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  • How can I make these images download on a seperate thread?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello!! I have the following code running on my Android device. It works great and displays my list items wonderfully. It's also clever in the fact it only downloads the data when it's needed by the ArrayAdapter. However, whilst the download of the thumbnail is occurring, the entire list stalls and you cannot scroll until it's finished downloading. Is there any way of threading this so it'll still scroll happily, maybe show a place holder for the downloading image, finish the download, and then show? Any help with this would be really apreciated. Thank-you kindly. Andy Barlow private class CatalogAdapter extends ArrayAdapter { private ArrayList<SingleQueueResult> items; //Must research what this actually does! public CatalogAdapter(Context context, int textViewResourceId, ArrayList<SingleQueueResult> items) { super(context, textViewResourceId, items); this.items = items; } /** This overrides the getview of the ArrayAdapter. It should send back our new custom rows for the list */ @Override public View getView(int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) { View v = convertView; if (v == null) { LayoutInflater vi = (LayoutInflater)getSystemService(Context.LAYOUT_INFLATER_SERVICE); v = vi.inflate(R.layout.mylists_rows, null); } final SingleQueueResult result = items.get(position); // Sets the text inside the rows as they are scrolled by! if (result != null) { TextView title = (TextView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_title); TextView format = (TextView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_format); title.setText(result.getTitle()); format.setText(result.getThumbnail()); // Download Images ImageView myImageView = (ImageView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_thumbnail); downloadImage(result.getThumbnail(), myImageView); } return v; } } // This should run in a seperate thread public void downloadImage(String imageUrl, ImageView myImageView) { try { url = new URL(imageUrl); URLConnection conn = url.openConnection(); conn.connect(); InputStream is = conn.getInputStream(); BufferedInputStream bis = new BufferedInputStream(is); Bitmap bm = BitmapFactory.decodeStream(bis); bis.close(); is.close(); myImageView.setImageBitmap(bm); } catch (IOException e) { /* Reset to Default image on any error. */ //this.myImageView.setImageDrawable(getResources().getDrawable(R.drawable.default)); } }

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  • 3 Servers, is this is a cluster?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, At the moment I have one Ubuntu server, 9.10, running with a simple Samba share, a mail server, DNS server and DHCP server. Mostly its just there for file sharing and email server. I also have 2 other servers that are exactly the same hardware and spec as the first, which have an rsync set up to retrieve the shared folders and backs them up. However, if the first server goes down, all of our shares disappear along with our mail and the system must be rebuilt. Also I tend to find if people are downloading a large amount from the file server, no-one can access there emails - especially in the morning when everyone is signing in at once. Would it be more beneficial for me to have all 3 servers, all running the same services, doing the same thing with some sort of cluster with load balancing? I'm not really sure where to begin looking, or how to go about such a setup where 3 servers are all identical, but perhaps one acts as the main load balancer?? If someone can point me in the right direction, or if this simply sounds like one of those Enterprise Cloud's that is now a default setup in Ubuntu Server 9.10+, then I'll go down that route. Cheers in advance. Andy

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  • Enhance Primavera Project Document Collaboration with AutoVue Enterprise Visualization

    Completing projects on time and within budget requires effective project planning, management and collaboration amongst a variety of stakeholders. By introducing Oracle’s AutoVue document visualization and collaboration solutions in Primavera , users can visualize and collaborate on engineering and project documents. Tune into this conversation with Guy Barlow, Industry Strategist for Primavera and Thierry Bonfante, Director Product Strategy for Oracle’s AutoVue solutions to learn how the combination of AutoVue and Primavera accelerates project delivery by providing the right documents to the right resources at the right time to increase team response rates, and provide all critical information for improved decision making.

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  • Managing Project and Portfolio Risk in the Energy Industry with Oracle's Primavera Solutions

    The current economic situation is causing energy companies to take a closer look at how they manage project and portfolio risk. Join Guy Barlow, industry strategist for the oil and gas and utility industries at Oracle, and learn how Oracle's Primavera project and portfolio risk management solutions can help executives and project team members successfully manage their CapEx and maintenance projects within a risk adjusted framework to complete projects on time and within budget.

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  • Why does my Sax Parser produce no results after using InputStream Read?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, I have this piece of code which I'm hoping will be able to tell me how much data I have downloaded (and soon put it in a progress bar), and then parse the results through my Sax Parser. If I comment out basically everything above the //xr.parse(new InputSource(request.getInputStream())); line and swap the xr.parse's over, it works fine. But at the moment, my Sax parser tells me I have nothing. Is it something to do with is.read (buffer) section? Also, just as a note, request is a HttpURLConnection with various signatures. /*Input stream to read from our connection*/ InputStream is = request.getInputStream(); /*we make a 2 Kb buffer to accelerate the download, instead of reading the file a byte at once*/ byte [ ] buffer = new byte [ 2048 ] ; /*How many bytes do we have already downloaded*/ int totBytes,bytes,sumBytes = 0; totBytes = request.getContentLength () ; while ( true ) { /*How many bytes we got*/ bytes = is.read (buffer); /*If no more byte, we're done with the download*/ if ( bytes <= 0 ) break; sumBytes+= bytes; Log.v("XML", sumBytes + " of " + totBytes + " " + ( ( float ) sumBytes/ ( float ) totBytes ) *100 + "% done" ); } /* Parse the xml-data from our URL. */ // OLD, and works if comment all the above //xr.parse(new InputSource(request.getInputStream())); xr.parse(new InputSource(is)) /* Parsing has finished. */; Can anyone help me at all?? Kind regards, Andy

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  • Sax Parser Character Array to Integer??

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, I am trying to get the contents of tags into variables in my java Sax parser. However, the Characters method only returns Char arrays. Is there anyway to get the Char array into an Int??? public void characters(char ch[], int start, int length) { if(this.in_total_results) { // my INT varialble would be nice here! } } Can anyone help at all? Kind regards, Andy

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  • 3 Servers, is this is a cluster?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, At the moment I have one Ubuntu server, 9.10, running with a simple Samba share, a mail server, DNS server and DHCP server. Mostly its just there for file sharing and email server. I also have 2 other servers that are exactly the same hardware and spec as the first, which have an rsync set up to retrieve the shared folders and backs them up. However, if the first server goes down, all of our shares disappear along with our mail and the system must be rebuilt. Also I tend to find if people are downloading a large amount from the file server, no-one can access there emails - especially in the morning when everyone is signing in at once. Would it be more beneficial for me to have all 3 servers, all running the same services, doing the same thing with some sort of cluster with load balancing? I'm not really sure where to begin looking, or how to go about such a setup where 3 servers are all identical, but perhaps one acts as the main load balancer?? If someone can point me in the right direction, or if this simply sounds like one of those Enterprise Cloud's that is now a default setup in Ubuntu Server 9.10+, then I'll go down that route. Cheers in advance. Andy

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  • Using git pull to track a remote branch without merging

    - by J Barlow
    I am using git to track content which is changed by some people and shared "read-only" with others. The "readers" may from time to time need to make a change, but mostly they will not. I want to allow for the git "writers" to rebase pushed branches** if need be, and ensure that the "readers" never accidentally get a merge. That's normally easy enough. git pull origin +master There's one case that seems to cause problems. If a reader makes a local change, the command above will merge. I want pull to be fully automatic if the reader has not made local changes, while if they have made local changes, it should stop and ask for input. I want to track any upstream changes while being careful about merging downstream changes. In a way, I don't really want to pull. I want to track the master branch exactly. ** (I know this is not a best practice, but it seems necessary in our case: we have one main branch that contains most of the work and some topic branches for specific customers with minor changes that need to be isolated. It seems easiest to frequently rebase to keep the topics up to date.)

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  • How can I unbind JQZOOM in my JQuery Script?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, I have this script at the moment, which changes an image when a thumbnail has been changed. I then want JQZOOM to be added to that new image. However, if I put it inside the Onclick event, it gets slower and slower the more times you click on it... I guess because its running multiple instances. Is there anyway to unbind the JQZOOM from something then rebind it to something else? Here is my jquery at the moment: var options = { zoomWidth: 400, zoomHeight: 325, xOffset: 25, yOffset: 0, position: "right", lens: true, zoomType: "reverse", imageOpacity: 0.5, showEffect: "fadein", hideEffect: "fadeout", fadeinSpeed: "medium", title: false }; $('.jqzoom').jqzoom(options); $('.single-zoom-image').click ( function () { $('#bigProductImage').attr("src", $(this).attr("zoom")); $('.jqzoom').attr("href", $(this).attr("extrazoom")); }); Thanks in advance if anyone can help me. Cheers!

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  • Ubuntu One Folder Sync Filter

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hi, I am trying to modify the Ubuntu One File syncing python scripts to not including things like .iso's. I have got as far as finding this file: /usr/share/pyshared/ubuntuone/u1sync/constants.py Inside is this piece of code: import re # the name of the directory u1sync uses to keep metadata about a mirror METADATA_DIR_NAME = u".ubuntuone-sync" # filenames to ignore SPECIAL_FILE_RE = re.compile(".*\\.(" "(u1)?partial|part|" "(u1)?conflict(\\.[0-9]+)?)$") How can I edit this last section (regex?) and make it ignore .iso files??? I'm fairly sure this is the place to put it! Pretty sure this is standard python action :) Any help would be appreciated. Thanks kindly. Andy

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  • Why do my Sax Parser produce no results after using InputStream Read?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hello, I have this piece of code which I'm hoping will be able to tell me how much data I have downloaded (and soon put it in a progress bar), and then parse the results through my Sax Parser. If I comment out basically everything above the //xr.parse(new InputSource(request.getInputStream())); line and swap the xr.parse's over, it works fine. But at the moment, my Sax parser tells me I have nothing. Is it something to do with is.read (buffer) section? Also, just as a note, request is a HttpURLConnection with various signatures. /*Input stream to read from our connection*/ InputStream is = request.getInputStream(); /*we make a 2 Kb buffer to accelerate the download, instead of reading the file a byte at once*/ byte [ ] buffer = new byte [ 2048 ] ; /*How many bytes do we have already downloaded*/ int totBytes,bytes,sumBytes = 0; totBytes = request.getContentLength () ; while ( true ) { /*How many bytes we got*/ bytes = is.read (buffer); /*If no more byte, we're done with the download*/ if ( bytes <= 0 ) break; sumBytes+= bytes; Log.v("XML", sumBytes + " of " + totBytes + " " + ( ( float ) sumBytes/ ( float ) totBytes ) *100 + "% done" ); } /* Parse the xml-data from our URL. */ // OLD, and works if comment all the above //xr.parse(new InputSource(request.getInputStream())); xr.parse(new InputSource(is)) /* Parsing has finished. */; Can anyone help me at all?? Kind regards, Andy

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  • How can I make these images download on a separate thread?

    - by Andy Barlow
    I have the following code running on my Android device. It works great and displays my list items wonderfully. It's also clever in the fact it only downloads the data when it's needed by the ArrayAdapter. However, whilst the download of the thumbnail is occurring, the entire list stalls and you cannot scroll until it's finished downloading. Is there any way of threading this so it'll still scroll happily, maybe show a place holder for the downloading image, finish the download, and then show? Any help with this would be really appreciated. private class CatalogAdapter extends ArrayAdapter<SingleQueueResult> { private ArrayList<SingleQueueResult> items; //Must research what this actually does! public CatalogAdapter(Context context, int textViewResourceId, ArrayList<SingleQueueResult> items) { super(context, textViewResourceId, items); this.items = items; } /** This overrides the getview of the ArrayAdapter. It should send back our new custom rows for the list */ @Override public View getView(int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) { View v = convertView; if (v == null) { LayoutInflater vi = (LayoutInflater)getSystemService(Context.LAYOUT_INFLATER_SERVICE); v = vi.inflate(R.layout.mylists_rows, null); } final SingleQueueResult result = items.get(position); // Sets the text inside the rows as they are scrolled by! if (result != null) { TextView title = (TextView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_title); TextView format = (TextView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_format); title.setText(result.getTitle()); format.setText(result.getThumbnail()); // Download Images ImageView myImageView = (ImageView)v.findViewById(R.id.mylist_thumbnail); downloadImage(result.getThumbnail(), myImageView); } return v; } } // This should run in a seperate thread public void downloadImage(String imageUrl, ImageView myImageView) { try { url = new URL(imageUrl); URLConnection conn = url.openConnection(); conn.connect(); InputStream is = conn.getInputStream(); BufferedInputStream bis = new BufferedInputStream(is); Bitmap bm = BitmapFactory.decodeStream(bis); bis.close(); is.close(); myImageView.setImageBitmap(bm); } catch (IOException e) { /* Reset to Default image on any error. */ //this.myImageView.setImageDrawable(getResources().getDrawable(R.drawable.default)); } }

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  • UITableViewCell imageView images loading small even when they are the correct size!

    - by Alex Barlow
    Im having an issue whilst loading images into a UITableViewCell after an asynchronous download and placement into an UIImage variable.. The images appear smaller than they actually are! But when scrolled down and scrolled back up to the image, or the whole table is reloaded, they appear at the correct size... Here is a code excerpt... - (void)reviewImageDidLoad:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath { ThumbDownloader *thumbDownloader = [imageDownloadsInProgress objectForKey:indexPath]; if (thumbDownloader != nil) { UITableViewCell *cell = [self.tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:thumbDownloader.indexPathInTableView]; [UIView beginAnimations:nil context:nil]; [UIView setAnimationDuration:0.4]; [self.tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:indexPath].imageView.alpha = 0.0; [UIView commitAnimations]; cell.imageView.image = thumbDownloader.review.thumb; [UIView beginAnimations:nil context:nil]; [UIView setAnimationDuration:0.4]; [self.tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:indexPath].imageView.alpha = 1.0; [UIView commitAnimations]; } } Here is an image of the app just after calling this method.. http://www.flickr.com/photos/arbarlow/5288563627/ After calling tableView reloadData or scrolling around the appear correctly, go the the next flickr image, to see the normal result, but im sure you can guess that.. Does anyone have an ideas as to make the images appear correctly? im absolutely stumped?! Regards, Alex iPhone noob

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  • How do I perform this MutliArray setup in Java?

    - by Andy Barlow
    I come from a PHP background and I'm just getting my teeth into some Java. I was wondering how I could implement the following in Java as simply as possible, just echoing the results to a terminal via the usual "System.out.print()" method. <?php $Results[0]['title'] = "No Country for Old Men"; $Results[0]['run_time'] = "122 mins"; $Results[0]['cert'] = "15"; $Results[1]['title'] = "Old School"; $Results[1]['run_time'] = "88 mins"; $Results[1]['cert'] = "18"; // Will basically show the above in order. foreach($Results as value) { echo $Results[$value]['title']; echo $Results[$value]['run_time']; echo $Results[$value]['cert']; } // Lets add some more as I need to do this in Java too $Results[2]['title'] = "Saving Private Ryan"; $Results[2]['run_time'] = "153 mins"; $Results[2]['cert'] = "15"; // Lets remove the first one as an example of another need $Results[0] = null; ?> I hear there are "list iterators" or something that are really good for rolling through data like this. Perhaps it could be implemented with that? A fully working .java file would be most handy in this instance, including how to add and remove items from the array like the above. P.S. I do plan on using this for an Android App in the distant future, so, hopefully it should all work on Android fine too, although, I imagine this sort of thing works on anything Java related :).

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  • Value was either too large or too small for an Int16 error

    - by Barlow Tucker
    I am working on fixing a bug in VB that is giving this error. I am new to VB, so there is some syntax that I am not fully understanding. The code that is throwing the error says: .Row(itemIndex).Item("parentIndex") = CLng(oID) + 1000000 I understand that adding 1000000 is too much for an int16. I can't change that value (not right now anyway). What I don't understand, and can't seem to find, is what .Row is referring too. Any ideas?

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  • Not unique table/alias - can't understand why!?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hi! I'm trying to join some tables together in MySQL, but I seem to get an error saying: #1066 - Not unique table/alias: 'calendar_jobs' I really want it to select everything from the cal_events, the 2 user bits and just the destination col from the jobs table, but become "null" if there arn't any job. A right join seemed to fit the bill but doesn't work! Can anyone help!? SELECT calendar_events.* , calendar_users.doctorOrNurse, calendar_users.passportName, calendar_jobs.destination FROM `calendar_events` , `calendar_users` , `calendar_jobs` RIGHT JOIN calendar_jobs ON calendar_events.jobID = calendar_jobs.jobID WHERE `start` >=0 AND calendar_users.userID = calendar_events.userID Cheers!

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  • Was: Not unique table :: Now: #1054 - Unknown column - can't understand why!?

    - by Andy Barlow
    Hi! I'm trying to join some tables together in MySQL, but I seem to get an error saying: #1066 - Not unique table/alias: 'calendar_jobs' I really want it to select everything from the cal_events, the 2 user bits and just the destination col from the jobs table, but become "null" if there arn't any job. A right join seemed to fit the bill but doesn't work! Can anyone help!? UPDATE: Thanks for the help on the previous query, I'm now up to this: SELECT calendar_events.* , calendar_users.doctorOrNurse, calendar_users.passportName, calendar_jobs.destination FROM `calendar_events` , `calendar_users` RIGHT JOIN calendar_jobs ON calendar_events.jobID = calendar_jobs.jobID WHERE `start` >= 0 AND calendar_users.userID = calendar_events.userID; But am now getting an error saying: #1054 - Unknown column 'calendar_events.jobID' in 'on clause' What is it this time!? Thanks again!

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  • Is there a way to find the browser window height and width in VB.Net without having using javascript

    - by Barlow Tucker
    I am needing to get the browser height and width of the browser window with vb. I can get these values by setting an ASP.Net hidden input control using javascript, after the page has loaded and a post back is done. I need to be able to get these values when the page initially loads so I can create an image based on those values. I am still new at VB.Net, so any help would be great. Thanks!

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  • Exclusive Webcast Series Explains How Project Success Drives Business Success

    - by Melissa Centurio Lopes
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} In the wake of the global financial crisis, organizations throughout the world are redoubling their efforts to enhance financial discipline, achieve operational excellence, and mitigate risk. How can they address all these areas with one comprehensive strategy? With enterprise project portfolio management solutions that provide greater transparency and visibility across all projects and portfolios, says Guy Barlow, Oracle director of industry strategy. In the following interview and in an exclusive, three-part webcast series, Barlow examines today’s new management realities and explains how organizations can succeed in this environment. Q: Financial discipline has always been important, what’s different today? A: A number of organizations are showing that by fiscally aligning projects with the business goals of their organizations, they can shave off hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars in inefficiency and waste. For example, one Oracle customer, the Columbus Regional Airport Authority, reduced its unbudgeted costs from US$24.4 million to US$3.5 million, for an 88 percent improvement. Q: How do organizations achieve results like this? A: First, they need to have the vision to see project management as part of a broad and critical element in their overall enterprise strategy. That means using a single solution, such as Oracle‘s Primavera, to manage multiple projects across multiple functions within a company. So someone in corporate mergers and acquisitions as well as a capital projects team can standardize on the same technology. By doing so they all gain greater efficiency in planning and execution—because the technology can be configured for their specific roles and needs—and the IT organization really benefits from lower maintenance. Second, enterprises must give executive leaders—CFOs, COOs, and CEOs—visibility across the entire business to easily see what projects are on track and which ones are falling behind. In fact, once executives see the power of enterprise project portfolio management, uptake is very quick across the organization. Read the full interview here.

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  • Survey Probes the Project Management Concerns of Financial Services Executives

    - by Melissa Centurio Lopes
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Do you wonder what are the top reasons why large projects in the financial industry fail to meet budgets, schedules, and other key performance criteria? Being able to answer this question can provide important insight and value of good project management practices for your organization. According to 400 senior executives who participated in a new survey conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit and sponsored by Oracle, unrealistic project goals is the main reason for roadblocks to success Other common stumbling blocks are poor alignment between project and organizational goals, inadequate human resources, lack of strong leadership, and unwillingness among team members to point out problems. This survey sample also had a lot to say about the impact of regulatory compliance on the overall portfolio management process. Thirty-nine percent acknowledged that regulations enabled efficient functioning of their businesses. But a similar number said that regulations often require more financial resources than were originally allocated to bring projects in on time. Regulations were seen by 35 percent of the executives as roadblocks to their ability to invest in the organization’s growth and success. These revelations among others are discussed in depth in a new on-demand Webcast titled “Too Good to Fail: Developing Project Management Expertise in Financial Services” now available from Oracle. The Webcast features Brian Gardner, editor of the Economist Intelligence Unit, who presents these findings from this survey along with Guy Barlow, director of industry strategy for Oracle Primavera. Together, they analyze what the numbers mean for project and program managers and the financial services industry. Register today to watch the on-demand Webcast and get a full rundown and analysis of the survey results. Take the Economist Intelligence Unit benchmarking survey and see how your views compare with those of other financial services industry executives in ensuring project success.  Read more in the October Edition of the quarterly Information InDepth EPPM Newsletter

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  • Why Executives Need Enterprise Project Portfolio Management: 3 Key Considerations to Drive Value Across the Organization

    - by Melissa Centurio Lopes
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Cambria","serif";} By: Guy Barlow, Oracle Primavera Industry Strategy Director Over the last few years there has been a tremendous shift – some would say tectonic in nature – that has brought project management to the forefront of executive attention. Many factors have been driving this growing awareness, most notably, the global financial crisis, heightened regulatory environments and a need to more effectively operationalize corporate strategy. Executives in India are no exception. In fact, given the phenomenal rate of progress of the country, top of mind for all executives (whether in finance, operations, IT, etc.) is the need to build capacity, ramp-up production and ensure that the right resources are in place to capture growth opportunities. This applies across all industries from asset-intensive – like oil & gas, utilities and mining – to traditional manufacturing and the public sector, including services-based sectors such as the financial, telecom and life sciences segments are also part of the mix. However, compounding matters is a complex, interplay between projects – big and small, complex and simple – as companies expand and grow both domestically and internationally. So, having a standardized, enterprise wide solution for project portfolio management is natural. Failing to do so is akin to having two ERP systems, one to manage “large” invoices and one to manage “small” invoices. It makes no sense and provides no enterprise wide visibility. Therefore, it is imperative for executives to understand the full range of their business commitments, the benefit to the company, current performance and associated course corrections if needed. Irrespective of industry and regardless of the use case (e.g., building a power plant, launching a new financial service or developing a new automobile) company leaders need to approach the value of enterprise project portfolio management via 3 critical areas: Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Cambria","serif";} 1. Greater Financial Discipline – Improve financial rigor and results through better governance and control is an imperative given today’s financial uncertainty and greater investment scrutiny. For example, as India plans a US$1 trillion investment in the country’s infrastructure how do companies ensure costs are managed? How do you control cash flow? Can you easily report this to stakeholders? 2. Improved Operational Excellence – Increase efficiency and reduce costs through robust collaboration and integration. Upwards of 66% of cost variances are driven by poor supplier collaboration. As you execute initiatives do you have visibility into the performance of your supply base? How are they integrated into the broader program plan? 3. Enhanced Risk Mitigation – Manage and react to uncertainty through improved transparency and contingency planning. What happens if you’re faced with a skills shortage? How do you plan and account for geo-political or weather related events? In summary, projects are not just the delivery of a product or service to a customer inside a predetermined schedule; they often form a contractual and even moral obligation to shareholders and stakeholders alike. Hence the intimate connection between executives and projects, with the latter providing executives with the platform to demonstrate that their organization has the capabilities and competencies needed to meet and, whenever possible, exceed their customer commitments. Effectively developing and operationalizing corporate strategy is the hallmark of successful executives and enterprise project and portfolio management allows them to achieve this goal. Article was first published for Manage India, an e-newsletter, PMI India.

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