Hello all

Has anyone worked on an R12 implementation where the whole look and feel of Self-Service has been changed (or Skinned) to look completely different?

One of the many comments we get from our users is the 'clunkiness' of the look and feel of standard SSHR, with many people commenting that it looks very dated compared to modern web applications.
Just wondered whether this was something other people had come across before?

Regards

Barry

Take a look at Applaud Solutions... They produce some nice looking Self Service interface replacements using Flash. Not a 100% replacement but there maybe something that you could introduce?

http://www.applaudsolutions.com/#panel=0

Not sure if they would be willing to pay the cash for the license though...

I have a somewhat hazy memory of one of my previous sites using this oufit for their absence management. A well-known Council of UK Reseach bodies based in Swindon!

Gavin / CT

Cheers - will take a look

Regards

Barry

Hi Barry,

If you want a supported way of doing this, you should look into "Customizing Look and Feel Administrator" responsibility and creating Custom Look And Feels (or 'skins'). These will work on any e-Business Suite OAF module e.g. SSHR, iRec, iExpenses etc, without the need to customize your system with custom applications.

They work in much the same way that the swan theme works, and once you've created a new CLAF, you just select which theme you want to use via the profile option - "Oracle Applications Look and Feel". They also work in both 11.5.10 and R12, and are supported in upgrades.

I'm obviously biased as I've been creating them for years, but I think using the supported skinning functionality should be your first port of call based on your requirements.

You can see some examples of what is possible here:
http://oracleskins.com/Examples.html

Mike

John Lewis have completely reskinned SSHR.

Have they!

ANy idea on how long it took them? Who did it?
Come on man, spill the beans

Regards

Barry

Hi Mike
Thanks for the info and link - will digest and get back to you for further information.

Regards

Barry

Barry,

Hitachi are in at John Lewis and if you want to speak to some one give Rob English a call. Even better give the old man Bob Moran a shout, he is working for Hitachi and is on the John Lewis project at present. He'll be able to guide you. And another name in the hat is Phil Bryne. Sure you know him as he was working at McKessons for years.

If you need contact details give me a shout in the office tomorrow

Cheers


Paul

the world is getting smaller by the day.
I saw Rob at the user group back in December and has his number (and Bob's too).
Didn't know Phil was there though - thanks for the head's up.

We must do beers again sometime soon - will have to organize the lads for a date in Feb

John Lewis CLAF took about 2 months to design, test, and implement into live, but that is mainly because they didn't have any formal design requirements to start with.

It's the grey and light green skin in the examples link I posted (at the end).

In general, CLAF skins normally take about 2 weeks to design/build, and then time for testing/re-design depends on how particular the customer is!

Mike

Barry

CLAF is a super way to brand standard Oracle and a decent designer will refresh self service with a much more contemporary edge. CLAF is a bit of a black art and Oracle Skins are the only ones I know who do it and do it well.

So as Michael says CLAF is your best start. It won't solve fundamental usability issues (think EITs & absence!) or re-engineer the user experience. Chucking on a nice portal that links off to the standard Oracle pages is a cheaper option than a complete re-skin (which is a brave undertaking!). JLT are using Applaud's EmployeeCenter (disclaimer: I work for Applaud!) as a portal to standard Oracle Self Service functions and they also have a nice Oracle Skin as well.

Building a similar custom portal could be achieved with technologies like HTML5, Flash, APEX or even SharePoint. Oracle will tell you to use ADF (which John Lewis used together with an Oracle Skin), which might work if you've already forked out for the Fusion Middleware licenses or if you're contemplating Fusion Apps Co-Existence any time soon - definitely speak with John Lewis about their experiences.

There are a few success stories of re-skinning. Pfizer in the US re-skinned the whole of Self Service using Flex 3. It was a big undertaking, took a team about a year to do the first part and cost several million USD (and of course there's ongoing support). It looked great but what's staggering are their annual cost savings - USD 50 mil every year! They presented this at OHUG 2011 so there's a slideshow on it kicking around somewhere. I wasn't involved in their project but met with them late last year out of interest.

Blackrock re-skinned Comp Workbench - a big deal in banks, or at least it used to be ;-) That was in Flex as well and was a big win for them.

I'm out of examples. Re-skinning is much bigger in the SAP world - there are several big ISVs who do it.

Whatever you do, use professional designers and UE experts to design - not your developers! I hope that helps.

Duncan

Duncan
Thanks for the thorough, and informative answer.

We had a demo session at Oracle yesterday covering fusion co-existence, which did seem like a possible path to go down (instead of a full-blown reimplementation in fusion) and is something we will investigate further.

As I may have hinted in my original post, one of the bug bears we have is with the self-service side of things. Winning over these users going forward is one of the main aims.

Your name rings bells with me (second person to do so today) - I'm sure we may have crossed paths in the past, either at oracle or at some event or other.

Regards
Barry

Yes, it's a very small world - a lot of familiar names on HCM Aces!

I forgot to mention we did a presentation at UKOUG2011 that was specifically about re-skinning SSHR so there's lots of useful info in that:

http://2011.ukoug.org/default.asp?p=8850&dlgact=shwprs&prs_prsid=6335&day_dayid=57

I can't find the presentation archives but drop me an email and I can send you a copy of the ppt if you're interested in finding out a little more about it.