hSenid's blog on Outsourcing

One of the most prevalent reasons for outsourcing is to save money or lower costs. With the outsourcing industry booming, you might consider opening a business providing outsourcing services. But how do you get started?

1. Start by writing a business plan. A business plan is a set of business goals, stating the reason why you believe these goals are attainable and the plan or action steps for reaching the goal.

2. Determine the services you will provide. After writing your business plan, you should also determine specific services you will be providing and the target market.

3. Get to know your Market. There are three possible markets you can cater to:

• General public: These are individual clients.

• Small commercial/Home-based businesses: These are companies that could require secretarial or administrative support or outsource a specific task to get the job done with minimal cost.
• Large Corporation: Large corporations usually outsource whenever they have a situation of work overload and their employees cannot accomplish the tasks. They outsource special projects and equip them to get the job done.

4. Determine your location. Your business site could be home-based or at a commercial location, depending of course on the size of your business and your target market.

5. Market your company. This is very essential to the success of your business. Put together a professional and attractive information package that you can easily distribute to possible clients.

The user interface requirements for hand held devices are different from those for desktop computers. For example, the display size of hand held devices is smaller, and the input devices do not always include pointing devices, for example, a mouse or pen input). For these reasons, you cannot follow the same user interface programming guidelines for applications running on desktop computers and hand-held devices.

The CLDC provides foundation classes for all resource-constrained Java-enabled hand held devices and needs to be complemented by profiles. For example, the CLDC itself does not define any Graphical User Interface (GUI) functionality. Official GUI classes for the Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME) are defined by the Java Community Process (JCP) and are included in profiles such as the Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP). The GUI classes included in the MIDP are not based on the Abstract Window Toolkit (AWT).

This article discusses the details of GUI programming for hand held devices. Because the MIDP GUI classes are not based on the AWT, this article starts with a brief discussion of why the MIDP Expert Group made that decision. That discussion is followed by a description of the GUI classes included in the MIDP with examples of how to use them. This article concludes with guidelines to GUI programming for mobile information devices.

Why not the AWT?

The MIDP Expert Group decided not to subset the existing AWT and Project Swing classes for the following reasons:

• The AWT is designed for desktop computers and optimized for these devices.
• The AWT assumes certain user interaction models. The component set of the AWT is designed to work with a pointing device such as a mouse; however many hand held devices, such as cell phones, have only a keypad for user input.
• While the AWT has a rich feature set, it is mainly desktop-based. Also, the feature set includes support for features not found on hand held devices. For example, the AWT has extensive support for window management, such as re-sizing overlapping windows. However, the limited display size of hand held devices makes re-sizing a window impractical. Therefore, the window and layout managers within the AWT are not required for hand held devices.
• When a user interacts with an AWT-based application, event objects are created dynamically. These objects exist only until each associated event is processed by the system, at which time the object becomes eligible for garbage collection. The limited CPU and memory of hand held devices cannot handle this behavior.

Outsourcing your tasks will involve a binding contract with the individual or company you are dealing with. There will always be continuity of work. If you do the process or employ someone and that person resigns from your company then you will be on the losing end. When you outsource, the person or company you are dealing with depends on you for income and work. You are assured that if something goes wrong the outsourced task will get done.  People will get replaced immediately so work will not be disrupted. There is a professional relationship and this is a binding one.

Time Saving

Outsourcing your online business means that you will pay someone to perform repetitive, boring or tedious tasks; which will allow you to focus on your income earning projects.

Costs Saving

By outsourcing your online business you will also be able to save costs such as your time. For instance, you could hire someone who specializes in areas of your business that you do not want to learn – or have no time to. This person will already have the needed tools to perform their tasks; which will not only allow you to save time but also money.

Guarantee of Quality

By handing these tasks over to an expert – who therefore knows his work in the smallest details – you will also have the opportunity to provide a high quality product to your customers who will trust you more.

Expand Your Offers

Outsourcing your online business also gives you the opportunity to develop more projects, allowing you then to provide more offers to your customers.

Outsourcing is not an added expense. It is a wise move and a secure one. This will help the business to expand and have more profits.