Oracle Service Bus Reviews

Overall it is a pretty good solution.

The most valuable aspects of the solution are mainly the SOA, and the JMS patch. There are some out-of-box items that are good, and, for the most part, they do provide good plugins. We have done the integration with the ESB.

I'm very comfortable with Oracle. I have a good understanding of how the solution works.

Mainly our integrations are under JMS. We are looking at some products which have good features and performance related to the JMS. Even if tomorrow if you're planning to replace JMS with Kafka or some other product, then it will be feasible to do it very quickly. However, in Oracle, we have seen a lot of difficulties when we go to integrate Kafka with the replacement of JMS. 

The personal settings are not up-to-date, in terms of orchestration. In Italy, we use SOA, however, we have faced a lot of difficulties when we have orchestration projects. 

The interface console is very slow. Even in production, we need to increase the RAM or CPU. And even after that, the performance is still not good in production.

Sometimes, we have seen data loss from the EM. We can't even recover the data from the back end table. Even if we ask the Oracle support team to get a patch they're taking one or two months for the production issue to resolve. These issues are killing the business and productivity. For this reason, management decided to replace Oracle with some other products that are also based on the current application - such as SAP and TIBCO. We're updating our system anyway, so it is a good time to get rid of Oracle.

With Oracle right now, we have to hire more people in the support team to look into all the issues we're facing. That is killing our delivery times and everything. 

If I want to do certain integrations or use certain plugins, it occasionally can be really difficult to do the configuration in Oracle Service Bus.

I've been working with the solution for about 12 years at this point. It has been over a decade.

Technical support hasn't been too good as of late. 

They say that they are good in terms of dealing with an existing issue. If you highlight it, they can quickly respond with the patch or they can respond with the previous tickets. However, with the new tickets, they will acknowledge your tickets, yet they take forever to actually resolve them. 

I've only ever really worked with Oracle products. I did not previously use a different solution.

The cost is reasonable. The price is fine. However, you need to see results from support. When issues pop up in production, delays in support can lead to revenue loss. For this reason, our company is looking into other options. The solution isn't worth the price if it's costing you money in the long run.  

Right now, we're doing some due diligence before buying a product. The concept is the same in all the products, only the components are different, the way of integration also are different but the concept is same with the ESB. That's what we are discussing with the technical team. We might look at TIBCO or other things such as MuleSoft.

We aren't using the latest version of the solution. We're working on an older one right now.

After more than a decade of working with the product, I can say that it is a pretty good solution. That said, before buying, a company needs to take into account their overall infrastructure to understand the volume of data they will need to process, et cetera. Based on those requirements, you'll need to find a product that works for you. 

While I like Oracle, there's no denying the support issues. 

Overall, I would rate the solution at a nine out of ten.

In previous organizations, Oracle Service Bus was predominantly used to build integration pipelines between many applications present in the network. In current organizations and projects, it remains in extensive use, providing various integrations needed for application landscapes and supporting different business operations.

The observability of the entire landscape has significantly improved, allowing proactive intervention in case of potential downtimes. Standardization and consolidation of the technology stack are essential benefits of Service Bus, as they create a consumable service and API architecture that is both scalable and adaptable. This plug-and-play approach allows businesses to scale operations according to their needs, which we have benefitted from in past projects.

Joining many services targeted at different endpoints is enabled through Oracle Service Bus. It provides a variety of connectors, allowing integration with numerous target systems. 

The flexibility offered by Oracle Service Bus, especially in the latest versions, includes abstracting underlying processes and enabling drag-and-drop mappings from source to destination. This ability facilitates easy business logic implementation.

While I have not used the latest versions, resource efficiency could be optimized, considering past experiences. Another area for improvement is the potential inclusion of an API gateway, which is currently missing from Oracle's offerings.

I've been using Oracle Service Bus for seven to eight years.

I have not encountered major stability issues, although configuration needs to be thorough. Configuration errors might introduce latency or disruptions, hence careful configuration is required for optimal performance.

Scalability has not been a problem. Oracle Service Bus can be rated eight out of ten for scalability.

Oracle's customer support is excellent, rated nine out of ten. Their support is mature and provides peace of mind in terms of scalability, high availability, and security.

Positive

Before Oracle, organizations may go through benchmark evaluations comparing competitor tools and services to determine what best satisfies their needs.

The initial setup was not difficult and took approximately one hour to complete.

A separate infrastructure team was responsible for installations, which was comprised of 30 individuals, including engineers and administrators.

By improving observability and offering standardization, Oracle Service Bus has resulted in faster recovery times, proactive interventions, and a plug-and-play architecture adaptable to business or operational needs.

Oracle products are generally expensive. However, with an enterprise agreement, they offer a more affordable solutions package. It is essential to evaluate the coating offers and relationships between the organization and Oracle for cost-effectiveness.

Organizations perform competitor benchmarking or VM benchmarking for tools and services to assess potential solutions.

Oracle Service Bus offers great integration and observability benefits. It is recommended because of Oracle's comprehensive customer service and mature technology stack, ensuring scalability, security, and consolidation.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

The use case involves tasks such as determining the appropriate licensing size, collaborating on firewall projects, and constructing the infrastructure to support the product. In most cases, I focused on integrating Oracle Service Bus to address issues, primarily with local ISPs and one ISP in Colombia. For larger projects covering all offices in Colombia, as well as two or three other projects, my involvement extended to local ISPs in Buenos Aires, specifically with Firecorp, a service provider catering to various companies within the country.

Enhanced error-handling capabilities significantly boosted the reliability of our application, preventing crashes and ensuring high availability. For context, when dealing with critical services requiring 24/7 availability, we would often implement geographic replication and active-active modes. This setup ensured continuous operation, with one system seamlessly taking over in case of downtime. While automated processes are feasible today, we relied on monitoring tools to confirm operational status. Upon detection of any issues, the system would automatically switch to an alternate data center. Our architectural approach varied based on project requirements, prioritizing resilience and continuity. The distinction between traffic replication and backup lies in the time needed for restoration. By adhering to proper processes, both methods yield similar outcomes, with the primary difference being the time required for recovery.

It aids in ensuring compliance with industry standards and protocols, although I'm uncertain whether the server comes with any preconfigured compliance settings. In my experience, I've been involved in PCI compliance and SOX compliance for large companies, and while considering the brand is essential, compliance configuration often extends beyond the software running on the network. Compliance efforts primarily focus on securing access and safeguarding information within servers or databases, rather than on individual software tools.

The most valuable feature for addressing data transformation requirements varies depending on the different layers involved in an IT project. My expertise primarily lies in infrastructure aspects. Therefore, it's important to consider various factors such as project size, focus, and the hardware being utilized, along with its configuration. For instance, when discussing infrastructure, noteworthy features would include ICI or NSX, STM, and essentially anything related to ensuring optimal performance and cost-effectiveness while considering the overall impact on the budget.

There is significant room for improvement in the monitoring capabilities. Enhancing this aspect of our monitoring process is essential for effectively pinpointing the root cause of issues accurately and resolving issues in our system.

I have been working with it for approximately eight years.

The stability is consistently high, with only one notable issue encountered. I would rate it nine out of ten.

While it offers high scalability, it also presents a challenge due to its complexity. Our user base ranges from five thousand to thirty thousand, with one particular department in Argentina boasting over fifty thousand users, since it's one of the government departments. I would rate it seven out of ten.

We've contacted tech support a few times, and the experience has generally been satisfactory. Regarding issue resolution and root cause analysis, I would rate it nine out of ten. However, when it comes to the time taken to escalate to the appropriate engineer with the necessary expertise, I would rate it five out of ten.

Neutral

I've been involved in numerous projects spanning over twenty-five years. My experience ranges from implementing SAP solutions to integrating various data sources and operating systems. I've managed nationwide deployments using remote desktop solutions and utilized SQL Server extensively. Throughout my career, I've worked with diverse technology brands, databases, and operating systems, including hardware components from Cisco, and storage solutions from NetApp, EMC, and HP. While I haven't directly compared Oracle with other ESP products, one noticeable difference is pricing. Oracle products tend to be higher-priced options, which may impact budget considerations. Additionally, while Oracle offers robust features, it often requires a larger team of skilled professionals to manage effectively, which can further affect costs.

The initial setup is complex.

The number of people involved in deployment varies depending on the project's scale, ranging from one for smaller projects to four or five for larger ones. In my experience, significant deployments often entail multiple profiles. For instance, in the database aspect of a major project, installation, configuration, testing, and tuning phases are crucial. This process typically spans several stages, with additional tuning iterations even after transitioning to production.

The pricing is on the higher side. I would rate it ten out of ten.

My recommendation varies greatly depending on the specific context. Factors such as budget constraints, available personnel for system management, and geographical location play significant roles. It's crucial to consider the unique challenges and resources available in each country or region. For instance, hiring local talent in countries like Argentina, Brazil, or Colombia may present different challenges and salary considerations compared to the UK. Overall, I would rate it seven out of ten.

The solution is primarily used for the ESB. When we want to integrate applications with each other, they want to communicate with each other, we use this. If one application wants to send a message to some other applications. It's used for transformation and integration.

The solution is very stable.

The scalability is very good. 

The installation is quite straightforward. 

We've been pleased with the level of technical support.

The pricing of the product could be better. It's a bit high.

We started using the solution around 2014. We've used it for quite a few years now. It's been a while. 

The solution is stable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. 

The scalability is very good. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so. It's not a problem.

Due to the fact that the solution is technical, there are not that many people on it. We are only a few specialized people that work on this ESB. In development, there are around five to seven people. They are a mix of engineers, managers, and admins.

Technical support has been good. We're satisfied with the level of service on offer. 

The initial setup is very straightforward and simple. It's not overly complex or difficult to implement.

In our systems, we install it for our local development. It's easy for us. It takes minutes to install it. The deployment process is quick.

We have five or six technical people that can handle deployment and maintenance tasks.

The pricing could be better.

We pay for the solution on a yearly basis. 

The product is a part of the Fusion Middleware. We have the full suite including the SOA and WebLogic.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten.

If a company wants to go to the Oracle stack, I'd recommend this solution. If a company wants to use it, it should first evaluate their requirements and whether they need to expand or if they have the capacity.

I use Service Bus to integrate multiple applications at an enterprise level. I work in the telecom sector and we integrate multiple applications and build PRM and CRM inventory systems. We are customers of Oracle and I'm the integration lead. 

Service Bus supports multiple protocol technologies and web services as well as file-based integration. It's very good in JMS-based integration. Nowadays, web service calls are based on SOAP and REST. Service Bus integrates well with different types of these supported protocols and systems. It's great in XML web service integration although REST and JSON formats are more in use these days. 

Service Bus lacks two main elements. The first is accessibility with the REST services and JSON. These are things that are generally available in most of the APIs address space nowadays. The second would be improved cloud compatibility. Oracle sometimes lags behind when it comes to newer formats.

I've been using this solution for 10 years. 

Service Bus is quite stable. If you implement it according to the guidelines, then I think it's a very stable product and provides good performance. 

The solution does not support auto-scaling. Nowadays, you have Kubernetes for containerization. It can scale up and down based on the load and volume and is better than Service Bus. We have around 10 people using Service bus; the technical team, an engineer, and mid-level developers. 

The technical support is very helpful and generally knowledgeable. Occasionally you get someone who is less knowledgeable but most of the time, they're great.

Positive

The initial setup is relatively simple and straightforward. It's not difficult for a layman to implement, especially the cluster environment. Deployment in an enterprise-level environment requires some experience because there are some complexities. If you're implementing without having modeled the threading effectively, the service performance is reduced. It's not a product limitation, but more about how you implement it. 

The main difference I see between Service Bus and other solutions is the cloud. The newer products coming out are cloud-native. Service Bus lacks that because it was not initially on the cloud. It needs to be more cloud-native. 

This is a very stable and good product to use. It's essential to have sufficient knowledge around implementation and to deal with thread work management to get better performance. A lot comes with experience but before implementing, it's worth going to Oracle and studying the recommendations around implementation and integration. 

Some improvements are needed around some of the latest technologies and trends, so I rate this solution eight out of 10.

The middleware provides the service from our core banking and manages the equipment from the satellite system to the core banking SMS or to any other system. Any system can communicate to another system through the solution.

The most valuable feature is the monitoring feature, where we can track the web's UI development.

The tracing. Some unknown errors will sometimes happen and the error message isn't clear. The security process to protect the servers also needs improvement. Sometimes, you need to open the whole project and complete another setup in the server, then hurry back and go through the service application to complete the security setup. If Oracle SB had one button to complete this process in one step, it would be better.

For the next update, I'd like to see event-driven architecture.

I've been using Oracle Service Bus for five years.

The solution is stable.

It's easy to scale mostly from the Oracle side. We added another node in the cluster but we haven't yet tried it.

When we've contacted support, they haven't always resolved the issue. We've then tried from our end to find a workaround and ended up finding a solution.  Their support service could be improved.

The setup was simple and deployment was managed on my own. It took only a few minutes.

I would give this solution a seven out of ten. My advice is to be aware of the amount of space to collect all the requirements because sometimes, maintenance on existing setups can rebuild the servers from the beginning.

I'm an integration architect and we're a customer of Oracle. 

What's valuable is the ability to master the process in one location. That's the main difference between other firewall products and this. Usually, there's an issue when you want to integrate many services together because you can't save contacts in one place. For example, if you have A, that calls B, that calls C, that calls D, there's no place to store your contacts and that's a problem. We can do that with Oracle.

The main inconvenience is the composition between services. Using software initiation, occupation with BPM, or BPI is better. There are issues, especially if you want to create some compensation in your service bin. If you have six or seven services you call in the same process, it's very difficult and that's the main issue. I get compensation with the WBS tool. 

Another point relates to monitoring. When you want to show what's happened in your system, you have to deploy a direct system on each service. It's simple to put the monitoring on your BPM and that's the main difference for me. Also, connectors can be on Apache Kafka, on Oracle, or OpenESB, or on Mule, it's the same thing. It's how you execute the process. For example, OpenESB support is the difference between the interface with the service and the implementation. Oracle is more intelligent. When you want to invoke a service B, for example, you don't directly invoke service B but ask the system for the best and most accurate implementation of B for your system and it provides that. You can't do that with a simple ESB. 

For additional features, if I compare OpenESB, there is the possibility to define policy between services so that when you create a connection, you can't associate the connection with the policy. That could be included in the solution. 

I've been using the product for a year. 

It's a stable solution. 

I have no problems with the scalability, but when you define the hierarchies there can be problems. 

We've never used technical support, we have our own tech team within the company. 

Implementation took a few weeks, no more. It was relatively simple I believe but I'm not an expert on deployment and installation.

This is a good product, not an exceptional product. You could say it's a bit greedy as it requires lots of additional resources because you have to deploy the database and then ESB on top of that. But if you have the resources and people, it's a good product. 

I would rate this product seven out of 10. 

• It’s a lightweight tool compared to Oracle BPEL
• The design of the product.

Because it can handle JSON inputs, we can now use JSON.

The logging and error-handling framework can be improved.

Usage of DVMs, MDS and other additional features that are possible in XSLT in BPEL are missing in this product.

I have used it for the past three years and I am satisfied with it.

There were no issues with deployment; it was very straightforward.

I have not encountered any stability issues. The product is highly stable.

I have not encountered any scalability issues. The product is highly scalable.

Technical support is 3 out of 5; availability of materials and support related to OSB 11g is less commonly available.

Even though we had been using Oracle BPEL, we had to go with Oracle Service Bus because it is able to handle JSON inputs. We tried to implement one scenario using Oracle BPEL but couldn’t achieve it in BPEL, so we had to go for OSB and were amazed by its flexibility in accepting incoming messages.

Initial setup involves a learning curve; it’s not as straightforward as Oracle BPEL. For example, defining custom variables, assigning and replacing different activities is a bit intriguing compared to BPEL.

We implemented it through Zensar. Their level of expertise is 4 out of 5.

ROI is not tangible, but we have benefited highly from this product.

I heard it’s available free with Oracle SOA Suite 11g, so don’t worry about additional licensing costs for this product.

Before choosing this product, we did not evaluate other options. We only explored different Oracle alternatives.

It is a very lightweight product and has great processing speeds.