Žiga Vaupot's Blog

Talking to Oracle Database in Slovenian In my previous blog post, Talking to Oracle Database in plain English I am discussing how to query Oracle Database using natural language queries to retrieve data from an Oracle database. Exploring SELECT AI Figure 1: Select AI From my quick exploration, I can conclude that AI has definitely entered databases and can be applied in very different scenarios. For example, using SELECT AI in chat application where data can be retrieved and presented from Oracle Database by applying natural language query. But that was in plain English. But what about if my primary natural language isn't English. What if your (and, for this matter also mine) isn't English. What if it is Slovenian? Would SELECT AI still work? Revisiting English Examples in Slovenian Let's examine the very same examples that I used in my previous blog post. Let's talk now ... po slovensko Enough said. Let's try the simplest query of all and let...

My SQL beginnings It was approximately 35 years ago (gosh, that long!?) when I first encountered SQL—Structured Query Language, for those who might not be 100% sure what I am talking about. It happened during labs at faculty when we visited IBM's training center in Radovljica, Slovenia, to learn and experiment with this (at least for me) new programming language. They called it a 4th generation language. With its roots in Boolean algebra and simple structure, we were told that it was almost like natural language (English, of course—who would have thought one day you would use Slovenian to query databases?). With all those SELECTs, FROMs, WHEREs, GROUP BYs, HAVINGs, ORDER BYs, etc., it actually sounded really cool and easy. My Select AI beginnings Fast forward to today, the other day I finally found some time to explore something different from my usual daily work. What caught my attention was one of the latest Oracle blogs: Introducing Select AI - Natural Language to SQL ...

I recently returned from Reading, UK, where I had the opportunity to attend the UKOUG 2023 conference . This year's event was particularly engaging, commemorating the 40th anniversary of the UK Oracle User Group. My participation at the conference had a dual purpose. Firstly, I attended to present, and while I was there, I had the chance to join several presentations that piqued my interest. I'm genuinely impressed by the innovative solutions showcased and the quality of work demonstrated by the presenters and their teams. My winners My standout presentation was LLMs are the Future of Conversational AI  by Antony Heljula of TPXimpact. Antony shared his experiences in developing chatbots that leverage large language models in conversational AI. Truly groundbreaking! A close second for me was Gianni Ceresa's (DATAlysis) presentation titled ID Please: Did You Already Ask That to Your Data?  Gianni delved into the crucial aspects of data lineage and governance, addressing the...

I am more than honoured to share that I am presenting at this year's UKOUG 2023 conference that is taking place on 15th and 16th November at Oracle TVP, Reading. I will deliver the following two presentations: Tuesday, 15th November, 10:00-10:45, Lambourne OCI Vision and Oracle Analytics: Just Like a Box of Chocolates   Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) is just like a box of chocolates. It is offering a variety of cloud services, including serverless and very user friendly AI services such as Vision, Language, Speach, Document Understanding and Digital Assistant. In this presentationa I am focusing on OCI Vision, which is a self-service AI Service, which applies computer vision for image-based content analysis. It allows developers easily integrate pre-trained models into their applications with APIs or custom training models to meet their specific use cases.  In this presentation we will demonstrate how to train machine learning model for x-ray image classification using...

HrOUG 2023 took place between Tuesday, 17th October, and Friday, 20th October. As usual in a great athmosphere of St. Andrew's Island near Rovinj . This year, 400+ attendees took part in the event organised by Davor and his team.  My part of the event has been focused on two presentations (they will be available to download any day soon), which I had already at SIOUG 2023 in June, however I've added some new facts and new demos since then: My view on Oracle’s position in Gartner Magic Quadrants for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms Gartner has published its Magic Quadrants for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms (Gartner, 2023) report for 2023, on April 5th. As usually, it presents how various analytics and BI vendors position regarding the completeness of their vision and ability to execute. It is considered as “the go-to resource” when evaluating and comparing these technologies. In their report, Gartner says that the key Oracle’s strengths are in...

28th annual event  Make IT 2023  took place in Portorož, Slovenia, between 1st and 2nd June 2023. The conference actually consists of two conferences:            As organisers, we are very pleased with the conference which has grown in terms of the content  presented and also regarding the number of attendees which has surpassed 350.   I've been involved with organisation as a member of the organising committee, however personally, my preference lies of course with  Make IT - SIOUG 2023 , where I delivered two presentations: OCI Vision and Oracle Analytics: Just like a Box of Chocolates OCI Vision is a self-service AI Service, which applies computer vision to analyze image-based content. It allows developers easily integrate pre-trained models into their applications with APIs or custom training models to meet their specific use cases. In our example, I will explore how to use OCI Vision service to create a custom-bui...

Maps Conditional Formatting Oracle Analytics Cloud (OAC) is now updated frequently on a bi-monthly basis, continuously adding valuable features that enhance user experience and analytical capabilities. The recent May Update, announced just a week ago, introduces several exciting new features and functionalities . One feature that caught my attention is Maps Conditional Formatting —a powerful option that allows you to highlight key data points directly within map visualizations, just as you can with other chart types. So, how does it work? It’s actually very straightforward, using the same conditional formatting model familiar to users from other visualization types. The map above is our starting point, showing profitability by country. Simple and clear, but without any conditional highlights. To apply conditional formatting, click on the traffic light icon ( Manage Conditional Formatting Rules ). This opens the Conditional Formatting popup window. Here, you can choose whether...

Being able to talk to computers using natural language, especially with the recent advancements in general AI models like ChatGPT, has become very popular in the last few months. Everyone is doing it. It's simple, easy to use, and frankly, it can be very useful. What has been around for a while—think Siri, Alexa, or TV remote controllers—has now been taken to a new level and is already widely used in business. In Oracle Analytics, Natural Language Recognition has been available for several years. I remember the early days when the Oracle Day by Day mobile application was introduced. One of the coolest features in Day by Day was the ability to ask questions using natural language. For example, What is revenue by region and channel for seniors? would provide an answer in the form of charts, tables, and more. This feature is still available today, and you can ask such questions in the Search field located on the Oracle Analytics home page. Oracle Analytics then provides the f...