Management » Software

How Software Asset Management Can Help You Save Money

lma — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 22:48:27 +0000

Simply put, Software Asset Management is a business process that can help you reduce your licensing costs and optimize your software assets. The business benefits of Software Asset Management are:

Reduce software licensing costs – only purchase/renew licenses for software that is used. Track all your license rights, such as upgrade, downgrade and transfer rights to optimize the way you account for and use your software assets.

Reduce help desk costs – on average, 50% of the time spend troubleshooting computer issues is spent on obtaining the computer configuration

Minimize unauthorized software usage, security risks – SAM empowers you to use the right software for you. Ensuring that your employees are using only authorized software helps increase productivity and avoid security risks.

Reduce business and legal risk due to not meeting regulatory requirements, or not complying with software vendor license agreements.

Better negotiation capabilities with your software vendors – knowing exactly what you have and what you need, as well as the number of licenses you need and your current license rights puts you in control in your next license negotiation.

Software Asset Management can help you reduce your overall software licensing costs by only purchasing software that you use and need, organize your licensing assets and keep track of your licenses agreements, terms and renewal dates. It is a process that helps you know which software is installed and used across your enterprise, and minimize unauthorized software usage. You can use it to better manage your software assets from a business perspective, reduce the cost of software licensing and improves your software asset utilization.

credit card settlement

Ups Software: Manage Your Ups For Optimized Performance

lma — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 19:18:03 +0000

UPS software is a specific product meant for automatic detection of UPS utility failure and low battery disaster. This software automatically winds up the computer when it detects an instant power failure or on detection of low battery warning. Now UPS monitoring software is an integral component of vital power protection installations worldwide. This software helps the experts to implement a centralized access of remote UPS through Ethernet with SNMP protocols and optimize battery run time to support the critical network and communications equipments attached together.

The UPS Monitoring Software works on well known TCP/IP protocol to regulate the running and monitoring of the sophisticated systems across the broad potential range of operating systems and software networks. The UPS Monitoring may easily be tailored in accordance with user\’s requirement for event scheduling and networking broadcasting. Where computer reliability is crucial- conditioned, backed up power is the only choice.

The UPS software accommodates several tailored development tools and utilities that allow monitoring software to manage integrated systems by a single UPS with no additional hardware. The status screen of the software led to the options to monitor lapsed and remaining battery time, accumulated battery voltage, charging status of battery and in-line voltage of the equipments. With the help of this software you can increase the life of your appliances.

Some well defined UPS software are designed to recover crucial application files when system shuts down or fell in hibernate mode directly. In case of sudden blackout, it pops up info messages on the computer system through window messenger services. Story not ends here but during power failure this UPS software also maintains the log of the occurrence history and manages the countdown time on low battery situation. These UPS software will maximize the time period of power backup. The UPS software is can be customized according to the customer for server support.

One of the major functions of the UPS monitoring software is to monitor UPS functioning both in normal and back up mode. Automatic handling of the PC shutdown or server is also taken up by the programming mechanism of this software. Some UPS software is also managed input and output voltage handling, frequency analysis, and battery related levels for best optimized battery performance. Adjustment of low backup level, load level control, preference settings and backup time calculation is also done by efficient UPS Software.

Ups Software: Efficiently Managing & Monitoring The Ups

lma — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 17:04:27 +0000

In today’s world of electronics almost every devices require power to operate. To protect and maintain these electrical devices, UPS is commonly used. UPS is mostly used to provide backup power to computers because important data stored in the computer can be corrupted due to sudden power break down. Managing one or few computer is easy, where one can be conscious to immediately shut down the computer as soon as the power breakdown occurs. But in companies and offices it is not easy to manage hundred and thousand of computers. To efficiently manage such huge numbers of computers, UPS monitoring software is developed, which automatically detects the power failure and battery low condition.

UPS software is vital in implementing a centralized access of UPS, which is generally carried out through Ethernet and help to optimize the battery run time. UPS software is used to program the equipment shutdown in case of mains break down and it also monitors the proper functioning of the UPS from different clients. UPS software is used depending on the UPS model and as per the client’s requirement. Some of the common UPS software’s that are widely used include:

• Client Mate– Client Mate software is used with the UPS having SNMP card. An IP address is used to identify a UPS. This software also helps to monitor the status of any client in the network. Series of option such as sending e-mail and shutdown control can also be set.

• Win Power– Win Power, UPS software that provides a complete control of the UPS connected to PC or server. It also has the option of sending e-mail.

• UPSilon 2000– This UPS software monitors the UPS functioning both in normal mode and back-up mode. In case of mains fault, it alerts through e-mail and indicates the remaining time.

• WebPower– Monitors the UPS functioning through SNMP card and simple web interface. UPS is visible from the company’s entire network and every client can view the log files.

These well developed UPS software are used for many crucial applications such as recovery of application file in case of sudden system shut down or system directly falling in hibernate mode and it also pop up info message during power failure. It also maintains log of the occurrence history and in low battery situation, it manages count down time. Apart from these functions, UPS software also maximize the time period of the power backup, manages input and output voltage, frequency analysis and optimized battery performances.

UPS Control Software Easing Out Computer Management in Big Organizations

lma — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 06:31:45 +0000

Today computers are used in various establishments like Government and private sectors, educational institutes, iron and steel plant and also in heavy industries. The wide use of computer across different sector has also increased the demand of UPS. UPS is required to provide power backup to these large number of computers during sudden power break down. To manage these large numbers of computer operating simultaneously is not an easy job and in order to easily manage and control, UPS control software is developed to quickly detect the power failure and low battery condition. UPS control software provides user-friendly interface to monitor and control the UPS apart from providing safe shut down for various computers during power failure. With the help of this software one can also monitor and control any UPS on the same LAN.

UPS control software is well supported by various operating systems such as Linux, windows, Novell Netware, Mac OS etc. Developed using the latest technology, UPS control software is easy to install and are used according to the capacity of power needed. Software is required according to the model of UPS thus one should be careful while buying this UPS accessory. Hence the UPS and UPS control software should be purchased from the same single source. Online research will help one to buy quality UPS and UPS control software at competitive price. Some of the highlighting features of UPS control software include:

• Multi-platform compatibility- Due to this feature it is possible to monitor computers with different operating system from a single console.

• Event Scheduling- Some powerful UPS control software program their own shut down procedure maintaining power on and off scenario that further increase safety and power economy.

• Message Management- UPS control software keep the users constantly informed of the status of their local and network UPS.

Some of the most commonly used UPS control software is Win Power, UpSilon 2000. Client Mate, WebPower, Power Shield etc. Ups accessories play a vital role in improving the functionality and performance of the UPS. Adapters, cable converters, sensors and UPS control software are some of the important UPS accessories that are usually required for the proper functioning of the UPS. This qualitative software maximizes the power backup time and increases battery performance apart from effectively managing the voltage output. Quite a good number of UPS control software is developed for the proper functioning of the UPS that further enhance the performance of the computers.

Search-n-organize: State-of-the-art Low-budget Document Management Solutions

lma — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 08:02:16 +0000

http://www.artifactmanager.com/papers/ArtifactManager_Organize-n-Search.pdf

WHITE PAPER

Organize-n-Search

State-of-the-art Low-budget Document Management Solutions

“We are living in the information age… The information explosion…” We have heard it so many times that have stopped paying any attention to it. However, information penetrates into every aspect of our lives. We are constantly trying to acquire new knowledge and looking for opportunities to benefit from it.

Users who actively work with documents and information, frequently face the problems related to search, organization and efficient use of documents. Copyeditors, writers, journalists, researchers, analysts, consultants, lawyers, medical workers, students, all run into the same challenges at home and at work.

This paper is intended for a wide range of people, who, for personal or business need, work with a large number of documents and other information. We take a close look at the problems of information management, benefits of using advanced technologies in the low-budget personal information management system, as well as system selection criteria to meet personal and professional needs of information workers.

Challenges of Document Management

Nowadays big part of information is stored in a form of text: books, articles, reports, memo, notes, specifications, descriptions, whitepapers, and manuals, not to mention a huge amount of time sensitive information, such as invoices, bank statements, schedules, contracts, and tax returns.

Yesterday, papers, photo albums, music disks, and video tapes were kept in drawers, boxes, and cabinets. But the development of personal computers and Internet has started the era of digital information.

Development of electronic formats has significantly increased system storage capacity and allowed accumulation of large information volumes. However, recent developments in the fields of computer systems and data storage have led to a new question: how can we effectively manage digital information?

Recent studies by IDC (Susan Feldman, Joshua Duhl, Julie Rahal Marobella, Alison Crawford. The Hidden Costs of Information Work. March 2005) revealed that on average 13 hours of every 40-hour work week are spent on creating documents. 9.5 hours per week are spent on searching for information, while almost 9.6 hours on analyzing the information. 6.5 hours are wasted on searching for information that is never found leading to the need to recreate the content. Formatting of information between different applications takes about 3.8 hours per week, whereas version control related issues take 2.2 hours.

Issues, effects and implications of information management are summarized in the following Figure.

Issues

Slow search

Search without desired results

Redundant search

Recreation of documents

Difficulty of use of the found information

Effects

Employer

Unplanned for wasted time

Work slowdown

Decrease in productivity

Decline in quality

Employee

Increased workload

Negative attitude towards work

Decline in the level of satisfaction from the job

Implications

Missed deadlines

Project failure

Lost revenue

Loss of employee

Figure 1: Issues, effects and implications of information management

* What is the best way to organize the information to find it faster in the future?

* How to easily find information inside of large volume of materials?

* How to find documents that are related?

* How to save the search results and view them in the future?

* How to share found information with colleagues and friends?

* How to effectively use found information?

Importance and significance of those problems are major factors that stimulate the development of new solutions and information management systems. Information Retrieval, Data and Knowledge Bases, Document & Content Management, to name a few, are the branches of information technologies that deal with the problems of information management.

Solutions to Document Management Problems

Solutions to document management problems are tightly linked to the following challenges: improving the efficiency of information access, improving quality and speed of search, improving the efficiency of information processing, improving reliability and safety of storage.

Efficient Access to Information

It is necessary to quickly and easily extract the text documents which meet certain criteria from an array of available information. These requirements are diverse and constantly changing. For example, original sources for articles, data for reports, textbooks to prepare for the exam, patient’s medical records, or precedents for court case – all have high, but temporary value to resolve the pressing challenges.

After finding the required documents, working through them, and creating a number of versions, the user will need to consolidate and store the results. For example, one may need to save a set of documents, or add comments to a set of documents for future use. One possible solution to meet the changing needs is to place a document in several groups. A group could consist of documents on certain topic, papers of the same author, articles of the same journal issue, previous versions of the article, or materials used to write an article.

Searching and organizing information in a meaningful way takes up a lot of time. To shorten the cycle and make a process more enjoyable, a number of solutions have been proposed.

Quality and Speed of Search

In some cases users can find the documents they need by using a query – a word or combination of words that might be in those documents.

In the past, search required scanning of all files on the computer drives and going through their content comparing the key words with words in the document. This called for the sequential scanning of all files for each request. But increased size and number of files have dramatically slowed down the search process. In addition, morphology was neglected and multiple queries were needed to find the document.

Best solutions for effective search of information are based on search engines and information retrieval technologies. The entire collection of files is pre-processed and the information about the documents and key words is stored in the index files. Indexing works for various file formats and takes into account all possible forms of the same word. This “smart” pre-processing mechanism significantly accelerates the search and improves its quality.

Organization

In many cases the user is unaware of the words contained in the document of interest. It’s also possible that the user is not able to generate a query that returns desired outcomes, or the number of documents is too large, or some documents may not contain the right words. In these scenarios the user has no choice but manually look for a desired document. To save the results of manual search, many use the systems designed specifically for organizing the information.

Simplified versions of organization systems use fields and registration cards to link the documents and accompanying information (date, author, title, a brief description, etc.) However, field sets are fixed and limited, and often do not allow grouping of the documents to accommodate changing needs of the users.

Enhanced systems use a hierarchy of folders (catalogs, or directories). However, in most cases, when a document belongs to multiple topics, the user may end up facing several problems. For example, in the hierarchy of file system folders, a document can not be assigned to several folders without duplication. In this case, duplication may result in an unnecessary increase of information volume as well as inconsistencies in content after one of the documents has been modified.

Top notch tools to organize the information use multiple hierarchical categorizations which came from the domain of knowledge bases and ontologies.

Version Control

Authoring of a complex document is a long process and requires many edits, corrections and rewritings. To avoid confusion, it is necessary to maintain a history of changes in the document. The old-fashion solution was to save the changes in the separate file with a unique name, which often resulted in lost files, more storage space as well as difficulties in finding the right version of the document. These and other problems related to tracking the history of the content, storing different versions of the document, and returning to its previous versions have been addressed by the invention of the versioning systems. These systems are designed to provide access to the previous versions and history of changes.

Figure 2: Authoring a document

Effective Work with Information

Search, organization, and version control, by themselves, significantly simplify the process. But till now, most of these functions were only provided by separate software tools. The first program implements search. The second program organizes information. The third program edits it. The fourth program keeps version history. And so on.

A user has to run multiple applications, toggle between them, import and export documents, and move and copy the files. This process dramatically slows down the work, decreases productivity, increases pressure, and therefore leads to mistakes and reduces work satisfaction.

To eliminate unnecessary labor and reduce the amount of wasted time, one needs an integrated solution that combines search, editing and version control functionality.

Privacy, Security and Reliability of Storage

It goes without saying that information is a valuable resource that is expensive to produce. It is necessary to not only provide a safe storage for the entire set of documents, but also protect valuable information from computer hardware and software failures, as well as human errors. In addition, the confidentiality of information should be preserved – unauthorized users should not have access to the information without the permissions from the owner. However, if necessary, the results of the work have to be publishable to third parties.

Earlier applications stored files on the secure computers in a folder structure. Individual users had access to specific folders, which required a complex access rights management policy. Thus the information was often duplicated on the users’ computers, causing many problems related to information relevance.

To address the above mentioned problems, modern document management systems store information in centralized repositories, which make it easy to store, retrieve, manipulate and modify documents. Advanced repositories support storage and processing of multiple documents and file formats including, but not limited to: text (Word, Acrobat, Open Office, etc.), spreadsheet, fax, e-mail, audio, and images.

Documents, images and other information stored in the electronic repository are easily accessible and retrievable. The losses associated with errors in streamlining, organizing, and placing of the documents are drastically reduced and possibly even eliminated. In addition, each document keeps not only a history of who viewed it, made changes and what changes were made, but also other information about the document, such as title, contents, themes, etc.

Valuable Benefits of Document Management Systems

Thus, state-of-the-art information and document management systems

* reduce information processing time (multi-category systems allow for fast categorization of the incoming information and re-organization of existing information)

* reduce the time required to access the information (full-text search tools and category system, history and version control provide an easy and quick way to find information)

* reduce the time required to create a document (integration of search, organization, modification and version control features in a single platform allow the user to work on new and existing documents in a more effective manner)

* eliminate the cases of lost data (electronic repositories automatically capture all document changes and allow the user to restore the history of changes)

By leveraging a wide range of features provided by information management tools, one may free up the time normally spent on unnecessary tasks and focus on more important activities. As a result, the use of information management systems increases the quality of work.

Criteria for Selecting the Right Document and Information Management System

Flexible categorization: The system must support the categorization of documents to meet specific requirements of the user. To do that, the system should include the following features:

* Flexible categorization (user should be able to create any categories or topics and place the documents there)

* Hierarchical categorization (high level topics that consist of more specific topics)

* Multiple categorization (the same document might be included in several topics, categories or groups of documents)

* Ability to merge related files in a package

Flexible grouping that keeps the history of the results simplifies future access to documents inside of assigned topics, and allows one to see the relationships between documents found in one category.

Powerful search tools: The system should be able to perform a full-text search of information by query which contains individual terms or phrases. The search feature should

* be fast, which implies indexing

* support full-text search for all common formats – pdf, doc, odt, etc.

* take into an account the differences in spelling of various grammatical forms of the words

* work with individual repositories, categories and themes (topics)

The above mentioned features allow the user to effectively query the documents, provide a fast access to desirable documents, and make it possible to work on documents that have not yet been classified.

Central repository: The system should be able to store information in a centralized repository that allows:

* storing high volumes of documents

* creation of multiple personal repositories

* protection of confidential information

Documents in the system should not be viewable by other applications. Only the owner of the information should be able to grant the access to the repository. Repositories not only eliminate the need to manually create the files and directories, but they also restrict access to information, tighten security and improve reliability by providing backup, recovery and data protection tools.

Composite documents: The system should be able to work with the collection of files as a single unit, allowing the user to make changes to the set of documents. This functionality helps to improve usability and makes it easier to work with documents that consist of multiple files – for example, html documents with pictures.

Figure 3: Composite document

Document registration cards: The system should support the functionality of attaching useful information, such as name, purpose, abstract, comments, author, date of creation and modification, etc. to the document or file. This type of information helps to increase the accessibility of the documents. The information about the document should be flexible enough to adapt to the needs of the user and the information unit type.

Supported file types: The system should be able to support a wide range of common document types and formats, including Microsoft Office (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, etc.), Open Office, as well as the formats of scanned documents and images.

Versioning system: The system should be able to support multiple versions of the document, track history and changes in chronological order – who, when, why modified the document and which changes were made. If needed, this functionality enables the user to work on one of the previous versions of the document.

Navigation history: The system should record the sequence of events describing the steps the user took while working on the documents and have that information available to the user at any given time.

Easy-to-use interface: The system should provide a user-friendly interface that includes intuitive navigation as well as the panels displaying categories, history, versions, and search results. All of these will dramatically enhance user experience and therefore increase user satisfaction.

Modern technology and open architecture: The system should be built using the latest technologies. The architecture should be

* scalable – support an unlimited number of repositories, documents stored in a

* repository, categories and their levels, as well as a fast search through unlimited amount of information

* modular and expandable – provide a foundation for rapid development and fast delivery of new features requested by the users

* cross-platform – compatible with Windows, Linux, and MacOS operating systems

This allows the system to grow organically and reduce the time to deliver the new features to meet growing user needs.

Integrated solution: The user’s objective is an effective execution of her or his work. To accomplish this goal the user has to go through repetitive cycles of work with information and documents. These cycles may include:

* Gathering of the information for a document

* Analyzing information

* Creating the outline and the first draft of the document

* Placing the document to the repository

* Making changes to the document

* Preparing the document for future use

* Searching for other materials that will be used in a new version of the document

These phases are executed repeatedly to improve the quality of the document, bringing it to the desired results. A good system should be able to integrate the above mentioned features so that the user can complete the sequence of document development tasks in a single system. This implements agile document management.

Low cost of the ownership: Adoption of a document management system can save any organization millions of dollars. At the same time, the scale and broad functionality of corporate systems leads to the high cost of ownership unaffordable for personal users. It’s also important to note that a user might not need all the features available in a corporate system and therefore will only get overwhelmed by its complexity. The cost of a personal information management system should be low, but at the same time it has to provide the right set of features to match the needs of individual user. The system should be easy to install and run on any personal computer.

Artifact Manager

Artifact Manager is an advanced document and information management system. This simple, convenient, low-budget solution has all of the features of the enterprise information management system that helps to achieve higher productivity levels through a better management of personal documents and information.

Required Features Artifact Manager

* Flexible categorization Yes

* Powerful search tools Yes

* Centalized repository Yes

* Composite documents Yes

* Document metadata Yes

* Wide range of file types Yes

* Version control Yes

* History Yes

* User-friendly interface Yes

* Modern technology and architecture Yes

* Integrated soluton Yes

* Low-cost ownership Yes

Figure 4: Features of Artifact Manager

Artifact Manager is the first enterprise-class personal platform for document and information management. It combines a powerful search, flexible organization, reliable storage, and convenient interface in a single easy-to-use environment.

Download Artifact Manager now at

http://www.ArtifactManager.com/downloads.html

No obligation of buying, no cumbersome registration, no spam

http://www.artifactmanager.com/papers/ArtifactManager_Organize-n-Search.pdf

Event Registration Software- Effective Tool for Streamlining the Event Management

lma — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 19:09:21 +0000

Event registration is a tedious process in which an organization has to handle an event and organize the sponsors along with making a comfortable registration process for the event. Event registration seems to be a simple task that requires recording the names of people who wish to attend the event but in reality it is a complicated task and especially if the seats are limited of the event or the organizers are charging any fees for attending the event. Thus a highly professional and easy-to-use registration service should be developed to manage every task related to event registration. Today many companies use event management software to efficiently handle the task of event registration that also proves to be beneficial for the companies in many other aspects.

Benefits of Event Management Software

Event registration software helps to streamline the event management task to quite an extent. The numerous benefits associated with Event Management Software include:

• Eliminate paper work and reduce printing cost– With the help of Event Management Software, a company can completely avoid paper work, which was earlier required to carry out the registration work. The attendee interested in the event has to fill out a paper registration form and in response to their form the event staff would send them a conformation mail. In contrast with online registration the attendee immediately receives the confirmation mail as soon as he submits the form online. Pre-event marketing can also be successfully done with online event registration through the e-mail advertising campaigns, which proves to be more effective than postal advertising.

• Reduce manual work– Online event registration also reduce the number of hours the event staff have to spend for entering the details of the event attendee. With online event registration software the collected data will be automatically sent to the secure database for the further requirement. Collecting data from the paper forms will require lot of time and manual work to be done to efficiently organize the database. Event registration software automatically sorts and houses the data of the event.

• Accurate and Precise Attendee Information- With online event management software, data of the attendee is automatically added to the database and can be easily viewed for knowing the accurate information about the attendee. Knowing the exact shirt size and food preference of the attendee will not be a big task as online entry form will provide quick and accurate information about the attendee. Thus, this will eliminate any assumptions to be made regarding information about the attendee that will also result in saving good amount of money.