Q3 Technologies review: Association with Q3 technologies 45

Q3’s customers benefit from highest levels of technology expertise in building business software solutions and products. Q3 has very strong competency in the entire range of Microsoft and Java suite of technologies. Q3 also has very strong expertise in Open Source Framework development as well as on the various Database technologies.

Microsoft Skill Sets
Languages and Technologies :
Microsoft .NET, ASP.NET, ADO.NET, C#.NET, VB.NET
Microsoft Visual Basic, ASP, VB Script, JavaScript
Windows DNA / .Net, SOA
XML/XSL, XSLT
SOAP, Web Services
Crystal Reports
Windows CE all versions . Pocket PC
Microsoft Visual C++, MFC
UML
DirectX 9
WinSock

JAVA Skill Sets
Languages and Technologies : Java, J2EE, JSP, Swing, Servlets, Spring, Struts, JUnit, Eclipse Plugins, RMI, Javascript, XSLT, HTML.

Web 2.0 : AJAX frameworks, Adobe Flex/Flash, Java Server Faces (JSF), Spring WebFlow, JBoss Seam.

Open Source Skill Sets
Languages and Technologies : C, Perl, Python, PHP, AJAX, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, DotNetNuke, ActionScript, Flex, VoIP

OS : Windows, HP, Linux, Solaris

CMS :Joomla!, TYPO3, Mambo, WordPress, dotproject, Moodle, Drupal, phpBB,
Mantis (Bug Tracking Tool), Live Help

CRM: SugarCRM

Database Skill Sets
RDBMS : SQL Server, Oracle, DB2, Informix, Sybase, MySQL, FoxPro, Postgre, SQL, Firebird, Teradata

Mobile Platforms
J2ME
Symbian OS
BREW
IPhone
Blackberry MDS
Palm OS
Windows Mobile/ Windows CE

Programming Languages and Tools :
J2ME
Wireless toolkit
Embedded Visual C++ and Visual Studio
Metrowerks CodeWarrior C++
BlackBerry JDE and Java /Pocket PC
PalmSource PODS and PRC-Tools (C/C++)
Embedded Visual Basic
CE .NET C# and VB.NET
Nokia Carbide.C++
Blackberry MDS Studio

Packaged Applications
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Enterprise Resource Planning
Supply Chain Management
Sage
Electronic Data Interchange
Providex
Quickbooks
AccPac
MS Dynamics
MS ActiveX

The team is excellent at communication. Q3 has tailored their processes to meet their client's demanding requirements. Q3's team has managed to always meet project timelines. Q3's level of performance and the ability to meet client requirements are truly exceptional. The prices are also very competitive.

Q3 Technologies has been in software development/ consulting services business for over fifteen years and offers services in software development, maintenance, quality assurance and product documentation services to technology driven organizations all over the world. The development centre of the company is located in India and has over 300 software engineers and architects providing full lifecycle product development services to its our worldwide clients. The focus of Q3 Technologies through the years has been a 100% on software product and applications development and it has worked in mission critical and very high quality environments. Q3 Technologies is Microsoft Certified partner and is in the process of being certified as an ISO9001:2000 company and appraised at CMMi Level 3.

Q3 technologies started the year with two important back to back tradeshows – India Soft 2009 and CeBIT. Both tradeshows are now done with 11 prospects and customers. At Q3 tech we believe in aggressive marketing and continue to invest in our future and the results are showing. We have signed four new customers in the last one month in Kyrgyzstan, Germany, and the US.

CeBIT is the world's largest trade fair showcasing digital IT and telecom solutions for home and work environments. The key target groups are users from industry, the wholesale/retail sector, skilled trades, banks, the services sector, government agencies, science and all users interested in technology.
Q3 reported a successful participation at CeBIT 2008 with interesting enquiries being received from countries in not only Europe but also Africa, Latin America, the Middle East and PAC region.
Q3 technologies also participated in IndiaSoft 2009. IndiaSoft provides the IT companies an excellent platform to showcase their IT products and services. Exhibitors like Q3 technologies use this platform as a launch pad for their latest products. This was a 2 day IT event that had the largest presence of Indian Tier 2 and 3 IT and ITES companies with innovative IT products & services. Q3 had a successful show and significant interest was generated from visitors who wanted to outsource their technology and product development requirements from our company.
Different companies from Colombia, Australia and Chile, visit Q3’s office in Gurgaon and all these visits were very productive and fruitful. At Q3 tech there are many more prospects that are continuing to materialize with and add more customers in the coming months.

In addition to providing access to new customers and markets, and gaining more visibility into the global business scenario, the most important validation that these events and business trips has provided is that Q3 tech is one of the best, technology consulting and outsourcing company in India in the mid segment. Each employee at Q3 technologies adds value to the organization and to the teammates by getting competitive and achieving greater heights. A number of companies have already shut down in places like Bangalore, others are struggling and many will not make it. And those like Q3 tech who do will be living in a new reality where real businesses will expect real work from people and companies that can deliver. Those that cannot will not last. Every employee at Q3 technologies makes sure that they do everything possible to make each customer and each project a success.

My experience with Q3 technologies has been an extremely positive one. I am fortunate to work for a company like Q3 technologies that I can be proud of. Q3 technologies is a company where you can be creative and suggestions are always welcome. I can boast of a long association with Q3 and not even once did I feel otherwise. The confidence that the management instills in its employees furthers the morale of its workforce tremendously.

The company is headquartered in Boston and has offices in Dallas, New York, UK and Germany with development centers in Massachusetts, Michigan and India. The company was established in 1996 and is one of the leading global IT/ software service providers. Q3 Technologies is a Microsoft certified partner. It’s offshore software product development and software engineering processes have been awarded the prestigious CMMi level 3 and ISO-9001:2000 certifications.

The recent economic slowdown was so swift and dramatic that many companies had to find ways to trim their outsourced product development costs in a hurry. While the big companies could move to scale up their lower cost offshore design centers rather quickly, the smaller companies were without that option. Unable to find a quick and economical way to implement their dream projects, many startups were forced to shut down. Still others signed contracts with limited third party product developers in low-cost geographies only to realize that outsourced product development is easier said than done.

Occasionally, customers discuss their experience in outsourced product development with companies, almost always noting failures by both parties. Like everything else, there’s a process for successful outsourced product development, and lack of enforcement will lead to expensive mistakes. Any outsourced product development project has several stakeholders, starting with the management of both the product and service companies. But the key stakeholders are the VP and Director of Engineering in a product company and the Technical Lead and Project Manager in a services company; their experience and skills can make or break the engagement.

It’s important to know the business model of your partner for outsourcing product development. While many companies make available qualified engineers, tools, and infrastructure, they sometimes do not take delivery responsibility for the product. The product development almost always involves hardware and software. While it’s much easier to have everything done by the same vendor, one must also consider their capabilities in both areas separately. In any case understand the business model and their fit to your requirements.

Outsourcing product development requires extensive documentation, much more than when doing it internally. Since it is a contractual arrangement, it requires very detailed documentation. Lack of adequate documentation is one sure way to end up in failure. Full documents are the requirements before the actual work starts and all the way through completion of the outsourced product development project.

Success in outsourcing product development is not obtained through black magic. It is the ultimate fruit that is harvested after the long process of careful and planned implementation of the various components that go into the execution of a project of outsourced product development.

Q3 technologies, Inc. is a complete IT solutions company, providing software development and IT services to corporations. Q3 Technologies helps clients improve their business performance. By successfully managing applications for its clients in various industries around the world, Q3 is a proven technology partner to help businesses and government agencies succeed. specialists for every aspect of software development – specification, scope verification, analysis, architecture, component design, UI design, development, testing, quality assurance, documentation, and support.

Some of the benefits of outsourcing your product development to Q3 technologies.
-> Workforce Flexibility and Availability of highly skilled resources
-> Accelerated development schedules and Faster time to market
-> Improved Quality of Service and On Demand technical expertise
-> Full Software Lifecycle Support
-> Lower costs and capital expenses

Q3’s customers benefit from highest levels of technology expertise in building business software solutions and products. Q3 has very strong competency in the entire range of Microsoft and Java suite of technologies. Q3 also has very strong expertise in Open Source Framework development as well as on the various Database technologies.

Product Engineering- The Key Ingredients for a Successful Recipe
Software product engineering involves a host of activities such as analyzing system requirements, estimating development requirements, preparing the architecture of the product, designing the software, implementing the code, incorporating the components, and finally testing the software to make sure that it satisfies client requirements. There are several contributing factors besides skilled programming and project management that lead to successful product engineering. Some of these factors are:

a. High level of commitment from the people involved in the product engineering process is a pre-requisite
Commitment and dedication of the people involved is a key ingredient in the product engineering process. It requires uninterrupted attention. Only dedicated resources should be involved in product engineering services.

b. The engineers must get clear and concise requirements from the client
The engineers must demand clarity of the requirements in order to bring client’s ideas to life. Whoever has a stake in the product must have a clear idea of which stage the product is in. This will ensure that the engineers head towards a definite direction. Developing a meaningful product should be more important than meeting deadlines.

c. Superior team work and communication is a must for top-quality product engineering services
Product engineering requires excellent team work. The team members should communicate freely with one another in order make sure everyone is on the same page. Asking questions and the right questions at that is a must in order to get a clear picture on how to engineer the product. Regular team meetings and updates also help.

d. Advance Feedback on the Software Helps
It is a good idea to get feedback from real users of the software. Amendments are easier and cheaper to make if the requirements come in at an early stage of product engineering. Feedbacks from different quarters provide a scope for reality check of the product before it is released.

e. Step by Step Approach
A step by step approach should be followed in the product engineering services. Trying to do things simultaneously affects the product engineering process adversely. Changes in the requirement is a given in product engineering services, however, planning ahead for the changes rarely helps. It is better to take care of the changes once the client requests for them instead of planning ahead.

Outsourcing Software Development – Way to your Software Solutions

The success of any outsourced project depends on many factors; Companies are looking to outsource their software development projects to India and Indian Companies are becoming a profitable choice for them. This is because they, being a mid sized and growing custom software development companies, understand their client's business process very well and can then convert it into IT solutions, thereby fulfilling the client's needs and requirements.

Outsourcing Software development is a complex job, highly technical and fast-changing. To fully adapt, even the first Fortune 500 companies go offshore outsourcing of their software needs. In a business environment that changes quickly, where competition is keener than it seems, speed in the accomplishment of tasks, as well as quality of inputs are vital factors that need not be compromised

Outsourcing Software Development services in India have the creative talent and technical expertise to accommodate your company's web development needs. Any company can save about 40% of its expenses by outsourcing project overseas. There is no doubt that it is a most effective way to stretch your budget. Many organizations use Outsource Software Development projects to India to reduce their costs.

Outsourcing software development needs will obliterate the rigorous and expensive process of manpower selection and deployment. Routine tasks that take up more time away from the concentration of efforts on competencies that can bring about more revenues for the company can be outsourced. As higher priority is accorded to core functions, your company earns more market advantage against its competitors, while maintaining its technological upper hand, through the expertise of your outsourced software developers. Offshore outsourcing of software development favors small-scale companies that have just started, and as much as possible scrimp on anything that pertains to cost.

The traditional approach to outsourcing development projects typically follows a single strategy. You begin by negotiating a contract, which may be based on previously defined requirements or may include the effort of gathering, documenting and validating fresh requirements. The Outsourcing service then works to your requirements to develop the system. Regular communication helps resolve potential misunderstandings.

The success of any outsourced software development project depends on many factors; Companies especially in US and Canada are looking to outsource their software development projects to India and Indian Companies are becoming a profitable choice for them. This is because they, being a mid sized and growing custom software development companies, understand their client's business process very well and can then convert it into IT solutions, thereby fulfilling the client's needs and requirements.

Once, outsourcing software development was about replacing my guys with your guys and saving some money. But that is changing, at the local and global level. The old strategy doesn’t acknowledge the investment that a software house, or any organization that uses software to leverage its market position, has already made in its own intellectual property. Now it’s like outsource the software development and move my guys into client-facing and strategic roles that add more value to the organization.

Outsourced software development is not really too different from in sourcing, except that the challenges can be magnified by physical distance. Essentially, however, it’s about the need to balance the triangle of people, technology and process. A key ingredient for successful project execution is solid development and management processes. These reduce fear, uncertainty and doubt by codifying strategy and providing transparency to the company outsourcing the software development at every stage.

At Q3 Tech, face to face meetings are held at all time, usually in the form of daily Scrums, pair programming, iteration retrospectives and iteration planning. In distributed software development teams, many times the onshore managers travel offshore to hold meetings with the offshore team, or in other circumstances, managers from offshore travel onshore for meetings. One important influence depends on the offshore person visiting the onshore team to absorb the project details and develop/foster relationships. He should take this know-how from the onsite team in a way that he is knowledgeable enough to answer many questions raised by his offshore team. In addition, he should be also capable of relating to his team members about the decisions that were taken in his meetings with the onsite team. Depending upon the complexity of the project, a member of the onsite team, with good knowledge in business logic is often sent to work offshore.
In implementing Q3 Tech’s projects, a series of processes are utilized. The software development process is not just a single approach. In implementing software offshore development, there are some principles that are followed, these are as follows -

➢ Customer satisfaction is achieved by rapid and continuous delivery of useful software.

➢ Quick delivery of working software within weeks rather than months

➢ The principle measure of development progress is derived from the working software

➢ Any changes in the software may be incorporated later

➢ Necessity in having face to face communication for better understanding

➢ Maintain close relationships between the business people and the developers

➢ Motivation and trust on the individuals make the project implementation successful.

➢ Apply continuous attention to the project design, and try to attain technical excellence.

➢ Adapt fast to changing circumstances.

It was found that the iterative framework brought benefits to Q3 software development vendors. By this approach, the customers could make payments after each iteration. By paying this way, the customer does not lose or be in a risk to pay for the whole lot after the completion of the project. This brought in commitment from the customer to provide the vendor with better business and motivates the vendor to consider each iteration important. The method of continuous feedback and communication helps in the offshore software development process, but the approach of short iterations has proved to be especially successful.

Business intelligence is a broad category of applications and technologies for gathering, storing, analyzing, and providing access to data to help enterprise users make better business decisions. BI applications include the activities of decision support systems, query and reporting, online analytical processing (OLAP), statistical analysis, forecasting, and data mining.

Business Intelligence becomes effective when it provides insight and helps you predict outcomes. Business Intelligence helps you track your mistakes, control your present and forecast future results based on your business decisions. Business Intelligence gives the maximum benefit to customers in terms of cost savings, improved quality, access to highly talented professionals, flexibility of operations and reduced time to market. Business intelligence services are driven towards customer’s current and future needs in mind, providing feature-rich solutions that are built on standard technologies. BI services have helped customers and partners increase productivity and efficiency by transforming data into actionable information.

Business Intelligence solutions can:

• Reduce total cost of managing and delivering information
• Support self-service access to information for employees, partners and clients
• Promote collaboration/workflow
• Automate legacy processes
• Reduce cost of business operations

Some of Business Intelligence Services are:

• Reporting - Reporting gives you access to a complete list of report types. With the reporting capability, you can personalize the style and quality of Business Intelligence delivered to your key stakeholders; and you expand the community of business intelligence users.

• Analysis – The analysis solution in BI enables the guided exploration of information that pertains to all dimensions of your business, regardless of where the data is stored. Analyze and report against online analytical processing (OLAP) and dimensionally aware relational sources. With the analysis capability, you can personalize the style and quality of business intelligence delivered to the client. OLAP tools such as Hyperion are geared towards slicing and dicing of the data. As such, they require a strong metadata layer, as well as front-end flexibility.

• Dashboards - Business dashboards communicate complex information quickly. They translate information from your various corporate systems and data into visually rich presentations using gauges, maps, charts, and other graphical elements to show multiple results together. Dashboards — operational, tactical, and strategic — help you monitor, measure, and manage corporate performance.

Online Marketplace – A Real Boom in the Market

Summary - An e-marketplace is a virtual online market where organizations register as buyers or sellers to conduct business-to-business e-commerce over the Internet. Web-based trading exchanges are the e-hot e-spots for buyers and sellers to meet and conduct business, from simple catalog presentations to, in the future, fully integrated back-office transactions.

Description – The Internet has dramatically changed how people sell and buy goods. In recent years we have seen the emergence of electronic marketplaces that leverage information technology to create more efficient markets like online auctions to bring together buyers and sellers with greater effectiveness at a massive scale. Despite the growing interest in and importance of such marketplaces, our understanding of how the design of the marketplace affects its use is still quite limited. There are many types of e-marketplace based on a range of business models. They can be operated by an independent third party, or be run by some form of industry consortium that has been set up to serve a particular sector or marketplace.
Services offered by e-marketplaces include electronic catalogues for online purchasing of goods and services, business directory listings and online auctions. Online exchanges, also known as trading hubs, are websites where buyers and sellers trade goods and services online. Online exchanges vary according to the size and number of companies using them and the type of commodity traded. There are already successful exchanges in markets as diverse as energy, textiles and logistics.

There are different types of online exchange, each catering for a specific aspect of trading:
• Request for quotation - an invitation to suppliers to provide a quote for a specific product or service
• Request for bid - an invitation to buyers to bid for a specific product or service that you are able to provide
• Commodity exchange - an ongoing process where the price of a standardized commodity such as energy or

telecoms bandwidth continuously changes as a result of changes in supply and demand
Like online auctions, online markets allow participants to trade straightforwardly with a wide variety of buyers and sellers. Two of the biggest factors driving the growth of exchanges are that large businesses can use them to reduce stock holdings while small businesses can bid collectively to earn volume discounts or to jointly deliver a large contract.

Q3 technologies has developed websites for many online Marketplaces.

Today, we are experiencing the greatest technological advantages of all time, and yet at the risk of loosing all we have built over the centuries. Shift in technological approach from manual to automated system, standalone to unified database, traditional software technology to open source technologies, static to dynamic website applications development, in-house to offshore software development outsourcing business solutions, more advancement in technologies and infrastructure, equipment, search engine optimization, internet marketing for websites promotion and a long list to go. Remember, with advancement and up gradation in technologies complexity is increasing and it is not an easy task to deliver a scalable solution.

In Offshore Development, you don't have direct contacts (face to face) with the clients. So the contact with the client must be made through internet e.g. E-mail, chatting etc. In offshore software development, first of all you need to organize everything that is required for the project.

Your first step is to collect the information from the client, such as what is the purpose of the offshore project that he needs to get developed, ask him to provide you vital statistics of the project. Also get the details of the system that already exists and need to make changes in that. If yes, then concentrate on the drawbacks of the old version so that you can overcome those and provide better solution to them.

Understand the requirement properly and have discussion on that. Create a list of software and hardware that will be required for the offshore project under development at your end. As an offshore developer, you must have to take care about the time required for the development of the offshore project.
The reason why offshore software development outsourcing services taken lead in the global market place is the improved access to IT skills and resources and reduction in IT investment are the profit that leads India the most preferable destination for Offshore Software Development Outsourcing. No doubt, ERP is one of the hidden forces to count on as ERP development has provided globally integrated system which makes very easy to locate functions anywhere in the world. Collaborative effort of all the developers, programmers, investors and clientele has made our offshore software development outsourcing services, a great success. Our technology practices include innovation, new implementation, continuous improvement in technologies, managing processes.

The most successful offshore software development companies are competent and flexible, and see their role as an information technology partner who solves your software problems, supports your team, and manages your projects from beginning to end.

Q3 technologies is an offshore product development company

INDIASOFT 2009 opens a plethora of opportunities for Exhibitors as well as IT Buyers globally looking for innovative outsourcing IT services & solutions including KPO, BPO. LPO, Banking, Finance, Insurance, Telecommunications, Media & Entertainment, Bio Informatics, Engineering Design, Travel, Hotel, Hospitality, Logistics, Transportation, Educational, Pharma, E Governance, and much more...under one roof.

There were around 100 Indian IT Tier II and III companies displaying a world of IT innovations and around 200 IT buyers from 50 countries for business networking. Visit INDIASOFT 2009 for the growth of your enterprise.

Q3 technologies exhibited at Indiasoft 2009

Q3 Technologies are an IT solutions company, providing software development and IT services to corporations worldwide. It offers world-class offshore services and solutions to Enterprises and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). The company caters to the consumer goods, industrial controls, high technology, pharmaceutical and process segment. It offers full life cycle product development, testing, maintenance and support services. It recently made inroads into the European market by signing up new clients in Italy and the Netherlands. It also signed six new clients in the quarter ending 30th June 2007.

Q3 conducts extensive cross-cultural training of staff, including cultural acclimatization, client business and organization overview, technical environment and client specific processes and effective communication, with the client. It encourages teamwork combined with individual initiative and creativity.

Q3's provides outsourced product development and software engineering services to some of the most quality conscious and mission critical environments in the world. This includes small and medium size software product companies as well as some of the largest IT companies across various lines of business.

Industries

Life Sciences

Healthcare

Telecom

Logistics & Fleet Mgmt.

Manufacturing

Financial Services

ISVs

Retail

Insurance

My association with Q3 has been very special. Working at Q3 technologies has been very satisfying. It has offered me tremendous opportunities for my personal learning and growth.

Q3 is like a second home for me. The atmosphere prevalent in the organization adds to the spirit of its employees, to be more motivated and result-oriented. The way the Q3 management conducts itself gives enormous confidence-boost to all its employees. Flexibility, Friendly work-culture, Emphasis on individual growth and opportunity to work on latest technology makes it a great place to work. Enablement, Exposure and Empowerment practice has ensured proper grooming and balanced development of resources.
To conclude, my experience with Q3 has been great.

My experience with Q3 Technologies has been great. I have seen the company grow many folds and through many facets. I am fortunate to work for a company like Q3 technologies that I can be proud of. My co-workers are not only extremely talented, but are easy-going and approachable. Everyone made me feel very comfortable from day one. Q3 tech is a company where you can be creative, and suggestions are always welcomed. I wish ‘Q3 Technologies’ all the very best of luck for future and earnestly want to be contributing in its coming successes.

Industry trends show that companies that have been asking the question ‘why outsource’ have become vocal advocates of the offshore model. Outsourcing work has come to be a tried-and-tested model and is recognized as a long term competitive strategy for success. The question going around now is not ‘why outsource?’ but ‘why not outsource?’ A surprising feature of outsourcing is that its momentum is continuing even after the red-hot economy of the millennium has simmered down.

Enterprises have discovered that it’s always a good time to outsource. Current Economic Growth is high and Major Developing Countries like India is Booming the outsourcing Industries right now. During this economic Growth, demand for business transformation and scarce IT skills drove outsourcing. The present economic decline has brought cost reduction back to the top of enterprise agendas, and outsourcing can provide this benefit.
Whether it involves designing network infrastructure, setting up a help desk, rolling out a new messaging system, or building an on-line business application, outsourcing can contain costs and risks, allowing IT service expenses to grow in a more linear fashion than is possible by building up an all-purpose in-house IT staff.

Software Outsourcing Development can give you the Benefits of:

• Reduce overheads, free up resources

• Avoid capital expenditure Improve efficiency

• Offload non-core functions

• Get access to specialized skills

• Save on manpower and training costs

• Reduce operating costs

• Improve speed and service

• Establish long-term, strategic relationships with world-class service

• providers to gain a competitive edge

• Enhance tactical and strategic advantages

• Focus on strategic thinking, process reengineering and managing trading partner relationships

• Spread your risks

• Provide the best quality services, products and people

• Be reliable and innovative

• Provide value-added services

• Increase customer satisfaction

• Avoid the cost of chasing technology

• Leverage the provider's extensive investments in technology, methodologies and people

• Benefit from the provider's expertise in solving problems for a variety of clients with similar requirements.

• Focus scarce resources on time-critical projects such as application reengineering

• Obtain needed project management and implementation consulting expertise, along with access to best practices and proven methodologies

• Reduce the risk of technological obsolescence and increase efficiency by consolidating and centralizing functions

• Keep pace and minimize the impact of rapid changes in applications and standards

• Extend the reach to more trading partners quickly and efficiently
Reduce the overall IT management burden while retaining control of strategic decision making.

Despite outsourcing having come into a lot of controversies in recent times, industry watchers predict that outsourcing as a business practice is on a growth mode. More and more companies are drawing up plans to outsource work to offshore locations. A major success have been Achieved by small and medium IT sector of technologies Companies. The trend is clearly in favor of outsourcing larger volumes of work. Vendors are moving up the value chain to include in their service offering a range of additional services that require greater skills, research support and expertise. As offshore vendors become more streamlined and improvise on the offshore outsourcing model, it is not difficult to see why outsourcing is here to stay.

The highly flexible open door culture of the organization and ample career growth and learning opportunities culminate into a motivated, collaborative team of people who always do the right things in the right manner to deliver excellent results for your projects. Q3 teams have demonstrated perfect synergy surpassing customer expectations every single time.

It's been quite good experience for me while working here in open, friendly & flexible work environment. Everybody is co-operative and believes in Team Work to achieve the excellence in work. Performance is measure of success and sky is the limit to grow but we need a platform to perform and grow, which Q3 definitely provides. I am playing various roles and getting working & learning opportunity on latest technology while working at different stages for Software Development Life Cycle. I feel proud to be associated with Q3 technologies.

Q3 technologies offers Search Engine Optimization Services

Search Engine Optimization can be defined as the activity of optimizing web pages or whole sites in order to make them more search engine-friendly, thus getting higher positions in search results. SEO is a hyper-competitive enterprise that requires intense focus and a thorough, up-to-date understanding of how the search engine algorithms and robots activate. Search engine rankings are essential to the success of your business on the Internet.

We at Q3, stand to announce ourselves as a reputable SEO company which promises guaranteed SEO services at cheap and affordable price. We specialize in increasing the traffic to your website by increasing your position in the search engine rankings. Our search engine ranking experts work diligently with you to meet and exceed your company's marketing needs. Search Engine Marketing is one of very few affordable methods currently available for achieving highly visible First Page Placements on the Major search engines like Google and Yahoo networks along with Local Internet Marketing and Targeted Email Marketing for Small Businesses and Medium size businesses nationwide.

We apply our established SEO Services so that your website achieves that same high level of success. Our Professional Search Engine Optimization Solution Includes:

• Website Optimization - Website optimization is an art of placing your website in top ten rankings of major search engines for a strategically defined & researched set of keywords. Affordable Website promotion and optimization of your site leads to high ROI by high ranking in search engines and increase in targeted traffic to your website thus resulting in more leads and sales.

• Directory Submission - Our directory submission services include manual directory submission services, fast submission to directories, anchor text. We never submit the site through automatic software’s which is counted as spam by all the major search engines. Search engines give importance to the number of inbound links to your site and from web directories you get one-way inbound links. When you submit your links to web directories they allow you to enter a site title (site title is different from the URL) that can contain your keywords. This generates SEO anchor text for you and this helps you in improving your search engine rankings. Quality links increase the highly targeted traffic to your website; increases search engine rankings, non reciprocal links from directories to your website.

• Link Building Services - Our Link building Services provide a unique customized solution for improving your site's link popularity. Quality link building requests will improve your website’s ranking. We specialize in placing text links on high quality websites. Text links are unique as these links are a direct source of targeted traffic to your website and can raise your organic search engine rankings. Link building is quite difficult, highly frustrating and very time intensive. We want to serve you to save money and your valuable time by offering affordable SEO Services to increase link popularity.

• On-page optimization Services - Website Optimization requires fine tuning of the content on your website. The main services in on-page optimization includes keyword analysis, building keyword rich content, html coding, building rich content, creation of optimized meta tags and implementing various search engine submission methodologies. The content must be fine tuned. At Q3, we do a thorough keyword research for a specific website, and then optimize the content on the basis of these keywords and theme of website. The content is implemented with clean html coding. We use well defined alt tags for images and defining suitable headings and titles in the Meta tags.

• Social Media Optimization – We use various means of social media optimization for clients. It is necessary for any online business to know about the behavior pattern of online users. It helps to reach the target audience. We’ll do market research, where you are operating and undertake different methods that will be helpful in taking your business to the top. Our team of content writers can write optimized content for your website and this would help you in spreading the content throughout the web. We focus on the core aspects of Social Media Optimization, which increases your linkage capacity through fresh, informative and eye catching content, making tagging and book-marking easy through implementation of Social Bookmarking buttons on your blogs and important pages, rewarding inbound links to your website. From an SEO standpoint, Social Media Optimization, if done in the right way, can provide you with benefits like traffic to your site, a good number of quality back-links and an increase in page ranking.

• Competitor Analysis - The next step in the process is for us to see what your top competitors are doing when it comes to search engine optimization. We look at their links, from where their links are coming, and what keywords they have decided to optimize for their websites. This will give us a significant edge over your competitors, because we can get results for your website by monitoring your competitor’s activities. We can create this edge by improvising on those strategies and keeping your website above your competitor’s websites in search engine results.

In addition to the above search engine optimization solutions, we provide other Internet marketing services including: search-friendly web design, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising campaigns, link building programs, SMO services, blog optimization and marketing, targeted local search marketing, and mobile marketing optimization etc.

Q3 technologies is a workplace with an open environment and a healthy work culture where work is fun and not a job. It has been a wonderful experience for me to be associated with the company for such a long period.

Q3tech is one of the finest software development organizations of the country. Environment in Q3 is very conducive for working and seeing your efforts fructify into meaningful entity. The guidance and support that I receive from my superiors from time to time has been enriching my experience I have gained tremendously in terms of continual learning and professional satisfaction at Q3 technologies.

Sharing local resources on Remote desktop
Most of the people are using remote computers from client site or within the company. Do you know that you can access local drives and printer from remote machine? Below is the information to access your printer and disk drives.
Open Remote Desktop Connection, click Start, point to Programs or All Programs, point to Accessories, point to Communications, and then click Remote Desktop Connection.
To make your local dives and printer available in a session
1. In the Remote Desktop Connection window, click Options.
2. On the Local Resources tab, under Local devices, click Printers for printer and Disk drives for local drives
3. Click Connect.
Now you can copy or paste data from remote machine to local drive, just open my computer on remote machine you will see local drives and printer in printers section.

Helpful Tech Tips.

Displaying Two time zones:-
Often, we work with two time zones, one with ours and other of clients’. The meetings or the calls that we schedule too are fixed based on the time zones of the clients/vendors or for that matter, the prospective attendants.
The process of displaying two time zones in Microsoft Outlook is as below:
1. In your Microsoft Outlook, click on Tools menu -> Options -> Calendar Options -> Time Zone
2. Select the Show an additional time zone check box.
3. In the Label box, type a description. Usually, this is filled in with the name of the place.
4. In the Time zone box, list the time zone you want to add.
5. It will display additional time zone in the Outlook Calendar

Installing Region specific Holidays
If you are working with US, UK or any other global client, its good to be aware of national holidays in that region. To display these holidays in outlook Calendar you need to fallow below mentioned steps

In Outlook go to Tools -> Options -> Calendar Options -> Add Holidays and choose India or United Kingdom or United States or any other country from the list. Clicking OK will install selected holidays and will be displayed in the Calendar.

Today is my last day in Q3 technologies. I wanted to take a moment to thank Q3 for everything. I have enjoyed my 2 years tenure here in Q3 technologies and I appreciate having had the opportunity to work with Q3. Thank you for believing in me all the time, support, guidance, and encouragement you have provided me during my time at Q3. Even though I will miss my colleagues and the company, I am looking forward to this new challenge and to starting a new phase of my career. I have learnt a lot of things, which I will remember forever.

It was indeed a great experience in working with you all. There were moments of success and failures and I had learnt lot from them. I am leaving with a good note of thanks and satisfaction. I wish all at Q3 a great success in the years to come.

I would like to give my special thanks to the HR department at q3 technologies. My releiving formalities went absolutely smoothly because of HR people and i faced no problems in getting relieved from Q3.

I will be continuing my journey in the same industry and look forward for opportunity to work together and hope to be in touch with you all.

My experience to this day has been great. Here an individual can grow along with the company and can see his long term future with Q3 Technologies. The kind of stability I was looking for, I got here in Q3 Technologies. Here we have excellent people to work with. All I can say “Q3 Technologies is truly a squad of achievers”.

I am very proud to be part of the Q3, where challenges never cease to end. And to be provided with freedom, respect, friendly culture, inspiration to innovate, motivation to excel and improvise. Finally to be appreciated and recognized by the organization is extremely satisfying. In simple words to put it across "A place to be @ work where success thrives.

AUTOMATED TESTING– ADVANTAGES and DISADVANTAGES-

"Automated Testing" is automating the manual testing process that is currently in use. This requires that a formalized "manual testing process", currently exists in the company or organization.
Automation is the use of strategies, tools and artifacts that augment or reduce the need of manual or human involvement or interaction in unskilled, repetitive or redundant tasks. Minimally, such a process includes:

• Detailed test cases, including predictable "expected results", which have been developed from Business Functional Specifications and Design documentation
• A standalone Test Environment, including a Test Database that is restorable to a known constant, such that the test cases are able to be repeated each time there are modifications made to the application.

The following types of testing can be automated:

• Functional - testing that operations perform as expected.
• Regression - testing that the behavior of the system has not changed.
• Exception or Negative - forcing error conditions in the system.
• Stress - determining the absolute capacities of the application and operational infrastructure.
• Performance - providing assurance that the performance of the system will be adequate for both batch runs and online transactions in relation to business projections and requirements.
• Load - determining the points at which the capacity and performance of the system become degraded to the situation that hardware or software upgrades would be required.

Benefits of Automated Testing

1. Reliable: Tests perform precisely the same operations each time they are run, thereby eliminating human error.
2. Repeatable: You can test how the software reacts under repeated execution of the same operations.
3. Programmable: You can program sophisticated tests that bring out hidden information from the application.
4. Comprehensive: You can build a suite of tests that covers every feature in your application.
5. Reusable: You can reuse tests on different versions of an application, even if the users interface changes.
6. Better Quality Software: Because you can run more tests in less time with fewer resources
7. Fast: Automated Tools run tests significantly faster than human users.
8. Cost Reduction: As the number of resources for regression test are reduced.
9. Choosing the right tools for the job and targeting the right areas of the organization to deploy them can only realize these benefits. The right areas where the automation fit must be chosen.

The following areas must be automated first-

1. Highly redundant tasks or scenarios.
2. Repetitive tasks, those are boring or tend to cause human error.
3. Well-developed and well-understood use cases or scenarios.
4. Relatively stable areas of the application over volatile ones must be automated.

The Automated testers must follow the following guidelines to get the benefits of automation:
• Concise: As simple as possible.
• Self-Checking: Test reports its own results; needs no human interpretation.
• Repeatable: Test can be run many times in a row without human intervention.
• Robust: Test produces same result now and forever. Tests are not affected by changes in the external environment.
• Sufficient: Tests verify all the requirements of the software being tested.
• Necessary: Everything in each test contributes to the specification of desired behavior.
• Clear: Every statement is easy to understand.
• Efficient: Tests run in a reasonable amount of time.
• Specific: Each test failure points to a specific piece of broken functionality; unit test failures provide "defect triangulation".
• Independent: Each test can be run by itself or in a suite with an arbitrary set of other tests in any order.
• Maintainable: Tests should be easy to understand and modify and extend.
• Traceable: To and from the code it tests and to and from the requirements.

Disadvantages of Automation Testing

Though the automation testing has many advantages, it has its own disadvantages too. Some of the disadvantages are:

1. Proficiency is required to write the automation test scripts.

2. Debugging the test script is major issue. If any error is present in the test script, sometimes it may lead to deadly consequences.

3. Test maintenance is costly in case of playback methods. Even though a minor change occurs in the GUI, the test script has to be rerecorded or replaced by a new test script.

4. Maintenance of test data files is difficult, if the test script tests more screens.

Some of the above disadvantages often cause damage to the benefit gained from the automated scripts. Though the automation testing has pros and corns, it is adapted widely all over the world.

TIPS FOR MORE EFFICIENT GOOGLE SEARCHES
For millions of people, Google is an indispensable search tool that they use every day, in all facets of their lives. From work or school, research, to looking up movies and celebrities to news and gossip, Google is the go-to search engine.

But instead of just typing in a phrase and wading through page after page of results, there are a number of ways to make your searches more efficient.

Some of these are obvious ones, which you probably know about. But others are lesser-known, and others are known but not often used. Use this guide to learn more about, or be reminded of, some of the best ways to get exactly what you're looking for, and quickly.
Either/or. Google normally searches for pages that contain all the words you type in the search box, but if you want pages that have one term or another (or both), use the OR operator -- or use the "|" symbol (pipe symbol) to save you a keystroke. [dumb | little | man]
Quotes. If you want to search for an exact phrase, use quotes. ["dumb little man"] will only find that exact phrase. [dumb "little man"] will find pages that contain the word dumb and the exact phrase "little man".
Not. If you don't want a term or phrase, use the "-" symbol. [-dumb little man] will return pages that contain "little" and "man" but that don't contain "dumb".
Similar terms. Use the "~" symbol to return similar terms. [~dumb little man -dumb] will get you pages that contain "funny little man" and "stupid little man" but not "dumb little man".
Wildcard. The "*" symbol is a wildcard. This is useful if you're trying to find the lyrics to a song, but can't remember the exact lyrics. [can't * me love lyrics] will return the Beatles song you're looking for. It's also useful for finding stuff only in certain domains, such as
educational information: ["dumb little man" research *.edu].
Advanced search. If you can't remember any of these operators, you can always use Google's advanced search.
Definitions. Use the "define:" operator to get a quick definition. [define:dumb] will give you a whole host of definitions from different sources, with links.
Calculator. One of the handiest uses of Google, type in a quick calculation in the search box and get an answer. It's faster than calling up your computer's calculator in most cases. Use the +, -, *, / symbols and parentheses to do a simple equation.
Numrange. This little-known feature searches for a range of numbers. For example, ["best books 2002..2007] will return lists of best books for each of the years from 2002 to 2007 (note the two periods between the two numbers).
Site-specific. Use the "site:" operator to search only within a certain website. [site: dumblittleman. com leo] will search for the term "leo" only within this blog.
Backlinks. The "link:" operator will find pages that link to a specific URL. You can use this not only for a main URL but even to a specific page. Not all links to an URL are listed, however.
Vertical search. Instead of searching for a term across all pages on the web, search within a specialized field. Google has a number of specific searches, allowing you to search within blogs, news, books, and much more:
o Blog Search
o Book Search
o Scholar
o Catalogs
o Code Search
o Directory
o Finance
o Images
o Local/Maps
o News
o Patent Search
o Product Search
o Video
Movies. Use the "movie:" operator to search for a movie title along with either a zip code or U.S. city and state to get a list of movie theaters in the area and show times.
Unit converter. Use Google for a quick conversion, from yards to meters for example, or different currency: [12 meters in yards]
Types of numbers: Google algorithms can recognize patterns in numbers you enter, so you can search for:
o Telephone area codes
o Vehicle ID number (US only)
o Federal Communications Commission (FCC) equipment numbers (US only)
o UPC codes
o Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) airplane registration number (US only)
o Patent numbers (US only)
o Even stock quotes (using the stock symbol) or a weather forecast regarding the next five days
File types. If you just want to search for .PDF files, or Word documents, or Excel spreadsheets, for example, use the "filetype:" operator.
Location of term. By default, Google searches for your term throughout a web page. But if you just want it to search certain locations, you can use operators such as "inurl:", "intitle:", "intext:", and "inanchor:". Those search for a term only within the URL, the title,
the body text, and the anchor text (the text used to describe a link).
Cached pages. Looking for a version of a page the Google stores on its own servers? This can help with outdated or update pages. Use the "cached:" operator.
Answer to life, the universe, and everything. Search for that phrase, in lower case, and Google will give you the answer .
Moreinfo:
For more on Google's search syntax, see this one.
http://www.googleguide.com/using_advanced_operators.html

Copy - paste stopped working?
Some time while working on Remote Desktop, you may discover that your clipboard has stopped working. You try to copy something to the clipboard, and it's not there. You try to paste something from the clipboard, and nothing comes out. What's going on?
If you find yourself in this situation, and you want your clipboard back, you'll have to either restart your remote session/machine or just follow below mentioned steps on your computer:
Click Start menu -> Select Run -> and Type “services.msc” (without quotes). System services window opens. Now look for “ClipBook”, “Network DDE” and “Network DDE DSDM” services and restart these services.
Now try copy and paste again, it must be working now.

Skype Tips
Display your time to other users on skype
When you click on any user in skype list you can see current time at his location. This time is important for clients too. By knowing your time he can manages meeting with you in working hours or so. Showing incorrect time may be confusing. So lets see how to set correct time. Open Skype -> Go to File menu and select option “Edit your Profile” – Now see for Checkbox “Show my Time” – make this check box on and select correct time zone from dropdown, e.g. for India select GMT +5:30 and click on Update button to save changes. Now from other user’s login you can check that correct time is displayed with your user name in the skype list.

Simple way to Group Chat or Conf call in skype
You must know that you can call or chat with multiple peoples using skype by starting call with one person and then adding others. The simplest way to do this is open skype press Control (CTRL) key from keyboard and now selects skype users just by mouse click from the skype list. Now right click on selected users and select option “Start Group Chat” for group chat or “Start Conference Call” for conf call.

How to know that your skype Microphone and speakers working correctly?
Some time you may faced situation that you are trying to call client and you or your client is not able to hear you and you might thinking that your skype Microphone or speakers are not working properly. But not sure and need help of IT team…
You can make sure that your skype Microphone and speakers are working or not. Just search for “Skype Test Call” in your skype contacts and call that contact. If you are able to call this contact and hear correctly then skype with microphone and speaker working fine else you need to check microphone and speakers.
Note that “Skype Test Call” remains offline but when you call it it gets online. If you don’t see this contact then you can add this contact by searching for skype name “Echo123”

10 Simple Ways to Speed Up your Windows XP

1. Disable Indexing Services

Indexing Services is a small little program that uses large amounts of RAM and can often make a computer endlessly loud and noisy. This system process indexes and updates lists of all the files that are on your computer. It does this so that when you do a search for something on your computer, it will search faster by scanning the index lists. If you don't search your computer often, or even if you do search often, this system service is completely unnecessary. To disable do the following:

Go to Start
Click Settings
Click Control Panel
Double-click Add/Remove Programs
Click the Add/Remove Window Components
Uncheck the Indexing services
Click Next
2. Optimise Display Settings

Windows XP can look sexy but displaying all the visual items can waste system resources. To optimise:

Go to Start
Click Settings
Click Control Panel
Click System
Click Advanced tab
In the Performance tab click Settings
Leave only the following ticked:
Show shadows under menus
Show shadows under mouse pointer
Show translucent selection rectangle
Use drop shadows for icons labels on the desktop
Use visual styles on windows and buttons
3. Speedup Folder Browsing

You may have noticed that everytime you open my computer to browse folders that there is a slight delay. This is because Windows XP automatically searches for network files and printers everytime you open Windows Explorer. To fix this and to increase browsing significantly:

Open My Computer
Click on Tools menu
Click on Folder Options
Click on the View tab.
Uncheck the Automatically search for network folders and printers check box
Click Apply
Click Ok
Reboot your computer
4. Disable Performance Counters

Windows XP has a performance monitor utility which monitors several areas of your PC's performance. These utilities take up system resources so disabling is a good idea.

To disable:

download and install the Extensible Performance Counter List

Then select each counter in turn in the 'Extensible performance counters' window and clear the 'performance counters enabled' checkbox at the bottom.button below

5. Improve Memory Usage

Cacheman Improves the performance of your computer by optimizing the disk cache, memory and a number of other settings.

Once Installed:

Go to Show Wizard and select All

Run all the wizards by selecting Next or Finished until you are back to the main menu. Use the defaults unless you know exactly what you are doing

Exit and Save Cacheman

Restart Windows

6. Optimise your internet connection

There are lots of ways to do this but by far the easiest is to run TCP/IP Optimizer.

Download and install

Click the General Settings tab and select your Connection Speed (Kbps)

Click Network Adapter and choose the interface you use to connect to the Internet

Check Optimal Settings then Apply

Reboot

7. Optimise Your Pagefile

If you give your pagefile a fixed size it saves the operating system from needing to resize the page file.

Right click on My Computer and select Properties

Select the Advanced tab

Under Performance choose the Settings button

Select the Advanced tab again and under Virtual Memory select Change

Highlight the drive containing your page file and make the initial Size of the file the same as the Maximum Size of the file.

Windows XP sizes the page file to about 1.5X the amount of actual physical memory by default. While this is good for systems with smaller amounts of memory (under 512MB) it is unlikely that a typical XP desktop system will ever need 1.5 X 512MB or more of virtual memory. If you have less than 512MB of memory, leave the page file at its default size. If you have 512MB or more, change the ratio to 1:1 page file size to physical memory size.

8. Run BootVis - Improve Boot Times

BootVis will significantly improve boot times

Download and Run

Select Trace

Select Next Boot and Driver Trace

A Trace Repetitions screen will appear, select Ok and Reboot

Upon reboot, BootVis will automatically start, analyze and log your system's boot process. When it's done, in the menu go to Trace and select Optimize System

Reboot.

When your machine has rebooted wait until you see the Optimizing System box appear. Be patient and wait for the process to complete

9. Remove the Desktop Picture

Your desktop background consumes a fair amount of memory and can slow the loading time of your system. Removing it will improve performance.

Right click on Desktop and select Properties

Select the Desktop tab

In the Background window select None

Click Ok

10. Remove Fonts for Speed

Fonts, especially TrueType fonts, use quite a bit of system resources. For optimal performance, trim your fonts down
to just those that you need to use on a daily basis and fonts that applications may require.

Open Control Panel
Open Fonts folder

Move fonts you don't need to a temporary directory ( e.g. C:FONTBKUP? ) just in case you need or want to bring a few
of them back. The more fonts you uninstall, the more system resources you will gain.

11 Ways to Protect Your System
In addition to installing the client-related products, we recommend that you follow these simple, common-sense precautions to reduce your exposure and protect your system.
1. Do not open e-mail attachments from an unknown, suspicious, or untrustworthy source. If you're not familiar with the sender, do not open, download, or execute any files or e-mail attachments.
2. Do not open an e-mail attachment unless you know what it is, even if it appears to come from a friend or someone you know. Some viruses replicate themselves and spread via e-mail. Stay on the safe side and confirm that the attachment was sent from a trusted source before you open it.
3. Do not open any e-mail attachments if the subject line is questionable. If you feel that the attachment may be important to you, always save the file to your hard drive before you open it.
4. Delete chain e-mails and other spam from your inbox. It's best not to forward or reply to messages like these. Unsolicited, intrusive mail clogs up networks, may contain annoying or offensive content, and may result in security and privacy risks.
5. Exercise caution when downloading files from the Internet. Make sure that the Web site is legitimate and reputable. Verify that an anti-virus program has checked the files on the download site. If you have any doubts, don't download the file at all. If you download software from the Internet, be especially vigilant of free software, which often carries adware or other potentially unwanted content along with it. Be especially wary of screensavers, games, browser add-ons, peer-to-peer (P2P) clients, and any downloads claiming to be “cracked” or free versions of expensive applications, such as Adobe® PhotoShop® or Microsoft® Office. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
6. Avoid downloads from non-Web sources altogether. The chances of downloading infected software from Usenet groups, IRC channels, instant messaging clients, or P2P is very high. Links to Web sites seen in IRC and instant messaging also frequently point to infected downloads. Avoid obtaining your software from these sources.
7. Update your anti-virus software often. Threats are on the increase, and they are constantly evolving. Hundreds of viruses are discovered each month. To make sure that you are protected against the newest breed of threats, update your anti-virus software frequently. That means downloading the latest virus signature files and the most current version of the scanning engine.
8. Back up your files frequently. If a virus infects your files, at least you can replace them with your back-up copy. It's a good idea to store your backup files in another secure physical location away from your computer.
9. Update your operating system, Web browser, and e-mail program on a regular basis. For example, you can get Microsoft® security updates for Microsoft® Windows® and Microsoft® Explorer at http://www.microsoft.com/security.
10. Do not open messages or click on links from unknown users in your instant messaging program. Instant messaging can be a vehicle for transmitting viruses and other malicious code, and it’s another means of initiating phishing scams.
11. Change passwords regularly for your windows accounts. Trojan Worms can begin using your common passwords to breach into your systems and shared folders and infect files and make your and IT’s life miserable within minutes.

List of do’s and don’ts

DO Smile it costs nothing and is always appreciated!

DON'T ignore people even when you don't want to talk, be friendly when
some says "Hello"!

DO make people feel important. Make each person feel that they
are special!

DON'T Brag! No one likes a person who is full of him or her!

Be an honest person!

DO have sense of humor! Laugh and people will laugh with you,
cry and you cry alone!

DON'T always have problems, troubles or always need help,
or you will soon be alone!

DO encourage people! Tell others what you like about them
or when they are doing well.

DON'T criticize or cut down people, even yourself!

DO have an interest in many things. Be an interesting person!

DON'T grab the best, biggest, and most for yourself
give others a break!

DO meet, strangers, it's hard. You can make a great friend
by being friendly to someone you might not know!

DON'T make fun of others when they make a mistake
or do something dumb!

DO help others when they have a problem
and share what you have with others!

DON'T have a bad temper, or be an angry person
looking for an argument or fight!

DO look good, clean, neat, & well groomed!

DON'T blame others for their mistakes or worse, for yours!

DO keep a confidence. If someone tells you something
keep it to yourself!

DON'T be too cool! Cool people are never popular people,
they are too cool!

DO listen and be an encourager!

DON'T over correct people!

DO take a joke and be a good sport!

DO remember names!

DON'T be loud and obnoxious! DO be yourself.

DO thank people!

...AND BE FRIENDLY!

Common business courtesies:

 Be on time. Respect other people’s time. Do not keep people waiting or take more than your allotted time.
 Keep promises and commitments, and your word.
 Return calls within 24 hours.
 Compliment publicly for a good job done, but not for personal, intimate issues, like a lovely hair-do, unless you know for certain that it will be acceptable.
 Reprimand in private.
 Thank all – even those who are paid for the service – for a favour or a courtesy offered.
 Do not use bad language.
 Do not take family to official functions if they are not invited.
 Do not run down anyone, in particular, an in-house colleague or a business competitor.
 Do not bypass the line of command.
 Do not brag, but do be proud of what you have achieved.
 Do not gossip, or involve yourself in office politics or personal gossip.
 Demonstrate respect in an appropriate manner, both verbally and non-verbally.

Cultivate healthy habits
All of us want to live a full life, look young, healthy and fresh and have the energy to attend to our needs till our last breath. This need not be just wishful thinking if only we remember that all it takes is a little care and a few healthy habits that we should follow all our lives.

o Excessive fat intake leads to addition of empty calories that only harm our body. Calories from fat should be under 30% for good health.

o Increase the fiber content in you meals. This means more nutrition especially if you include complex carbohydrates like whole grains and fresh fruits in your daily intake.

o Are you drinking enough water? This is an oft repeated advice – especially the bit about a minimum of eight glasses a day – but it does go a long way in getting rid of toxins even while it aids in digestion.

o Exercise, exercise, exercise. This cannot be repeated enough. No time for a structured exercise? No problem! Just go for a brisk daily walk to strengthen those bones.

o Did you know that intake of refined carbohydrates will lead your emotions on a roller coaster ride? Any high glycemic foodstuff is actually a nutritional disaster as it will only lead you a merry dance between high energy and bouts of fatigue. You will end up depressed and emotionally spent.

o If the salt content in your daily diet is high, rest assured that it will lead to complications of high blood pressure and water retention.

o If you take supplements, see to it that they are of good quality that will help to prevent diseases and help in the slowing down of ageing.

o Try and get rid of all negative habits like smoking, coffee addiction or alcohol.

o Being overweight leaves you open to umpteen complications. Try and maintain an optimum weight instead of sudden dieting followed by bingeing which will only strain your body.

o Prone to stress? Do what it takes to distress yourself and think yourself to happiness. Remember, you are just about as happy as you make your mind up to be.

Be Specific of What You Ask For!

A man walks into a restaurant with a full-grown ostrich behind him. As he sits, the waitress comes over and asks for their orders.

The man says, "I'll have a hamburger, fries and a coke, " and turns to the ostrich, "What's yours?"

"I'll have the same, " says the ostrich.
A short time later the waitress returns with the order. "That will be $6.40 please, " and the man reaches into his pocket and pulls out the exact change for payment.

The next day, the man and the ostrich come again and the man says, "I'll have a hamburger, fries and a coke, " and the ostrich says, "I'll have the same." Once again the man reaches into his pocket and pays with exact change.

This becomes a routine until late one evening, the two enter again.
"The usual?" asks the waitress. “No, this is Friday night, so I will have a steak, baked potato and salad, " says the man, "same for me, " says the ostrich.

A short time later the waitress comes with the order and says, "That will be $12.62." Once again the man pulls exact change out of his pocket and places it on the table.
The waitress can't hold back her curiosity any longer.
"Excuse me, sir. How do you manage to always come up with the exact change out of your pocket every time?"

"Well, " says the man, "several years ago I was cleaning the attic and I found an old lamp. When I rubbed it a Genie appeared and offered me two wishes. My first wish was that if I ever had to pay for anything, I would just put my hand in my pocket and the right amount of money would always be there."

"That's brilliant!" says the waitress. "Most people would wish for a million dollars or something, but you'll always be as rich as you want for as long as you live!"

"That's right. Whether it's a gallon of milk or a Rolls Royce, the exact money is always there, " says the man.

The waitress asks, "One other thing, sir, what's with the ostrich?"

The man sighs, pauses, and answers..."My second wish was for a tall chick with long legs...who agrees with everything I say"

10 Health Commandments

Here are 10 Health Commandments that have survived the test of time.

1) Exercise Your Body
• There is no need to climb mountains as Moses did, but if you don't use it, you'll lose it.
• A famous physician once wrote, " If exercise came in a pill bottle, it would be the most widely prescribed medicine of all."

2) Exercise Your Mind
• A sound mind in a sound body...
• Again, if you don't use it, you will loose it. Read. Write. Go back to school. Exchange ideas. Be creative. Be reflective.
• Learn something new everyday. Share what you learn with others.

3) Exercise Your Spirit
• Read inspirational and/or scriptural works. Don't be afraid to be open and loving. Give -- and allow others to give to you.
• Be sure there's a balance in your life :
- time alone
- time with one other person
- time with two or more other people ( group activities )

4) Exercise Your Willpower
• Examine your habits - the ones you want to develop, and the ones you want to change. Then, set goals and make those changes.

5) Have a Happy Heart
• Laugh. Live. Create. Share surprises.
• Help others find joy and purpose in their lives.

6) Play
• Schedule time for pure play, and
• Find ways throughout your day to have fun.

7) Eat, Drink and Be Merry - Sensibly
• Don't eat or drink or do anything else to excess.
• Don't smoke cigarettes or use harmful drugs.
• Don't take stupid chances.

8) Give Up Guilt, Regret and Depression
• Let go of the past and move on!
• Decide what's wrong (not who's wrong), and take action.

9) Fear Not the Future
• The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time.
• The future's not totally in your control, but if you take care of today, most of the future will take care of itself.

10) Live Now
• Learn from the past. Plan for the future. Live in the present.
• Love others (and yourself) appropriately - now. Look for leaders (living, dead or imagined) who are worthy of admiration and imitate their good qualities.
• Pursue and preserve healthy relationships; you become like those you are with.

Ten Things To Always Remember….
And One Thing To Never Forget.

Your Presence is a Present to the World.
You’re truly one of a Kind.
Your Life can be what you want it to be.
Take the days one at a time.
Count the Blessings, Not your troubles.
You’ll make it through, whatever comes along.
Within you are so many answers.
Have courage.
Be Strong.
Wish for a Star.

And don’t ever forget how very Special You are.

A large labour pool with multi-lingual skills, proximity to the Middle East and Europe, and a deep cost advantage vis-a-vis the US and Europe are factors making countries such as South Africa attractive offshore destinations for Indian back office and tech service providers.

Companies that are eyeing or have presence in both countries include all the major players including HCL Technologies Ltd, Wipro Ltd, Infosys Technologies Ltd and Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
HCL, which had put together a team three months ago to assess the business process outsourcing climate in Africa, has already picked Cape Town and Johannesburg to set up back-office units, details of which will be finalized soon.

“We have zeroed in on these two locations, but the business plan, the scale and size and all other details will be finalized by (an)#8195;internal committee, ” said a company executive, who did not wish to be identified.

Wipro and Infosys declined to comment on their Africa plans, but an industry representative said both firms are exploring the possibility of setting up operations there.

“Representatives of Infosys and Wipro have visited South Africa to invest there, but the process is still at a very nascent stage. Wipro is looking at setting up a manufacturing facility there, ” said Shipra Tripathi, director, Africa desk, at business lobby Confederation of Indian Industry.

Satyam Computer Services Ltd, which serves six of the largest firms in Africa, already counts more than 120 workers at customer locations in offices at Johannesburg and Cape Town.

The Hyderabad-based firm said in July that it plans to strengthen its presence in South Africa over the next two to three years to leverage untapped business opportunities and local employees.
TCS already has operations in both Johannesburg and Cape Town with 100 employees, and is in the process of setting up a global delivery centre in Morocco.

Other Indian tech and back-office companies are also speaking to government officials in African countries to understand the market there.

“Indian tech companies, such as Satyam and TCS, have approached us about possible investments... Other big outsourcing companies, such as Genpact and Convergys, have also been provided with information, ” said Ray Ngcobo, chief director of the industry development division at South Africa’s department of trade and industry, in an email.
The main interest in Africa is likely to come from business process outsourcing firms—rather than tech services—thanks to language skill access and time zone advantages, especially to serve European customers. “We are in the same time zone as Europe and one hour ahead of the UK, ” wrote Ngcobo.

Besides South Africa, Mauritius, Egypt, Ghana and Morocco are relatively mature destinations from a BPO perspective while Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, Tunisia and Uganda are the upcoming destinations.
Offshore BPO services in Egypt, that provide large skilled multi-lingual workforce—English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Hebrew and Russian—contributed around $150 million (Rs615 crore) in 2005 and have been gaining momentum since then, according to a joint report by researcher Everest Research Institute and consultant AT#8195;Kearney.

The number of offshore agents has doubled since 2005 and is currently at more than 5, 000, the majority of them working from Cairo and Alexandria.

South Africa has four key BPO locations—Johannesburg, which has more than 360 contact centres, Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth. Many of the big global tech and BPO firms such as IBM Corp., Microsoft Corp., Accenture Inc., Sun Microsystems Inc., Electronic Data Systems Inc., Unysis Corp. and Siemens AG operate from South Africa.
Africa is also emerging an attractive destination to play host to tech service delivery centres. According to the government-sponsored Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council, export of computer software and services, together with BPO services to Africa, increased from $96 million in 2005-06 to $164 million in 2006-07. “The South African market provides substantial opportunity in software products for banking, insurance, e-governance, telecom, power, healthcare, ” says D.K. Sareen, executive director at the council.

i-Flex Solutions Ltd, a provider of banking and financial software solutions, has cut its teeth in the African market two decades ago and counts at least 100 banks there among its clients. “Africa is mineral rich and certain parts are oil rich, which means there is huge potential for trading, which (in turn) requires a strong financial system and product, ” said a company spokesperson.
The untapped tech labour pool in Egypt and South Africa will likely drive more investment towards these regions than elsewhere in Africa, predicted Nikhil Rajpal, vice-president, global sourcing practice at Everest Research Institute.

“In the first quarter of 2008, we will be expanding to Cape Town with another 15 people offering similar services and will also be setting up a 300-seater disabled call centre in Johannesburg in the same period, ” says Sandeep Sekhar, chief executive and chairman. “Last year, our revenues from Africa were less than 10%. This year, over 20% of will come from South Africa.”

Offshore windfarm scheme revised

Amended plans have been put forward for an offshore windfarm off the north Wales coast, cutting the area where turbines would be built by 20%.

Npower renewables said it would mean a "significant reduction in the visual impact" of the Gwynt y Mor scheme.

The proposals for 200 turbines about 15km (nine miles) off Llandudno have run into opposition, and First Minister Rhodri Morgan wants a public inquiry.

Work would begin in 2010 if approved by the Department of Trade and Industry.

Npower renewables, which submitted its initial application in November 2005, has said the development would generate enough electricity for 500, 000 homes, and prevent about two million tonnes of carbon dioxide being released each year.

A protest group called Save Our Scenery has claimed it would spoil the area, although there have also been demonstrations in favour.

The call for a public inquiry was made by Mr Morgan shortly before the Welsh assembly election in May.

Conservatives said they also wanted an inquiry, and both Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats said during the campaign that the final decision should be devolved to the assembly, rather than made by the DTI.

The developer is now submitting revised plans to the UK government and other organisations, along with new environmental information.

The firm said it had responded to consultation by carrying out extra work "to clarify the potential environmental effects of the project and the measures which can be taken to minimise them".

Npower said its further design work would reduce the effect on the view at a points, including those from Conwy mountain, and at Llandudno from the Great Orme and the promenade.

Mark Legerton, the company's offshore development manager, said: "We appreciate that the visual impact of the wind farm is a concern for some.

"As such we have taken steps to reduce this significantly by making the area in which the turbines will be built 20% smaller than was originally proposed.

"The decision-makers should now have all of the information that they need to determine whether the project should be granted permission, and we hope that a decision will be made before the end of the year."

The new information will be sent to local councils across north Wales and Merseyside, as well as local MPs and AMs. It will be available for public viewing from Wednesday.

Were you caught off guard by the recent wave of selling that swept across Wall Street? Did it leave you with unexpected losses? It might be time for some correction protection.

It seems talk of a correction seems to be picking up steam.

Only one day ago TD Securities strategist Stephen Koukoulas told CNBC.com, “our hunch is that the stock market will have a significant pullback in the next six months.”

Investment strategist Subodh Kumar told us he expects a 10 to 15 percent correction in the nearer term. And on Fast Money, the founder of hedge fund T2 Partners Whitney Tilson revealed a substantial number of short positions based on a similar belief. Considering Thursday's market action all these guys may be onto something.

If we're about to embark on the next leg lower, how should you protect yourself?

The next financial meltdown will be in the currency markets, as central banks around the world have been printing money, giving the appearance of massive government intervention to weaken their currencies, legendary investor Jim Rogers, chairman, Rogers Holdings, told CNBC Wednesday.

RELATED LINKS

Current DateTime: 08:59:27 21 May 2009
LinksList Documentid: [protected]
Faber: Capitalism Could Fail
Dr. Doom: Money-Printing Caused Rally
Pros Say: Go East, Investor
Slideshow: World's Safest Banks

"At the moment I have virtually no hedges, I suspect it is going to be the next problem, big crisis will be in the currency markets, I'm trying to figure out what to do there, " Rogers told "Squawk Box Asia".

Rogers has bought the yen [JPY-TN 94.09 -0.30 (-0.32%) ] because he expects the Japanese currency to withstand future problems, but he does not have short positions in any currency and is currently not buying the yen any more.

"I'm certainly not short in the dollar — not at the moment, although it may be the peak. We may have come to the peak, " he said. "I don't plan to own the yen forever, because you know the Japanese, Japan has some huge problems down the road."

For the moment currencies may look safer than anything else in the markets, as stocks may face a new bottom since they were artificially lifted by the amount of money created by central banks, but there are pitfalls ahead, he said.

"If I am right, you're going to see a lot of currency problems in the next decade or two, " Rogers said.

"Governments around the world are doing their best to destroy currencies, many currencies in fact. And people need to understand that; if they don't understand it now, they're going to find out, they're going to find out the hard way, " he added.