University databases tended from afar

By ADAM GIFFORD

Oracle will manage Victoria University's financial application databases remotely via the internet.

Financial systems accountant Andy Davey said shifting to the iDBA service reduced the university's risk and cost less than hiring its own database administrators, who were hard to find.

"It means we can run our projects in parallel with student administration without compromising deadlines and competing for the use of staff and resources."

The university is on version 11.5.5 of Oracle Financials.

"We are putting through a lot of new initiatives around Oracle Financials, such as grants accounting so we can better monitor and report on how people are progressing with their research," Davey said. "We are also putting in electronic procurement."

Victoria continues to host the database on a Sun Enterprise 450 production server, with test, development and back-up done on an Enterprise 3000 box.

Oracle's monitoring software gives round-the-clock access so it can address table space or database issues at any time.

Victoria has about 40 core application users, and a further 200 casual users who access the database through the Discoverer query tool or through the web to raise invoices or issue receipts.

Oracle spokesman Peter Marks said six customers were now on iDBA, with an even split between application and database management.

He said the price varied according to how many databases and environments Oracle was required to manage, but "it's cost-effective - probably about one person's salary."