Did you think that Mainframes were a dry, humourless topic? Think again...at least in death the mainframe has given us a chance to laugh out ... LOUD, than ks to this video from Youtube - source, UoM. The video outlines an entire burial ritual, complete with tomb, priest, hymns and eulogy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEFPPeUJPEA&feature=player_embedded
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Indian Building Industry - Lack of Automation
Ask anyone who has occupied a new flat in Mumbai, about the level of satisfaction with quality of fittings and monitoring of quality of delivery and probably the response would be uniform - NOT SATISFIED. Right from taps exploding in faces once they are turned on, to incorrect installation of equipment - the woes would complete the veritable dictionary.
A lack of comprehensive focus on quality at the top management level percolates through to operational levels and results in air-brushing of the entire issue. An over reliance on manual labour in the industry, drags into the equation cases of individual interpretation over-riding corporate standards for various.
Lack of widespread usage of power tools and electronic aids leads to gaps in estimation and communication leading to inaccurate dissemination of information and loss of client satisfaction. The devil is in the details and the devil could very well be holidaying in Vegas if the builders' attention to detail is anything to base a premise upon.
I have recently moved into a new flat finished by an established name in the industry - and I am scared of actually opening a tap or closing too roughly a door too hard - for fear of the item losing its relevance and ending up in my hand in a non-servicable state.
Educating operational level staff about the importance of quality and how a delta improvement in quality leads to a butterfly effect realization of benefits at the customer end, is an important improvement area for the industry. This coupled with transparency and a slight flexibility at the builders' end as well as a focus on exploiting technology for creating open channels of communication can help the industry meet the expectations of a generation that is otherwise slowly getting used to being pampered by half hour turn-around times for requirements in various aspects of life.
A lack of comprehensive focus on quality at the top management level percolates through to operational levels and results in air-brushing of the entire issue. An over reliance on manual labour in the industry, drags into the equation cases of individual interpretation over-riding corporate standards for various.
Lack of widespread usage of power tools and electronic aids leads to gaps in estimation and communication leading to inaccurate dissemination of information and loss of client satisfaction. The devil is in the details and the devil could very well be holidaying in Vegas if the builders' attention to detail is anything to base a premise upon.
I have recently moved into a new flat finished by an established name in the industry - and I am scared of actually opening a tap or closing too roughly a door too hard - for fear of the item losing its relevance and ending up in my hand in a non-servicable state.
Educating operational level staff about the importance of quality and how a delta improvement in quality leads to a butterfly effect realization of benefits at the customer end, is an important improvement area for the industry. This coupled with transparency and a slight flexibility at the builders' end as well as a focus on exploiting technology for creating open channels of communication can help the industry meet the expectations of a generation that is otherwise slowly getting used to being pampered by half hour turn-around times for requirements in various aspects of life.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Open Source Possibilities
Frankly, its been a revelation to me. Long have I been an advocate of enterprise systems and have been pretty slow in appreciating the capability and penetration of systems that built on open source. These systems, shorn of blinkered enterprise development requirements, has me and I am now a fan. In areas such as IT security, web-conferencing solutions, document management, collaboration, social networking, operating systems and CRM, customers are now willing to actually evaluate the possibility of deploying open source tools and technologies, even though they may have already invested in formal enterprise systems of a similar nature. The business driver for such implementation being unrealized business benefits or complex and incomplete installation of enterprise applications.
Open Source is here to stay. Consultants will ignore open source at their peril, especially because of the lean economic scenario that we are enmeshed in now. As the tribe of open source proponents increases, so is the breadth of their imagination. I am waiting for the day, when a client actually asks me to scout for an ERP - built on the principles of open software, because they want to avoid license costs as well as the real killer - AMC.
Implementation costs on open source framework as well as support capabilities of vendors are the two concerns that consultants who prospect such solutions will have to factor in, during their due diligence. Currently, there is no metric to judge cost of development or maintenance for deployment on open architecture. Assurance of performance is another area that needs addressal as is a framework for risk assessment of projects that are using open frameworks. Once a rationale for this is crystallized, development and maintenance of complex enterprise systems will emerge into a new paradigm.
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