Oracle Forms and Oracle Reports are two of the oldest tools that are available for application development. Nevertheless, many companies are now considering a move to Oracle ADF. Why is this?
For one, Oracle seems to be bent on its development tools that are based on the Java platform. The company is slowly moving away from Oracle Forms and Oracle Reports to Oracle ADF and Business Intelligence Publisher. Java EE is the recognized industry standard in application development and Oracle recognizes that.
For another, Oracle ADF has a more powerful set of technologies and tools. Instead of just relying on CRUD transactional applications that are easily created with Oracle Forms, you might find that evolving business needs and requirements are better served by Oracle ADF. Oracle ADF can help you easily come up with standards-based applications that are ready for the Web and even the cloud.
There are a lot of other Java tool sets that you can use, but by far, Oracle ADF is one of the easiest to master especially if you are used to working with Oracle Forms and Reports.
But for some, they simply have no choice but to use Oracle ADF for their application development, such as when you need to use Java-based applications for OS compatibility.
If you are looking to conquer IT challenges in the future, or if you want to be ready for social, mobile, big data, context-aware computing, and SOA, then you should look into relegating Oracle Forms and Reports to better application development and business intelligence tools such as Oracle ADF and Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher.
How do you make the transition?
There are several ways to migrate.
One, there are automated migration tools that you could use. These tools can turn your Oracle Forms applications to Java-based ones. However, manual migration often yields to better and more optimized codes. What’s more, the migrated application might be very difficult to maintain.
You could also outsource your migration efforts, which generally gives you better products but may take a while to complete. Or you could do it yourself if you have experts in your IT team with the skills set required to migrate applications into Oracle ADF.
What is Oracle’s Future direction for Oracle Forms and Reports?
Nevertheless, Oracle has come out and said that it is largely committed to continuing development and support for Oracle Forms and Oracle Reports. This is because PL/SQL has a large user base. In fact, the company has a new version in the works for Oracle Forms and Reports to be delivered as part of Oracle Fusion Middleware 12c.
Even with the recommendations to migrate to Oracle ADF, both Oracle Forms and Reports are still viable tools for your current IT strategy and you can still get Oracle support for these products!
Let Four Cornerstone Assist You
Regardless of whether you decide to continue application development with Oracle Forms and Oracle Reports, or move on the newer, recommended and more powerful technologies, Four Cornerstone can come to your rescue!
If you decide to stay, we can ensure that you have the latest versions of Oracle Forms, Oracle Reports, Oracle Designer and other Oracle software and tools that you may need.
If you decide to migrate, we can assist you in bringing your Oracle Forms and Reports applications to Oracle ADF or any other Java toolsets you use. Four Cornerstone can further help ease you into the transition, even helping with training your current IT staff to learn Oracle ADF and Oracle Business Intelligence, especially if they are more well-versed to PL/SQL than Java.
