longer than expected.

What if we need to refresh the data several times a day? What if the materialized view sources data from OLTP tables, and we can’t create additional load on the OLTP system?

Two main aspects must be considered: the source of the materialized view and the data refresh method.
We assume a staging area exists where all necessary tables are replicated, providing near real-time data.
We plan to demonstrate how a materialized view can be refactored into a combination of a view, table, and procedure (or mapping). By using a hash function, we can update data incrementally instead of performing a full load. This approach makes the process faster and ensures business users have continuous access to the data. It also enables more frequent refreshes, even approaching real-time updates.

Additionally, if this materialized view serves as a source for third-party systems, it can include attributes for further change data capture (CDC).

This approach reduces data outage time, protects against incidents, and enables close-to-real-time data for end users.

Speakers

Konstantin Zhernevskiy

Senior DWH Architect, Data Intensity

Konstantin is a senior DWH architect at Data Intensity with over 20 years of experience in the Oracle technology stack. For the past 10 years, he has focused on delivering data marts, data warehouses, and analytical reporting applications. His expertise includes AI, machine learning... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT
Room 209

Development, Infrastructure (including database)

10:15am MDT

High Availability and Disaster Recovery Options in Oracle Cloud to Meet RPO and RTO Requirements

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT

Room 213

Oracle Gen 2 Cloud is more powerful, secure, and advanced than its Gen 1 counterpart. Available since 2019, it has seen numerous service and feature enhancements. One key area of progress is business continuity. Explore Oracle Cloud's High Availability and Disaster Recovery solutions to ensure your business meets its Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO) requirements. We'll also discuss the benefits of the Full Stack Disaster Recovery service on OCI.

Speakers

Biju Thomas

SVP of Digital Transformation, Data Intensity

Biju Thomas is an OCI technical solution expert and leads the Digital Transformation practice at Data Intensity. He has been recognized as an Oracle ACE Director since 2015 for his expertise and contributions to the Oracle community. Biju started as a developer, has extensive experience... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT
Room 213

Infrastructure (including database), Infrastructure (including database)

10:15am MDT

Revolutionizing Query Performance with Oracle 23ai: AI-Driven Performance Optimizations in Action

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT

Room 220

Oracle 23ai revolutionizes query performance with AI-driven optimizations, including automatic indexing, adaptive execution plans, and real-time analytics. By leveraging integrated machine learning algorithms and innovations like vectorized execution, intelligent workload management, and real-time analytics, it enables organizations to process large datasets more efficiently.

This presentation will explore practical strategies for using Oracle 23ai’s intelligent features, illustrated through case studies that highlight its transformative impact on database performance.

Speakers

Janis Griffin

Senior Systems Consultant, Quest Software

Janis Griffin has more than 35 years of Oracle DBA experience, including the design, development, and implementation of critical database applications. Before joining Quest, she held DBA positions primarily in the telecom and network industries, working with real-time network routing... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 10:15am - 11:00am MDT
Room 220

Intrastructure (including database), Development

11:15am MDT

The Best Data Modeling Tools

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT

Room 224

I recently evaluated sixteen of the leading data modeling tools and will share my findings, including the top scorers, their costs and licensing models, pros and cons, and any deal-breakers. I’ll also walk you through the 65 criteria and scoring methodology I used. We’ll take a closer look at the tool that claimed first place. I first came across this tool in 2019 when it ranked second in a similar evaluation I conducted of twelve modeling tools. Since then, it has only gotten better, saving my employers substantial amounts of money.

Speakers

Bill Coulam

Founder, dbSherpa.com & dataSherpa.blog

Bill has been designing and building large volume, custom Oracle systems since 1995 and writing and speaking at Oracle user groups since 2001. Bill serves on the board of UTOUG.

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT
Room 224

Data (not database), Development

11:15am MDT

Oracle Generative AI & Vector Database with Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG)

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT

Room 209

Learn how to leverage AI and machine learning (ML) by understanding their potential in your applications and products. This session will cover algorithms and their uses with Oracle’s Vector Database and Vector Search, along with Large Language Models (LLMs) like Cohere, Llama, and ChatGPT. We’ll explore how these models can help drive success through Oracle’s products and teach you how to integrate AI/ML into your company’s tech plan for innovation or security. This session is accessible for non-experts.

Speakers

Rich Niemiec

Chief Innovation Officer, Viscosity North America

Rich Niemiec is the current chief innovation officer of Viscosity North America. A world-renowned IT and data expert, he co-founded and served as CEO of TUSC, a Chicago-based systems integrator of business solutions founded in 1988. Rich is inducted into both the Chicago and E&Y National... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT
Room 209

Development, Data (not database)

11:15am MDT

Backup Your Database and Don't Worry About Its Recoverability, ZDLRA Gets You Covered

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT

Room 220

Large databases are becoming increasingly common, and backing them up is always a challenge. Now, imagine how difficult it would be to recover them in the event of a disaster or media failure.

What if there was a solution that could back up databases, reduce backup size and time, validate the recoverability of the backup, and, best of all, guarantee no data loss?

In this session, we'll explore some of the benefits of Oracle's Zero Data Loss Recovery Appliance and show how it works. If your company doesn't have the budget or need for such a robust solution, don't worry—we'll also look at a DIY approach to help you manage backups effectively.

Speakers

Franky Weber Faust

Lead Database Consultant, Pythian

Franky Faust is a lead Oracle database consultant at Pythian, specializing in Oracle Exadata and high-availability technologies. He also has extensive expertise in databases such as Snowflake, MySQL, Cassandra, and SQL Server.Franky is dedicated to enhancing his skills, with a focus... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT
Room 220

Infrastructure (including database)

11:15am MDT

Multitenant 12.1 to Multitenant 23ai: Technical Deep Dive

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT

Room 213

Oracle Database 23ai introduces new features for pluggable databases (PDBs), enhancing options for both cloud and on-premises environments. This session provides a deep dive into multitenant architecture, covering key concepts of container databases (CDB) and PDBs, their unique value, and how to manage shared and exclusive components. We’ll also explore methods for accessing and managing CDBs/PDBs and outline migration paths from earlier versions to 12c and 23ai.
Advanced features from Oracle 12c R2 and 23ai will be covered, including PDB relocation, lockdown profiles, memory and I/O prioritization, and snapshot carousel. New 23ai capabilities—Control PDB Open Order, Hybrid Read-Only Mode for PDBs, and Refreshable PDBs in DBCA—will be highlighted, demonstrating how Oracle Database 23ai provides greater flexibility, control, and efficiency in multitenant environments.

Speakers

Anuj Mohan

Principal Enterprise Architect, Big River Steel

Anuj is an Oracle ACE and a frequent speaker at major Oracle conferences, including Oracle OpenWorld, Collaborate, Great Lakes, East Coast, and local user groups. He is also a regular speaker at Northern Kentucky University (NKU). Anuj is the founder of Oracle19cSIG (Quest) and has... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 11:15am - 12:00pm MDT
Room 213

Infrastructure (including database), Data (not database)

1:30pm MDT

Building a Generative AI RAG Application with Vector Search in Oracle Database 23ai

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT

Room 224

A key AI feature introduced in Oracle Database 23ai is vector search. A vector is an array of numbers representing the semantic content of data, rather than words or image pixels. Vectors enable similarity searches based on semantic content.

In this session, we'll explore the AI vector search features in Oracle 23ai, including generating, storing, indexing, and searching vectors, as well as integrating vector search with mission-critical enterprise capabilities.

Through sample code, we'll cover vector embedding generation methods for unstructured data, including using external embedding services and Oracle's native PL/SQL procedure, VECTOR_EMBEDDING(), to import ONNX embedding models.

We'll also discuss how to perform vector similarity searches and address challenges associated with managing high-dimensional data efficiently, ensuring query performance and accuracy, and creating new vector indexes for faster, more accurate similarity searches.

Finally, we'll explore how vector search enhances Generative AI and Large Language Models (LLMs), addressing the hallucination issue by augmenting prompts with private database content. Using examples, we will demonstrate building a Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) application, incorporating tracking, embedding with the LangChain framework, and LLMs.

Speakers

Kai Yu

Principal Consultant, Independent

Kai Yu is an independent principal consultant with over 30 years of experience in the tech industry, specializing in Oracle Database, Oracle Applications, Cloud, and AI and machine learning. He previously served as a Distinguished Engineer at Dell Technologies, leading Oracle Database... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT
Room 224

Data (not database), Development

1:30pm MDT

SQL Puzzles

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT

Room 209

Join me on a journey to explore the SQL challenges I’ve faced over the years. We’ll walk through real-world technical problems and write SQL together to solve them. Takeaways will include:
- A deeper understanding of core SQL concepts
- Improved query optimization skills
- Creative problem-solving (training your brain to approach data problems from different angles)

Speakers

Brandon Mason

Manager of Database Administration, America First Credit Union

Like many DBAs, Brandon graduated in human resource management and started his career in an HR office. While that work didn’t enhance his technical skills, it helped him develop the ability to work effectively with the people who manage systems. Brandon has been an Oracle DBA for... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT
Room 209

Development, Intrastructure (including database)

1:30pm MDT

Gateway to Hell - Network Basics for DBAs, DEVs and DevOps

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT

Room 213

New environments are increasingly built on a software-defined data center, both on-premises and in the cloud. However, more traditional approaches still require database administrators or DevOps teams to understand and manage the network stack. Knowledge of this foundational technology is more important than ever, even though, at its core, it originated in the 1980s and ’90s.

With a lighthearted approach, we’ll answer questions like:
- What’s so great about the Classless Society?
- What does a salami pizza have to do with network technology?
- If Superman likes supernetting, who handles subnetting?
- How do nuclear weapons impact network design?
- If my routes come from GPS, what do I need a router for?
- Who has DNS in their DNA?

We invite DBAs, developers, and DevOps professionals to rediscover the basics of network technology through the practical lens of experienced, hands-on database experts. This session is designed for IT professionals with limited exposure to networking who want to expand their understanding.

Speakers

Martin Klier

Senior DB Expert, Performing Databases GmbH

Martin Klier has nearly 20 years of experience in Oracle database administration, focusing on high-availability solutions with RAC and Data Guard. In recent years, he has specialized in performance analysis and tuning of complex systems.Klier is an Oracle ACE Director and frequently... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 1:30pm - 2:15pm MDT
Room 213

Infrastructure (including database), Beyond Oracle

2:30pm MDT

Generating OAC Semantic Model Using LLMs

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT

Room 224

Large language models (LLMs) are powerful tools for gathering data across various fields, ushering in a new era of AI-driven code generation. LLMs can generate structured data formats such as XML and SQL. By training on extensive datasets of XML documents, these models learn to understand both the syntax and semantics of XML, enabling them to produce well-formed XML documents, complete existing structures, and transform XML data into other formats.

We aim to test the hypothesis that LLMs can generate an OAC Semantic Model. The creation of a Semantic Model is time-consuming and stands to benefit significantly from improvement. We are currently investigating this approach and are eager to determine its efficacy.

Our idea is to train the LLM using XML generation techniques for the OAC Semantic Model, based on ADW Schema metadata, including table definitions, foreign keys, view definitions, table statistics, table documentation, and data catalogs. We plan to begin training with simple examples of the Semantic Model and gradually increase the complexity.

To test our hypothesis, we will use several LLMs, including GPT, Gemini, LLaMA, and Perplexity. We will evaluate multiple test cases for each model, comparing the results to see if they can effectively generate the models and whether these models can be successfully uploaded into OAC.

Speakers

Konstantin Zhernevskiy

Senior DWH Architect, Data Intensity

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT
Room 224

Data (not database)

2:30pm MDT

How To Estimate SQL Run Times Without Application Code Modifications

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT

Room 220

Imagine knowing SQL run times without modifying your application code. That's exactly what I'll demonstrate by diving into ASH data.

Picture this: A ticket reports, "This query takes 45 seconds!" How can you verify that? Is 45 seconds typical? Has it happened before? Could it be using a suboptimal execution plan? By analyzing ASH data, we'll answer these questions and more.

In this session, I'll show you how to manually infer SQL run times from ASH data. I'll then introduce a flexible SQL script that analyzes ASH data, infers run times, and reports results—down to the execution plan level. Finally, we'll use a simple spreadsheet to review and analyze the results. Join me as we explore a hidden gem in ASH data analysis!

Speakers

Craig Shallahamer

Applied AI Scientist, OraPub / Viscosity North America

Having worked with Oracle technology since 1989, Craig Shallahamer is a leader in the fields of machine learning, artificial intelligence and Oracle database performance tuning.Craig has extensive experience in constructing and teaching predictive modeling methods, notably developing... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT
Room 220

Infrastructure (including database), Development

2:30pm MDT

Liquibase With Oracle – Automating Your Schema Management

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT

Room 213

Managing a modern database schema can be complex, frustrating, and even risky. Schemas are at the core of application data and can either support or hinder application design. Oracle has integrated the open-source Liquibase into SQLcl, which has been included with Oracle 19c and SQL Developer for some time.

This session will teach you how to use SQLcl to track changes, manage schema and database code drift, make reliable changes, ensure consistent rollbacks, and more. Expand your DevOps methodology by fully automating schema updates.

Speakers

Gary Gordhamer

Managing Principal Consultant, Viscosity North America

Gary Gordhamer has spent much of his career focusing on enterprise application landscapes and business process digitization. His technical experience spans more than 30 years with Oracle E-Business Suite, middleware, databases, and related technologies. His professional background... Read More →

Tuesday March 25, 2025 2:30pm - 3:15pm MDT
Room 213

Infrastructure (including database), Development

UTOUG Training Days 2025

From $50.00