By now, most of us know it takes more resources to run a Fusion Applications environment, than any other ERP system. Creating a local sandbox, to acquire knowledge and experience of  Fusion Applications, is not done on local servers anymore.

Do not despair …

As of August 15, 2011 Oracle PartnerNetwork provided hundreds of Oracle Fusion Applications self-paced learning assets to partners!

Yes, it is true, with this Oracle has shown to be commited to deliver Fusion Applications as a serious part of the Oracle stack and not just a hype as many skeptics would like to position a Apps wich they have not seen yet.

Fusion Learning Center can be accessed through the following link.

Way to go Oracle!

On 22 May 2011 Oracle Fusion Applications (Beta version) was available for download on eDelivery.

What is Oracle Fusion Applications:

‘Designed from the ground up using the latest technology advances and incorporating the best practices gathered from Oracle’s thousands of customers, Oracle Fusion Applications are 100% open-standards-based business applications that set a new standard for the way we innovate, work, and adopt technology’ (www.oracle.com)

To give you an impression of the end product see this demo.

To give an idea of the infrastructure of Oracle Fusion Applications, see the next picture.

This post and all posting still to come, will describe the installation steps to install Oracle Fusion Applications.

In Release 11i you could setup suspense accounting via enabling a checkbox and filling a code combination field. However in R12 there is no checkbox anymore. So be aware when you upgrade from 11i to R12 that the suspense accounting can be activated without knowing.

In R12 Oracle only looks if you have filled the code combination field. So if you have switched off the suspense account checkbox in 11i (on Set Of Books)  but the code combination field was filled, the suspense accounting will automatically be activated when you upgrade to R12.

In Release 12 Oracle has introduced new functionality Called ‘Alternate Account’. This new functionality is very usefull when when you have major changes in your account code combinations. Recently we have made major changes in the Accounting Flexfield for a customer and we have end-dated all active code combinations and defined a whole new range of code combinations. The new range was succesfully added to the old disabled range using the alternate account field.

With this great functionality we were able to implement a great and major change fast and at the same time we did not had to change the accounting created on already entered transactions (with old and disabled code combinations) in the subledgers (AP/AR). 

When Transactions in the subledgers are send to GL with old and end-dated code combinations, GL automatically replaces the code combination during Journal import what results into the alternate account when you post the journal. Of course there are some attention points that you have to take into account when implementing this solution but I’m very exited about this functionality!  See below picture the screen where you can use this new field.

Some of the attention points you have to consider are:

1. Alternate account functionality does not work (yet) for encumbrance accounting.
2. When you reconcile GL code combination balances with Subledger (AP/AR) balances at period-end you have to include the alternate account functionality because in the Subledger (AP/AR) the Balance is on the disabled account and in GL the Balance is on the Alternate account.

If you’re interested in using this new and great functionality and you want to know the whole story please let me know.