Next Technology

Purchasing new construction software for your business likely involves more costs than you are planning for. Beyond the price of the actual software itself, there are a number of hidden costs that many businesses do not plan for that become a part of the “true cost” to implement the new software. If you do not account for these costs prior to purchasing software, you may be in for a rude awakening when you go to implement the new package and realize that you do not have enough money to move forward.

The five most common additional costs incurred when implementing new construction management software are:

The Cost to Train New Staff and Properly Implement the Software: Many buyers understand that some money will be tied up in training staff and actually installing the software, but this number is often underestimated. In most cases, it costs at least as much to properly train staff and implement the software as it does to purchase the software. This 1:1 ratio can grow even higher for more complex systems. Some companies try to limit this cost by skimping on training, but this never pays off. Your best bet is to figure this number in to your budget from the get-go to prevent problems down the road. The last thing you want to do is have a great piece of software that nobody can use properly.

Cost of Hiring Staff with More Experience or Different Skill Sets: In most cases, your current staff should be able to learn the new software and operate it well. However, in certain cases where the software or company does highly specialized work, it may be necessary to hire a few new people to run the system. This will obviously result in higher payroll costs. Even if the new staff replaces old staff, since they have better skills, chances are that you will have to pay them more. Before purchasing new software, consider whether or not new software will require new people to operate it and make sure that you figure this number in to your budget.

The Cost to Maintain the Software: Most construction software vendors charge an annual fee to maintain the software. Generally, these costs are between 18 and 24 percent of the cost of the software and are paid every year. Beyond the annual fees, you also need to account for the additional costs for things like custom reports that you may have to have one of your vendor reps complete for you.

The Cost of Purchasing the Wrong Software: Some may argue that this cost should not be considered here, but the truth is that it is a real cost. If you purchase the wrong software and using the software takes more time than it should, that extra time is lost time that could be spent on value-added activities. This extra cost can add up over time, eventually making the true cost of the software more than the value that the software is delivering.

The Cost of Inferior Software: This cost is slightly different from the one above in that this applies to companies that buy software that is right for their company but that does not do all of the features that they require. As a result, employees will resort to using things like spreadsheets to manage the data that the software doesn’t. This creates issues with integration and also adds time to tasks that can be avoided by purchasing the right software up front.

To avoid any surprises down the road, make sure you look at all of the above and estimate the true cost that acquiring new construction software will have. Training will pay for itself over time if it is done properly and maintenance costs will protect your investment, so neither should be avoided – just accounted for up front.

Though the Apple iPad has been out for a little over a month now, it is still nearly impossible for customers to find stores that have them in stock. Carnegie Digital Computers knows exactly why these devices are selling so well. Besides the iPad’s sleek design and visual appeal, Carnegie Digital Computers explains why certain features are drawing customers in.

The iPad offers a lot of choice as far as meeting consumer needs, says Carnegie Digital Computers. The tablet computer is available in both a Wi-Fi only version, as well as a Wi-Fi plus 3G compatible version. The 3G compatible version, explains Carnegie Digital Computers, would allow users to access the web anywhere—even where wireless Internet access is not available. Carnegie Digital Computers continues that the iPad is also available with 16, 32, or 64 GB memory. This lets customers pick the iPad that is perfect for them without paying for unnecessary extras.

Another favorite feature of the new iPad is the web and e-mail experience it offers, says Carnegie Digital Computers. For example, when viewing a webpage, users can view it in both landscape and portrait. Carnegie Digital Computers explains that customers love that when they rotate the iPad, the page automatically rotates too and expands to fill the screen. Also, the multi-touch features of the screen are astounding, says Carnegie Digital Computers. Users are able to double tap the screen to enlarge particular portions of websites. Carnegie Digital Computers says that new iPad owners constantly comment on its ease of use and intuitiveness.

The ipad also changes the way users can view photos and video. Carnegie Digital Computers explains that the iPad display is brilliant and vibrant, while high-definition videos show up bolder than ever. According to Carnegie Digital Computers, YouTube is already a working component of the iPad. The iPad also supports iPod and iBook functions. Come in to Carnegie Digital Computers and try out the new iPad—once you experience it, you will definitely want one.

In business, there are several reasons why knowing the location of a workforce can result in measurable benefits in terms of an organisation’s duty-of-care as well as efficiency savings. With GPS enabled mobile smartphones and Blackberries becoming more commonplace, then the cost and convenience of tracking individual handsets is so low that it is now being seen by many as a commodity with a stronger than ever case for adoption.

Many businesses now equip their people with Blackberry mobile phones so that they can work effectively away from the office. Many Blackberry models now have GPS capabilities built into the handset itself. For the user, this brings access to a range of useful location based services such as interactive maps and the ability to conduct searches that give results based on your current location.

In many businesses, it can be helpful to be able to quickly establish where their individual employees are, or even be able to monitor how long they have spent at a particular site. There are now a number of companies offering a small software download for Blackberries and other smart-phones that can communicate the GPS location information from the handset to a central tracking server. This data can then be accessed by approved individuals in a number of different ways, such as via a simple web browser or using a more sophisticated tracking console application capable of detailed analysis and reporting. The data can also be made available to a company’s business systems.

The Blackberry GPS software typically has a small footprint meaning that it can run in the background without any impact on the normal operation of the phone. In some cases the software can even be installed and configured remotely, so that there is no need for the user to bring the phone to a central team to initiate the process.

A key benefit of using a Blackberry or indeed other smart-phone as the tracking device as opposed to a dedicated GPS tracking unit is that there is no need to issue people with a dedicated tracking device, which not only saves money (both in terms of the cost of the device and also in terms of not needing a second mobile data service), but also saves the user from having to worry about keeping the GPS tracking device charged up, and of course, remembering to wear or carry it at all times.

The use of Blackberry mobile tracking can help to make a mobile workforce more effective and also enable the business to react effectively to a change in circumstances (such as enabling you to find out who is the nearest employee to a given location). Over a period of time, you can also build up a good understanding of the duration it takes your staff to undertake various types of activities on location, which in turn can lead to more accurate planning and costing.

It has been widely reported that employees tend to work more productively and effectively if they are aware that their company has the ability to monitor their movements. Moreover, when on the move, it is possible to monitor the speed at which the user is travelling, and to set alarms that will report when a specified speed is exceeded, or the phone travels outside of a defined area.

For lone workers, particularly those in occupations that may occasionally put them at risk, then the added security that they can raise an alarm and know that their position can be accurately found is enormously valuable.

In conclusion, the cost of utilising the GPS capability of a Blackberry or smart-phone device so as to enable a business to monitor the location of their employees, whether for efficiency benefits or to provide safeguards for lone workers is now so inexpensive that it opens up new opportunities in organisations that would have previously considered this technology too costly to consider.

Communication has progressed leaps and bounds with the invention of mobile phones. Today we have the best means of communicating with anyone in any corner of the world, by pressing a single button of our mobile phone. Mobile phones have become more sophisticated and advanced communication has become much easier. You can hold the whole world at your finger tips, if you have a mobile phone.

From Internet browsing to sending and receiving e-mails and calls, today’s phones are capable of doing multifarious activities within seconds. Now phones have become an indispensable part of our lives. With the passage of time, phones with latest technologies began to crowd the market. Again it is seen that the players of the mobile phone market are constantly involved in fierce competition. So, in order to ensure their sustainability, the phone manufacturers are manufacturing new and innovative gadgets. Everyday, you would find new gadgets entering the market.

If you take note of the last few months of the current year you will find some of the amazing gadgets that have redefined the whole concept of mobile telephony. Most of the manufacturers have come up with one or the other gadgets with latest technologies incorporated in it. To mention a few, look at the Apple iPhone, the Nokia N95 8GB or the Nokia 6300. These special phones of 2007 are gifted with the latest connectivity options and superlative capabilities. Apple iPhone, the most talked gadget is a marvelous phone with brilliant multimedia functions. It is a music player, a Internet browser, a camera and what not. As a PDA too, the phone is unparalleled.

Samsung, the reputed slider phone manufacturer is also not far behind. The latest Samsung U600 and the Samsung G600 launched in 2007 are sexy as well as stylish. Along with all possible features, the brilliant outlook of these phones makes them epitomes of pure beauty.

So, is the new kid of Nokia, Nokia N95 8GB. With a massive storage capacity, the phone can store enough of the multimedia files which a user can hear while on the move. As a communication device too, Nokia N95 8GB has surpassed almost all its contemporaries.

This year a large collection of mobile phones are released. All the latest phones are powered with advanced technologies. But, if we talk of the special phones of 2007, Apple iPhone, Samsung U600, Nokia N95 8GB are some of the phones that stand tall among the crowd.

Home video games consoles have been around since Magnavox first released the Odyssey console in 1972. Since that time, the video game console has overcome its share of adversity, surviving two periods of uncertainty and market crashes in 1977 and 1983, which cast doubts over the future of the industry.

In recent years however, the video games console industry has gone from strength to strength, and the competition between developers is fierce. New technologies have driven games consoles away from the game cartridge format, as used by such consoles as the Nintendo SNES and Sega Megadrive towards a compact-disc format as used by today’s generation of consoles – a technology pioneered by Sega’s Saturn system. However, it was the launch of Sony’s Playstation console in Japan in 1994, and Europe a year later which really made home video gaming popular.

Since then, there have been three major developers in the games console market. Nintendo are perhaps the most well-known of the three, having been designing and developing games consoles since the 1980s. From their SNES and N64 systems through to the Gamecube and today’s Wii console, Nintendo have earned a hardcore following among video gamers and are perhaps the dominant entity in the handheld console market since the launch of their Gameboy system and more recently the Nintendo DS.

Having seen phenomenal success with their Playstation console, Sony has become almost synonymous within the video game consoles market. Their Playstation 2 console was released in 2000 and has been the most commercially successful and fastest selling home console in video game history, with over 120 million units shipped worldwide by May 2007. Following a delay, Sony released their latest console – the Playstation 3 – in March 2007, and it became the fastest-selling home games console in the UK, selling around 165,000 consoles in its first two days of availability.

The third company, Microsoft, are seen as the newcomers in the video games console market, having launched their Xbox console in 2002 as a competitor to Sony’s Playstation 2. The Xbox was seen by many to bring desktop computing and games consoles together, with the console being the first to employ an internal hard-drive for storage instead of removable memory cards, as well as other similarities with its hardware specifications when compared with a personal computer. Although it proved popular, it was unable to make much of an impact against the Playstation 2’s market share. In late 2005, Microsoft launched the new Xbox 360 into the marketplace.

For many, the latest ‘Console War’ has only just begun and it is not yet possible to determine which, if any, of the three major consoles – Sony’s Playstation 3, Nintendo’s Wii and Microsoft’s Xbox 360 – will come to dominate this new generation. The Xbox 360 has gained an early lead in terms of market share, but this is due in no small part to having being launched a year before its rivals. Sony’s Playstation 3 has Blu-ray capabilities, which allow it to show high-definition video, and both consoles appear to have been aimed towards the hardcore gamer.

At the expense of cutting edge graphics, Nintendo’s Wii console utilises a wireless, interactive controller which can detect motion and rotation in three dimensions. The controller also plays sound and includes force feedback, allowing the user to experience vibrations that mimic feelings experienced during the game. Despite some quarters dismissing the Wii as ‘gimmicky’, Nintendo have found themselves being unable to make consoles fast enough to satisfy demand. Since January, it has outsold both the Sony and Microsoft consoles due to its mass appeal among casual gamers, as well as its ease of use.

The audience for games is bigger than ever, with the game industry enjoying a record year. In the U.S, revenues during 2006 increased by 20 per cent to $12.5 billion, with predictions for 2007 rumoured to outstrip that figure. Even so, it’s too soon to tell how the latest ‘console war’ will fan out.