Category: Emerging technologies

Internet of Things – The Inevitable Future of Innovation for Start-Ups

March 17, 2015

Internet of Things or IoT is the inter-connection between distinctive and embedded computer devices belonging to an existing Internet related infrastructure. It offers an advanced connectivity of computer devices, systems, smart objects etc., which goes beyond M2M (Machine to Machine), thus, ushering automation in almost all fields. Internet of Things: Recent Trends and Future Nowadays, Internet of Things is considered to be one of the emerging technologies that, with time, would have a great repercussion on global businesses. In fact, it has grown to be a mega technological trend among other emerging technologies and is expected to be so in the upcoming years. Trends: IoT is making companies data-driven IoT is changing the type of products and services offered by companies IoT is transforming the nature of business-critical operations for organizations IoT is making Data Management and Security a must Future: According to Cisco, IoT devices would dominate the world by 2018 According to a Gartner Report, the number of IoT devices would increase to 26 billion by 2020 The incremental revenue from IoT is predicted to reach $309 billion every year by 2020 Internet of Things: Challenges Similar to any other technology, Internet of Things is even not free from challenges. After all, it is not easy to maintain consistency in the wireless connection between such a huge number of electronic devices. Hence, IoT is more likely to require the following to move up to the next level: Innovative ways are required to sense complex environments Variety of connectivity standards are needed for addressing diverse application needs A number of IoT applications need to be operated with batteries for years Protecting user privacy and security is vital Development of IoT applications is not easy for all developers IoT applications need end-to-end solutions like cloud services Internet of Things: The Future of Innovation Internet of Things, being one of the emerging industries, especially in the country of India, has got the potential of bringing in innovations in different fields leveraging disruptive technologies and open platforms. Researches show that IoT would not just have a noticeable impact on the global IT market but would even change the way we live. Here are some of the innovations that Internet of Things is expected to bring in: Utility companies are looking for a Smart Grid that can read meters remotely People want to control cookers via internet so that they can prepare meal while on their way back home Television companies wish to monitor what people are watching the most for delivering targeted advertising Local supermarkets are in need of smart fridges so as to help people with targeted shopping Internet of Things: How Advantageous it is for Start-ups Now, IoT is becoming the most attention-grabbing market for start-ups, start-up accelerators and investors all over the world. The emergence of innovative smart objects has brought in a brilliant and prospective future for start-ups. According to Gartner, industries that are leading the sector and are into the digitalization of everything are: Manufacturing: 15% Healthcare: 15% Insurance: 11% Apart from the aforementioned major industries, there are a number of other start-ups who are venturing into this newly emerging industry: IoT Operators IoT Device Management platform providers IoT Application Development platform providers IoT Security and Service Providers IoT Consulting and System Integrators Opportunities and Challenges for Start-ups Leveraging Internet of Things Start-ups that have already taken a step forward towards Internet of Things are of the opinion that innovation is highly necessary for businesses for creating a competitive advantage; and IoT is such an emerging technology that helps businesses with world-class IT innovations, thereby, offering start-ups a number of growth opportunities to savor. However, it is not free from challenges. Here are some of the major opportunities and challenges that start-ups might experience while leveraging Internet of Things: Opportunities: Electronics industry is about to be driven by power-efficient electronics and miniaturization Huge need of IoT hubs providing testing solutions and required infrastructure are arising Global electronics brands like Cisco, Intel, Samsung and others are investing heavily in India through start-ups International brands like Apple, Google, IBM, Oracle and many others are announcing IoT strategies for both consumer and enterprises Challenges: Business funding Market misunderstandings Creating the right IoT business culture Recruiting IoT experts In spite of all these challenges, Internet of Things can help start-ups add value and sustain it for a longer period, if adopted and implemented properly. In fact, IoT is predicted to be the inevitable future of start-ups.

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Internet of Things – The Next Growth Driver for Insurance Industry

March 4, 2015

With the evolving technology, the world is becoming more connected. The Internet of Things (IoT) is one such technological advancement that is making the world safer and healthier. In this respect, insurance sector is an important industry to talk about when it comes to IoT. It has a material impact on the static insurance industry. However, the question is how big will the impact be? SMA survey shows that 74% of insurers plan to invest in IoT by 2016, with 7% already planning some serious investment. Insurers are now presented with tons of opportunities to use digital technologies and create more business prospects. For instance, this connected ecosystem is an excellent medium for relevant engagement of consumers with their cars, homes and selves- With consumers demanding universal remote control to replace their collection of remotes, the majority of the household will remain connected to the IoT enabled monitoring and control solutions. USAA patented a device to install at homes and track various parameters including wind speed, humidity and mechanical vibration, or extreme temperatures that can lead to severe damages of insured homes. Similarly, car insurance companies can increase policy rates or offer discounts based on the driving habits that are monitored by a device plugged into the car. In this context, one of the leading car insurance companies in the United States offers ‘Usage Based Insurance’ program called Progressive Snapshot which provides personalized rate based on driving habits. Not only this, consumers can now pay insurance premium according to the usage of car. When it is a matter of IoT connected self, wearable devices can lead to independent living solutions especially for elderly and physically challenged individuals. The Internet of Things – A Big Game Changer for Insurance Sector Less risk with more opportunities IoT helps to resolve the social challenges of our time and create value for both the individuals and companies. For example, autonomous driving and driving assistance system will significantly reduce the number of accidents and the amount of damage they can cause in future. Also active household automation systems can prevent hazards and risks such as fire and theft. The system enables the users to act more carefully and responsibly which ultimately reduces failures and accidents leading to insurance claims. Better pricing strategy With more personalized and flexible insurance policies, insurers can offer their customers more enhanced, safety and lower premiums. For instance, how you intend to use the car to commute in heavy and medium traffic will influence what you pay for insurance. Also if sensors could notify a homeowner remotely through mobile app regarding a burst pipe, it can reduce the frequency and severity of insurance claims. Direct customer contact Insurers can gain direct access to their target groups through products based on networked objects and services. The daily use of networked products allows companies to acquire valuable information required to understand the current situation and needs of their customers. Accordingly they can offer them further products and services that match their current situation. If customers find this experience fruitful, it reinforces their confidence in the service providers and leads to more and new business opportunities. Cross-selling opportunities with micro targeting When assistance service providers get automatic notifications during any emergencies, this helps them to better support senior citizens especially who live alone. This program popularly called Ambient Assistant Living aims at enabling elderly people to lead an independent life in a homely environment. Moreover, sensors installed throughout the home give insurers the ability to remotely monitor their health and daily activities and provide better medical assistance. The insurers can also offer appropriate policies covering equipment and care. Higher customer satisfaction Minimum risks and dynamic pricing creates more transparency between the insurers and the customers. Customer awareness on the factors that impacts their insurance premium not only prevents premium loading but also helps customers to better control their plans. The Major Obstacle Behind the Adoption of IoT in Insurance Sharing information across multiple devices and sensors impose security threat. These potential threats could lead to more and more claims for insurance firms. In short, IoT is hackable. However, insurance companies are looking for automation metrics to help manage these risks on a personal and commercial basis. Internet of Things – An Image Booster for Insurers As insurers can accompany their customers through every stages of their lives offering them comfort and security, IoT shift their image from being ‘pure risk insurers’ toward being ‘smart life companions’. Such high level of automation and smart IoT systems could reduce the human error elements completely, thereby reducing the need for insurance or the complete absence of insurance. IoT is surely to provide transformational opportunities to improve business intelligence and make better decisions.

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Fence Your WordPress Website from Hackers with “Wordfence” Security Plugin

December 15, 2014

Have you ever thought that your WordPress website can be hacked? Are you ready to face the adversities of such an attack that can put your site and blogs at stake? If you are pondering about how to secure your website from such attacks/hack, then this blog is a must-read for you. Hackers across the globe are always actively working on their plans to hack websites that are of interest to them; and obviously WordPress based websites are no exception. In fact, the present frequency of hacking attacks across all WordPress sites is increasing every minute. So, isn’t it wise to secure your tirelessly created website before it gets hacked? Off course it is! How to Secure Your WordPress Website Securing the WordPress site you have is not that tough with ‘Wordfence’ Security plugin. All you need to do is download the latest version of the plugin, which is one of the premier cyber security solution developed specifically for securing WordPress websites. It’s a free WordPress security plugin that includes a comprehensive package of anti-virus and firewall incorporating tools & machine learning that can help your website recover from any major hack. However, the premium version of the security plugin is even available with some extra features at a cost of $ 3.90 to $ 39 per year. What You Would Get Wordfence, featured with a number of unique security features, is the sole WordPress site security plugin that offers real-time distributed protection by learning from other websites that have already been hacked. Once it gets notified about a hack attempt on WordPress website running Wordfence, it automatically blocks that particular attacker not only for that site but also from intruding into the other sites running this security plugin. How Wordfence Secures Your WordPress Website Here are the features that help Wordfence to be so much active in maintaining your website security: Cellphone Sign-in: Even referred to as Two Factor Authentication, Cellphone Sign-in allows you to sign-in to your website through cellphone and permanently stop brute force attacks. Network and Geo-blocking: This feature helps in blocking WordPress hackers even when they change IP address for hacking. Wordfence directly bans their network, range of IP addresses and country & makes WordPress security stronger. Site Repair: Being backed by cloud servers, Wordfence can help you identify the hacked files. When your WordPress website gets hacked, Wordfence uses its source code verification feature for letting you know what has changed in your site so that you can easily repair the files that have been hacked. Machine Learning: This feature of Wordfence keeps your WordPress website pre-protected when someone else’s website receives a hack attempt. It reports attacks on a real-time basis to its cloud server and this in turn, helps it identify the IP address & block it for all the websites running Wordfence. Source Code Verification: Wordfence not just verifies the integrity of the core source code and opensource plugins & themes of your WordPress website but even does a full scan of unrecognizable files. It even scans the source code that remote scans are unable to do. What Limitations Wordfence Has In spite of all the aforementioned features and benefits, this WordPress security plugin is not free from limitations. Here are the loop holes of the plugin: You might need to wait for a while to get a tech support. If you are unsure about how to use the plugin, it might provide you with false positives. If the plugin is misconfigured, it causes Wordfence to stop working without any prior intimation. Scanning of websites tends to occupy a lot of memory. Currently, it does not include security from fake sign-ups. Final Thoughts Despite all of these limitations, Wordfence is a feature-packed and efficient cyber security plugin that can protect your WordPress website on a real-time basis at a affordable price. Detailed information about this security plugin can be availed at the site of Wordfence. Further, for any technical support you may consult us at info@indusnet.co.in

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3 Reasons Why You Should Use Microsoft Navision

March 16, 2013

It is no secret that Microsoft Dynamics NAV (formerly, Navision) is one of the most efficient ERP systems around. It has helped thousands of enterprises to integrate financial management, manufacturing, business intelligence and reporting, supply chain management, sales and marketing, HR management, project and service management and other processes which are usually treated as different departments in most companies. Microsoft Dynamics NAV enables companies to integrate these various processes under one comprehensive software program, save money, time and become more productive and efficient on the whole. However, we still get questions asking why a company must choose Microsoft Dynamics NAV. We have put together a list of reasons why Microsoft and we think that Dynamics NAV is one of the best enterprise resource planning systems around. Gaining Control over Different Processes and Department The first thing that Microsoft Dynamics NAV does is integrate the various functions of your company. It increases the insight level of managers and administrations and helps them to actually know what is happening within an organization in its purest definition. It increases visibility and makes managers confident about taking the right decisions and streamline operations. Financial management will not seem as threatening as it did earlier, and thanks to a great user interface and built-in workflow charts, you will be able to make better financial decisions. Microsoft Dynamics NAV helps administration and managers to look forward, instead of looking backwards. The software comes with self-service reporting tools and real-time business intelligence which at the end of the day are required to make informed decisions. With a clear view of what is happening in your business, you will be able to address current issues and prevent future problems. Moreover, the detailed audit trails and transaction history will ensure there are no loopholes in your accounts. Microsoft Dynamics NAV Helps You Increase Margins When it comes to running a business it is all about increasing margins. Increased margins not only help a company to make more money, but also increase investor confidence and boost stock price, if you are already a listed company. By allowing you to get a clear picture of what is happening within your organization, Microsoft Dynamics NAC helps you to make smarter decisions and increase operating margins. When your margins increase, your cash flow increase as well, giving you more operating cash flow to run your business and make wise investment decisions. If you are looking for improving your fundamentals including management effectively in terms of return on sales and return on assets, NAV helps you to increase your profitability eventually. Moreover, Microsoft Dynamics NAV helps you to cut operational costs and minimize errors, which are very important if you want to improve your fundamentals. The coolest thing about Microsoft NAV is that it is a great software program with an amazing UI which allows you to automate key business processes. There is nothing more important than being able to analyze financial data easily to identify trends and then take the necessary action to increase overall cash flow. Microsoft Dynamics NAV Helps Companies Grow All companies want to increase growth and success. Microsoft Dynamics NAV ultimately helps you to grow as a company and as a professional. It increases profitability and adjusts as your company grows in its own way. Whether you connect with people on the desktop through SharePoint, over the Internet, or with the help of instant messaging, email and voice, Microsoft Dynamics NAV allows you to transform the way you work with people and connect with them. It helps you to choose the right deployment action, and provides you with greater facility with regard to IT systems. Multi currency support, flexible accounting processes and increased knowledge about risks help you to grow your business without encountering any of the negative side effects that come alongside running a business. It is safe to say that Microsoft Dynamics NAV is one of the best ERP systems around and it will help you to integrate various functions of your business under one easy software program. It is an affordable and wise decision to install Microsoft Dynamics NAV. If you are unsure or want more details, you could contact one of our professionals who are specials in ERP solutions.

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Pinterest – The New Social Networking Kid on the Block

April 26, 2012

Pinterest is the latest entrant in the field of Social bookmarking. It is a social bookmarking site with a little twist. Pinterest is based on the concept of curation. It allows users to create visual collection of things they find interesting on the web. You surf the web and when you come across something interesting, you pin those onto something called “pinboards”. These pinboards are then organized based upon the theme like “Infographics”, “Places of Interest”, “Home decoration”, “wedding gowns” etc. These pinned items and boards can be shared with others. Other people with similar interest can follow you and like your pins and also can comment on it. So Pinterest is not only a social bookmarking and sharing site but also a acts like a social network site too.   In a very short span of time it has created quite a buzz in the Internet. A primary reason for the enormous success of Pinterest is because of the fact that basic human behavior has been transported to the web. Many of us during our teenage days, have created collages by cutting pictures of celebrities and visual ads and pasted it on the wall to feel cool. The same way we feel cool about sharing interesting stuffs on the web. According to founder of Pinterest the mission is to “connect everyone in the world through the “things” they find interesting”. And true to it’s mission it is helping like-minded people with similar tastes to connect with each other virtually. Few Facts about Pinterest Pinterest is co-founded by Ben Silbermann, Paul Sciarra and Evan Sharp and was launched as beta among a closed group of people in March 2010, later on it opened up to public as invitation only. It is built in Python(Django), MySQL, Redis, Solr and Hadoop. Among the Pinterest users, 80% are female, 47% are between ages of 18-34 and 69% have household income between $25,000 to $75,000 per year. In a minute almost 1090 users visit Pinterest. Pinterest is the fastest growing social network site with more than 10 million users in 2 years since it’s launch. Pinterest became the third largest social network in US in March 2012. Jane Wang the most followed user in Pinterest with 2854609 followers is the mother of co-founder Ben Silbermann’s mother. Pinterest accounts for 3.6% of referral traffic almost same as twitter with 3.61%. So it is increasingly being preferred by brands. Uses of Pinterest Pinterest is the most efficient content creation tool. With Pinterest the social media has evolved from long form to push button publishing. The image below shows evolution of social media through various forms: Pinterest is used extensively by brands and online marketers to promote their products as it has got a high rate of referral traffic. It is used by users to plan wedding, decorate homes, saving recipes, finding styles, saving infographics, learning language development and lot more. Getting Started with Pinterest Before we let you know the tips to use Pinterest effectively, let’s familiarize with few pinterest based terms: Pin: A pin is an images attached to anything you share. The images may be from the ink you are sharing or can be uploaded. Pins can include a description also called caption. If the caption contains a price, then the images attached can have a diagonal bar showing the price. Repin: Once you pin a stuff on Pinterest, other users can share it, it is called repin. Board: Pins are organized into boards based on the theme. Each board can be considered having pins of similar theme or niche. Pinmarklet/PinIt Bookmarklet: It is a browser button which helps in pinning the stuffs on the Internet. Once you install the pinmarklet on your browser, you can just push on the button if you want to share something on pinterest. This will automatically grab an image and source link. Signing up with Pinterest Pinterest has not yet opened the registration for the masses. It is currently in invitation only. So in order to signup for Pinterest, you need to head over to the website pinterest.com and request an invite or ask someone who is already having an account in Pinterest. After receiving an invite you can register through Facebook connect or Twitter. Editing Profile After you are logged in to Pinterest, you can edit your profile. In order to edit your profile, click on your username at the top-right and click on Settings. You can see many fields like First name, Last name, Email, Passwword, Profile picture, Bio, Website URl, Location etc. which can be edited. Another good thing is that Pinterest allows changing the username any time you wish. Changing Profile Picture You can either choose to display your Facebook profile picture or Twitter profile picture. If you want to add your own picture, you can choose to upload an image from your computer and set that as your profile picture. You will see 2 buttons “refresh from Facebok” and “refresh from Twitter” near the profile image that helps in updating Facebook and Twitter profile picture as your Pinterest picture. Adding/Inviting Friends You can even find friends from other social network as well as your email contacts. Go to http://pinterest.com/invites/ and select the services from where you want to find and invite friends. After you select the desired service, you have to allow Pinterest to access the service. Creating Pin Board Boards and Pins are the heart of Pinterest. Boards or Pin boards are collection of pins belonging to similar theme or niche. The first thing you need to do after you edit your profile is to create few boards based on the things you like. Pinterest will automatically give you few pin board ideas, you can choose those or create your own pin boards. You can have boards like Places of interest, Recipe collection, Shades of my life, blogging resources etc. If you want to add new boards any time in the future, you can click on the Add button which will

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Mobile Advertising 101

April 18, 2012

Introduction Mobile advertising is the most popular form of advertising. It is the most exciting frontiers in interactive advertising. Part of the success of mobile advertising can be attributed to the growing demand and reach of mobile devices in addition to the evolution of sophisticated smart phones. Internet has now been reinvented on mobile devices, so as the advertising. Mobile advertisement is an essential pillar of online marketing strategy. Each and every company/business is trying to reach to as many customers as possible and mobile as a medium is successfully catering to the need. Advertisers are shifting focus from mainstream computers to Mobile devices, hence smaller, personalized and interactive form of advertisement is also gradually gaining popularity. In the latest “Mobile Advertising and Marketing 3rd Edition” report  by Berg Insight the global mobile marketing and advertising market will grow from € 1 billion in 2008 to € 8.7 billion in 2014 which is a 43 percent Compounded Annual Growth Rate. At that value it will be 11.7 percent of total digital advertising. The number presented above gives an idea about how mobile advertising is gradually playing an important role. Mobile Advertising ecosystem The mobile advertising ecosystem involves several intermediaries between the “Advertisers” and the “Consumers”.  When a message has to be conveyed from an Advertiser to an intended consumer, it has to be processed through Ad agency, Content publishers, Mobile Carrier and finally to the Consumer. The figure below gives workflow of a typical mobile advertising campaign: Types of Mobile Advertisement Mobile advertisement is of various types. They vary from a simple SMS to rich media ads like animated graphics and video. These ads can be highly targeted and can be displayed based on user’s behavior. Let’s discuss below the various forms of mobile advertisement: SMS (Short Messaging Service) This is the primitive and simplest form of mobile advertisement and exists from a long time ago. This kind of advertisement is supported by all the mobile phones and hence it has the highest reach. But the conversion rate for SMS ads is very low. Whatever information a brand wants to convey to the consumers is composed in short message and sent via a SMS gateway. SMS advertising is suitable for sending coupon and special discounts. Retail, restaurants and entertainment markets get benefitted through this form of mobile advertising. If this SMS ad is used excessively by sending same message to a number multiple times, it cause irritation among customers and can be fatal to a brand. Text Ads These kinds of ads are displayed like a normal text on mobile websites. These ads are currently responsible for 50% of mobile Internet traffic as they fit in almost any mobile device and mobile web browsers having Internet access. The Text ads like normal desktop ads contain 3 lines of text and a URL that links to the advertiser’s website. Image Ads The image ads can be of 2 types. One that is served through MMS and another served through Mobile websites. This is a popular method of advertising. The image ads include both static and animated images. In image ads via MMS, the advertisers load static and animated images to an ad server and the ad server identifies the mobile device and serve related ads. In the image ads via mobile sites, the ads images are embedded on the mobile web pages and appear while browsing the mobile sites. Graphical Banners There are various types and size of graphical banner ads available for mobile. These ads may be quite interactive and can have call to action button placed on it. The difference between image ads and banner ads is that image ads might not have a clickable component whereas the graphical ads have a clickable component. Video Ads These kinds of ads are usually supported by high end mobile devices and resemble mainstream advertisement. The ads that are displayed on TV or websites can also be displayed on mobile devices. For example while playing videos in sites like youtube, few of the videos want you to see the video ads before the actual video is played. Embedded Ads These kinds of ads are generally part of free mobile games or apps and displayed during game play. Push Notification/Scroll Ads These kinds of ads are pushed to your mobile device and appear when the mobile device is idle. Usually these ads ask you to perform some action to deliver further content. These ads are served through the mobile operator. Mobile Ads Transmission Options Mobile ads can be served via various medium as given below: Short Messaging Service Multimedia messaging Service Premium SMS Subscription based SMS service Wireless Access Protocol sites Mobile Web Mobile Operator (via caller tunes and IVRS) Streaming media Broadcast Media Mobile Ad Network In order to facilitate the mobile advertising, the mobile ad networks play an important role. These ad networks are the one where advertisers meet the publishers. Below are a list of global renowned ad networks: Admob Admob has been acquired by Google in 2009. It is one of the world’s largest mobile advertising platform. It serves as high as 40 billion banner and text ads per month across mobile web and mobile apps. iAds iAds is a mobile advertising platform from Apple. iAds has been a part of iOS 4. It helps third party application developers to embed advertisement into the apps they build for iPhones and iPads. inMobi Founded in India, inMobi is the largest independent mobile advertising network in the world. It is a performance based mobile advertising network and helps advertisers reach their target audience and publishers monetize their content. It started as an SMS based search platform. Microsoft Adcenter Mobile advertising solution from Microsoft offers both display ads and search advertising. According to Microsoft the mobile display ad solution connects to nearly 50 million unique users and the mobile search ad solution leverage the partnership with Bing and Yahoo and reaches to almost 28 million users. Apart from the above list of ad

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Making Money from Mobile Apps

March 26, 2012

Every now and then we heard stories about app developers making fortune from the app they developed. Though the news are hard to believe, they are in fact true, as mobile app market has untapped potential to make money. The other side of the story also laments that not every app developers make money with their apps, which is also true to the T. Considering the fact that there are millions of apps in Apple App Store as well as Android Market, everyone into the app development cannot make money. Having a careful look at the top selling apps, we can see that all popular apps have few things in common which makes them popular and people do not think twice to pay money to have those apps in their smartphone. If you understand these distinguishing factors and incorporate those into your next mobile app, you can still win against the competition and your app will get visibility, more importantly it will serve as a money making machine. Before we proceed further on “how to make money through mobile apps”, lets us have a look at the recipes for a successful mobile app. If our app is successful then it will make us money. If you are serious about making money from your app, you need to clearly understand the elements of successful mobile apps. Researching the App Store With infinite competing apps in the market, you need to do proper research to find out the niche that has very few apps or no apps at all. This will lead you to face less competition. Researching on the app stores will also give you insight on the current trend of the app usage. You will get to know about what is making people dissatisfied about an app and what are they looking for in an app. Creating an Innovative App It takes lot of efforts, time and money to create an app that looks good and performs. So do not waste your effort in replicating an existing concept, rather utilize that to come up with something new. The app market is flooded with all sorts of app, so if the app you develop is another archetypical app available in the market with a little twist, it will disperse in the vast sea of app store and you will hardly find any takers. On the other hand after a thorough research if you come up with something unique that solves certain problem the smart phone users are facing, you will have lot of takers for that app. Performance and Loading Time The success of an app depends upon how consistently it performs. The app has to be tested properly in all conditions before it is released in the app market. The app should consume less memory and CPU power so it can run on all kind of smartphones including the starter range. The main reason people prefer mobile app is because they want to access information faster. Mobile apps which take long time to load are removed as soon as they are installed. Loading time of 5-7 seconds is fine but above that creates dissatisfaction. Enticing User Interface The main reason of success of a smartphone app is the user interface. If the user interface is appealing and has simple and easy navigation, it will be user friendly and hence will be popular among all kind of smart phone users. If the UI of an app is cluttered, it will fail to gain user acceptance. Apps like Feathers, Gowalla, Instagram are considered having the best User Interface. Value Proposition The mobile app has to be usable, that means it has to offer some sort of a solutions to something needed by the users and make life easier. Such an app will gain popularity quite rapidly. Such apps offer something extra then other app and engage the users. If you look at apps like Flixter, Gowalla, Echofon, Tripit etc. they all have what it takes to be a top selling app. Now that we are done with identifying the recipes of a successful app, it is time to know how to make money from our app. Once our app is ready to launch, there are 2 important steps that need to be successfully completed. Getting Approved in the App store After your app is developed the only hindrance before it is available to public is getting approved in the app store for the respective platform. While it is easier to be approved in Android marketplace, getting approved in Apple App store is quite difficult. But if the submitted app complies with all the policies and guidelines, it will definitely get thumbs up. If Apple feels that the App is just a copycat and does not add any value addition to iPhone, contains pornographic and racial content then the app is likely to be disapproved. Promoting the App Once the app is approved and listed in the App market place your next goal is to let customers know about it so that they will download the app. The best promotion technique is to get features as a new app in the category or top selling app. But to be featured in the app market place you need numbers. So there are external ways to promote the app and get the desired numbers and then automatically get featured in the app marketplace and you will see a sudden increase in downloads as soon as your app get featured in the marketplace. You can create a dedicated website for your app, utilize blogs in the same niche to write about your apps, Take help of influential people in social media to talk about your app in Twitter and Facebook. These methods will create a buzz about your app and information about it will reach to more and more people. With good promotion and marketing, your app will gradually gain visibility and it is time to see the result in terms of monetary benefit you

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native-vs-webapp

Pros & Cons of Mobile Apps (aka Native Apps) vs Web Apps

February 7, 2012

Looking into the phenomenal growth of mobile browsing, businesses are shifting their focus to mobile web. Their overall web strategy is gradually leaning towards mobile web. However depending upon the business the mobile strategy will vary. For example a business related to selling products like Amazon or Ebay will have a different strategy then a business offering news to the readers. Whatever be the business, the bigger question while creating mobile strategy is whether to use open standards like HTML, CSS and JavaScript to build the Mobile site or build it as a native Mobile App for the device you are targeting. To start with both Mobile Web App and Native App have their pros and cons. So before you start building the application a thorough evaluation is essential. Difference between Web Apps and Native Apps Before we proceed, let’s understand what exactly is the difference between the 2 types. Native Apps are applications specifically designed to run on a particular platform. The whole application is installed in the device and can be executed. They are usually dependent on mobile firmware as well as the Operating System. So an app designed for Android will work only on Android devices and not on an iPhone. It needs to be ported or adapted to iOS to be used in iPhone. These Native Apps are mostly obtained through a marketplace. Web Apps are applications which are usually accessed through a web browser and the whole or part of it needs to be downloaded onto the device each time you access it. These are created using open web standard like HTML, CSS and JavaScript. These are usually platform independent. These web apps are loaded automatically in the mobile web browser through the use of sophisticated detection technology when the site is accessed through mobile. The image below depicts how US smartphone users use Mobile App and Browser for various tasks. Pros and Cons of Web Apps & Native Apps Both Native and Web Apps have their pros and cons. A clear understanding of the benefits and demerit of each along with your mobile web strategy will help in choosing one over the other and if requires choosing the both. Rich User Interface: Native Apps seamlessly integrate into the device features and provide a rich user experience. They integrate with phone in such a way that gives the feel of built-in functionality of the device. The improvement is mobile web technology is helping the Web Apps to gradually go through a phenomenal change in user interface. But the Native Apps clearly win here. Connectivity: Native Apps can be used to some extent even if there is no data connectivity however Web App requires connection to Internet to function. Native App is winner. Performance: As Web Apps require HTML and JavaScript rendering they are comparatively slower as compared to similar Native Apps. Native App is winner. Availability: The Native Apps are distributed through a marketplace like Android Market or iPhone Apps Store. And these are available subject to Approval. Even if an App is approved now, in future that may be rejected based upon the terms. This dependency of Native App for distribution is a hindrance for Enterprise to go for a Native App for their business application. On the other hand the web app can be accessed from any device without such restrictions. Web App is winner. Updates: The updates to Native Apps happen through the market place where as the web app update is instant. The moment you make any changes in the web app users will be able to see the updated features instantly. Web App is winner. Cost of development: The most notable advantage of mobile web app is that you build it once and it will be available to all devices irrespective of the configuration and platform with few changes. Native Apps being platform dependent, considerable amount of money has to be spent to develop same App for different platform like Android, iOS, Windows 7 and Blackberry. Web App is a winner here. Engagement and Branding: Because of the stronger integration with the mobile platform Native Apps provide a better engagement. Also they help in creating a stronger branding for your business as there will be a dedicated icon of your brand on the mobile device which is used to launch the Native Application. Native App is a winner here. For further elaborate learning on this Max Katz has created a table that shows various differences in various categories between Native App and mobile Web App. Conclusion: Thanks to HTML5, CSS3 and jQuery framework like jQuery Mobile and Sencha Touch the gap between a Native App and Mobile Web App is gradually reducing. With few exceptions most of the native apps could be written into Web Apps and can provide almost similar experience. Another form of the App called Hybrid App is also seen now a days which is a web app placed inside a native wrapper. According to Jeff Haydn the Native App and Mobile web are not mutually exclusive and need to co-exist for some time. Feel free to contact us at info@indusnet.co.in for our advice. We will be more than happy to help without any bias, as we have both capabilities and only suggest the right fit to our clients. You can also visit our mobile section.

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Indus Net Technologies powers Emami Chisel Art’s online auction platform

March 7, 2008

Indus Net Technologies has recently completed an art auction website for Emami Chisel Art Private Limited (http://www.emamichisel.com/). The website streamlines the process of online auction and allows registered users to bid on paintings along with the floor bidders, making it a powerful tool for traditional auction houses. Thus the charm of floor bidding remains along with the convenience of online bidding for people who cannot make it to the floor. The site concluded its first auction on 23rd February 2008 with sales for the evening touching Rs 240 million (US$ 6233766.23). Tribute to Hashmi crossed the $ 1 million mark, creating a record for any Husain ever sold at an auction, with Internet bidding contributing to a sizable portion. We wish them all the best and renew our commitment to deliver cutting edge solutions to companies around the world.  

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HTML 5 working draft released

January 25, 2008

W3C HTML Working Group has recently released HTML 5 working draft. This is a very important step forward; the same is available for review and comment at http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/WD-html5-20080122/ The new standard addresses the need of web application developers in more pro-active way: Basic template facility has been implemented with facility to repeat elements There are also new elements for navigation, headers, footers, figures, and dialog Client-side persistent storage functionality (JavaScript APIs for key/value pairs & embedded SQL databases) Support for server-sent events, which will facilitate persistent connections to remote data sources Some old features like frames have been removed. Let us see how soon new browsers start supporting these new features of HTML 5. Currently the Opera browser has the best support (though it does not support all features) for HTML 5. Footnote: There is an overall trend to make HTML more developer friendly so that complex web applications are developed as per W3C standards and are compatible on different browsers on different mediums. With Bill Gate’s prediction coming in about different shapes and sizes of computers in this decade which will make computers more intuitive (like the table PC), this seems to be moving in the right direction. So let’s think, how your website will look and take shape (as per device specific browser compatibility) when displayed on a coffee table as the people sitting around it mumble the name of your company! Abhishek

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