Category
UMsys
Today there is the "Anwendertag"
(User's day) for UMsys
in Munich. UMsys stands for Universal Management System.
It is a meta management framework, that has been used for environmental
management and eGovernment. UMsys is in the market for about 20 years.
Already then it had the notion of people, places and processes - with special
extensions for environment and government like substances, measurements
or regulations.
It started as a terminal application
build on Uniface
and Informix. Ten years ago I helped to design the revision from UMsys/3
to UMsys/4 moving to C++ and Oracle as client server application.
This year will see another two or threefold
transition. Since some
of our users move to Linux, the client application will move to .NET/Mono
or something
else. In parallel a web client
is under development. Here we opted to use open standards and leverage
on xForms
and XML. Our server runs on J2EE (Tomcat and Websphere have been tested)
and uses the Open
Presentation Server (OPS).
I will talk about OPS in March at Singapore's XML Standards day. Stay tuned
form more stories about environment, UMsys and xForms.
Category
UMsys
My paper was well received and I had some
good discussions with Asia's steel cookers. You can download the paper
from the download section of UMsys
Asia. I always thought that
steel is a boring topic and technology isn't improving. Attending some
of the sessions I learned, that the industry is actually progressing quite
fast and that you can produce steel today with less energy, in higher quantities
and with custom mechanical properties that were unknown 10 years ago. I
was very pleased, to see a transition from a pure cost based view of production
towards a value based approach. The steel companies also swiftly stepped
in and used their products for disaster relief. The pictures show were
light-years away from the tin huts we associate with steel based housing.
I spend the evening walking around one
of the lakes next to the hotel (took me more than 1.5 hours) and was pleasantly
surprised how buzzing the evenings were. The Hanoians use the coolness
of the night to meet and enjoy the evening with friends at the lake shore.
It almost felt like a holiday.
Category
UMsys
Off to Hanoi, Vietnam. I will speak
on the annual
conference of the South East
Asia Iron and Steel Institute (SEAISI).
It's my first time to Vietnam and my first time to meet Asia's steel barons.
I'm curious how selling care for environment, health, safety and quality
will be received by this audience.
I'm doing that at the Asia CTO of UMsys,
the Universal Management System (you'd guessed:) for environment, health,
safety and quality.
More about UMsys and Vietnam soon.
Stay tuned
Category
UMsys
Explaing UMsys to a quality manager.
Category
UMsys
What do you do in a country where big
US brands are a NO NO, but chicken fast food is a feasible business? Well
you name your business in such a way that it sounds like KFC when pronounced
in the local language. You also could borrow some decorative ideas <g>.
And NO I didn't test it. Our host gave us no chance to surrender to such
a temptation, but fed us with excellent food and entertainment.
And NO I wasn't there to talk about
nuclear fuel. I did attend the Management
Excellence conference in Tehran
as an exhibitor and key note speaker. You can download the presentation
from the UMsys
website.
Hospitality in Iran is outstanding and
the speakers had a good time presenting to a special audience. Special
in a sense, that using handphones or taking a break by walking out was
considered quite acceptable behaviour. It was also special for me, because
it was my first presentation with a translator. He was standing with me
on stage and translated and explained every sentence I made into Farsi.
Preparing for that gave another boost to clarity of my message.
The Iranian economy is quite interesting.
The workforce is VERY young. One of our hosts claimed 80% are below 30,
everyone wants to do business, most of them rather keeps the government
out of it (which is kind of difficult since the big industries like Oil&Gas,
cars, mining etc. are government dominated and everyone wants to improve.
I've seen very modern very advanced estates in Tehran and quite some outdated
stuff too. What differs from sights I'm used to other places are the drastic
contrast.
Carefully spoken (since I need to return
there). The fact that the population is rather young and the government
rather old, suggests that their might be at least generation tensions if
not more, that make a change in government without outer influence a possibility
that is not so out of this world.
Category
UMsys
If you can't make sense of the abbreviations
in the headline, you are in good company. They are the current buzzwords
in the electronic industry. It is not about the latest protocol or gadget,
it's about the new regulations regarding electronic goods and electronic
waste. In a nutshell: Manufacturers must not use lead or other hazardous
substances in production. The final owner of the product before it enters
the market (a.k.a. the brand) is responsible for compliance. It also means,
that manufacturers have to pay for disposal of their goods.
We have a speaking slot on a conference
in SG on 22nd and also present UMsys in our booth.
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