Categories
Endeca

Install Oracle Endeca Commerce Tools and Frameworks v11 on Linux

If you are trying to install Tools and Frameworks under the new Oracle Endeca Commerce v11 with Linux, you might have noticed that the installer just got more complicated. We used to be able to install Tools and Frameworks by moving an unzipped directory to the right location and that would be all.

Now we need to run an installer located at:

/app/endeca/cd/Disk1/install/runInstaller.sh

If you are connecting through the console of a Linux box using SSH, you might have got this error

Preparing to launch Oracle Universal Installer from /tmp/OraInstall2014-03-04_02-06-11PM. Please wait ...<br />DISPLAY not set. Please set the DISPLAY and try again.<br />Depending on the Unix Shell, you can use one of the following commands as examples to set the DISPLAY environment variable:<br />- For csh: % setenv DISPLAY 192.168.1.128:0.0<br />- For sh, ksh and bash: $ DISPLAY=192.168.1.128:0.0; export DISPLAY<br />Use the following command to see what shell is being used:<br />echo $SHELL<br />Use the following command to view the current DISPLAY environment variable setting:<br />echo $DISPLAY<br />- Make sure that client users are authorized to connect to the X Server.<br />To enable client users to access the X Server, open an xterm, dtterm or xconsole as the user that started the session and type the following command:<br />% xhost +<br />To test that the DISPLAY environment variable is set correctly, run a X11 based program that comes with the native operating system such as 'xclock':<br />% &amp;lt;full path to xclock.. see below&amp;gt;<br />If you are not able to run xclock successfully, please refer to your PC-X Server or OS vendor for further assistance.<br />Typical path for xclock: /usr/X11R6/bin/xclock

The installer is trying to run the program through a visual user interface that is using a X window, which isn’t possible through a text-based terminal.

From there, you can use the silentInstaller (see documentation for more details) but there are less options available and I personally had issues running it. So instead, here are the steps if you want to run the installer with X11 to be able to interact with the user interface.

If you are on Mac, download and install Xquartz, which is an open-source X.Org X Window System (if running OS X before 10.8, it is bundled with the OS).

http://xquartz.macosforge.org/landing/

For other operating systems, you will have to find your own version of X.Org X11 and install it.

Then, all you have to do is connect on the Linux server where Endeca will be installed by using the -X parameter (which enables a X11 forwarding funnel to your own machine)

Example:

ssh -X username@hostname

Then, when you will run the installer

/app/endeca/cd/Disk1/install/runInstaller.sh

The installer will automatically launch XQuartz (or your own version of X.org on your operating system) on your machine and you’ll be able to install Endeca Tools and Frameworks on the Linux box.

Tools and Framework installer for Oracle Endeca Commerce

Advertisement
Categories
Endeca

How-to Install Oracle Endeca Integrator on Mac OS X

Oracle Endeca Information Discovery is shipping with the ETL tool “Endeca Information Discovery Integrator”. This is in fact a white label name for the open-source tool CloverETL with some added features.

Since Clover can work on Mac, I was wondering if I would be able to make CloverETL work on Mac and be compatible with the existing Endeca tools. Most of the time during Endeca development, we use Endeca Integrator Server to load the data into Endeca Server. Those software typically run on powerful servers so the only tool you really need to use locally is Integrator, to be able to make modifications to the Endeca loading graphs and upload them onto Endeca Integrator Server. Since I use a Mac for all my development needs, it only makes sense to run Integrator locally on Mac and let the other tools run on the servers.

Those instructions are for Endeca OEID 2.3, assuming someone already installed it on Windows. I believe the instructions are very similar for Endeca OEID 3.0 and also on Linux (using different paths).

To get started, download CloverETL Designer Free Trial 3.2.1 for Mac
http://designer.cloveretl.com/update/3.2.1/cloveretl-designer-macosx-cocoa-x86_64.dmg

Since you already own a license of Clover by buying OEID, I assume that this is safe to transfer your license from the Windows version of Clover to the Mac version, but do it at your own risk!
So after installing Integrator on Windows

Find license.dat into

C:\Oracle\Endeca\Discovery\2.3.0\Integrator\configuration\org.eclipse.osgi\bundles\294\1\.cp\license.dat

When you launch CloverETL Designer on Mac, copy paste the content of the license.dat file into the box that asks you to enter your license file.

Move every folder that starts with com.endeca. from Integrator Windows at this path:

C:\Oracle\Endeca\Oracle\Endeca\Discovery\2.3.0\Integrator\plugins

to Mac

CloverETL Designer Application -> Right click Show Package Contents -> Contents -> MacOs -> plugins

Relaunch CloverETL on Mac, Go to Clover Preferences

Components
Click Browse
Drag and drop the plugins folder in the window

Go choose

plugins/com.endeca.latitude._1.0.0/components.xml

Click Import

Click Apply
Copy all the files in

C:\Oracle\Endeca\Oracle\Endeca\Discovery\2.3.0\Integrator\plugins\com.endeca.latitude._1.0.0\icons

to

CloverETL Designer Application -> Right click Show Package Contents -> Contents->MacOs -> plugins -> com.cloveretl.gui_3.2.1 -> icons

Relaunch Clover.

That is all! You now have CloverETL with all the extra Endeca graph components and also with the ability to export and run your graphs on Integrator Server. You can start editing your graphs in your existing Endeca project.

Categories
Endeca

Explore the Endeca Configuration Repository with WebDav

With Oracle Endeca Commerce, the Workbench application is storing all its configuration files inside a configuration repository. That includes typical workbench configurations used by the MDEX, Experience Manager configurations such as cartridges XMLs, landing pages and also media assets accessible by the Media Banner cartridge.

While Endeca provides scripts in the control project folder to upload content to that configuration repository, such as set_media, set_editors_config, set_templates and import_site, one  less known fact is that you can  connect to the repository  through a WebDav client and have a direct access to all the files and folders.

The reason it’s possible is because the technology underneath the Endeca Configuration Repository is  Apache Sling, a REST web framework built on top of the Java Content Repository Apache JackRabbit. If you use Windows, you can download a client such as CloudSafe to connect to it. On Mac, Cyberduck supports it (in theory MacOS X is supposed to support the WebDav protocol natively but for some reason when trying to connect to this WebDav repository, I can’t establish the connection).

Once you are ready to connect to the WebDav server, the URL to use is the link stored  in the config file WorkbenchConfig.xml for the IFCR component.

If the URL is: http://localhost:8006/ifcr, you should add /sites/name_of_your_project at the end.
So for the reference application, it would be http://localhost:8006/ifcr/sites/Discover . The user/password is be the same as the one stored in that same config section (admin/admin by default).

WebDav configuration to access Endeca Configuration Repository with CloudSafe
WebDav configuration to access Endeca Configuration Repository with CloudSafe

Once you are logged in with WebDav, you can start transferring files back and forth between the config repository and your own hard drive. I wouldn’t advise to change the XML config files stored in that config repository without knowing exactly what you are doing but there is a clear use case for managing your media assets (such as pictures and videos) that are accessible through the Media banner cartridge in Page Manager. While Endeca provides the set_media control script to upload files, being able to drag and drop files and delete them as you want directly into the config repository is much more easier and natural to do with a user interface than having to re-run that control script every time you want to make changes to your media files. You might as well consider giving access to that repository to your business users so that they can easily start managing the media files that they will need to use when creating the landing pages.

Here is the list of folders visible from a WebDav client when logging in on the Configuration Repository

Endeca Configuration Repository on a Webdav client

Let me know in the comments if you can think of other interesting use case to use the Endeca Configuration Repository through a WebDav client!

Categories
Endeca

Oracle Endeca Commerce Resources

Updated on September 12th 2014

Since I already wrote a blog post listing a list of resources for Oracle Endeca Information Discovery, I figured it would be good to do the same for the Oracle Endeca Commerce (Experience Manager).

Official Oracle resources

OTN Technical Questions Forum
The official forum for people having technical questions. Use the search feature when you have an issue, you will surely find someone that had a similar problem.
https://community.oracle.com/community/oracle-applications/endeca_experience_management/technical_questions

Documentation Index
Full documentation for Endeca Commerce in PDF and all related modules
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/indexes/documentation/endecaguidedsearch-1552767.html

Oracle Endeca Community
Official discussion support forum limited to people having access to Oracle Support (you will need a login access to Oracle Support). Less questions than the OTN Technical Questions but still a lot of relevant informations available.

You can also have access to the Knowledge Base which include articles written by the members of the Oracle Support team that relates to common bugs and problems encountered by the various clients.

https://communities.oracle.com/portal/server.pt/community/endeca/515

OnDemand webcast: Oracle Endeca Commerce v11 and v11.1 release
90 minutes webcast talking about the new features of v11.1 release
https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=registration.jsp&eventid=818009&sessionid=1&key=785A54F73316D47EAB775C38616D91EC&partnerref=CXBlog&sourcepage=register

2 hours long free webcast that explains the new features in Endeca Commerce (now called Oracle Commerce v11) with 1 hour just for details on the technical implementation, very useful
https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=registration.jsp&eventid=729924&sessionid=1&key=2903C41714A26E6D2FB8BED58734BA80&sourcepage=register

Oracle Commerce v11 and v11.1 What’s new document
The document lists the new features of Endeca with Oracle Commerce v11 and v11.1 in PDF. As part of Endeca Documentation Index you can also look at the release notes of each application but this one provides a more business-friendly list of features.
v11: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/apps-tech/commerce/overview/oc-11-0-0-whatsnew-2132255.pdf
v11.1: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/apps-tech/commerce/overview/oc-11-1-0-whatsnew-2245182.pdf

Oracle Commerce Youtube Channel
Not as good as the Oracle OEID Youtube channel, but you might still find some generic information about Endeca Commerce on this Youtube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/user/OracleCommerce/videos

Oracle A-Team Chronicles
Oracle has a technical team that publishes various blog posts, they have some interesting Endeca articles available
http://www.ateam-oracle.com/tag/endeca/

Non-Official Oracle resources

EndecaCommunity.com
Questions & Answers type of website that includes questions on both Endeca Commerce and Endeca Information Discovery. The Learning Center includes a couple articles on Endeca Commerce.
https://www.endecacommunity.com/

Bird’s Eye View blog
Contain some articles on the integration between Endeca and ATG
http://branchbird.com/blog/

Faceted Guides
Community written guides that include instructions on how to install Endeca and do typical operations
http://www.facetedguides.com/

Quest 4 ATG
Some blog posts on the integration of Endeca with ATG and steps to deploy an Endeca application
http://quest4atg.blogspot.ca/

GroupBy Inc
Oracle Gold Partner consulting firm, full of Endeca experts (and former Endeca employees). If you need help with your Endeca implementation, contact them. (I work there!)
http://www.groupbyinc.com/

Categories
Endeca

Resources for Oracle Endeca Information Discovery (OEID)

(Updated on Nov 29th 2013)

Since Endeca was bought by Oracle, resources to help you implement your Oracle Endeca Information Discovery solution have been scattered a little bit everywhere, so here is a summary of all the resources I have found.

Official Oracle resources

Oracle OTN Discussions Forum
Publicly accessible forum where lots of questions are being asked daily, lots of great answers. Make use of the search to read the archives!
https://forums.oracle.com/forums/forum.jspa?forumID=1404

Product Documentation
The complete documentation for Information Discovery 3.0 and the previous versions. Available online in HTML or in .PDF
There’s no search across all documents online so I suggest to download the full package in PDF and use your operating system search to execute a full search.
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/endeca/documentation/

Oracle EID Youtube channel
Training videos for Information Discovery 3.0 and 2.3 by the Oracle team. It’s a very good introduction to the product and it covers some advanced features as well. The videos are not too long, it’s definitely worth a watch
http://www.youtube.com/user/OracleEID

Oracle Endeca Information Discovery Wiki:
This official Oracle wiki contains great Design Patterns for Integrator (CloverETL) and some informations on Endeca Query Language (EQL)
https://wikis.oracle.com/display/endecainformationdiscovery

Endeca Community Forum
This forum is only accessible when you have access to Oracle Support. The forum is supposed to be monitored by the Support team but in my experience it is hard to get answers to questions and a lot less people are reading this forum compared to the public forum.

To access it, click on that link and login using your Oracle Support user/password. Then click Discussion.
https://communities.oracle.com/portal/server.pt/community/oracle_endeca_information_discovery/551

From the Support page, you can also access the Endeca Knowledge Base

And the Information Center 

Non-Oracle resources

Endeca123 Blog
Contains great tutorials on common Endeca use cases that are not very well covered by the official documentation
http://www.endeca123.com

EndecaCommunity
Another Question and Answers forum where questions from Information Discovery are mixed with the other Endeca products. Look at the Information Center for some blog articles on Endeca.
https://qa.endecacommunity.com/questions/

Rittman Mead Consulting Blog
Some Endeca tutorial and a great article about record-level security.
http://www.rittmanmead.com/category/oracle-endeca/

Branchbird Blog
Lots of articles on Endeca Information Discovery and eCommerce
http://branchbird.com/blog/

3sixty-analytics Blogs
Some blog articles on Endeca Information Discovery
http://blog.3sixty-analytics.com/?cat=3

GroupBy Inc
Oracle Gold Partner consulting firm, full of Endeca experts (and former Endeca employees). If you need help with your Endeca implementation, contact them. (I work there!)
http://www.groupbyinc.com/

chez brochez blog
Blog from an Endeca consultant (Ryan B. Rochez), lots of technical posts about Endeca Information Discovery 3.0
http://brochez.wordpress.com/category/endeca/

OBIEE tips and tricks
Great article on how to install quickly OEID 3.1
http://obieestuff.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/oracle-endeca-information-discovery.html

I will update this post if I hear of other resources!