Data Base For Business


A computer database is a structured collection of records or data that is stored in a computer system. A database relies upon software to organize the storage of data. In other words, the software models the database structure in what are known as database models (or data models). The model in most common use today is the relational model. Other models such as the hierarchical model and the network model use a more explicit representation of relationships (see below for explanation of the various database models)drawski .

Database management systems are usually categorized according to the database model that they support. The data model tends to determine the query languages that are available to access the database. A great deal of the internal engineering of a DBMS, however, is independent of the data model, and is concerned with managing factors such as performance, concurrency, integrity, and recovery from hardware failures. In these areas there are large differences between products.

Data Base Model

Various techniques are used to model data structure.

Most database systems are built around one particular data model, although it is increasingly common for products to offer support for more than one model. For any one logical model various physical implementations may be possible, and most products will offer the user some level of control in tuning the physical implementation, since the choices that are made have a significant effect on performance. An example is the relational model: all serious implementations of the relational model allow the creation of indexes which provide fast access to rows in a table if the values of certain columns are known.

Applications of databases

Databases are used in many applications, spanning virtually the entire range of computer software. Databases are the preferred method of storage for large multiuser applications, where coordination between many users is needed. Even individual users find them convenient, and many electronic mail programs and personal organizers are based on standard database technology. Software database drivers are available for most database platforms so that application software can use a common Application Programming Interface to retrieve the information stored in a database. Two commonly used database APIs are JDBC and ODBC.

All of these databases can take advantage of indexing to increase their speed, and this technology has advanced tremendously since its early uses in the 1960s and 1970s. The most common kind of index is a sorted list of the contents of some particular table column, with pointers to the row associated with the value. An index allows a set of table rows matching some criterion to be located quickly. Typically, indexes are also stored in the various forms of data-structure mentioned above (such as B-trees, hashes, and linked lists). Usually, a specific technique is chosen by the database designer to increase efficiency in the particular case of the type of index required.

Relational DBMSs have the advantage that indexes can be created or dropped without changing existing applications making use of it. The database chooses between many different strategies based on which one it estimates will run the fastest. In other words, indexes are transparent to the application or end-user querying the database; while they affect performance, any SQL command will run with or without indexes existing in the database.

Relational DBMSs utilize many different algorithms to compute the result of an SQL statement. The RDBMS will produce a plan of how to execute the query, which is generated by analyzing the run times of the different algorithms and selecting the quickest. Some of the key algorithms that deal with joins are nested loop join, sort-merge join and hash join. Which of these is chosen depends on whether an index exists, what type it is, and its cardinality.

An index speeds up access to data, but it has disadvantages as well. First, every index increases the amount of storage on the hard drive necessary for the database file, and second, the index must be updated each time the data are altered, and this costs time. (Thus an index saves time in the reading of data, but it costs time in entering and altering data. It thus depends on the use to which the data are to be put whether an index is on the whole a net plus or minus in the quest for efficiency.)

A special case of an index is a primary index, or primary key, which is distinguished in that the primary index must ensure a unique reference to a record. Often, for this purpose one simply uses a running index number (ID number). Primary indexes play a significant role in relational databases, and they can speed up access to data considerably.

Links to database products



Lifecycle Management


CHASAB Business Solutions has a strong partnership with UGS, a leading global provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software and services, itself having millions of licensed seats and customers worldwide. Recognized as a leader in many industries, UGS is an innovative, customer focused company, delivering world-class products and services.

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) is a strategic business approach that reduces risk through achieving control of the product development and launching processes and through the provision of support through the product life. PLM establishes a knowledge backbone which facilitates the creation, capture, management, sharing, use and re-use of all information concerning a product from initial concept to its end of life.

Having the best PLM solution and using the best practices worldwide, Alna Business Solutions helps companies to accelerate revenue, reduce costs, improve quality and drive innovation throughout the product lifecycle. With PLM you can reduce time to market, reduce spending on R&D, reduce total lifecycle asset costs and improve the productivity of the team.

Key components of PLM:

-Workflow
-Product Design Management
-Change Management
-Configuration Management
-Visualization and Collaboration
-Requirements Management
-Project and Resource Management
-Manufacturing Process Management
-Document Management
-Enterprise Application Integration

PLM allows:

-Timely delivery of projects within budgetary constraints
-Effective communication across the extended enterprise
-Leverage to partners to foster innovation
-Traceability of decision-making processes
-Adherence to corporate and regulatory polices
-Improvement of productivity in the workforce by eliminating non-value added activities
-Guaranteed real-time access to information in the context of the individual user
-Maximisation of re-use of information to extend its business value throughout the value chain
-Management of large data volumes that are constantly growing
-Certainty that all company information is secure and protected
-Interfacing with other corporate systems

PLM supports Global Collaboration, in that it provides a single source for all product information, connects global teams including partners and suppliers and automates formal review, approval and change management processes, as well as supports informal, spontaneous web-based collaboration and provides secure global access to all product information “anytime and anywhere”.


Quality Reporting System


QRS – Quality Control System enables:

  • to plan and manage QC (Quality Control) related activities by assigning them to certain operations and people,
  • to have simplified user interfaces for production people to report QC information and more advanced interfaces for managers to review reported information,
  • to report results of both planned and unplanned QC activities,
  • to report actual results of every QC activity, to record quantities that passed QC, that are to be reworked or scrapped,
  • to assist in performing QC by having information (information about how to measure, how to connect measurement devices, etc.) readily available,
  • to print QC related documentation such as products quality certificates sent to clients,
  • statistics of various failure reasons, QC instructions, etc.

The benefits of QRS are:

  • reduced cost and time delays in QC information communication: performed QC activities and their results are readily available to managers enabling to identify:
    - underperforming personnel and machines,
    - the products and working procedures that result in unsatisfactory QC results.
  • improved cost awareness: costs associated with replacing scrapped items or reworking items that did not pass QC can be identified,
  • improved management of QC processes: QC activities can be planned and made mandatory for selected items and operations.

SOLUTION



CHASAB Business Solutions offers customized solutions that allow clients to improve performance and achieve better long-term results. We design solutions based on the client’s specific requirements, we adapt to the client’s way of conducting business and serve as a true partner who can fully address the client’s business challenges and needs.

We are ISO 9001:2000 certified by BVQI, and provide our clients with high quality products and services, flexibility and efficiency. Having industry knowledge and expertise, we are committed to supplying the best possible solutions to our customers, thereby helping them to solve their business challenges.

In addition to its own unique developments, for example E-commerce, Mobile solutions and Billing, Alna Business Solutions has extensive experience in successful implementations of ERP & CRM, Information management & Product lifecycle solutions, Business Intelligence solutions, and Payroll & HR solutions.

Who Are the Businessmen?

It’s a game not everyone can play, but more people should be aware of this career alternative.

Most American businessmen have at some time in their careers thought about starting their own company. Some have envisioned their ~wn enterprise as an avenue to personal wealth through large capital gains. To them, there is a beautiful formula for financial success: (1) start a small company, preferably in a glamour industry; (2) generate rapid growth in sales and profits; (3) then sell out either to the public or to some large acquisitive conglomerate.

Others have seen their own company as an opportunity to do what they really wanted to do: to get close to a sport by developing a ski area, or to reduce a new technology to practical use. Still others have sought an escape from stultifying large-company constraints, politics, or career impasses. In their dreams, their own venture would be a means to gain the top position in a business.

Despite dreams, wishful thinking, and even plans, few people actually take the step of trying to start a company. Why is this? Is there a special breed of man which is particularly inclined to become an entrepreneur? Are there special characteristics or conditions which stimulate entrepreneurial activities? The basic questions we are asking here are classic ones- Are entrepreneurs born or are they made? If they can be made, what are the ingredients? I have reached the conclusions that, given a degree of ambition and ability not uncommon to many individuals, certain kinds of experiences and situational conditions—rather than personality or ego—are the major determinants of whether or not an individual becomes an entrepreneur.

If we examine some of the attitudes in the subculture of American businessmen we find that there are significant connotations to starting a company as a career alternative. Almost everyone gets a glow—a tingle—at the idea of being an entrepre

neur. To men in their thirties and forties the idea of starting a company means “free enterprise” and “Opportunity,” as reflected in Horatio Alger stories. In value terms of the younger generation, starting a company is a way to “do your own thing.” For such businessmen and for many business school students, starting a successful

Patrick R. tiles, “Who are the entrepreneurs?” pp. 5—14, MSU Bsiness Topics, Whiter 1974. Reprinted by permission of the publisher, Division of Research. Graduate School of Business Administration, Michigan State University. Patrick R. tiles is on the faculty of the Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University. company is a very attractive idea, yet only rarely do they seem to consider it a serious alternative. When a possible opportunity presents itself, there is somehow too little time to investigate it properly and too little time to determine whether or not the idea really makes sense. Thus, it appears that most would-be entrepreneurs stop before they get started. Unfortunately, there is very little information on people who have had ideas about starting companies but never seriously pursued them.

We might think that we already know a lot about the entrepreneurs themselves— those who actually go ahead and start companies. Yet, do we really? We find that there are people who think of entrepreneurs being formed by school systems and child raising,’ by rejecting fathers,2 or by the business environment.3 However, efforts to measure and predict entrepreneurial potential are, at best, still in the development stages.4

Perhaps one of the best broad-based studies on entrepreneurs was carried out by Orvis F. Collins and David G. Moore at Michigan State University in 1964. Using a series of personal interviews and psychological tests, they reached a number of rather unsettling conclusions regarding people who start their own company:

Throughout the preceding analysis, obviously we have been having difficulty deciding whether the entrepreneur is essentially a “reject” of our organizational society who, instead of becoming a hobo, criminal, or professor, makes his adjustment by starting his own business; or whether he is a man who is positively attracted to succeed in it. We have, perhaps without intention, regarded him as a reject.

Entrepreneurs are men who have failed in the traditional and highly structured roles available to them in the society. In this . ... entrepreneurs are not unique. What is unique about them is that they found an outlet for their creativity by making out of an undifferen

tiated mass of circumstances a creation uniquely their own: a business firm.

The men who travel the entrepreneurial way are, taken on balance, not remarkably like-able people. This, too, is understandable. As any one of them might say in thevernacular of the world of the entrepreneur, “Nice guys don’t win.”’

Several small-sample studies at Harvard and MIT have yielded results different from the Collins and Moore study.e Entrepreneurs were found not to be failures. Instead “most of the founders had experienced a generally higher than average level of success in their previous employment. Several had established outstanding records of achievement.”7 These entrepreneurs seemed more typical of the successful, hard-charging, young business executive Or engineer than a reject figure.’

One possible explanation, of course, is that people in Michigan are very different from those in New England. It might be more helpful, however, if we categorized in some detail: (1) the kinds of business which are used in studies of small business fatality rates and in the Collins and Moore study, and (2) the kinds of business which might be started as alternatives to pfofessional management or engineering careers. The survey-type studies are comprehensive in that they essentially look at all companies which are started withi.n a particular period of time. This includes a wide range of business ventures: dry cleaners, retail shops, electronics manufacturers, computer software firms, gas stations, and so forth. Each of these is used in the computation of a wide range of statistics about the rise and demise of new companies. There should he no reason to doubt the aggregate figures or the results of in-depth studies made of these situations. The Collins and Moore study looked at 10 manu facturing firms started between 1945 and 1958 in Michigan but made no further distinctions as to the nature of the business, size, or potential.

If we consider kinds of ventures which might be of interest to a professional manager or an engineer, the vast majority of the enterprises started each year (and, therefore, the bulk of those considered in large, broad-based studies) would not be included. A dry cleaning establishment or a small metal fabricating shop is not the basis for the dreams of these people. From their perspective (and. therefore the perspective of this article), we should label this subcategory of small business as marginal firms. That leaves us with the task of considering the kinds of venture situations which are potentially attractive career alternatives. The first, which I have labeled the high-potential venture, is the company which “is started with the intention that the venture grow rapidly in sales and profits and become a large corporation.’” In its planning stage the high-potential venture is the extreme of personal economic opportunity, the entrepreneur’s big dream: such as Polaroid, Digital Equipment, Scientific Data System, Cartridge Television, Viatron, and so on.

Another type of enterprise, less obvious than the high-potential venture, also holds a strong interest for many would-be entrepreneurs. This type of venture we might call the attractive small company. In contrast to the high-potential venture, the attractive small company is not intended to become a large corporation, probably will never have a public market for its stock, and will not be attractive to most venture capital investors. However, in contrast to the marginal firms, attractive small companies can provide salaries of $40,000 to $80,000 per year, perquisites (company car, country club memberships, travel, and so forth) to its owner/managers, and often flexibility in life-style such as working hours, kinds of projects and tasks pursued, or geographical location. In this subcategory we find such businesses as consulting and other service firms and some specialized manufacturers.

Both the high-potential venture and the attractive small company are interesting beyond the scope of the benefits they may provide to their founder/owners. In the high-potential venture we find the genesis of the major corporations of the future and, therefore, the source of a growing number of jobs and other contributions to the economy. The attractive small companies provide less spectacular but stable inputs of a similar nature. Both of these kinds of companies must gain and maintain their position by providing competitive discomfort to the existing corporate giants through innovation~ flexibility, and efficiency.

The marginal firms, on the other hand, provide support for their owners! employers but frequently at a tower level than might be obtained by employment if they could or would work elsewhere. However, these people are not likely to seek employment elsewhere because of their difficulties in functioning in larger and more structured organizations. “

Without questio’t, some of the businessmen and engineers who start high-potential ventures or attractive small companies are compulsive entrepreneurs. They cannot function effectively in a large organization. They must be their own boss and they may have known this all their lives. It may seem as if they could have behaved in no other way. But what about the others who started companies? What about the entrepreneurs who ate bashally well-adjusted people ~nd who had given little previous thought, if any, to the idea of their own company? flow did these people happen to become entrepreneurs although most were already successful in the pursuit of a more conventional career? What factors play a leading role in determining who becomes an entrepreneur? Which factors might be largely fortuitous and which might be controlled by the individual?

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