Since migrating to Oracle Forms 11g with the help of PITSS, their hardware and software risks are now a thing of the past. As a result, 14 of the 19 VW sites where the application is used were successfully migrated in 2013, and the rest followed in 2014.
PITSS Delivers High-Quality Oracle Forms Service
Immediately after receiving the order, PITSS impressed with an enormously quick project start. After the kickoff in July 2012, the first working version of the application, which consisted of around 350 Forms modules, was already available for testing purposes at the beginning of September.
After adjusting the various associated C programs, VW was responsible for quality assurance, including comprehensive testing and acceptance workshops with the users.
The PITSS team performed the Oracle Forms migration using PITSS.CON, a powerful Oracle based development platform that is used for the modernization and development of Oracle Forms and Reports applications.
A hardware incompatibility with Oracle Forms 11g became apparent at the end of the test cycles and could not be solved by an automation tool like PITSS.CON. We had to find a special solution for the approximately 25 Forms modules that run on the mobile devices.
Modern and mobile: Oracle ADF and MS NET
PITSS met the January deadline without any problems because the mobile devices were not used in Portugal. However, a solution had to be developed by early summer that fulfilled all of the requirements for the wide range of handheld devices.
In addition to support for new devices and operating systems such as Android, iOS, etc., all the old devices also had to remain functional. This meant that even the now obsolete platform Microsoft Windows CE 5 had to remain functional.
Support for a wide variety of platforms was only one challenge the PITSS team faced. PITSS recommended a certified runtime environment based on Oracle best practices.
PITSS protected VW’s investment to reduce future developments and the need for migration, as well as ensured an attractive interface. After all, end users are now used to modern apps for mobile phones and expect an appropriate user interface.
At first glance, Oracle ADF Mobile offered the necessary functions. In principle it also ran under the mobile version of Internet Explorer for Windows CE 5, however not completely as desired.
Therefore, PITSS decided to use a combination of Oracle database, ADF application and a .NET user interface. The Forms functionality migrated with the help of PITSS.CON in three layers: a thin .NET user interface and a thick database and ADF-layer; all in a development period of just two months.