Oracle

On Friday, with a corvidian finality, I received my last ever paycheque from Sun.  As from today, Sun no longer exists in the UK, and its assets, including me, belong to Oracle.

Back in 2007 when Sun first approached me, I don’t think I’d have considered working for Oracle.  Their reputation didn’t seem compatible with my ideas.  So that puts me somewhere I never thought I’d be!  But when the news of the takeover broke, I reevaluated that, and decided that if they want me, I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt.  And what I’ve seen so far is reassuring: the handling of the transition is looking good, and there’s clearly interesting work going on at Oracle.  Last but not least, it’s not going to get in the way of my open source work.

Today I have a new document from Oracle to sign.  Two actually, but one of them is fairly trivial.  The agreement to keep Oracle’s secrets and intellectual property needs a second reading, but appears similar to the one I signed for Sun, and rather less onerous than the garbage UK companies tend to inflict on you.  Assuming a second reading tomorrow leaves me happy, I shall sign and return it.

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve also attended (via ‘phone and ‘net) a number of introductory presentations.  Oracle is doing a good job of selling itself : sufficient to engender my positive feelings towards them (or should I say us)?  Most noteworthy was a meeting with future colleagues at which they presented one of the main products to which I may be contributing.  I can see potential for an excellent fit with some of my interests and past work, and I look forward to the opportunity to take this forward.

On the negative side, I have today missed a chance to meet our new masters in person.  I put myself down for a presentation/meeting at 2pm today at Sun’s (as was) UK HQ, only to be told later that it was overbooked.  But I expect there will be future opportunities.