You could just make the number their company name! The number could also figure on your UI, so they don't need to search for it. There are tons and tons of businesses which do this - and for very good reasons. Don't discard this idea without deeper consideration.
Are the people calling you potential buyers of support? [Assuming they are not freeloaders by nature, individuals who might not want your business support, etc]
If they are potential buyers this is an EXCELLENT marketing opportunity. They are calling you for something they need. Converting that into a transaction is a clear path that many callers themselves may expect subconsciously. It's all about positioning and expectation management!
The key thing is to setup expectations, right from before they call, to the number they call, what they hear when they call, about the different levels of support, paid & free, how they can reach the right tier of support for their category, how they can upgrade their support tier, and how they can resolve their problem.
For instance, if you have a support forum + support FAQ, redirect all free callers to that --- AFTER telling them that free support is community supported, with customers just like them providing support.
If they want a specific type of support or customization, or installation support, then direct them to the relevant FREE instruction manual, and tell them that premium support for these is available for enterprise/business customers.
For callers make sure your IVR script takes into account both free and paid users [if you use the same 1800 number, you could also give toll-free numbers for premium support users, and toll numbers for free users].
Your script could be
1. Premium support users: Please enter your support id to be taken straight to our support team 2. If you do not have a support id:
Press 1 for free installation support options [list out website address, forum address, FAQ address, etc.].
Press 2 to buy premium installation support [[ Note the 'to buy' clearly setting their expectation ]]
Press 3 for free post-installation support options [list out website address, forum address, FAQ address, etc.].
Press 4 to buy premium annual support
Press 5 to reach sales
Wherever you list your number make sure it's listed as 'Premium Support Number' or 'Business Support' or something which will influence the caller to understand that this is not free support. For instance you may now have 'Toll-free support number' - which is misleading!
I guarantee if you do this right, you will have more satisfied users and potential customers!
If you want some consulting around this to help you implement this fully, drop me a note - I've been doing marketing/prodmgmt for an open-source based software vendor for a few years. [[ prasanna at wignite dot com ]]
I make sure all my savings get socked away asap, and live on the rest 'paycheck to paycheck'. In this case, I couldn't have put in additional money into my account from my savings!
Most of the replies are irrelevant as they address different fields. While an MS is less useful than work experience in many fields, that's not nearly as true in Elec Engg, or Comp Engg. or any math-heavy fields.
I've done my MS in the Elec. dept. If your MSCE is like CE at my school, then it's going to be a lot of Comp. Arch., VLSI, Solid State, Analog Elec., Signal Processing, etc. which you CANNOT learn on the job. My rule of thumb - heavier the math in a course, lower the probability that you can learn it on the job. Very few employers let you learn on the job - and math-heavy stuff is far easier to learn at school.
An MS is a minimum qualification to get into the mid-level of places like Qualcomm, Analog Devices, TI, Intel, AMD, etc. So my advice? Do an MS CE, make sure you do interns at every possible opportunity. Or if you're near a school which lets you do a part-time MS, start working, and start your MS too. Not doing an MS will get you stuck very soon!
Your code is probably going to be read a bazillion times more than edited. So take some more time to write it clearly.
Performance is hardly an issue for most business apps - and you should solve most performance issues by choosing the correct algo/method, rather than optimizing code. 80/20 rules applies, 80% of the time is spent in 20% of the code. And the performance critical parts of the code are probably 5% (for most people).
The compiler is not buggy. Even though gcc might spit insane amounts of errors for a single mistake in STL, the compiler is not buggy. Even though you read your code a hundred times and you can't find a mistake, the compiler is not buggy. It's infinitely more likely that you have screwed up than it is to have a tool error (unless you're doing Verilog/VHDL:)
Learn to use a debugger. Any debugger will make you appreciate what the code does better.
Read Code Complete, Pragmatic Programmer.
10 Learn how to learn better. 20 Keep learning and practicing. 30 Goto 10
$126M buys 126000KW, i.e., 126MW of installed wind power. At a power factor of 30% this produces 38MW of power.
A coal powered plant would produce 300000 Tons of CO2 a year to generate this power. Three years of operation would mean 1M tons of CO2 not released into the atmosphere.
For a gas-powered plant, it would be 6 years. For an oil powered plant, 4 years.
A 38MW plant is not really much power, and is a drop in the bucket. On the other hand the research benefits from this project are not easily quantifiable. So I'd go with the research on this one!
In my science text-book (in India), the section on theories of creation of life simply went in the following order: 1) Creation by God (ID) - not the Christian God:) 2) Spontaneous Evolution 3) Pre-existing life 4) Evolution
It stated simply that 2, and 3 were dis-proved by the following experiment, and then went on to explain evolution in detail. No more fuss about ID. Of course no statements that Evolution is *just* a theory either.
I think that such a mention of theories is very valuable in explaining the rise of evolution as a theory that is the prevalent scientific consensus.
Y-combinator seems to be generating 40 quickie get-big-or-die-trying companies a year. What I found interesting is that in a few years 'Alumnus of Y-combinator' is going to have a very good cachet associated with it - just as an MS from a good college does. There're going to be a bunch of successes and even those who don't succeed will have the associated aura. The guys who put themselves through Y-combinator are a self-selected bunch of motivated people, who might even have an above average chance of succeeding in life.
Olin students might have similar self-selected characteristics. And in a few years, the results of that experiment - with widespread Olin alumni support - are going to be worth watching.
Note, I'm in no way related to either. Just speculating on a correlation that I see.
These have been extensively deployed in Bangalore. Practically every roof-top has one. There are apparently a few interesting issues - while black pipes absorb the most heat, they also radiate the most. So they have some material which absorbs more than it radiates. Not entirely sure of the science behind it.
Got information from a reporter who was on site during the launch. Apparently ISRO charged the Italians $29000 per kg. And the reason for the high price is the high accuracy of the PSLV and the low inclination from the equator required. The latter is aided by the closeness of Sriharikota to the Equator.
This allows for little to no use of on-board propellant in the satellite - increasing its orbital life-span significantly.
Third, there was another satellite launched with this payload - 185 kg.
Taking the launch cost as $15K per kg for this satellite (it may not have required such a precise orbit), and keeping in mind that the full capacity of the PSLV is 1 tonne, I'd say this launch is quite price competitive.
http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id =NEWEN20070009135
ISRO was not keen to name figures but indicated they were charging around 30 per cent less than the regular international price of $15,000 to $20,000 per kg of payload to make things commercially attractive to the customer.
''The cost is about Rs 80 crore usually. If you remove the six strapons, it will come down by Rs 12 crore.''
''The cost of launch was negotiated on a commercial basis. We have to keep confidentiality to win a market. We are not losing anything. We are making what we are spending and more,'' said Madhavan Nair, Chairperson, ISRO. Which makes no sense - Rs 68 Crore = $16 Million. 353kg @ $15K/kg = $ 5.2 Million.
So either the numbers are out of whack, or Madhavan Nair's quote is incorrect or out of context.
i really object to the characterization of outsourcing as "fair competition" when its just not the case. Do we lack the average standard of living in the West? yes.
Is it deliberate? Hell no.
Can the whole world survive if everyone uses the same resources the average American uses? Hell No.
Given that we must use less resources, we will provide cheaper labor/services.
When America exports cheap things due to abundance of cheap power/land it's fine. But when we export cheap labor/services due to abundant people power, somehow it is unfair competition?
how about.. we founded and grew our own economy.. hmm? We didn't pull this crap of draining the wealth of other nations to build our own. We invented and exported the majority of what makes today's world modern. Err, your American economy was based on the destruction of the Native American economy. Secondly, European expansion and growth was mainly funded on colonial profits. Find out about the enormous amounts of wealth siphoned out of Asia and Africa over the last 500 years.
You guys have had a good time for the past few hundred years. The rest of the world (the 'South') hasn't. Arguments for free-trade have been made and have been accepted both by China and India. And now that BRIC are competing with the Europeans and the US on an equal footing, suddenly free-trade isn't what you want. And a closed economy is what you want. Sorry guys, your corporates aren't listening to you any more.
And we're not going to stay quiet about 5% of the people taking 25% of the resources for much longer. We want our share to be reasonable too.
Learn to 'innovate'. Learn to be more efficient. Or we will take your jobs and your resources, and then you'll have no choice but to be more efficient.
Indian voting machine are also similar. No touch screens, no networking, nothing fancy. A very small micro-controller adds the votes. An extension cord to the Polling office to mark one person one vote, a 7 segment LCD to display the tally. At the end of the vote, each machine's tally is read, and overall total is done manually.
I would like to see a detailed technical tear-down of the Indian EVM though from the attacker perspective though. Couldn't find one in a casual search yet.
Right, so scale according to the median salary by region and job profile, and then award visas to the highest paid.
Almost anything is better than the way it is now. At least companies/people who are really needed will be able to make it in. As opposed to only those who can afford to wait for 6 months being able to get in.
And this will avoid the argument that companies take in H1B candidates only because of lower wages.
This would probably make it more difficult for my friends who want to get work and go to the US. But I think it'll make it more fair than it is today.
Slashdot Mirror
You could just make the number their company name! The number could also figure on your UI, so they don't need to search for it. There are tons and tons of businesses which do this - and for very good reasons. Don't discard this idea without deeper consideration.
Are the people calling you potential buyers of support? [Assuming they are not freeloaders by nature, individuals who might not want your business support, etc]
If they are potential buyers this is an EXCELLENT marketing opportunity. They are calling you for something they need. Converting that into a transaction is a clear path that many callers themselves may expect subconsciously. It's all about positioning and expectation management!
The key thing is to setup expectations, right from before they call, to the number they call, what they hear when they call, about the different levels of support, paid & free, how they can reach the right tier of support for their category, how they can upgrade their support tier, and how they can resolve their problem.
For instance, if you have a support forum + support FAQ, redirect all free callers to that --- AFTER telling them that free support is community supported, with customers just like them providing support.
If they want a specific type of support or customization, or installation support, then direct them to the relevant FREE instruction manual, and tell them that premium support for these is available for enterprise/business customers.
For callers make sure your IVR script takes into account both free and paid users [if you use the same 1800 number, you could also give toll-free numbers for premium support users, and toll numbers for free users].
Your script could be
1. Premium support users: Please enter your support id to be taken straight to our support team
2. If you do not have a support id:
Press 1 for free installation support options [list out website address, forum address, FAQ address, etc.].
Press 2 to buy premium installation support [[ Note the 'to buy' clearly setting their expectation ]]
Press 3 for free post-installation support options [list out website address, forum address, FAQ address, etc.].
Press 4 to buy premium annual support
Press 5 to reach sales
Wherever you list your number make sure it's listed as 'Premium Support Number' or 'Business Support' or something which will influence the caller to understand that this is not free support. For instance you may now have 'Toll-free support number' - which is misleading!
I guarantee if you do this right, you will have more satisfied users and potential customers!
If you want some consulting around this to help you implement this fully, drop me a note - I've been doing marketing/prodmgmt for an open-source based software vendor for a few years. [[ prasanna at wignite dot com ]]
You've got many choices.
1. Get an over bed table ala http://www.amazon.com/Invacare-Over-Bed-Table/dp/B000QA0EHI $49, you can adjust the height, upto 42" which should be within a few inches of what you need.
2. Use a bed tray on your normal table - ala http://www.standsandmounts.com/winsomewoodnaturalwoodbreakfasttraywithtiltingtop.aspx
3. Get a shelf with adjustable racks ala http://visualadventures.com/gear-review/how-to-make-an-adjustable-stand-up-desk-for-about-50
4. El cheapo option, wooden boxes, or piles of telephone directories, or piles of soft drink can crates.
Get a tall stool to sit in when you need a break from standing.
I make sure all my savings get socked away asap, and live on the rest 'paycheck to paycheck'. In this case, I couldn't have put in additional money into my account from my savings!
Ideas are worthless. Execution - priceless.
Most of the replies are irrelevant as they address different fields. While an MS is less useful than work experience in many fields, that's not nearly as true in Elec Engg, or Comp Engg. or any math-heavy fields.
I've done my MS in the Elec. dept. If your MSCE is like CE at my school, then it's going to be a lot of Comp. Arch., VLSI, Solid State, Analog Elec., Signal Processing, etc. which you CANNOT learn on the job. My rule of thumb - heavier the math in a course, lower the probability that you can learn it on the job. Very few employers let you learn on the job - and math-heavy stuff is far easier to learn at school.
An MS is a minimum qualification to get into the mid-level of places like Qualcomm, Analog Devices, TI, Intel, AMD, etc. So my advice? Do an MS CE, make sure you do interns at every possible opportunity. Or if you're near a school which lets you do a part-time MS, start working, and start your MS too. Not doing an MS will get you stuck very soon!
I wish my dead company had a P/E of ~19 and make consistent profits.
http://finance.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:YHOO
Bomb the family of 4 so they never need money again, and buy another bomb for the next family :|
India does have a work-permit system. Immigrating to India - becoming an Indian citizen is not as easy.
I see a lot of expats in Bangalore, presumably working on the H1B equivalent.
Your code is probably going to be read a bazillion times more than edited. So take some more time to write it clearly.
Performance is hardly an issue for most business apps - and you should solve most performance issues by choosing the correct algo/method, rather than optimizing code. 80/20 rules applies, 80% of the time is spent in 20% of the code. And the performance critical parts of the code are probably 5% (for most people).
The compiler is not buggy. Even though gcc might spit insane amounts of errors for a single mistake in STL, the compiler is not buggy. Even though you read your code a hundred times and you can't find a mistake, the compiler is not buggy. It's infinitely more likely that you have screwed up than it is to have a tool error (unless you're doing Verilog/VHDL :)
Learn to use a debugger. Any debugger will make you appreciate what the code does better.
Read Code Complete, Pragmatic Programmer.
10 Learn how to learn better.
20 Keep learning and practicing.
30 Goto 10
$126M buys 126000KW, i.e., 126MW of installed wind power. At a power factor of 30% this produces 38MW of power.
A coal powered plant would produce 300000 Tons of CO2 a year to generate this power. Three years of operation would mean 1M tons of CO2 not released into the atmosphere.
For a gas-powered plant, it would be 6 years. For an oil powered plant, 4 years.
A 38MW plant is not really much power, and is a drop in the bucket. On the other hand the research benefits from this project are not easily quantifiable. So I'd go with the research on this one!
References:
http://www.seen.org/pages/db/method.shtml
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/econ/index.htm
In my science text-book (in India), the section on theories of creation of life simply went in the following order: :)
1) Creation by God (ID) - not the Christian God
2) Spontaneous Evolution
3) Pre-existing life
4) Evolution
It stated simply that 2, and 3 were dis-proved by the following experiment, and then went on to explain evolution in detail. No more fuss about ID. Of course no statements that Evolution is *just* a theory either.
I think that such a mention of theories is very valuable in explaining the rise of evolution as a theory that is the prevalent scientific consensus.
Interesting :-).
Y-combinator seems to be generating 40 quickie get-big-or-die-trying companies a year. What I found interesting is that in a few years 'Alumnus of Y-combinator' is going to have a very good cachet associated with it - just as an MS from a good college does. There're going to be a bunch of successes and even those who don't succeed will have the associated aura. The guys who put themselves through Y-combinator are a self-selected bunch of motivated people, who might even have an above average chance of succeeding in life.
Olin students might have similar self-selected characteristics. And in a few years, the results of that experiment - with widespread Olin alumni support - are going to be worth watching.
Note, I'm in no way related to either. Just speculating on a correlation that I see.
It's called the L1 visa - intra-company transfer.
Brilliant idea for a firefox extension! Although the interface would be key to it's usefulness.
Read the "Black Swan".
There are events that are extremely improbable - but we still need to work to get out of those.
So.. we should have left Iraq to fend for itself then? That would not have produced any terrorists who would kill 60000 Iraqis and 3000 Americans!
http://www.tatabpsolar.com/prod_gallery7.html
These have been extensively deployed in Bangalore. Practically every roof-top has one. There are apparently a few interesting issues - while black pipes absorb the most heat, they also radiate the most. So they have some material which absorbs more than it radiates. Not entirely sure of the science behind it.
Got information from a reporter who was on site during the launch. Apparently ISRO charged the Italians $29000 per kg. And the reason for the high price is the high accuracy of the PSLV and the low inclination from the equator required. The latter is aided by the closeness of Sriharikota to the Equator.
? NEWSID=%7B293BBF69-290B-459A-B16A-A53FFFF5CA05%7D& CATEGORYNAME=NATIONAL4 981200.htm
This allows for little to no use of on-board propellant in the satellite - increasing its orbital life-span significantly.
Third, there was another satellite launched with this payload - 185 kg.
Taking the launch cost as $15K per kg for this satellite (it may not have required such a precise orbit), and keeping in mind that the full capacity of the PSLV is 1 tonne, I'd say this launch is quite price competitive.
Ref:
(for the 1 ton capacity)
http://www.chennaionline.com/colnews/newsitem.asp
(for the $29K figure)
http://www.hindu.com/2007/04/24/stories/200704240
http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?i
''The cost is about Rs 80 crore usually. If you remove the six strapons, it will come down by Rs 12 crore.''
''The cost of launch was negotiated on a commercial basis. We have to keep confidentiality to win a market. We are not losing anything. We are making what we are spending and more,'' said Madhavan Nair, Chairperson, ISRO. Which makes no sense - Rs 68 Crore = $16 Million.
353kg @ $15K/kg = $ 5.2 Million.
So either the numbers are out of whack, or Madhavan Nair's quote is incorrect or out of context.
Is it deliberate? Hell no.
Can the whole world survive if everyone uses the same resources the average American uses? Hell No.
Given that we must use less resources, we will provide cheaper labor/services.
When America exports cheap things due to abundance of cheap power/land it's fine. But when we export cheap labor/services due to abundant people power, somehow it is unfair competition?
You guys have had a good time for the past few hundred years. The rest of the world (the 'South') hasn't. Arguments for free-trade have been made and have been accepted both by China and India. And now that BRIC are competing with the Europeans and the US on an equal footing, suddenly free-trade isn't what you want. And a closed economy is what you want. Sorry guys, your corporates aren't listening to you any more.
And we're not going to stay quiet about 5% of the people taking 25% of the resources for much longer. We want our share to be reasonable too.
Learn to 'innovate'. Learn to be more efficient. Or we will take your jobs and your resources, and then you'll have no choice but to be more efficient.
I Agree completely.
r onic-voting-machines-compared-to-diebold/i che4.htm
Indian voting machine are also similar. No touch screens, no networking, nothing fancy. A very small micro-controller adds the votes. An extension cord to the Polling office to mark one person one vote, a 7 segment LCD to display the tally. At the end of the vote, each machine's tally is read, and overall total is done manually.
For reference
http://amit.chakradeo.net/2004/05/14/indias-elect
http://www.bel-india.com/Website/StaticAsp/prod_n
I would like to see a detailed technical tear-down of the Indian EVM though from the attacker perspective though. Couldn't find one in a casual search yet.
And when you figure out a better way to write drivers, do let the rest of us know.
Not being sarcastic here, but when you need to deal with bare metal is there any alternative?
Can any managed-memory code be used for drivers?
Right, so scale according to the median salary by region and job profile, and then award visas to the highest paid.
Almost anything is better than the way it is now. At least companies/people who are really needed will be able to make it in. As opposed to only those who can afford to wait for 6 months being able to get in.
And this will avoid the argument that companies take in H1B candidates only because of lower wages.
This would probably make it more difficult for my friends who want to get work and go to the US. But I think it'll make it more fair than it is today.