It’s National IT Professionals Day. Let’s hear from our internal IT specialist about their career and the day-to-day workload.
“How did your career start?”
Like many brought up in the 1980’s, my first experience was at school and saving birthday/Christmas money to purchase a Sinclair ZX81. I moved away from the “Wobbly 16K RAM Pack” and upgraded to the full colour Sinclair Spectrum 48K where I learned the craft of hacking games to bypass copy protection devices, making mods for infinite lives cheats and so on!
Without the structure (good or bad) of any formal training, I have always looked at I.T. from an “every day is a learning day” perspective. I always try and look at the desired outcome and work backwards, learning as I go. Trial and error is your friend here!
“What are your responsibilities at deegee?”
Job one was to bring in-house the hardware support. In cost terms alone, the company’s hardware contract had been more expensive than replacing the IT estate every 18 months. With a three-year life cycle of a PC, this was an immediate cash saver. However, with more careful planning and ongoing management, as well as re-deployment of equipment as it comes out of its initial primary use, we really do extract every ounce of value out of our kit!
Moving away from the hardware aspect, I’m fundamentally lazy! By that I mean, if a certain dataset is requested from me more than a couple of times, I will find a way to automate it. My first breakthrough came in presenting a daily sales figure to the Directors; it had been taking a member of the team around five to six minutes to produce and record a sales total for the day (every day!). I worked on interrogating our ERP system to splat that figure on a screen in a fraction of a second, so that the Directors could keep a track of what they needed pretty much in real time. What I learned from that opened up opportunities across the business; the availability of real-time information generated a demand for more, actionable, figures. Probably my biggest ever time-saver was translating a bespoke commission report that was taking thirty-five minutes to run, into a web-based report that presented the same data in under five seconds.
Today, we are about fifteen months into a product data digitalisation project; classifying data to ETIM standards as well as capturing bespoke data points, product images, technical drawings, … We are already benefitting from on-demand product datasheets that pull from this constantly up-to-date data. No more regenerating hundreds of .pdf sheets as products evolve, just click and print/email! This is great for new products as the datasheet can be available moments after engineering have confirmed the data is valid, often in advance of even ordering production quantities of component stock. We currently syndicate our data to two UK data pools, making our product data potentially available on the Trade Counter of nearly every Electrical Wholesaler in the UK, and provide, via our overseas distributors, exports for their systems. We have great plans for exploiting this central, structured, “single-source-of-truth” dataset into many other areas.
“How did you support the company during the Pandemic?”
We were extremely lucky, to be honest. Some years earlier I had moved away from hosting our email server (MS Exchange) in-house and migrated to the Microsoft 365 cloud. This alone took a management headache away, allowing business email outside of the building without resorting to personal email accounts. I then, for cost reasons at the time, migrated all our telecoms to a VOIP infrastructure.
For some considerable time, as a company we had been kicking-around the possibility of moving our ERP system online mainly as a server license cost saving. With news of the impending Covid-19 pandemic in the media, I finally signed the contract to commit to the move on the 12th of February 2020. Thanks to the professionalism and commitment of our partners at Smith Cooper and Infuse, we completed data migration and went live with our new platform on the 26th of March 2020 – just ahead of the Government’s stay at home order.
The final piece of the jigsaw was to quickly source laptops for the team – which, as you can guess, was tricky at the time.
Taken all-together, it was possible for the team to work from home as if they were in the office – totally as it should be. Looking back, like many other companies we found that many of the reasons to not allow working from home were nothing more than managerial excuses; excuses that were taken away when forced to make the change. We are a better company for having come through this.
“What’s next?”
We continue to look at ways to eliminate printed paper in as many forms as possible; often, it is the existence of a core piece of paper that prevents a given task from transitioning well off-site. Our product digitalisation efforts have taught us a lot about central storage and data re-use and I’m using those lessons to move us forward.
Energy consumption within any business is a constant cause for concern and I.T. equipment that is “always-on” has a real impact on this. I am implementing seemingly insignificant changes that will have large impacts over the long-term. Being able to decommission a single server that isn’t actually contributing much to the business can save hundreds of pounds each year.
“Last words?”
“Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time” – Steven Wright. No matter how big or challenging something is, do whatever it takes to move towards it. Small incremental movements over the long-term will get you there.
We are delighted to announce that we have achieved EDATA Gold Standard and are now listed within the Electrical Distributors’ Association (EDA) EDATA data pool. We are immensely grateful for the help and guidance of the teams at the EDA and NG15 Ltd in working with us to reach this milestone.
“This is just the first batch of products to be listed.”, said Jon Whiten, “The initial upload represents our core stocked ranges and work continues to add new & existing lines over the coming weeks – watch this space!”
Gold Quality Data is increasingly vital in supporting B2B sales, particularly in the Electrical Wholesale sector, providing a seamless Manufacture to End-user experience.
A single alarm warning may not be enough to provide safety to an entire manufacturing works. Now there is a solution to this in the form of an audiovisual alarm. This is an audible and visual warning suitable to work in an emergency situation, which is incorporated in just a single device, making it easy to install.
Where to use Beacon Sounder combinations?
Alarm sounders are may be found in a variety of areas such as schools, laboratories, factories, and many more. They can also be used in checking the status of an airport through its pattern and colour. Emergency vehicles also take advantage of these sounder combinations to get the attention of other road users. Indeed, they are highly versatile to use.
How does it work?
Beacon sounder combinations are accessible for both indoor and outdoor applications- this assures the fullness of security and safety in a certain area.
They are equipped with various coloured lenses and are tone-enabled devices. It features different tones ranging from high to industry-standard frequency patterns.There are volume control and tunable specs to fully manage the device personally. The coloured lenses serve as a visual warning signal that can be seen from a distance.
Recommended Products
114 dB Multi-tone Sounder with Integrated LED beacon
Series ISB-C was released onto the market in 2018 and is proving to be extremely popular.
It offers an overall 64 tone combinations with a maximum volume output of 114dB. It has been designed with a clear lens with five colour LED options.
ISB-T Combined Sounder Beacon
In 2014, this product was verified as an IP66 rated device, making even more versatile. It’s robust housing makes it suitable for a variety of different applications.
It is equipped with 64 electronic tones and high-intensity flashing LEDs available in many colours. The volume can be adjusted via an internal volume control to be used in a closed area, with the capability of a 114dB output.
Series C Industrial Beacon Sounder Combo
These can be found as our XFC + IAS-C or PSC + IAS-C products.
They produce a sound output of about 110 dB with 64 tones to choose from, as well as offering a visual indicator in the full-colour spectrum, in either LED or Xenon Strobe.
Suitable for indoor or outdoor use, these products are an ideal alternative to our combined beacon and sounder range.
Conclusion
As a conclusion, these combo alarms have been used by many manufacturing businesses today, and enhance safety and works operations immensely. Perfect for environments with a high noise levels, that require an audible warning signal as well as visual.
Further information can be found on our website, or alternatively, our Sales Team are on hand to advise!
Electro-Magnetic Compatibility (EMC) is the ability of an electronic device to function without interfering with or interference from another electronic device.
The EMC Directive 2014/30/EU requires that electronic devices emit no conducted or radiated electro-magnetic frequencies which might cause them to affect other devices (such as crackling on the radio, or worse, erratic function). In addition there may be concern about the effects of other devices or circumstances on the electronic device itself and its robustness in continuing to function as it should. Such concerns include voltage surges, drop-outs and effect of radiated frequencies on the device for instance from mobile phone interference.
For many years now D.G. Controls Ltd has carried out its own EMC testing. A crucial element of CE marking, we always test for EMC emissions (Conducted and Radiated) against the Residential standards, since we know many of our beacons and sounders are used in offices, residential homes and commercial premises. There is also an industrial standard which is slightly more relaxed on acceptable emissions, but since we are not always able to define the end-use of our products we would always err on the side of caution. When considering Conducted Emissions, both the Quasi-Peak (QP) and the Average (AV) emissions (measured in decibels microvolt or dBuV) need to be below the limit line as defined within the respective standard. Interestingly this is not the case with some competitor products which we run “out of interest” through our equipment and find that they are actually compliant to neither the industrial nor the residential standard!
Having our own test equipment means that at every single stage of the PCB design process we can evaluate EMC compliance; our in-house knowledge about this commonly considered “black-art” has increased exponentially as we have taken on the challenge of designing more complex circuitry which is fully compliant:
All deegee beacons and sounders are supported by a Declaration of Conformity which sets-out the EMC status, compliance with the Low Voltage Directive, and the IP (Ingress Protection) rating. Full technical reports including the actual data can be issued where a client specifically requests one, but requirement for these often only comes from the military or public services sector.
It is official – we are already re-booked for Hannover Messe 24th – 28th April 2017! You’ll find us in the same location and we are already planning a monster of a celebration and the biggest new product launch in the history of the company.
