A few weeks before the first ever Oracle sponsored Maker Faire, I was experimenting with some of the cognitive (vision) recognition APIs available. Google Vision API, Watson Visual Recognition and Microsoft Computer Vision API are some of the biggest players in this field right now. After testing all of them I found the idea of Microsoft’s CaptionBot really compelling:… Read More
For the last 6 years, each Friday, I have been bringing a mobile painting studio to my kids’ school. Among other things, we work on what I call “color studies” – a set of formal exercises aimed to sharpen one’s sense of color and develop painting skill, just like musical scales, chords and arrpedgios sharpen… Read More
Introduction Another Maker Faire has come and gone, the 12th one already. Unlike last year, Oracle had a booth again at the Maker Faire, staffed by my colleagues and myself throughout the weekend, where we showed of some fun demos. Here are some impressions, both from reactions in our booth and from the grounds. The… Read More
Maker Faire 2016
Another year, another amazing at the Maker Faire. I’ve attended my fair share of Maker Faires these years, so the pyrotechnic sculptures, 3D printing masterpieces, and handmade artisan marketplaces were of no particular surprise. But somehow, every time I come around to the San Mateo fairgrounds, the Faire can’t help but be so aggressively fresh, crazy,… Read More
Oracle’s Fashion Technology Makers: Soldering, Sewing, and Storytelling
Many hands make light (emitting diodes) work. Oracle Applications User Experience (OAUX) gets down to designing fashion technology (#fashtech) solutions in a fun maker event with a serious research and learning intent. OAUX Senior Director and resident part-time fashion blogger, Ultan “Gucci Translated” O’Broin (@ultan), reports from the Redwood City runway. Fashion and Technology: What’s… Read More
On Oracle Corporate Citizenship
Yesterday, our entire organization, Oracle Applications User Experience (@usableapps) got a treat. We learned about Oracle’s corporate citizenship from Colleen Cassity, Executive Director of the Oracle Education Foundation (OEF). I’m familiar with Oracle’s philanthropic endeavors, but only vaguely so. I’ve used the corporate giving match, but beyond that, this was all new information. During her presentation,… Read More
Maker Faire 2015
This weekend the 10th Annual Maker Faire Bay Area took place in my backyard and rather than fighting traffic for 2 days with the +130,000 attendees I decided, as I have for the last 9 years, to join them. Unlike last year, Oracle had no presence at the Maker Faire itself, so I had plenty… Read More
Oracle OpenWorld and JavaOne 2014 Cometh
This time next week, we’ll be in the thick of the Oracle super-conference, the combination of Oracle OpenWorld and JavaOne. This year, our team and our larger organization, Oracle Applications User Experience, will have precisely a metric ton of activities during the week. For the first time, our team will be doing stuff at JavaOne too. Anthony (@anthonyslai)… Read More
AppsLab at the Maker Faire
Last week was Maker Week for us, and the culmination was the Maker Faire over the weekend. This was my first Maker Faire, and wow was it an absolute blast. I highly recommend taking in one of their events if there’s one in your town. Perhaps the best attribute of the Maker Faire is that… Read More
It’s Almost Maker Week
Maker Faire Bay Area (@makerfaire) is coming up quickly, May 17 and 18, and we’re excited to be participating. Here’s the backstory on why. Ultan (@ultan) and Justin (@kestelyn) spoke at Maker Faire 2012 (video), and the Java (@java) team is a major sponsor of the Maker Faire. Unfortunately for him, Ultan won’t be around to attend, so when… Read More
Lots going on here at the ‘Lab as always, and now, I have video to prove it. First, a large of our daily routines now involve showing off our demos to visitor to the User Experience Cloud Labs at Oracle HQ. Our demos live in a space we affectionately call the Gadget Lab, and during… Read More
Oracle hosted the first-ever company co-sponsored Maker Faire event on November 17, 2016. When I heard of the event, I had something in my mind that I would encourage a group of middle-schoolers to make a game for the event. I have been teaching them occasionally on Arduino, NodeMCU and MQTT concept over some weekends,… Read More
OpenWorld 2015 Highlights
It’s been nearly three weeks, and I’m finally getting around to sharing the highlights of our OpenWorld 2015. Enjoy. Keynotes Last year, Steve Miranda showed some of our project work in his keynote. This year, our Glance framework on the Apple Watch, made an appearance in Larry Ellison’s first keynote in a video showcasing the evolution… Read More
Connect All the Things: An IoT Nerf Gun
Introduction As part of my foray into the Internet of Things (IoT) I was looking for a project I could sink my teeth in because I find it easier to learn something by doing it rather than just reading about it. It just happened to be that at JavaOne this year they will have a… Read More
Fourfecta! Java, IoT, Making and Raspi
Here comes more Maker content for your reading pleasure, this time it’s an OTN piece on Java and the Internet of Things: A Perfect Match: Java and the Internet of Things The piece features lots of Noel (@noelportugal) wisdom, on making, on IoT, on the Raspi and on Java, his own personal fourfecta. If you’re scanning… Read More
Find Us at Kscope14 Next Week in Seattle
Kscope14 (#kscope14), the annual conference of the Oracle Development Tools User Group, affectionately ODTUG (@odtug), will happen next week in beautiful Seattle, June 22 to June 26. The good people at ODTUG have graciously invited me back as a speaker for the 2014 vintage, and Anthony (@anthonyslai) will be my wingman for our session, Oracle Cloud… Read More
Recap of the Apps UX Gamification Design Jam
I’m back from the latest leg on my US tour, the Applications UX Gamification Design Jam. If you were following the #gamifyOracle hashtag, you might have seen some of what went on, but for completeness sake, here’s my recap. This was an internal-only meeting held by the Applications UX team, bringing together the entire organization of… Read More
Sun SPOTs and the Internet of Things
Last week, I met John Yopp (@johnyopp) who runs a team called the Retail Applied Research. You might be familiar with the Retail (@OracleRetail) team, e.g. from reading David Dorf’s (@dordav) blog. Anyway, John and his team are a lab; they work on prototypes, proving concepts for retail use cases, etc. Sound familiar? Yeah, that’s… Read More