The world of Openbravo professionals

Having delivered 32 courses in 2010, it is time to reflect back and analyze our efforts. Within the past year we at Openbravo Education invested heavily into developing compelling online courses that are:

• cheaper to attend
• more flexible for the student's daily schedule
• better integrated with Openbravo's existing documentation and offerings
• first class practical learning experience

As indicated by our students' ratings, the effort paid off. On a scale from 1 to 5, 1 being the worst and 5 being the best, these were some of the rating averages we have kept track of in 2010:

• Overall course grade: 4.13
• Course materials: 4.17
• Course instructor: 4.46
• Course acquisition of skills: 4.12
• Course platform and infrastructure: 4.29

One of our students that attended the two technical courses that have been rewritten and much improved in the past year says:

I found that Openbravo ERP Online Basic Technical Training and the Advanced Development Training provided a very good task oriented virtual classroom for me to pick up the technical knowledge I needed to deploy and develop Openbravo ERP. A number of hands-on assignments along with a virtual server was provided to get us up and running quickly. Well done.

- Khong Seng Kin, Agile Matrix Solutions, Malaysia -

However, educating students is not enough without demonstrating their expertise. After all, our main enterprise building blocks are partners and certifications are a vital element in the world of competent Openbravo professionals. We are happy to say that the world has grown significantly in 2010:

• students that successfully completed our courses last year:
• 72 completed the Basic Functional Training
• 51 completed the Basic Technical Training
• 34 completed the Advanced Development Training
• new certified professionals in 2010:
• 81 certified functional professionals
• 69 certified technical professionals

Become one or find one today!

Welcome to the world of certified Openbravo professionals!

Join the Openbravo Certified Professionals!

When your car breaks, you normally have a few options:

• repair it yourself
• take it to your cousin's friend who is a mechanic
• take it to the dealer's garage

All three options serve a purpose, however, if your car is mission critical for your daily work, which option will you take? In such a situation the third option is most often the prudent one to take because:

• you can get a substitute car for the day and still be able to go about your work
• you will get warranty on work done
• original replacement parts and tools will be used
• the mechanics are properly trained and know what they are doing

Analogous to the above situation, why take risks when it comes to implementation and maintenance of such a mission critical software such as an ERP? Numerous vendors base their channel business on certified partners. For example, this year's Red Hat Partner Summit in Valencia was a reassuring event in this aspect as several sessions emphasized the importance of official training and certification within their ecosystem. Here at Openbravo, we like to relate to Red Hat's successful strategy and strive to perfect our channel driven business as well.

Consequently, becoming an Openbravo Certified Consultant has never been easier:

• It's affordable, the Foundation level exams cost 150EUR (price is region dependant) and include 2 takes. Even better, the certification exam is now automatically included in our courses ( see http://www.openbravo.com/services/training/ )
• It's easy to learn the topics covered using our extensive wiki documentation and the official courses offered
• Enrollment only takes a few clicks
• The Foundation level exams take 80 minutes and 50 multiple questions

And, there are good reasons to become one:

1. Take the opportunity to improve your knowledge of Openbravo ERP
2. Upgrade your partnership level and receive better visibility on our website ( http://www.openbravo.com/partners/find-partners-support/ )
3. Improve your professional recognition with customers using the Openbravo Certified logo
4. ...and more goodies for the certified members are coming soon!

Join the team of certified Openbravo professionals today at http://www.openbravo.com/services/certification/ !

Basic Technical Training Now Online!

In a hurry to implement Openbravo? Join our new Basic Technical Training and get the job done. Here's the scoop.

The trend of moving trainings online continues throughout the whole industry. Two of our flagship courses have been available online for a while now, namely the Basic Functional and the Advanced Development Training. We've received very positive feedback about the convenience of these courses but also identified some room for improvement.

Instead of just publishing the missing link between the two online courses, we've taken the opportunity and completely revamped the former Basic Development course.
Here's what's new in the new Basic Technical Training, as it is called today:

• new content targeted at implementation consultants with no programming requirements
• less theory, more exercises and real examples
• more interactivity through live chat sessions with the instructor
• available in all time-zones through multiple scheduled live sessions, forums, logs and recordings
• shorter and more intense 2-week schedule
• available online or as a classroom course
• reduced online price of 999EUR (zone dependant)

We've listened to our partners and the students of the existing online courses and aimed at an even more attractive and convenient online format. We hope we will leave you with no reason or excuse to not learn how to implement Openbravo ERP :)

Take a look at the schedule of all the courses or read the specific course guide with more details on this new training.

We hope to see you in the chatroom!
Rok Lenardic
Openbravo Training Manager

Tell us what training you need!

The end of the year is near and we in education department are in full span of preparing plans for the next one.

We are very happy with the enrichment of our online curriculum made in 2009. Nevertheless, we know there is always room for further improvements and innovation.

That's why we're calling upon you to submit ideas and cast your votes for courses and materials you would like to see in the upcoming year.

Help us improve and innovate Openbravo curriculum by visiting http://obeducation.uservoice.com/ and dropping an idea or a vote.

We look forward to hearing from you,
Rok Lenardic
Senior Training Specialist

Mastering Openbravo ERP development online

I recently taught the first delivery of the online advanced development course. This technical course has been completely revamped to reflect the new functionalities delivered with the 2.50 release of Openbravo ERP and also follows a more consistent learning methodology. The class was a success but even more, fun to teach.

Technical courses are always a bit harder to convert to online because publishing a bunch of powerpoints or videos just doesn't cut it. Anyone with a technical background will tell you that getting your hands dirty with practical examples wins over theory any time.

That is why we've joined a few widely available technologies together in order to design a course that is far better than an average online course with slides and videos:

• using the Wiki, we've incorporated many Howto guides into our public Developer's Manual; this is the first step towards learning a topic, step by step
• each student is provided with their own cloud instance of Openbravo ERP where development must be done; these instances are accessed, troubleshot and graded by an Openbravo Training Specialist.
• using an open source elearning platform (www.moodle.org), a virtual classroom is formed where practical assignments are given, results are submitted and problems discussed

The result is a course that is flexible in terms of time, dedication and student level while at the same time providing all the benefits of a real classroom such as a dedicated instructor, live troubleshooting and help.

Here is a testimonial from one of our students:

The Online Advanced Development course allowed me to learn all the possibilities that Openbravo ERP offers to developers. The knowledge acquired in the course will serve me as a strong foundation to create a vertical for Openbravo ERP, as well as new modules that extend the capabilities of the system.
Attending the online course has given me the flexibility to follow my own study schedule while meeting the priorities and needs of my company. The course is organized so you are not required to attend during working hours, but can devote time in the evenings or on weekends to your studies.

Esteban (Ais - Grupo Conasa)

If you would like to be one of them and learn the advance development capabilities of Openbravo ERP such as modularity, manual coding, background jobs, webservices and more, visit http://www.openbravo.com/services/training/#two .

We're looking forward to seeing you in one of our classrooms,
Rok Lenardic

QuickStart - ERP for life in a week!

The abundant functionality and complexity of an ERP application can often leave VARs and end clients reluctant to take the next step of adopting an enteprise application.

At Openbravo, we have noticed that smaller companies that are at the point of needing to switch to an integrated ERP system often hesitate to do so for the following reasons:

1. installation, implementation and management of an ERP instance can be uncertain and costly
   
   
2. overwhelming amount of features and modules to chose from and configure
   
   
3. slow learning curve to adopt the application
   

Openbravo estimated around 400 hours of consultant work were required for the standard implementation of our ERP application. Consequently, many small companies can not afford the costs and the length of the process.

In order to address the bottlenecks listed above as well as bring the number of implementation hours down to a minimum, Openbravo started an internal project codenamed Xpress earlier this year. The objective of the project was quite simple: Kick starting partners and end-customers by delivering a toolkit that leverages the modularity of Openbravo ERP 2.50 and localization efforts with a fixed scope implementation methodology.

In a nutshell, the QuickStart toolkit, as it was renamed for release, addresses the above issues with three main groups of deliverables:

1. the QuickStart template of simplified application screens and predefined roles
2. the Consultant's Manual that contains the full step-by-step guide of a fixed scope implementation
3. end user documentation and tutorials based on business process diagrams
   

Specifically, these deliverables address the hesitations stated above:

1. installation, implementation and management of an ERP instance can be uncertain and costly
   * a Consultant's Manual combined with an Initial Interview Form guides the consultant throughout all phases required to bring up an instance of Openbravo ERP and configure it according to end user requirements
   * a Professional Subscription Appliance takes care of easy and secure deployment of an instance on the cloud as well as simplifies the instance management such as backup, updates, etc
   * a localization pack that is prepackaged within the appliance offers out of the box full functionality for a specific country
   * import templates enable fast import of legacy data into the application such as customers/vendors and products of the end client
   
   
2. overwhelming amount of features and modules to chose from and configure
   * a QuickStart template preconfigures the application with rich functional footprint a smaller company should start with. Simplified windows, menu and predefined roles enable the end-users to pick up the application faster
   * the Consultant's Manual guides the consultant through a fixed scope implementation methodology
   
   
3. slow learning curve to adopt the application
   * UI Navigation Tutorial is a set of interactive videos that teach the end users how to use the application, this way cutting down training requirements
   * Business Process User Manual - an end-user manual designed to show how everyday tasks that enterprise users are well acquainted with are done in Openbravo ERP.
   

We are happy to announce that the fruits of these efforts are finally available and hope they will boost Openbravo adoption with partners and end-users even more. The toolkit aims at providing benefits to the partners as well as end customers:

1. Fixed scope implementations based on the Amazon cloud are faster, more cost effective and more clear on the deliverables and expectations > Less risk, high return for the customer
   
2. The toolkit enables partners to get up to speed and be ready to implement Openbravo quicker
3. First class business process oriented documentation for end users assists with smooth daily operations
   

For more information, please follow the link http://www.openbravo.com/product/erp/quickstart.

Rok Lenardic
QuickStart Project Manager