What is Hybrid app development?

Hybrid mobile app are created in the same way as websites. Both use a combination of technologies such as CSS, HTML and JavaScript. Nevertheless, rather than targeting a mobile browser, hybrid apps target a WebView hosted inside a native container. This allows them to do things such as access the hardware capacities of a mobile device. Hybrid apps could be found in the app stores. With them, one could play games, engage friends via social media, and take pictures, track health and a whole lot more.

WHAT EXACTLY ARE HBYRID APPS?

At core, hybrid apps are websites packaged into a native wrapper. They feel and look like a native application, but outside of the basic frame of the app, they’re fueled by the website of a company. A hybrid app basically is a web app built with the use of HTML5 and JavaScript, wrapped in native container that loads most of the information on a page as a user navigates through the app.

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF HBYRID APPS?

ADVANTAGES:

1. Access to device data. Hybrid applications, similar to native apps could access data that devices pick up through functionality, like GPS and camera, but push notifications and address book information as well. Connecting with this functionality offers hybrid applications much more freedom to the kind of things they could do.

2. Easy scaling. The apps are also much easier to scale to different platforms and operating systems. The reason for this is that web technology is nearly 100 percent similar across various platforms and operating systems, to the could cod be reused simply without rebuilding the entire application from scratch.

3. Offline working. Due to their native infrastructure, hybrid apps could work offline. Although, while offline, obviously data could not be updated, users could still load the application and access data that’s previously loaded, unlike web applications. Data made while offline, whether captured through surveys, forms or any other way, could be stored on the device and sent to servers the moment a user connects to the internet.

4. More resources. Using web technology for application content makes hybrid application development much easier. Web technology knowledge far outstrips native coding, thus, there are a lot more resources and people available to deliver it. At the same time, costs and resources needed to code with web technologies are remarkably lower compared to native ones, so organizations could save money and time as well.

DISADVANTAGES:

1. Glitches. Another issue about hybrid and web apps is the way they render or load content. For instant, it is glitch, by loading various element of the app at different times. This is in contrast to the more polished and smoother native application user experience. Nonetheless, there are a lot of resources and solutions to fix the glitches.

2. Slower performance. Due to the content being based on web technology, hybrid applications could be slower to load compared to native apps. However, there are ways of managing this so it performs at its best.

3. Native vs. web components. A challenge to hybrid application developers is to make decisions wherein which components of applications must be native and which should be web-based. Obviously, this depends on every single application and its use, thus it’s something that every development team would have to individually decide.

4 Visual and interactive components. While visual and interactive components like 3D animations and games are available in hybrid applications, they still perform better on fully native applications. Nevertheless, hybrid apps performance is improving on a daily basis and getting closer to that of native applications.

THE MOST COST-EFFECTIVE WAY OF CREATING OPTIMAL MOBILE APPLICATIONS

Web applications and native applications seem to be very familiar, but they’re based on an entirely different infrastructure, both of which have their pros and their drawbacks. Hybrid applications now are letting developers take advantage of the benefits of both applications. While hybrid apps still pose some issues, developers are more and more coming up solutions to overcome them. Presently, the great benefits of hybrid apps make them the most cost effective ways to build optimal mobile applications and the differences in performance in comparison to native apps that are not that significant to warrant the extra efforts and cost.

WHY ENTERPRISE APPLICATIONS SHOULD BE HYBRID

There is an overflowing of databases on the internet regarding the merits and faults of native and web applications. Obviously, some favor the former while others favor the latter. While these applications are built on considerably different forms of technology, most people have no idea about the difference between them. To add to the confusion of the mix, there are things like hybrid apps that combine the elements of native and web technologies.

Ultimately, both technologies have their pros and cons. Nevertheless, it appears like hybrid would become the norm, at least in the enterprise level. As mentioned earlier, hybrid apps combine the power of both native and web apps. A hybrid app is like a native application with a browser embedded within. By combining the technologies, hybrid applications could take advantage of tall the native features of a native application, accessing data from other applications, ability to be downloaded form an app store, and offline working, while the actual content depends on HTML rendered in a browser.

Obviously, a hybrid app is a good choice if lacking in sufficient fund. Furthermore, even if the application will not be more customer-centered, hybrid application is good.

Technology trends that transform the Insurance industry

Confronted with a highly volatile, fast-paced environment, rapidly evolving customer needs, new regulatory initiatives and a host of disruptive and innovative technologies, few insurance firms have the luxury to sit back and ponder on longer-term technology trends and their implications in the field. In effect, market pressures have forced every insurer to be a digital insurer. Both property and casualty and life insurance providers now are using digital technologies to boost the customer experience, optimally manage risk and improve profitability. Some organizations are doing this on an ad hoc basis, while some carry out a bigger strategic plan.

Insurance brokers and agents are undergoing a main major shift on what the customers and clients expect these days. By the year 2017, ‘digital natives’ would dominate the workplace, which has a great implication for agents and brokers who wants to engage with customers and grow their business. With the maturing of the millennial generation and entering into its peak buying power, more automated and digital ways of doing business would be a fundamental part of daily workflows. With the fast growth of cloud-based technology and mobile users to social media interaction, a study on tech trends for insurance agents explains that agents have finally realized the need to be more efficient, nimble and accessible to serve the customers of today.

Insurance companies that are agile, flexible and could offer advanced technology to build the kind of business processes that the clients’ at present demand are the ones that pose a threat to the traditional, maybe even bigger insurance organizations. The first step for an insurance firm to stay ahead of the changes and challenges in the years to come begins with the deployment of the right technology within the document management workflows as well as day-to-day business processes. Insurers should embrace technology trends that transform the industry to create a user-friendly, more automated processes.

Embracing a cloud-based and on premise infrastructure is important. A couple of years ago, 84 percent of insurance firms were operating in the cloud. Additionally, more than half of these firms reported that cloud has minimized the amount of work. Today, as the insurance field adopts a more simplified workflow, people could expect a remarkable increase in the use of technology that could be operated through hybrid cloud and on premise, ultimately ensuring flexibility for the clientele and robust adherence to the ever-changing government regulations within the environment.

Automating business processes where necessary is another technology trend that insurance firms should do. The key to moving towards a more digital landscape and boosting customer service is by automating workflows where necessary. With the excessive utilization of social media growing, and on numerous channels, clients expect ultimate personalization and interaction from their insurance brokers and agents. As a matter of fact, a survey ways that online and cross-channel customer experience would get the most attention this year. Although the standard face-to-face interaction is less common between insurance companies and clients, still, relationships are just as important, if not every more important than in the past. Thus, insurance providers need more time to interact with their clientele and less time on sorting papers, scrolling through documents and remaining on top of processing claims. This is the reason why workflows automation would be paramount to moving the digital transformation forward.

Insurance firms should choose programs and systems with the customers in mind. This year is dubbed as the ‘age of the customer’, wherein the customer experience is at the center of the digital movement. Meaning that technologies as well as new digital processes could not be implemented with an admin-first mindset. Today’s customers expect an intelligent, uncomplicated process from insurance providers. Although this could signal several internal processes disruption for the agent, the end result should be to make the programs easier to use for the clients, not just the IT team. Keeping the clientele on top of the mind this year would be the key to a successful digital transition.

Now is the time for insurers to adopt more digital practices to stay ahead of the competition. Rather than just adding value to the sector, technology underpins its very evolution and growth. The use of mobile devices, social media, GPS and CCTV footage have all hugely impacted the way claims are processed and policies are assessed. The value and analysis of ‘big data’ gleaned through client interactions has become more than ever important, as insurers are looking to maximize profits and efficiencies while keeping the customers happy. Now, technology enables insurers to move from the traditional broker scenario to a direct-to-market approach, cutting out middlemen and going straight to the client.

Bootstrap themes and plugins

In itself, Bootstrap is full of JavaScript components that are very useful, which cover a lot of use cases, be it for instance modal window or user login, alert messages to show an important message to a visitor, carousel for the homepage. However, in some instances one may need more than that. This is the time to find some of the Bootstrap themes and third party plugins. Usually, they are built on top of the current Bootstrap components and extend them in a lot of ways.

THEMES AND PLUGINS

The plugins and themes could be divided into few groups, such as:

1. Component package

2. Lightboxes and gallery plugins

3. Buttons

4. Navigations and Navbars

5. Forms

COMPONENT PACKAGES

More than a dozen reusable components built to offer dropdowns, iconography, input groups, alerts, navigation and many more.

Fuel UX – extends Bootstrap with more lightweight JS controls for the web applications. It includes combo box, checkbox, data picker, loader, infinite scroll, radio, placard, repeater, search, scheduler, spinbox, select list, tree and wizard. The complex library is truly worth checking out.

Jasny Bootstrap – Is a component package that many would find useful. Included are off-canvas menu component, fixed-top alerts, labelled buttons, input mask for text inputs, file input with image previews and a whole lot more.

LIGHTBOXES AND GALLERY PLUGINS

EkkoLightbox – it is a lightbox Bootstrap module that supports YouTube videos, images and galleries and built around the Modal plugin of Bootstrap. It could be styled easily, the same as Bootstrap modal, supports header and footer section. Working with it is very easy.

Bootstrap media lightbox – It is lightweight and borderless media lightbox Bootstrap 3 extension. It supports image galleries, single images, videos and frames.

Bootstrap image gallery – is a responsive, touch-enabled and customizable image and video gallery. It displays videos and images in the model dialog of the framework, mouse and keyboard navigation, features swipe, transition effects, full-screen support and on-demand content loading that could be extended to display more types of content.

BUTTONS

CSS3 Microsoft modern buttons – helps to easily re-create stylish buttons that are used by Microsoft on their sites. It is a nice addition to default Bootstrap buttons.

Social buttons – Social sign-in buttons made in pure CSS-based on Bootstrap and Font awesome. It is very easy to work with, it only requires adding one of the prepared classes.

NAVIGATIONS AND NAVBARS

Yamm – is another mega menu for Bootstrap 3. It uses standard navbar markup as well as fluid grid system classes from Bootstrap. It works for fixed and responsive layout and could include nearly any Bootstrap elements.

Bootstrap sidebar – is a responsive sidebar plugin or Bootstrap 3. If the menus are too large to fit in a horizontal menu bar, or a responsive sidebar is required, that’s compatible with the platform, then this is the plugin of choice.

Hover dropdown – It enables opening dropdowns only through hovering over them. A nice features is the possible setting of timeout.

Tab drop – it’s very useful when the tabs do not fit in one row. The script takes the not fitting tabs and creates a new drop-down tab. In the dropdown, there are tabs that do not fit.

Bootstrap tree navigation – it is a JavaScript plugin for Twitter Bootstrap 3. It helps create tree navigation menus, build and maintained by Morris Singer.

FORMS

Tokenfiled for Bootstrap – is an advanced tagging/tokenizing plugin for Twitter Bootstrap and jQuery with a focus on copy-paste and keyboard support.

JqBootstrap Validation – is a jQuery validation plugin for Bootstrap forms. It could validate number, email, min, pattern, max and a whole lot more.

Bootstrap markdown – is a simple markdown editing tool that truly works. It is designed to be integrated easily with the Bootstrap project. It exposes useful API that enables fully hook-in to the plugins.

Bootstrap Combobox – It is easy to implement to boost user experience with long select elements.

Bootstrap color palette – is a simple color palette plugin for the platform that enables a user to choose from the basic color palette or one that is defined by the user.

Bootstrap Maxlength – a visual feedback indicator for the maxlength attribute. It uses a Twitter Bootstrap label to reveal a visual feedback to a user regarding the maximum length of the field wherein a user is inserting text. Moreover, it uses the HTML5 attribute ‘maxlength’ to work.

Bootstrap Colorpicker – is indeed nice and customizable plugin for Bootstrap. The interface is great where one could choose from a complete color palette, which includes opacity option.

JQuery file upload – is a widget with numerous file selection, progress bar for jQuery and drag and drop support. It supports cross-domain, resumable and chunked file uploads. It also works with any server-side platform, such as Ruby on Rails, Python, PHP, Node.js, Java, Go and more that supports a standard HTML form file uploads.

Data Range picker – a JS component for selecting data ranges. It is designed to work with the CSS framework of Bootstrap.

Bootstrap select – is a jQuery plugin that uses Bootstrap’s dropdown.js to style. Moreover, it also brings more functionality to normal select boxes.

Each and every Bootstrap theme offers an extensive set of tools that are super easy to get up and running. It provides a great leg up when beginning a project.

How does QA fit into the Product life cycle?

THE LIFECYCLE CONCEPT

The product life cycle concept nowadays is about the state that the Copernican view of the universe was three-hundred years ago. Many people knew about it, yet, hardly anybody seemed to use it in any productive or effective way. Today that a lot of people know and in some way understand the product life cycle, it is about time to put it to work.

QA is the process wherein the entire software development activities would strictly adhere to the regulations and rules. The rules are called Standards, that’s followed in the development lifecycle. If the standard is not adhered to, then there is a possibility of errors in a lot of ways. These standards ensure that the process of development is free from bugs. Simply put, QA is very critical. QA testing is employed to minimize possible defects in each development life cycle stage. The focus of software QA is to continuously monitor all throughout the development life cycle for quality products. This needs monitoring both products and processes. The objective is to determine and eliminate defects as early as possible, thus lowering maintenance and test costs.

MAIN GOALS OF QUALITY ASSURANCE

The main goals of quality assurance during the software development are to develop software that is error free, determine if there’s any variation from the requirements, use the software in real-time and provide confidence in the product, among other things. The inclusion of QA in the product lifecycle could contribute to the reduction of billions invested on IT software project rework.

The life cycle process begins with requirements, and as it evolves inside the SDLC, more efforts are made to build or modify a solution, more people involved and the cost of the project rises. Bugs that are discovered at the end of the process have the tendency to need considerably more effort for fixing. The sooner the bug is determined, the cheaper it would be to fix. In testing, the cost of bug fixing could be represented by something around a logarithmic function, in which the cost could increase by over ten times as the project progresses via the life cycle phases. A bug that is identified during conception will cost something like zero. However, when the same bug is found only after testing or implementation, the average repair cost could get to something from ten to one thousand times more.

The advantages of QA Testing in the earlier phases:

1. A lot of problems are introduced to the system during design or planning. Testing anticipates future issues at considerably lower cost.

2. Testers would be more familiar with the software, since they are more involved with the product evolution in the earlier stages.

3. Since testing is involved with all SDLC phases, management would not feel like testing is the bottleneck for product release.

4. The test environment could be prepared ahead of time, anticipating risks as well as preventing delays.

5. Test cases written during requirements and shared with the team before construction could help developers think outside the box, evaluate more chances of code failure.

6. Involving QA in all product lifecycle helps in making a ‘quality culture’ inside the company.

7. The risk of short time testing is significantly reduced, boosting test coverage as well as the kinds of tests done.

Developers should be aligned with the expectations about the requirements. In most instances, to be able to keep pace with the schedule, developers don’t invest ample time for reviewing the specification. Often, they ignore vita documents or misunderstand some requirements. This type of ambiguity will generate more bugs to be identified at the end of the project and the repair cost would end up more expensive. Moreover, developers should also build unit tests and review code before commits. Together, the small day-to-day activities make great contribution to prevent defect during the construction stage. Additionally, some types of tests definitely worth the consideration of being automated and the automation team will get involved with the process. The automated tests execution, such as load, UI, performance, unit and more could be linked strongly to commits of developers in the construction phase. Preventing a defect is an integral investment with short-term return. The joint actions not just boost the quality of the product by anticipating problems, but reduce the cost of product maintenance as well, increase overall productivity and lessen the development time.

The bottom line appears to be that QA is integral and customers would opt to wait a bit longer for a quality product than receive a potentially flawed one faster. An organization is better off taking time to complete a project than not.

QA or Quality Assurance is an integral aspect in the software product lifecycle. This is particularly true for customers who choose to wait longer for a quality product instead receiving early a potentially flawed one.

Data analytics, the good, the bad and the ugly

Today, consumers are researching, comparing and buying online more than ever. Big Data and data analytics is here, has been around for some time and probably would be here for many years. Data could become one’s worst nightmare if it is just allowed to sit there, buried under boxes. On the other hand, it could be a best friend with the right analytics, fast and smart analytics for extracting valuable nuggets from the data an apply insight here, there and everywhere.

UNLOCKING THE FULL POTENTIAL OF DATA ANALYTICS

Successful organizations know how to unlock data’s full potential, transforming information into insight and insight into action and using it to competitive edge. Moreover, the organizations know how to democratize decision making as well as move it from the few elite to the empowered many, another major way of avoiding data hoarding.

DATA ANALYTICS, THE GOOD

Human judgment is the center of successful data analysis. This may appear at odds with the current frenzy in Big Data and the focus on data management and machine learning methodologies. However, while the tools offer great value, it’s necessary to keep in mind that they are just that, tools.

A company knows its goals, know the actions within the web space, which generate the most meaning to the business strategy. Consider the key performance metrics and create a holistic strategy around garnering data points. Keep the focus small, objective clear and construct an analytics implementation, which reflects the decisions. The strategy enables higher focus, maintaining accuracy within metrics. A marketing strategy is easier to develop. Strategy optimization is more precise with a major focus on conversions generation. The scope of data integrity maintenance is more impactful and less daunting when the ecosystem has 3-5 metrics in contrast to 10 or more.

Big data is good when trying to sell stuff. It helps build more sturdy models with more data, particularly when it has the characteristics, such as variety, volume, veracity and variability. Structure of unstructured, big data could provide greater clarity.

DATA ANALYTICS, THE BAD

More data does not always mean better information. Intelligence is a key component of national security and could be invaluable in wartime and peacetime. However, it’s just one security tool among many and there are considerable costs as well as limitations.

Tracking plenty of data across websites isn’t a bad thing. However, there’s a pitfall when a strategy morphs into tracking simply to track. This could cause a snowballing effect of bigger volume of data, less actionable understanding of the story the data points are telling and poorer integrity. More is not always better. An inferior strategy in analytics usually is a derivative of business goals that are not clear. As data accrues and more variables are tracked, their relevance gets diluted. It becomes easier focusing on the metrics that appear favorable even if they’re weak barometers of the business success. Keep it focused and keep data collection insightful.

DATA ANALYTICS, THE UGLY

The key to making clear decisions from digital data is context. Frequently, time is a major contextual factor. With accurate long-term data, an organization could see normalized trends that tell them they are doing better than last year and the reason why. However, when overbearing analytics strategies are implemented, often, there are inconsistencies, which corrode the benefitting factor of data collection in long term. Changes in website functionality, tracking tags dropping, altering data point focus and volatile marketing strategies all interrupt the ability of making recommendations from normalized sets of data. Most of the ugly scenarios could be avoided through keeping an eye on actions that matter and making certain of the accuracy over time.

Is it possible to keep sensitive data out of government hands and corporations? There is a reason for old-school devices, such as typewriters being used. The defense and emergencies ministries of Russia for document drafts, special reports and secret notes prepared for President Putin. The outdated technology has turned into an ultimate security system exactly because it is ‘off-line’ and has a unique advantage, which documents could be linked to a certain machine. Identifiable information or PII is at danger of exposure. There are indeed mechanisms and schemes for keeping data secure, but locks could be picked and accidents could occur. The more data, the more vulnerable to identity theft or even worse.

Nothing, not the cautious logic of mathematics, the statistical models and theories and not the awesome arithmetic power of modern computers, nothing could substitute for the flexibility of the informed human mind.

Truly, big data and analytics is a wonderful thing. However, there are always drawbacks to big data usage that could impact an organization, big or small.

Evaluating what will work and what doesn’t in the Information Technology

In the IT era, the best of times are the worst times. Computer hardware gets cheaper, faster and more portable. New information technology systems and business analytic systems captured people’s imagination. Furthermore, corporate IT spending has bounced back from its plunge back in 2001.

COPING WITH TECHNOLOGY ABUNDANCE IN THE MARKETPLACE TODAY

As the drumbeats of Information Technology become louder, they pose a threat to overwhelm general managers. One of the biggest issues that companies face is coping with technology abundance. It’s difficult for executives to determine what all the apps, systems and acronyms do, let alone decide which to purchase and how to adopt them successfully. Most managers feel unequipped to navigate the constant change in the technology landscape and so involve themselves with IT less and less. The digital transformation of the business environment is at the top of the agendas of CEO and CIO, as it should be. Customer expectations and behaviors change at dizzying pace. Furthermore, innovation that’s needed to compete effectively would be defined more and more by software.

DETERMINING WHAT TYPES OF IT PROGRAMS ARE VIABLE FOR THE FUTURE

Thoroughly inventing the IT wheel isn’t a sustainable starting point. Rebuilding existing services and processes on new platforms consume a lot of valuable resources, introduces unacceptable risk and will take a long time. How do CIOs decide what parts of the Information technology infrastructure have a viable future and what would be phased out to make room for advancement? The decision essentially should be based on business impact, value and risk. Also, there are technology hurdles, which investments should also get over simply to be taken into consideration. When evaluating where it makes sense to push IT to the new digital age, there are three major areas to measure against. These are the following:

1. DevOps ready. If innovation’s defined by software, the capacity of delivering software capabilities more effectively and faster defines successful organizations. DevOps practices and the culture of continuous delivery, which accompanies will be the heart of the competitive weapon. For a technology investment to live a happy and long life in the brave world of more agile and faster software delivery, it requires effectively meshing with a DevOps worldview. For instance, a lot of mainframe developers integrate actively what are very traditional app development environments to high-speed DevOps world with huge success. The compatibility of DevOps soon would need to be part of the evaluation criteria or that information tech investment these days may not be able to keep up with the future.

2. Security lifespan. As more and more of the core business model of companies’ runs on IT, thus the scope and criticality of intellectual property grow in proportion. Security therefore would finally complete the slow evolution from business impediment that is often forgotten to pivotal element in innovation strategy. It’s important that tools and systems, both present and future have long security lifespans. The recent ransom ware attacks in the world were in no small part successful since they targeted systems that already were well past the security sell-by dates. CIOs in response should always have the security vulnerability assessment lens nearby when reviewing if an existing technology could make the all-important leap to the future of the digital enterprise. Without a security path forward, it’s time to decide if a replacement is required to prevent future compliance and security damages.

3. Flexibility and connectivity. Hybrid information technology environments would rule the business information technology world. It’s not only an accumulation of cloud service and on premise solutions but a real hybrid model as well. A complex and mixture of platforms, consumption models and delivery mechanisms that are built and operated with ample agility to keep pace with the continuous change in the business requirements.

For any technology, the question would be how well it would coexist in the world with everything else. Standalone platforms are quickly becoming a thing of the past. Everything would have to be flexible, connected and responsive to change soon. If a critical business system could not find a new connected home, it could be near its end of days. Nonetheless, the most venerable business systems can have long lives ahead if they could make the critical connectivity work. The rising pressure to digitize business would continue to skyrocket in the years to come as the rate of change in customer demand accelerates, along with the technology landscape’s complexity. Nonetheless, enterprise CIOs have a lot of tools to create an innovative hybrid infrastructure, provided that they could evaluate carefully the suitability of what exists these days.

Much of legacy information tech actually is highly applicable to the next generation of digital business. Furthermore, with the right metrics to evaluate against, enterprises and businesses could rapidly move nowadays to build what they would need tomorrow.

The common practices of project managers for effective software implementation

There are numerous software apps available that could help with project management tasks, but there are also various opinions on what kinds of functionality one wants. A project management software is a tool that has the capacity to help in planning, organizing and managing resource pools and develop resource estimates as well. Depending on its sophistication, the software could manage estimation and plan, schedule, cost control and budget management, allocation resource, collaboration, communication, decision-making, quality management and documentation or admin systems. Nowadays, many browser-based and PC-based project management software solutions exist and finding their way into almost any kind of business.

Selecting the best project-management tool would depend primarily on what one needs as well as the project managers view of project-management software. The best project management program in the world could not help a company complete tasks faster or more effectively if the staff do not or will not use it. A management tool will only become effective when the task manager will be able to use it at its full advantage.

The following are some tips for project managers to get the most of the software.

1. Begin with a needs analysis. Project management solutions come in all sizes and shapes. The first thing to do is to determine what type of management collaboration tool the business or company needs. For instance, a manager should determine if all the tasks are internal or working with external vendors and customers. Other things to consider is if the tasks should be assigned or simply require a space where everyone could collaborate and if the task would involve budgets and invoices.

2. Make certain the software is easy to use. Find a program that is both intuitive and as a whole in-line with how the company works. If it fails to meet the company specifics out-of-the-box, then a solution should be one with built-in custom fields and the capability to rename categories and fields.

3. Consider a cloud-based service. This is preferable for a number of factors, such as deployment ease and overall ownership cost. It could also save thousands of dollars over a solution that has to be installed and managed. Users could also access the system on any device, anywhere and upgrades are automatically delivered since it is web-based.

4. Select a solution that could scale. Implementing a solution throughout the company is in itself a long-term project. That is why it is necessary to go for a solution that would grow with the company and provides features that the a manager may not even consider using at the start.

5. Ensure that the PM software incorporates with core applications, like email. An important factor in choosing a product is the integration capabilities. Since everyone uses email, a solution should be able to post messages to email that would boost user engagement and extend the product reach.

6. Solicit input from the people and departments who will actually use the software. Choosing a program that would be a good overall fit is critical. The best way of doing this is to include an entire team in the process of selection. Gather feedback from people and departments as they may have goals they would like to attain.

7. Compare various management solutions. Make a checklist based on the needs and compared products. Both the project manager and members of the team should review the software. If outside parties would also be using the software, solicit their opinion as well.

8. Opt for a solution that offers good community and vendor support. When choosing a project management software, find a vendor with a rich user community. This is important when questions arise since there will be fellow users to turn to for advice.

9. Establish goals from the start. Define the goals for clarity on how to set up the program, how to use it and how to train people on it. Otherwise, the software implementation will just be like a ship without a rudder.

10. Provide ample training. Consider numerous training sessions to ensure that everyone could attend. Set up a project immediately so employees could practice making posts, attaching files and using the program.

Having a project management software however will not entirely spell success to an organization or business if the project manager fails to do his or her responsibilities. Here are skills that task managers need to be effective and successful:

1. Be a good multi-tasker and highly organized. A good manager is one who knows how to manage numerous tasks and track concerns daily. The success or failure of a project lies in the difference between a project manager who is highly organized and a manager who is not.

2. Take charge and know how to lead. Task managers need good leaders. Managing a task is all about leading vendors and stakeholders to a successful outcome. Tasks must be lead in a way that builds consensus while at the same time flashing out the true roadblocks and risks. Effective managers showcase an image of a better tomorrow as well as foster confidence in the abilities of the members of the team to realize the vision.

3. One should be an effective communicator. Effective communication means that the manager should consistently ensure that they are clearly understood by all stakeholders and that they understand what is expected of them throughout the lifecycle of the task. Moreover, it is necessary that all stakeholders effectively communicate with one another as well as with the task head.

4. Know how and when to negotiate. Managers should also be excellent negotiators. A good head invests time to understand and negotiate the relationships and determine the stakeholder's interests. Without negotiating skills, one could spoil or ignore the crucial relationships, which make the success of a task very unlikely.

5. Recognize and solve issues fast. There would be times when issues and obstacle arise that require immediate resolutions. The way the project managers handle these issues would set him apart from others.

6. Become detail-oriented. Managing a project is all about details, big and small ones. That is why project managers should be meticulous when it comes to managing the details of each project and the impact that every detail could have on the overall success of the task. Details could make or break it, and an effective PM recognizes that.

7. Possesses necessary technical skills. To become a good PM, one must possess robust knowledge of the software, platforms and programs that the company works with regularly. This is true even if the job is actually non-technical. Furthermore, a great leader must have ample technical knowledge regarding areas of the project to be able to assign themselves to some of them.

The new Facebook Watch Tab that offers a wide range of shows for all users

Facebook mobile users would soon see a new Watch tab that offers a wide array of shows. It’s becoming the destination for viewers of programs. This of course makes FB a media company. However, qualifying for the label is not just a matter of pedants but also more on semantics, about the ambition of Facebook, its social obligations and the future of media.

MAKING THE FACEBOOK EXPERIENCE MUCH STICKIER

Facebook watch is all about making the experience much stickier, thus making users want to spend more and more time in the Facebook home. Today, with over two billion users, the social media giant wants to do much more in order to retain the interest of people who are logged in. Videos with high quality will do this, as will the eventual move of the company into live sports that has long been rumored but has not materialized yet. Power brings about responsibility and there have been instances when FB appeared uncomfortable with its social obligations. For example on the issue of fake news, despite having hundreds of thousands of new moderators, the company is determined not be an arbiter on what’s true or what’s false, preferring the user community to make the judgments.

FACEBOOK WATCH WILL ACCELERATE THE SHIFT TO AUDIENCE TREND

Across media, power shifts to audiences. The idea of editors to determine what users could read or for commissioners to determine what users will watch is getting weak. Schedules have become obsolete, albeit gradually. The Facebook watch hastens the trend. With a user base that’s massively larger than Netflix and YouTube combined, the social interactions performed when logged on to FB is recorded meticulously by the algorithms of the social network. This of course helps drive content promotion and distribution.

In any Facebook mobile application, convenience is king. The social network makes it more convenient to enjoy viewing experiences with no need to leave the platform. Mark Zuckerberg justifiably argues that this is a way to transfer more power to users. Watching video on FB has an amazing power of connecting people, foster community and spark and inspire conversation. On the social network, videos are discovered via friends and bring together communities. As more and more people enjoy the experience, they like the serendipity of discovering news on the News Feed. However, they also want a dedicated area where they could go to for watching videos.

THE VIDEO TAB IN THE UNITED STATES

Last year the Video Tab was launched in the United States, which offered a predictable space to find Facebook videos. Now, the company wants to make it even easier to catch up on shows. The new Watch is a new platform for shows. It would be available on desktop, mobile, laptop and in TV applications. Shows are made of episode, recorded or live and follow a storyline or theme. To help people keep up with the shows they follow, it has a watch list so they will not miss out on the latest episodes. Watch is personalized to help discover new shows that are organized on what friends and communities are viewing. For instance, there are sections such as ‘most talked about’ that includes shows wherein a lot of people used the Haha reaction. There is also the ‘what friends are watching’ that helps connect with friends regarding shows that they are following as well. In FB Live, people’s reactions and comments to a video often are much a part of the experience as the video itself. So when watching a show, one could see comments and connect with friends as well as other viewers while viewing or join in a dedicated FB Group for the show.

THE PLATFORM FOR SHOWS

Watch is the platform for all publishers and creators to look for an audience, create a community of passionate fans and also earn for their work. A wide range of FB shows could be successful, especially the following:

1. Shows that engage the fans and the community. Nas Daily publishes a daily show making videos together with fans all over the world. The Watchlist makes it easy for fans to catch a new episode daily.

2. Live shows that directly connect with fans. A New York Times bestselling author, Gabby Bernstein, life coach and motivational speaker, users a mix of live and recorded episodes for connecting with fans as well as answer queries in real time.

3. Live events which bring communities together. Major League Baseball broadcasts a game on Facebook every week, letting people view live baseball while connecting with friends as well as fellow platform fans.

4. Shows following a narrative arch or have a consistent theme. The show Tastemade’s Kitchen Little is a funny one about children who watch a how-to recipe video and then instruct professional chefs on how to make it. Every episode features a new chef, a new kid and a new recipe. The food, unsurprisingly does not always turn out as expected.

Watch would be home to a range of shows, from reality, comedy, to live sports. It’s exciting to see how publishers and creators use shows for connecting with fans and community.

Rural Health IT helps to improve health care services in most rural settings

Rural Health Information Technology uses computers for storing, protecting, retrieving and transferring information electronically within the health care scenario. The key elements of the rural health IT include electronic medical records for patients instead of paper records, secure electronic networks for delivering updated records anytime, anywhere the patient or clinician may need them. Furthermore, the Rural Health IT provides electronic transmittal of medical test results to hasten and simplify the processing by health care providers.

Health IT works to improve safety, quality and effectiveness of services. Furthermore, the systems could help make certain that the physicians as well as other wellness professionals will have the most current particulars regarding the condition or ailment they are treating. HIT systems boost quality of service via avoiding medical errors and duplication. Since most patients receive ministry from various health providers, the provincial medical IT works to ensure coordinated, efficient and secure exchange of statistics. Moreover, through the use of the information technology system, researchers could learn faster regarding new therapies and treatments.

The potentials of the HIT include the following:

1. Lower medical errors
2. Ascertain safer patient transitions between medical care settings
3. Reduce unnecessary and duplicative testing
4. Boost sharing of care information between laboratories, providers, patients and pharmacies
5. Ensures security and privacy of electronic wellness data since information is electronically maintained and transmitted.

Advances in wellness IT hold great promise in terms of helping rural and small communities overcome difficulties in health provisioning, like distance and shortage of personnel. A lot of small and rural medical providers point to the lack of financial resources as to why there are poor adoption rates. The medical IT investment should compete with other capital expenses, like the need for a new operating room equipment. There are few grants that state specifically that they would fund the HIT initiative that supports the cost of software, hardware and the necessary training for implementing and using electronic records, computerized provider order entry, e-prescribing, electronic transmittal of medical tests and decision support systems among others. There are some grants which would support the quality of medical ministering, access, patient safety, workforce training programs and controlling the cost.

Grants that support the initiatives may not specifically state they fund HIT. Nonetheless, HIT is considered as a solution to boost the initiatives. The use of IT allows better care coordination and quick access to patient data. This could improve the quality of wellness care and patient results in parochial settings. Using HIT holds a lot of potential for rural America. Not only does it enable better wellness coordination, it also allows instant access to patient data which could improve the quality of care given.

The benefits of electronic health records are well-documented. Moreover, rural providers are positioned uniquely to benefit from it. Health IT has the potential of transforming the way parochial providers collect, manage, store, use and share information. In addition, the program helps rural areas to coordinate and access care, boost disease survey, target health education and compile regional data and information. All of these activities are aimed at boosting the quality of services and results.

The Internet of Things in the Entertainment Field

The drastic rise in the number of smart devices as well as sensors that are connected to IoT or the Internet of Things could potentially change the way consumers interact with all networked technology, including the entertainment and media platforms. This represents a chance for the entertainment field to assimilate the growing number of customer insight that would be generated constantly by IoT technologies all over the market to drive more interactive and responsive offerings.

ANALYSIS CAPABILITIES THAT ENTERTAINMENT PROVIDERS HAVE TO ESTABLISH

There are three kinds of analysis capabilities that entertainment provider would have to establish to process IoT data to customer insights as well as marketing opportunities. These are the following:

1. SITUATIONAL ANALYTICS. This help organizations utilize network-centric data for measuring current behaviors, competitive and performance conditions to support decision-making process in a daily basis. From an entertainment point of view this may take the form of comprehending the current disposition of a consumer to better measure the type of entertainment that’s most appropriate.

2. PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS. Enables providers to anticipate the behavior patterns of customers, the trends and derive business intelligence to boost offerings. Knowing that a consumer is coming home from a major sporting event could give insight as to the kind of programming to deliver.

3. PRESCRIPTIVE ANALYTICS. Would boost the ability of providers to quickly respond to customer interactions and resolve conflicts or create more intuitive user experiences to deliver customized content and offers. This includes considering diagnostic options and network performance when delivering an entertainment experience.

Through integration of these three types of IoT data analysis to their operations, entertainment providers would have an extensive dashboard that provides end-to-end insight to their inventory constantly, network infrastructures and customers, offering unprecedented control over delivery channels and managing revenue streams.

In an Internet of Things world, media organizations would be able to understand what a person is watching, and measure where, how, why and with whom consumers are viewing content. This new insight level as well as the provided context by smart devices enable the media and entertainment companies to deliver targeted ad that’s relevant to a person’s physical activity, mood or location in real-time. IoT not only boosts consumer content experience, but also encourage the advertising field to thoroughly redefine the measure of success. If smart devices offer useful data to content providers perceived as non-intrusive and the content experience result interprets consumer current readings appropriately in real-time and respond rapidly to those needs with targeted and relevant advertising the implications for enhanced brand loyalty could be wide.

IoT CREATES A WOW FOR CONCERT GOERS

The same security and convenience that could be used in sporting events may be used also at concerts within arenas and stadiums. Additionally, the Internet of Things could turn concerts to amazing experiences. For instance, for those who are far away from the stage, there are GoPro cameras that live stream the concert. A user may use the stadium’s WiFi network to access the stream and look at close-ups of their favorite artists on their mobile devices.

THE FUTURE OF ENTERTAINMENT IS LIMITLESS

Although still at the beginning stages, IoT adoption in arenas and stadiums is not far away. Devices and sensors are being tested at present, and the viability of the solutions is indeed promising. With the introduction of IoT technology in the world of entertainment, there will be well-connected and interactive networks formed between viewers and the entertainment platforms. The benefit is that there is an increased scope for the field to accumulate as much insight from customer as possible in an attempt to generate programs and technologies that would be appreciated and loved by everybody. Creating a more responsive and better platform for viewers, they could have direct interaction with the offerings and in turn would benefit the connected entertainment field in bringing up more viewer-friendly and better content.

The Internet of Things could pave the way for more automated and intuitive entertainment suggestions to be made for viewers, in movies and music as well, whichever suit their current mood or situation. IoT and other cloud-based resources could build a fast growing environment wherein the analysis and exchange of data would ensure that there is better availability and interaction of entertaining stuff between the industry and the viewers. IoT could boost the way people enjoy entertainment as well as boost their experiences. Connected devices would be able to deliver the kind of entertainment that is interactive and truly unforgettable.

Entertainment firms have a great deal to gain from IoT. Organizations that tackle the obstacles on implementing the systems and invest in new capabilities ahead will stand to gain the most from the competitive advantages.

Without a doubt, the Internet of Things is making waves in the entertainment field. New technologies are being tested to cater to the changing needs of people nowadays in terms of entertainment.

Determine the top qualities to look for in a software development company

WHEN HIRING SOFTWARE DEVELOMENT FIRMS

Nowadays, the corporate world is more competitive than ever. In order to survive in this world, an organization needs constant innovation. A lot of enterprises have gone online and in constant development stage. They have the best software development team and work hard to acquire a higher market share. In this race, no company wants to be left behind. The hindrance to competitiveness is not having a blue print but the lack of someone who could turn the blueprint to reality. The solution is to choose the right software development provider. Trying to hire a software develop could be a laborious, frustrating undertaking. That is why, it is very important to collate several possible companies, determine which are likely to meet one’s expectations and select the most appropriate provider from the collated list of service providers.

The first and foremost step when looking to hire a software development service provider is to look for one that could clearly understand the requirements and deliver the perfect software through transforming ideas into technical reality. It is a fact that with the popularity and continuous demand of software development, there are so many service providers that claim they are best in their niche, thus it is difficult to just trust all of these without doing an in-depth research. An organization or business seeking for software services should do a thorough research to determine which service provider will be able to deliver the software desired within the time frame.

TOP QUALITIES TO LOOK FOR IN COMPUTER SOFTWARE COMPANIES

1. Customized development approach. The first quality to look for in a software developer is whether or not it is able to provide customized development services. Customized development, undertakes analysis of the business and its objectives which the software is developed and taking into account the unique requirements of the software product. Refrain from associating with a developer that do not perform customized development and serve clients with pre-developed themes.

2. Past history of work. There are several software companies that boast of wide experience, but lacks showcasing the projects accomplished for the clientele. It’s important to determine whether the service provider in mind has dealt with similar projects and check if the job was accomplished in a suitable way. Talk to old clients if possible or ask for references.

3. Experienced team of developers. If the software project involves detailed interactions with the development team, it’s necessary to always ask which technicians would work on the project. Furthermore, it’s also important to carry out several pre-development discussions with the team to make sure that they’re capable of understanding the company’s perspective and could develop the software as required. This is integral, particularly for a project that’s long-term.

4. Pricing structure. Before hiring a software developer, make certain that the provider is transparent with the cost of the project and provide an accurate picture of the costs that would be involved in the process. If a company keeps hidden costs, then the best thing to do is to look for another service provider.

5. User experience development. Important consideration is the end user of the software and if the develop could provide the user experience desired, which is important for the project. Only a handful of software development companies have the required set of resources and the right expertise to ensure the development of excellent user experience. Go through the portfolio of the service provider and evaluate if it delivers the user experience quality in mind.

6. Information security. Always, security is a vital concern when sharing confidential information regarding the business or organization and the required information for the project development. It would be unwise to share sensitive and critical information on a project with a service provider that does not guarantee intellectual property security.

7. Maintain communication. Make sure the service provider provides constant communication. The service provider is the companion on the path to success, thus choosing a reliable one is top priority.

8. Ensure ownership of the software product. Take ownership of the source codes of the software product. The software developer should be able to provide a royalty complimentary license to the source codes, which allow continuous software development in the future.

Read more details: https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/blog/2015/06/the-10-qualities-to-look-for-when-hiring-software-engineers

For any company seeking the services or looking to hire a software development service provider, it is of extreme importance to indulge in due diligence before choosing one for a custom development. The best developer is able to provide top-notch quality, able to use the latest technology tools within one’s budget and could accomplish the software project on time. Remember, the most expensive one may not always be able to provide the best service, nor the most affordable one is able to accomplish the project desired.

The future of development on Salesforce with Lightning experience

The future of Salesforce development is with Lightning experience. Salesforce has been around for 16 years, 48 product releases, thousands of features and millions of happy users all over the world. It has been an amazing journey of Salesforce. It has changed business for the better and brought innovation to life.

THE LIGHTNING EXPERIENCE

Salesforce considers its best, biggest and the most game-changing release as the Lightning Experience. It is built and designed based on the gathered feedback of over 150,000 customers and sixteen years of experience of providing the leading CRM in the world. Salesforce Lightning is the new CRM standard and would hasten success for each and every Salesforce customer.

WHAT IS THE LIGHTNING EXPERIENCE?

Salesforce’s Lightning experience consists of three things, such as:

• Desktop application, with more than 25 new features, made with a modern UI or user interface and optimized for speed.
• The lightning experience would be available to existing and prospective customers at no added cost. Lightning Experience is available for Service Cloud, Sales Cloud and any platform license for all editions, including GE, EE, PE, UE and PXE. Customers could determine for whom and when they enable the Lightning experience.

LIGHTNING COMPONENTS FOR COMMUNITY CLOUD

Each of the components were tailored to Community Cloud, allowing customers to add capabilities such as surveys, videos, search and planning and blogs to their communities within minutes, just by dragging and dropping a Lightning component towards the community page. There is no coding needed. These partner-built components today are live and available on the Salesforce AppExchange. Every component introduced today is optimized for the Salesforce Lightning platform as well as user experience, easily accessible and could be branded on any device. There will be more new partner-built Lightning components in the months ahead. This is all a part of the vision to make the biggest range of technology available nowadays to customers with less complexity and less cost, all made possible by the Salesforce platform.

WHO COULD USE THE NEW LIGHTNING EXPERIENCE?

Customers could opt to roll it out to specific users through the use of profiles or permission sets. Users whom the Lightning Experience is enabled could switch between the Classic and Lightning Experience in the user menu in the pages header. Attributes such as field order and field-level security would be the same in the two User Interfaces.

HOW TO GET THE APPS READY FOR THE NEW LIGHTNING EXPERIENCE

The UX or user experience is one of the most vital aspects of the initiative. It is practically in the name “Lightning Experience”. A lot of applications features customizations, which include custom buttons, custom objects, and Visualforce pages. To prepare for the Lightning release, all partners must test their applications to ascertain that functionality continues to work properly in the new experience. Moreover, partners could also get their applications designated as “Lightning Ready”. Applications that are lighting ready would work in Lightning experience and provide a more consistent experience with other Lightning pages. If the application utilizes standard objects, Salesforce UI, page layouts, but without custom Visualforce pages, then one must expect them to properly display in the new Lightning Experience with the new feel and look. Generally, Visualforce pages work in the new User Interface, but must be tested to make sure all features are supported appropriately and correctly functioning.

EARN THE LIGHTNING READY CERTIFICATION

To earn the certification, Visualforce pages in applications must be updated to provide a more consistent UX or user experience with Lightning. To help in this effort, the company is publishing the Lightning Design System that is formal documentation around all styles, which make up the Lightning Experience across form factors. The design system is available to all and would be made GA via an open-source project on GitHub for Dreamforce. It could be used for designing applications that are built on the platform and on other platforms as well.

THE BOX LIGHTNING COMPONETN PACK

Robust, secure content right at the fingertips with the component pack. The Box Lightning Component Pack makes it amazingly easy to embed a Box File or Box Folder to a community, allowing the organization to seamlessly work with the external partners and vendors, all in a single central location.

In today’s age of always on, always connected world, with new technologies evolving practically every day, it could be hard for companies to keep up, particularly in mobile communities and applications, wherein they interact with partners and customers most. Through combining the Salesforce Lightning platform with innovative partner ecosystem, the company empowers customers with the latest that technology has to offer.

Indeed, the future of development on the Salesforce platform is the new Lightning Experience. It’s considered as the most game-changing, best and biggest release of Salesforce.

Oracle is Gartner’s 2017 Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Integration PaaS

Oracle has been named as the Gartner 2017 Magic Quadrant for Enterprise PaaS or Platform-as-a-Service. The oracle database definition is an object-relational database management system, which is produce4d and marketed by Oracle Corporation. Oracle has a lot of advantages and features, which make it popular and thus make it as the biggest enterprise software company in the world. It comes with new versions and new implemented features in the new version while earlier versions’ features are still being maintained. One integral aspect is that Oracle databases have the tendency to be backwards compatible. Furthermore, when it releases a new version, the documentation has a list of all features that are new to that version, so making it user-friendly for anyone to learn the new features. An Oracle database is a collection of data that’s treated as a unit. The purpose of the database is for storing and retrieving related information. A database server is the key to solving the concerns and issues of information management. Oracle is the first database that’s designed for enterprise grid computing, the most cost-effective and flexible way of managing information and apps. Enterprise grid computing creates huge pools of modular, industry-standard storage and servers. With the architecture, every new system could be provisioned rapi8dly from the pool of components.

ORACLE, THE LEADER IN PLATFORM-AS-A-SERVICE IN 2017

Oracle meaning in computer means that it is being used for nearly all huge apps and one of the main in application where it takes its major presence is banking. As a matter of fact, the top 10 banks in the world run Oracle apps. This is because it offers a strong combination of technology and pre-integrated, extensive business applications that include key functionality that is specifically built for banks. It’s been named as the leader in the “Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Integration Platform as a Service of Gartner in 2017. The recognition is another milestone that the company feels is because of the tremendous growth and momentum of the Oracle Cloud Platform this year. Moreover, the recognition is another acknowledgement of its strong momentum in the integration in the bigger PaaS sector, that’s driven by the successful adoption of the cloud platform offerings by hundreds of thousands of customers. Through the successful delivery of a comprehensive iPaas offering, which provides an easy way of integrating any kind of data, application, system and device, Oracle has provided customers a robust option to meet the ever evolving integration requirements.


For more information, visit http://cloud.oracle.com.

The Oracle Platform that includes its iPaaS offerings, has experienced tremendous growth, adding thousands of customers in 2017. SMBs, global enterprises and ISVs turn to the Cloud Platform to create and run contemporary mobile, web and cloud-native apps. Continuing its commitment to the clientele, it was able to deliver over 50 cloud services during the last couple of years. Its iPaaS offerings are Oracle Integration Cloud Service as well as the Oracle SOA Cloud Service, which are part of the cloud platform. The Oracle Integration Cloud is a robust yet simple integration platform, which targets ad hoc integrators. Oracle SOA Cloud on the other hand delivers a high-control platform that is intended for specialist integrators. Furthermore, Oracle has a lot of other cross-PaaS offerings that could be combined with iPaaS services for greater productivity delivery. The services include Oracle Self Service Integration for citizen integrators, the Oracle Process Cloud for enhanced orchestration, Oracle API Platform Cloud for management of API, Oracle Real-Time Integration Business Insight for monitoring of business activity, Oracle Managed File Transfer Cloud for transfer or managed file and the Oracle IoT cloud for the Internet of Things integration. The Oracle Cloud is the most integrated and broadest public cloud that offers a complete array of services across PaaS, SaaS and IaaS. Moreover, it supports new cloud environments, current ones and hybrid, and all developers, workloads and data. Oracle Cloud delivers almost 1,000 SaaS apps and fifty enterprise-class PaaS and IaaS services to the clientele in over 195 countries in the globe as well as supports 55 billion transactions daily.

Gartner places vendors within a certain quadrant based on their capability to execute and vision completeness. Based on the report, ‘leaders in this market paid client number in thousands for their iPaaS offerings. Often, many thousands of indirect users through platform versions that are embedded, as well as ‘freemium’ choices. They have a robust reputation and notable market presence as well as a proven track record in allowing numerous integration use cases, supported often by the huge global networks of their partners. The platforms are functionally rich and well-proven, with regular releases to address the fast-evolving market quickly. Gartner sees integration platform as a service as offering ‘capabilities to enable subscribers to implement application, data, API and process integration projects that span on-premises and cloud-resident endpoints. This is achieved via the development, deployment, execution, management and monitoring the ‘integration flows’, that is integration apps that bridge between numerous endpoints so they work hand-in-hand.

Global Information Technology market briefing for strategists and marketers

The Global Information Technology Global Market briefing provides marketers, strategists as well as senior management with vital information that they need in assessing the IT market and the Information Technology systems. The biggest geographic markets by consumption in the IT market include Asia, the Americas and Europe. America was the biggest region in the Information Technology market back in 2016, based on 39.0 percent market share.

GLOBAL IT MARKET BRIEIFING 2017

There has been a growing prevalence of low cost open source options in the past few years. Open source became a preferred platform for the development of new technology. Before, software publishers will open source software that’s not making money. Now, however organizations are open sourcing software to boost their presence and share in the marketplace. According to Open Source Initiative president Allison Randal, seventy-eight percent of companies use open source solutions. Furthermore, sixty-five percent join in open source projects that indicate a boost in open source platforms for building apps in 2015. The key topics that were covered include, IT market characteristics, market drivers, IT market historic growth, market restraints, free trade reduction, forecast of IT market growth, IT comparison with other markets, IT market historic and forecast growth comparison with others and a whole lot more.

The IT Global Market briefing report of the Business Research Company covers size and growth, market characteristics, segmentation, competitive landscape, regional breakdowns, trends, market shares and strategies for this market. The report’s market characteristics section defines as well as explains the market. The market section provides IT market revenues that cover historic market growth and forecasting the future. The comparison with other markets section outlines the information technology market share among other manufacturing markets.

The five key themes that define global tech market in the next couple of years include:

1. Moderate overall growth at below 5 percent. The worldwide tech market in constant currency terms would continue growing modestly throughout this year respectively at 4.5 and 4.7 percent respectively. The strong US dollar persisted in 2016, which result in lower dollar-denominated growth rates. Nevertheless, the dollar lost some steam this year, thus there is a projected 4.9 percent growth in terms of the US dollar.

2. The US tech market, although not posting strongest growth would grow by 5 percent and more. By far, the biggest tech market, the US would post steady 5.9 percent growth this year. Individual country-level growth rates would be all over the globe. Mexico, India, China, Sweden, Israel and Poland would have the fastest tech market 6 percent growth.

3. BT or Business Technology serves as a growth engine in the growing markets. The tech would account for more than half of the total new project spending this year. In countries with steady-growth in industry, tech and business leaders heavily invest in new projects, which support the BT Agenda. Traditional IT spending continues to dominate the total tech spending, particularly in emerging markets. The total BT spending is expected to reach by $827 billion all over the world this year.

4. Analytic and cloud adoption. This means that software and services cost would grow quicker. SaaS would carry overall software market in the next couple of years, with adoption spreading from CRM, financial managing purchasing, analytics and management of human capital. SaaS subscription revenues for apps would come close to equal the combined software license as well as maintenance revenues this year.

The Information Technology future could be broken down into category, such as the following.

The IoT. With higher-bandwidth wireless and faster networks in place, the IoT would be a much bigger part of people’s daily lives.

Wireless innovation. A main move to build out broadband wireless networks provide underlying infrastructure that is critical for communications innovation.

Smarter cars, smarter cities. Tech companies, city officials as well as other groups are putting wireless cameras and sensors in light poles that are embedded in street pavement, put outside buildings and more. These will be critical tools for city management and urban planning. They would be vital for self-driving vehicles soon.

Virtual and augmented reality. There are already big advancements in augmented and virtual reality. There is no doubt that VR and AR would revolutionize the computing experience. Furthermore, it also offers new ways of interacting with technology and with one another. The techs are in the early stages but would bring in new innovation levels and jobs to the computing experience on the next decade.

Healthcare. The health information digitization opens new markets for devices that are health-related, from fitness trackers to hospital-grade technology.

Data centers. Data centers, data engineers and analysts would grow further. At present, almost each company requires more staff in dealing with the disciplines, particularly data analysis. The biggest companies in the world are collecting petabytes or terabytes of data of all kinds on a daily basis that should be searched, analyzed and utilized to boost their ability of creating services and products.

For more information about this report visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/9qmdtf/information

Facebook inserts into politics with tools useful for elected officials

Among the most popular media websites, Facebook is ranking high. This year, it launched several features, which make it easier for people to reach government representatives on the social network, which include ‘Town Hall’. Related integrations with News Feed enables sharing representatives contact information in posts.

FACEBOOK IS EXPANDING ON FEATURES FOR ELECTED OFFICIALS

These days, Facebook is expanding on initiatives designed for elected officials. The new tools help government officials reach their constituents and to understand which issues that their constituents care the most as well. In particular, FB, one of the top social media sites is rolling out three new features, namely, constituent badges, insights and district targeting. The primary objective of the new features is to help politicians connect with constituents in their district better. However, at a deeper level, FB makes it easier than ever for the officials to acquire insight into the behaviors and thoughts that drive their communities, transform the social network into a gold mine of data to predict voter behavior as well as all kinds of other relevant political findings. Moreover, the new looks are an expansion of the existing Town Hall feature, which was first introduced in March. It is a way for users to connect and reach out to local representatives better through FB. It is all part of the wider effort to help make the social media site a tool for enhancing civic discourse.

The first feature is the Constituent badges. A new, opt-in feature which allow FB users to identify themselves as living in the district where the elected official represents. The social media giant determines if someone is a constituent or otherwise based on the address provided in Town Hall or being part of the process that’s used to turn on badges. Although anyone pretend to be a constituent and enter a fake address, FB has put controls in place for limiting the bad actors. Users could only be a verified constituent based on a single address at a time. Moreover, if a person changes the address, the badge is removed from prior posts. Also, FB limits the amount of time that an address could be changed. The badges is to make it easier for officials to find out which questions, comments and concerns are shared by the people that they actually represent. Whether they will treat the sentiments with the same degree of relevance or not as they would an email, letter or phone call remains to be seen. Users would be prompted to turn on constituent badges when they make a comment or like posts by their representatives via a unit, which appears on the page. User alternately could go to the Town Hall section to turn on the badge themselves. As soon as enabled, the badges would appear anytime someone comments on shared content by their own reps.

The second feature is the Constituent insights. It’s designed to help officials find out which local news content and stories are popular in their area so they could share their ideas and thoughts on these matters. This would be available via a new Page Insight feature, which is available to Page admins that include a section that could be scrolled horizontally wherein locally trending stories and news appear. The elected officials could click a link to post the story to their FB page, together with their thoughts about it. In addition, constituents could browse through the same stories on a new Community tab on the FB page of the official.

The third feature is the District Targeting feature, which arguably is the most notable. The feature provides elected officials a means of gathering feedback from constituents effectively and directly via Facebook, using posts or polls targeted only towards those actually living in their specific district. This means that the government official could post to the social media site to ask for constituents’ feedback regarding an issue. These posts would be viewable to those who are living in their district only. Definitely, this also means that the official will be taking an active and even proactive role when it comes to engaging with the constituent base and their community, instead of waiting for constituents to proceed to their office with their thoughts, which often is the case nowadays.

Today, rather than seeing faces and names of potential constituents, officials elected to their posts could see a special badge designating a user as someone living in their district. The features will cut down those pretending to be in a district that they really do not belong into. All of the features combined offer a very powerful tool for politicians to start engaging more deeply with the people, as well as learning from them. Overall, the Town Hall combination with the new features targeted towards government officials represent Facebook’s growing effort to be move involved in the political process as well as the dialog that surrounds policy issues.

Check out the Medical Image Analysis market in the software industry environment

The software industry growth is tremendous and it just keeps evolving round the clock. One of the latest in the software environment is the medical image analysis software market that’s expected to reach $3,135.3 Million by 2020. A lot of factors drive the growth of the market, which include the growing public and private sector investments, advancements in technology, fast growth in the aging population, imaging technologies fusion, growing apps of CAD or computer-aided diagnosis, growing incidences of chronic diseases and the growth of the use of imaging equipment. On the one hand, growing hacking-related risks associated with using medical software and equipment, financial hindrance4s and dearth of skilled professionals are the main factors that restrain the growth of the market.

MEDICAL IMAGE SOFTWARE INDUSTRY ANALYSIS MARKET

The medical image analysis software market is segmented according to the type of software, image type, application, modality, region and end user. Based on the kind of software, the market is segmented to standalone as well as integrated software. The standalone segment is expected to witness considerable growth, in the forecast period, since the software offers easy-to-use tools and high flexibility for inspecting, evaluating and processing imaging data.

Medical imaging is both a technique and process of creat5ing visual representations of the physiological and anatomical functions that take place in the human body. Depending on what technique is used in the analysis of muscles, bones and organs. Together with the physiological and anatomical functions of the body, the study of the growth of a tumor, its movement and other abnormalities could also be detected with the aid of medical imaging. The software that’s used in the devices for analysis and creation of image is paramount. The research is the result of the combination of primary and secondary research, done for understanding and arriving at trends which are used for forecasting the revenue expected of the medical image analysis software market in the future. Prime research formed the bulk of the research efforts with collected information, in-depth interviews and discussions with several key industry experts as well as opinion leaders. Secondary research involved the study of annual reports, company websites, press releases, yearly reports, analyst presentation, investor presentations and different national and international databases.

The report yields an estimated market size in terms of US dollars for every software type, modality, imaging type, end user, applica5tion and geography between 2014 and 2024, taking into consideration the macro and micro environmental factors. The generated revenue from every product was calculated by taking into account sever5al products used in procedures as well as their market demand per use, rate of disease prevalence, several product launched, annual revenue gained by products of every sub segment, industry trends, end user trend and the production rate across all geographies.

The medical image analysis software market by app is segmented into orthopedic, cardiology, oncology, nephrology, neurology, gynecology, dental and others in terms of end users. The medical image analysis software industry is segmented into clinics, hospitals, research and academic institutions, ambulatory surgical centers, diagnostic centers. Based on geography, the market of the medical image analysis software is segmented into regions such as the regions of Asia Pacific, both North and Latin America, the Middle East, Europe and Africa.
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The market has been designated in the following:

BY SOFTWARE TYPE

• Integrated
• Standalone

BY IMAGING TYPE

• 2D imaging
• 3D imaging
• 4D imaging

BY MODALITY

• CT
• PET
• MRI
• SPECT
• Radiographic imaging
• Ultrasound
• Other modalities

BY APPLICATION

• Cardiology
• Oncology
• Orthopedic
• Neurology
• Gynecology
• Dental
• Nephrology
• Others

BY END USERS

• Clinics
• Hospitals
• Diagnostic centers
• Research and academic institutes
• Ambulatory surgical centers

BY GEOGRAPHY

• US
• North America
• Canada
• Brazil
• Latin America
• Mexico
• Rest of Latin America
• Europe
• Germany
• UK
• Spain
• France
• Italy
• Rest of Europe
• Asia Pacific
• Japan
• India
• Australia
• China
• New Zealand
• Rest of Asia Pacific
• Africa and Middle East
• Saudi Arabia
• South Africa
• UAE 

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The market share analysis among the market players is analyzed to signify the players’ contribution in the market when it comes to percentage share. All the factors help the market players decide on business plans and strategies to strengthen their positions in the worldwide market. Geography based, the market has been analyzed for major regions. Also, the study covers a comprehensive country analysis mainly contributing in the medical image analysis software market. Moreover, the report profiles major players in the market as well and offers different attributes, like financial overview, the overview of the organization, portfolio of product, business strategies as well as recent developments. Key companies that are profiled in the medical image analysis software market include Siemens, GE Healthcare, Agfa-Gevaert N.V., Healthineers, Pie Medical Imaging, Hologic Inc., AQUILAB, Medical Cybernetics, Inc., ScienceSoft USA Corp., Merge Healthcare Incorporated and many more.

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Software Outsourcing outlook for 2017

With the changes in how businesses operate at present, software outsourcing service providers are faced with a challenge of uncertainty. Nevertheless, service providers should be able to establish innovative ways and to find new strategies to bounce back.

Outsourcing has metamorphosed the way businesses operate these days, evolving with time to keep pace with industry developments. With the rush to deliver the most efficient and the most affordable services, outsourcing strategy is rapidly changing with the evolving business dynamics. This enabled organizations to affordably outsource technical support and other processes to reliable outsourcing partners.

A NEW YEAR WITH A NEW OUTLOOK

It is a new year with a new US president, a new European landscape as well as new paradigms taking shape in the outsourcing space. The winds of change are upon everyone. Companies, customers and providers would be wise to comprehend where they are going. From call centers to software development, 2016 was a year marked by considerable change and uncertainty across the business process outsourcing scale. Technological, political and human factors all have conspired to ensure that regardless what sector works in, there would be no more ‘business as usual’. In 2016, Amazon has released the APIs for its Alexa AI or Artificial Intelligence product, meaning that the research that the retail and cloud behemoth put into artificial intelligence and recognition is now available for third-party developers.

SOFTWARE OUTSOURCING FOR 2017

The outsourcing scenario for this year could be determined by the following.

1. Brexit and Trump would change course. The course of software outsourcing would be determined by the new Trump regime in the United States and the effects of Brexit in the United Kingdom. Already, companies have started re-assessing contacts in the light of the not-so-pro-outsourcing changes that are expected. Legal complications would be discussed more, renegotiations would occur as companies attempt to arrive at a common ground for adherence to policy as well as business viability. Despite this, more work transitioned to onshore delivery centers is expected.

2. Security would be a major concern. The past 2016 was an infamous year for security and data security breaches. With the change in outsourcing policies, delivery mechanisms and required infrastructure would change, making security challenges. On the other hand, increased awareness on security compel companies to go for advanced security measures, like threat intelligence, automation and analytics solutions. New vendors in the security environment would emerge, delivering niche services.

3. The Cloud would mature. The initial Cloud craze has worn off. Now, customers are ascending maturity levels. As customers get more knowledgeable, Cloud service providers would have to adapt or else perish. Home-grown cloud vendors are expected to emerge, having taken a cue from the initial outsourced parties on delivering a superlative cloud experience.

4. Dwindling growth for offshore providers. With changes in policy come a hit to offshore service providers, be it data analytics, cloud or SaaS. The persisting currency exchange problems are a dampener, which badly affects the margins and thus result in downsizing of staff. Thus, vendors would have to face reality and be ready to find alternative avenues to income generation. One way may be to find acquisitions by US and UK organizations.

5. AI-led automation. Machine learning would find a place in the commercial outsourcing process, with deep learning giving deeper insights to outsourcing mechanisms as well as driving costs down. Automation helps standardize, thus details of existing outsourcing deals could stand redundant and would see many renegotiation headed by intelligent automation.

6. Cognitive would witness concrete advancement. Although 2016 saw much talk and less concrete action in the cognitive intelligence environment, 2017 will seal it for cognitive-based solutions, especially platforms. Most of these may be more home-grown, instead of the present crop of outsourced ones. The new entrants would use the past references of certain case studies to establish themselves.

7. Defeat of the call center. The call center, an earlier prominent outsourcing function would lose its importance with the emergence of self-servicing tools as well as virtual assistants. Virtual agents would take over in the form of contract centers that cater to the queries and needs of customers.

8. Market consolidation. Most importantly, with all the policy changes that are shaking up the outsourcing ecosystem, one could expect a slew of mergers, spin-offs, acquisitions and renewed ways of working to take over. New policies ensure that some vendors will be driven out of business. Only those who comprehend and act on the changes would make it through.

THE NEED TO FIND INNOVATIVE WAYS

2017 is proposed to be the end of the outsourcing saga. The model that delivered a competitive edge to organizations and a cost advantage to customers, is set to cease. How organizations cope and bounce back is a matter of action and agility, at the right time and with the right business model. In the coming months, the smartest outsourcing service providers would find ways to commercialize and leverage these platforms.

For a software outsourcing service provider, it is important to learn to adjust and get used to the trends and factors that could affect outsourcing and use these trends and factors to meet client requirements.