Some New Thoughts for an Old Friend (iSetup)

Oracle has given an old friend a facelift in Release 12. Among some of the nips and tucks you will find the ability to create custom selection sets, comparison reports between multiple environments and a new process flow that promotes “Transformation” to a process all by itself. In addition to congratulating “Transformation” on it’s new found level of achievement, let’s dive in and discover what the new and improved Release 12 version of iSetup has in store for us, ok?

The integration between iRepository and iSetup has been strengthened in that any interface and/or API that is defined to iRepository can be defined to iSetup which is the underpinning for creating custom selection sets within iSetup. This opens up the playbook for iSetup by providing access to data objects never before experienced and if iSetup can get to those data objects, that means migration nirvana can be achieved between environments for those objects. What is even more impressive is how Oracle has reinforced iRepository with all the open API’s and interfaces in and out of the E-Business Suite footprint. This allows for a higher degree of reach for iSetup into data objects heretofore unreachable.

Next consider running a comparison report, but only being able to run the comparison against one environment? How counter-intuitive is that? Doesn’t comparison infer checking one environment against another? Well, now the comparison reporting function does just that, it can be pointed to multiple environments and behold, comparison deltas are reported – how cool is that?

Lastly, let’s turn our attention back to our friend “Transformation” which just got promoted. The process flow for 11i iSetup is below:

And now here is the new and improved process flow for Release 12:

You will notice that you don’t have to run a load process any longer in order to perform a transformation of your data objects.

One important note on iSetup that hasn’t changed is that the source and target environments must be at the same version of E-Business Suite, keeping iSetup geared for implementations and migration of configuration changes between environments.

Would enjoy hearing about your experiences with iSetup and get your reactions to the Release 12 improvements.