EXTRANET NEWS *
Published Weekly
Editors: Joel Orr, N'omi Orr,
Stephen Orr
http://www.extranetnews.com
1. eTIMEMACHINE:
PROJECT GLUE FOR THE ENTERPRISE
2. THE LIST
3. TIDBITS
4. QUOTE OF THE WEEK
1. eTIMEMACHINE:
PROJECT GLUE FOR THE ENTERPRISE
Joel Orr
While you don’t hear the phrase much anymore, “islands of automation” still describes much of industry and construction: Each corporate function pursued automation on its own terms, according to its own needs, at its own pace.
So now the Finance Department is completely committed to AccPac, Engineering uses Primavera to manage projects, Manufacturing has adopted MS Project, HR has adopted JD Edwards. And now, IT wants to move everyone to SAP.
eTimeMachine (http://www.etimemachine.com) solves this problem by synchronizing these and other apps with its own user interface, as well as with each other. Information entered into one application immediately becomes accessible in all other appropriate locations. (Other applications: Oracle; Excel; Access; payroll programs; and more.)
The product has its own interface, with three levels of “information hiding” – workspaces for the: 1) executive; 2) manager; and 3) employee.
1) Executives have access to a complete executive information management system, with full drill-down into any data.
2) Managers can see and do anything.
3) Employees have access to everything they need to get their jobs done.
Your workspace allows you to have a full multi-project view – even if each project is only defined within one other app.
Users can continue to use the screens of the separate applications if they choose. eTimeMachine embeds some of its extended functionality into those systems. It is always possible to switch to the eTimeMachine workspace for more convenient access to its extended functionality.
And get this: If all this seems too good to be true, you can check it out at no cost: eTimeMachine invites prospects to use five seats for an entire year at no cost, to see if it does what they say it does. (Frankly, I can’t imagine anyone needing more than 30-45 days to see if it works.)
The product comes in three flavors:
Our take: Why isn’t this company huge? This is a tremendous “pain point” for large firms, and the names on the customer and partner lists are many and impressive.
Maybe it’s their awkward name.
2. THE LIST
Total companies: 254 (see who's on The List at
http://www.extranetnews.com)
3. TIDBITS
* MPS User
Conference 2002: Connecting with Customers will be held September 18-20, in
* Missed the
Bentley International User Conference? Come to Virtual BIUC, http://www.virtualbiuc.com.
* Get the Laiserin Letter from star architect and pundit Jerry Laiserin. Go to http://www.laiserin.com/ to enjoy it and sign up for it. Highly
recommended.
* Read David Coleman's great article, "Good Pilot
Projects Gone Bad: Complexity and Project Management," at
http://www.collaborate.com/publication/newsletter/publications_newsletter_june02.html
* Go to http://www.enr.com/new/indcal.asp for ENR's construction-industry calendar.
* CADwire has up-to-the-minute
nuggets of well-organized news, press releases, and commentary from Joel and
his associates in Cyon Research Corporation. http://www.cadwire.net
is the place to go to find out what is going on in the world of engineering and
architecture automation.
4. QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“The last of the human freedoms: to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
- Viktor Frankl, psychiatrist, survivor of Nazi concentration camps – who had this realization in the camps.