Coscto Wholesale Corporation Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Coscto Wholesale Corporation - Case Study Example Consumers want new products, which often result from sizable expenditures on research and development that can be undertaken only by large enterprise. In reality, it seems that a market of partial monopolies has provided the greatest measure of abundance (Global Marketing Principles 2008). Competition occurs not only in markets of many small firms but also in markets of relatively few large ones. However, in markets with few large firms, competitive action can be countered, and price competition may not serve as an effective method of competition. Therefore, products and services also become competitive weapons, and nonprice competition assumes importance. This fact has not yet been sufficiently recognized and integrated into theoretical models (Costco Home Page 2008). Costco spends no on advertising following "the no-frills concept". Costco has no public relations and advertising department trying to prove that the main principle of business is to sell products "as inexpensively as possible" (DiCarlo 2004). Costco does not rely on advertising proposing customers unique services and wide assortment, low prices and customer support. Technological improvements facilitate the type of centralized management that characterizes these organizations. The economies of scale that result from increasing store count and the ability to divide tasks between store operations and central merchandising put them in very powerful positions vis--vis both their customers and their suppliers. Costco was founded in 1976 as Cash-and Carry Company. The owner of Costco, sol Price, opened the Price Club store in San Diego as a discount store. INTRODUCTION The sales model of Costco is to sell products at low prices but at high volumes. During the 1980s, economic turmoil opened the door to retailing innovators who cut the cost out of distribution and drove conventional department stores or discounters to their knees or to bankruptcy court. Of the top twenty discount department stores in 1980, fewer than half remain in operation today, while the doomed still stick to business as usual. The seeds of "creative destruction" were sown in the 1980s but will be harvested in the 1990s. As many as 20 percent of the regional shopping centers currently operating in the United States will close by the year 2000 (Costco Home Page 2008; Bearden et al p. 54). In order to remain competititve, Costco changed its strategy and introduce Costco membership. Goldstar and Business Memberships costs about $50 a year and the Executive membership is about $100 a year. Only Costco members can purchase main products except drugs, drinks and gasoline similar to other retailers of this type, Costco continues to rattle around within overstored retail square footage that outstripped both population growth and consumer spending over the past decade (Costco Home Page 2008). The coming shakeout in retailing has been preordained by a copycat, follow-the-leader mentality, a quiet conspiracy toward "sameness" in retailing--in layout, location, presentation, products, and service. Diversity in products, in consumers, in employees, and in the environment will demand diversity and dexterity among retailers. "Costco sells very large volumes of merchandise and achieving high inventory turnover In addition to

Java-Whitepaper Essay Example for Free

Java-Whitepaper Essay This white paper compares C++/Qt with Java/AWT/Swing for developing large-scale, real-world software with graphical user interfaces. References are made to independent reports that examine various aspects of the two toolsets. 1 A Comparison of Qt and Java 1. What Do We Compare? When selecting an environment for a large software development project, there are many aspects that must be considered. The programming language is one of the most significant aspects, since its choice has considerable impact on what other options are available. For example, in a GUI development project, developers will need a GUI library that provides ready-made user interface components, for example, buttons and menus. Since the selection of the GUI library itself has a large impact on the development of a project, it is not uncommon for the GUI library to be chosen first, with the programming language being determined by the languages for which the library is available. Usually, there is only one language per library. Other software components like database access libraries or communication libraries must also be taken into consideration, but they rarely have such a strong impact on the overall design as the GUI libraries. In this white paper, the objective is to compare the C++/Qt environment with the Java/AWT/Swing environment. In order to do this in the most useful way, we will begin by comparing the programming languages involved, i. e. C++ and Java, and then compare the two GUI libraries, Qt for C++ and AWT/Swing for Java. 2. Comparing C++ and Java When discussing the various benefits and drawbacks of particular programming languages, the debate often degenerates into arguments that are based on personal experience and preference rather than any objective criteria. Personal preferences and experience should be taken into account when selecting a programming language for a project, but because it is subjective, it cannot be considered here. Instead we will look at issues such as programmer-efficiency, runtime-efficiency and memory-efficiency since these can be quantified and have been examined in scientifically conducted research, although we will also incorporate information based on the practical exerience of projects that have been implemented in our own company. 2. 1. Programmer-efficiency Programmer-efficiency describes how efficiently (i. e. how quickly and accurately) a programmer with a given degree of experience and knowledge can implement a certain set of requirements in a particular programming language, including debugging and project setup time. Since developer salaries are one of the primary cost factors for any programming project, programmer-efficiency greatly affects the 2 A Comparison of Qt and Java cost-efficiency of the project. To some extent, programmer-efficiency is also determined by the tools available. The main design goal of Java is increased programmer-efficiency compared to other general-purpose programming languages, rather than increased memory- or runtime-efficiency. Java has several features designed to make it more programmer-efficient. For example, unlike C++ (or C), the programmer does not have to explicitly free (give back) allocated memory resources to the operating system. Freeing unused memory (garbage collection) is handled automatically by the Java runtime system, at the expense of memory- and runtime-efficiency (see below). This liberates the programmer from the burden of keeping track of allocated memory, a tedious task that is a major cause of bugs. This feature alone should significantly increase the programmer-efficiency of Java programmers, compared to C++ (or C) programmers. Research shows that in practice, garbage collection and other Java features, do not have a major influence on the programmer-efficiency. One of the classic software estimation models, Barry Boehm’s CoCoMo1 predicts the cost and schedule of a software project using cost drivers which take into account variables like the general experience of a programmers, the experience with the programming language in question, the targeted reliability of the program, etc. Boehm writes that the amount of effort per source statement was highly independent of the language level. Other research, for example, A method of programming measurement and estimation by C. E. Walston and C. P. Felix of IBM2, points in the same direction. Both the reports cited here pre-date the advent of Java by many years, although they seem to reveal a general principle that the sophistication of a general-purpose programming language has, compared with other aspects, like the experience of the developers, no significant influence on the overall project costs. There is more recent research that explicitly includes Java and which supports this hypothesis. In An empirical comparison of C, C++, Java, Perl, Python, Rexx, and Tcl3, Lutz Prechelt of the University of Karlsruhe, describes an experiment he conducted in which computer science students were assigned a particular design and development task and asked to implement the specification provided in any of the languages C, C++, or Java which they could freely choose according to their personal preferences (the other languages were examined in a different part of the research project). The data gathered shows almost the same results for C++ and Java (with C running third in most aspects). This is also backed up by our own experience: if programmers can choose their favorite programming language (which is usually the one they have most experience of), programmers with the same level of experience (measured for example, in years of programming experience in general) achieve about the same programmer-efficiency. Another interesting aspect that we noted (but which is not yet supported by any formal 3 A Comparison of Qt and Java research) is that less experienced developers seem to achieve somewhat better results with Java, medium-experienced developers achieve about the same results with both programming languages, nd experienced developers achieve better results with C++. These findings could be due to better tools being available for C++; nevertheless this is an aspect that must be taken into account. An interesting way to quantify programmer-efficiency is the Function Point method developed by Capers Jones. Function points are a software metric that only depend on the functionality, not on the implementation. Working from the function points, it is possible to compute the lines of code needed per function point as well as the language level which describes how many function points can be implemented in a certain amount of time. Intriguingly, both the values for the lines of code per function point and the language level are identical for C++ and Java (6 for the language level, compared with C’s 3. 5 and Tcl’s 5, and 53 for the lines of code per function point, compared with C’s 91 and Tcl’s 64). In conclusion: both research and practice contradict the claim that Java programmers achieve a higher programmer-efficiency than C++ programmers. 2. 2. Runtime-efficiency We have seen that Java’s programmer-efficiency appears to be illusory. We will now examine its runtime efficiency. Again, Prechelt provides useful data. The amount of data he provides is huge, but he arrives at the conclusion that a Java program must be expected to run at least 1. 22 times as long as a C/C++ program. Note that he says at least; the average runtime of Java programs is even longer. Our own experience shows that Java programs tend to run about 2-3 times as long than their equivalent C/C++ programs for the same task. Not surprisingly, Java loses even more ground when the tasks are CPU-bound. When it comes to programs with a graphical user interface, the increased latency of Java programs is worse than the runtime performance hit. Usability studies show that users do not care about whether a long running task takes, say, two or three minutes, but they do care when a program does not show an immediate reaction to their interaction, for example when they press a button. These studies show that the limit of what a user accepts before they consider a program to be unresponsive can be as little as 0. 7 seconds. Well return to this issue when we compare graphical user interfaces in Java and C++ programs. An explanation about why Java programs are slower than C++ is in order. C++ programs are compiled by the C++ compiler into a binary format that can be executed directly by the CPU; the whole program execution thus takes place in 4 A Comparison of Qt and Java hardware. (This is an oversimplification since most modern CPUs execute microcode, but this does not affect the issues discussed here. ) On the other hand, the Java compiler compiles the source code into bytecode which is not executed directly by the CPU, but rather by another piece of software, the Java Virtual Machine (JVM). The JVM in turn, runs on the CPU. The execution of the bytecode of a Java program does not take place in (fast) hardware, but instead in (much slower) software emulation. Work has been undertaken to develop Just in Time (JIT) compilers to address Java’s runtime efficiency problem, but no universal solution has yet emerged. It is the semi-interpreted nature of Java programs that makes the compile once, run anywhere approach of Java possible in the first place. Once a Java program is compiled into bytecode, it can be executed on any platform which has a JVM. In practice, this is not always the case, because of implementation differences in different JVMs, and because of the necessity to sometimes use native, non-Java code, usually written in C or C++, together with Java programs. But is the use of platform-independent bytecode the right approach for crossplatform applications? With a good cross-platform toolkit like Qt and good compilers on the various platforms, programmers can achieve almost the same by compiling their source code once for each platform: write once, compile everywhere. It can be argued that for this to work, developers need access to all the platforms they want to support, while with Java, in theory at least, developers only need access to one platform running the Java development tools and a JVM. In practice, no responsible software manufacturer will ever certify their software for a platform the software hasnt been tested on, so they would still need access to all the relevant platforms. The question arises why it should be necessary to run the Java Virtual Machine in software; if a program can be implemented in software, it should also be possible to have hardware implement the same unctionality. This is what the Java designers had in mind when they developed the language; they assumed that the performance penalty would disappear as soon as Java CPUs that implement the JVM in hardware would become available. But after five years, such Java CPUs have not become generally available. Java automatically de-allocates (frees) unused memory. The programmer allocates memory, and the JVM keeps track of all the allocated memory blocks and the references to them. As soon as a memory block is no longer referenced, it can be reclaimed. This is done in a process called garbage collection in which the JVM periodically checks all the allocated memory blocks, and removes any which are no longer referred to. Garbage collection is very convenient, but the trade offs are greater memory consumption and slower runtime speed.. With C++, the programmer can (and should) delete blocks of memory as soon as they are no longer required. With Java, blocks are not deleted until the next garbage collection run, and this depends on the implementation on the JVM being used. Prechtelt provides figures which state that on average ( ) and with a confidence of 80%, the Java programs consume at least 32 MB (or 297%) more memory than the C/C++ programs ( ). In addition to the higher memory requirements, the garbage collection process itself requires processing power which is consequently not available to the actual application functionality, leading to slower overall runtimes. Since the garbage collector runs periodically, it can occasionally lead to Java programs freezing for a few seconds. The best JVM implementations keep the occurrence of such freezes to a minimum, but the freezes have not been eliminated entirely. When dealing with external programs and devices, for example, during I/O or when interacting with a database, it is usually desirable to close the file or database connection as soon as it is no longer required. Using C++’s destructors, this happens as soon as the programmer calls delete. In Java, closing may not occur until the next garbage collecting sweep, which at best may tie up resources unnecessarily, and at worst risks the open resources ending up in an inconsistent state. The fact that Java programs keep memory blocks around longer than is strictly necessary is especially problematic for embedded devices where memory is often at a premium. It is no coincidence that there is (at the time of writing) no complete implementation of the Java platform for embedded devices, only partial implementations that implement a subset. The main reason why garbage collection is more expensive than explicit memory management by the programmer is that with the Java scheme, information is lost. In a C++ program, the programmer knows both where their memory blocks are (by storing pointers to them) and knows when they are not needed any longer. In a Java 6 A Comparison of Qt and Java program, the latter information is not available to the JVM (even though it is known to the programmer), and thus the JVM has to manually find unreferenced blocks. A Java programmer can make use of their knowledge of when a memory block is not needed any longer by deleting all references that are still around and triggering garbage collection manually, but this requires as much effort on the part of the programmer as with the explicit memory management in C++, and still the JVM has to look at each block during garbage collection to determine which ones are no longer used. Technically, there is nothing that prevents the implementation and use of garbage collection in C++ programs, and there are commercial programs and libraries available that offer this. But because of the disadvantages mentioned above, few C++ programmers make use of this. The Qt toolkit takes a more efficient approach to easing the memory management task for its programmers: when an object is deleted, all dependant objects are automatically deleted too. Qt’s approach does not interfere with the programmer’s freedom to delete manually when they wish to. Because manual memory management burdens programmers, C and C++ have been accused of being prone to generate unstable, bug-ridden software. Although the danger of producing memory corruption (which typically leads to program crashes) is certainly higher with C and C++, good education, tools and experience can greatly reduce the risks. Memory management can be learned like anything else, and there are a large number of tools available, both commercial and open source, that help programmers ensure that there are no memory errors in the program; for example, Insure++ by Parasoft, Purify by Rational and the open source Electric Fence. C++s flexible memory management system also makes it possible to write custom memory profilers that are adapted to whichever type of application a programmer writes. To sum up this discussion, we have found C++ to provide much better runtime- and memory-efficiency than Java, while having comparable programmer-efficiency. 2. 4. Available libraries and tools The Java platform includes an impressive number of packages that provide hundreds of classes for all kinds of purposes, including graphical user interfaces, security, networking and other tasks. This is certainly an advantage of the Java platform. For each package available on the Java platform, there is at least one corresponding library for C++, although it can be difficult to assemble the various libraries that would be needed for a C++ project and make them all work together correctly. However, this strength of Java is also one of its weaknesses. It becomes increasingly difficult for the individual programmer to find their way through the huge APIs. For any given task, you can be almost certain that somewhere, there is 7 A Comparison of Qt and Java functionality that would accomplish the task or at least help with its implementation. But it can be very difficult to find the right package and the right class. Also, with an increasing number of packages, the size of the Java platform has increased considerably. This has led to subsets e. g. , for embedded systems, but with a subset, the advantage of having everything readily available disappears. As an aside, the size of the Java platform makes it almost impossible for smaller manufacturers to ship a Java system independent from Sun Microsystems, Java’s inventor, and this reduces competition. If Java has an advantage on the side of available libraries, C++ clearly has an advantage when it comes to available tools. Because of the considerable maturity of the C and C++ family of languages, many tools for all aspects of application development have been developed, including: design, debugging, and profiling tools. While there are Java tools appearing all the time, they seldom measure up to their C++ counterparts. This is often even the case with tools with the same functionality coming from the same manufacturer; compare, for example, Rational’s Quantify, a profiler for Java and for C/C++. The most important tool any developer of a compiled language uses, is still the compiler. C++ has the advantage of having compilers that are clearly superior in execution speed. In order to be able to ship their compilers (and other tools) on various platforms, vendors tend to implement their Java tools in Java itself, with all the aforementioned memory and efficiency problems. There are a few Java compilers written in a native language like C (for example, IBM’s Jikes), but these are the exception, and seldom used. 3. Comparing AWT/Swing and Qt So far, we have compared the programming language Java and the programming language C++. But as we discussed at the beginning of this article, the programming language is only one of the aspects to consider in GUI development. We will now compare the packages for GUI development that are shipped with Java, i. e. AWT and Swing, with the cross-platform GUI toolkit, Qt, from the Norwegian supplier, Trolltech. We have confined the comparision on the C++ side to the Qt GUI toolkit, since unlike MFC (Microsoft Foundation Classes) and similar toolkits, This seems to contradict Java’s cross-platform philosophy and may be due to the the initial AWT version being reputedly developed in under fourteen days. Because of these and a number of other problems with the AWT, it has since been augmented by the Swing toolkit. Swing relies on the AWT (and consequently on the native libraries) only for very basic things like creating rectangular windows, handling events and executing primitive drawing operations. Everything else is handled within Swing, including all the drawing of the GUI components. This does away with the problem of applications looking and behaving differently on different platforms. Unfortunately, because Swing is mostly implemented in Java itself, it lacks efficiency. As a result, Swing programs are not only slow when performing computations, but also when drawing and handling the user interface, leading to poor responsiveness. As mentioned earlier, poor responsiveness is one of the things that users are least willing to tolerate in a GUI application. On today’s standard commodity hardware, it is not unusual to be able to watch how a Swing button is redrawn when the mouse is pressed over it. While this situation will surely improve with faster hardware, this does not address the fundamental problem that complex user interfaces developed with Swing are inherently slow. The Qt toolkit follows a similar approach; like Swing, it only relies on the native libraries only for very basic things and handles the drawing of GUI components itself. This brings Qt the same advantages as Swing (for example, applications look and behave the same on different platforms), but since Qt is entirely implemented in C++ and thus compiled to native code; it does not have Swing’s efficiency problems. User interfaces written with Qt are typically very fast; because of Qts smart use of caching techniques, they are sometimes even faster than comparable programs written using only the native libraries. Theoretically, an optimal native program should always be at least as fast as an equivalent optimal Qt program; however, making a native program optimal is much more difficult and requires more programming skills than making a Qt program optimal. Both Qt and Swing employ a styling technique that lets programs display in any one of a number of styles, independent of the platform they are running on. This is possible because both Qt and Swing handle the drawing themselves and can draw GUI elements in whichever style is desired. Qt even ships with a style that emulates the default look-and-feel in Swing programs, along with styles that emulate the 9 A Comparison of Qt and Java Win32 look-and-feel, the Motif look-and-feel, and—in the Macintosh version— the MacOS X Aqua style. 3. 2. Programming Paradigms In Qt and Swing While programming APIs to some extent are a matter of the programmers personal taste, there are some APIs that lend themselves to simple, short, and elegant application code far more readily than others.

The formation and objectives of the IFAC

The formation and objectives of the IFAC IFAC the (international federation of accountants) is a non governmental and a global organization for accountancy professional, formed in 1977 in Munich -Germany at the 11th world congress of accountants. Currently there are 164member bodies in 125 countries and jurisdictions, representing over 2.5 million accountants. Source: Q FINANCE The complex world of international auditing regulation. Objectives of IFAC The main functions of IFAC are to guard the interest of the public by developing international standards, promoting international convergence and contributing to the development of the accountancy profession worldwide. Source 16th Jan 2008.Allen Blewitt, ACCAs chief executive, goes head to head with Ian Ball, IFACs chief executive, in a wide-ranging discussion of IFACs work and the added value it offers both to its members and to accountancy professionals worldwide .What does IFAC actually do for me ? (http://www.accaglobal.com/members/publications/accounting_business/archive/2008/january/3059282). Formation of IFAC From a very long period of time, it was believed that accountancy showcased itself as an international profession, but it was only during the early 1960s that initiatives regarding the international standardization in accounting and auditing practices bechanced. In the year 1962, the 8th global congress conducted in New York conceptualized the idea of setting the international standards that would govern the accounting and auditing practices worldwide. However during the year 1967 in order to examine the needs of accounting profession, the 9th global congress constituted the international working party and to report back to the next international congress held in Sydney (1972). In the 1972 congress an International Co-ordination committee for accounting profession (ICCAP) was formed, following the report of the international working party. Apparently the ICCAP had also been given the remit to recommend changes for widening its work, but opinions continued to be divided, at times there were discussions about the expansion of ICCAP to become an INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF ACCOUNTANTS. Thus after due consideration the final report of ICCAP declared the proposed constitution of IFAC. Source THE FORMATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF ACCOUNTANTS by Prof Christopher Humphrey, Manchester Business School, England and Anne Loft, Lund University, Sweden. (http://www.ifac.org/download/ifac_history_article_2-2007.pdf ) Setting Standards, Making History: The International Federation of Accountants (IFAC), 1977-2007 by Prof Christopher Humphrey, Manchester Business School, England and Anne Loft, Lund University, Sweden. Transparency and alliance with member bodies is the main aim with which the organizational structure of IFAC has been designed. The IFAC council consists of 15 National representatives (a president, deputy president and 2 vice presidents).The main objectives of the IFAC council and the board is to look after the overall governance and the management of the organization. The council and the committee members are country representatives (if there are two or more member bodies in the country they will be collectively represented by the appointed national representative). Source http://www.ifac.org/About/2009-annual-report/ifac/structure/index2.html PROJECTS IMPLEMENTED BY IFAC INFLUENCING THE FINANCIAL REPORTING /AUDITING PRACTICES WORLDWIDE Introduction to the general standard setting initiative taken by IFAC Development, promotion and enforcement of globally recognized standards are the only fundamental way to protect public interest. The above mentioned criteria are also the only means to ensure the prospect of information upon which investors and other stakeholders rely on. The International Accounting Education Standards Board (IAESB), International Ethics standards board for accountants (IESBA), International Public Sector Accounting Standards Board (IPSASB) and the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB) are collectively referred to as the public interest activity committee and they follow a rigorous process in a transparent, efficient and effective manner that supports the development of high quality standards in the public interest. These independent standard setting boards have consultative advisory groups which include public member and the publics perspective. Another initiative taken by IFAC with regard to the standard setting process is the Compliance program established by the IFAC board that evaluates the quality of the IFAC members and associates as to whether they use the best possible criteria to initiate a standard. The Compliance Advisory Panel (CAP) oversees the implementation and operation of the IFACs compliance program. IFAC initiates standard setting boards not only highlighting to the professional accountants (Professional Accountants in a Business committee) and public interests but also several initiatives have been taken to address the issue of the small and medium business and the developing nations. Such as the formation of Small and Medium practice committee that ensures standards produced are applicable to Small and medium practices (SMPs) and Small and medium entities (SMEs).The Developing Nations Committee which oversees the interest of the developing nations and the Transnational Audit Committee that deals with the needs of the members of Forum of Firms(FoF). BACKGROUND ON THE INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF ACCOUNTANTS (Pg 4- 6)à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦web.ifac.org/media//d/international/background-information-on-t.pdf

Psychological Problem Associated with Cerebral Palsy :: Health, Medical Research, Stress, Depression

Psychological Problems Associated with Cerebral Palsy Cerebral Palsy is a condition that limits physical abilities. This disability affects about one child in every five hundred children (Micheksen 405). Cerebral Palsy is mostly known to affect children by severe motor impairment, however; this disorder can affect a person in a psychological way too. A cross-sectional European Study was done by a group of eleven people focusing on the psychological impact of children with cerebral palsy (Michelsen 406) Eight hundred and eighteen children between the ages of eight and twelve were involved. The main goal of the â€Å"SPARCLE† study was to investigate if cerebral palsy relates to psychological and behavioral problems. A strengths and difficulties questionnaire (SDQ) was used as one way to detect emotional and behavioral abnormalities (Michelsen 406). Along with an Impact Score (IS) that was based on questions completed by family members answering a total of twenty-five questions. The total from the Impact Score was then computed to determine if the child’s behavior was abnormal or not (Michelsen 406). The results of the SDF showed that more than twenty-five percent of children participating showed abnormal results (Michelsen 410). It also showed that children with milder cerebral palsy had higher behavioral difficulties in comparison to children with more severe cases. The reason being that severe cerebral palsy prevents certain behaviors, such as fighting or cheating (Michelsen 410). The parental impact score survey showed that almost half of all participants agreed that their child suffered difficulties. When asked how often the family was affected by the child’s cerebral palsy forty-two percent answered, â€Å"Quite a lot† (Michelsen 409). Another forty percent of parents believe their child struggles with behavior and communication skills among children their age in school (Michelsen 410). The findings from the SDQ and SI tests determined that a significant number of children with cerebral palsy suffer abnormal behaviors. This study indicates that children with cerebral palsy suffer from psychological and behavior problems when trying to communicate mostly with family and peers. Based on a research done in the Netherlands self-perception, and over-all satisfaction was tested for relevance to psychological problems due to cerebral palsy. One hundred and ten children whose age were nine, eleven, and thirteen took place in this study (Schuengel 1252) Once again the children with cerebral palsy took self-assessment surveys that included subjects such as, physical performance, appearance, and if they were satisfied with their overall abilities (Schuengel 1253).

Business Requirements Document for Baderman Island Resorts Essay

Table of Contents Revision History3 1.Assumptions, Constraints, and Dependencies3 1.1Related Projects and Dependencies3 1.2Assumptions and Constraints3 2.Business and Customer Requirements3 2.1Strategic Business and Customer Requirements3 3.References3 Revision History NameDateChanges and Reason for ChangesVersion Annamae Goodrick04/05/2014Baderman Island resort wants a reservation system to support the three hotels on the island. 1.0 1.Assumptions, Constraints, and Dependencies 1.1Related Projects and Dependencies The resort has three hotels. The hotels cater to different market segments and have slightly different needs in an online reservation system. Client needs and expectations are set forth in a set of business rules outlined below. 1.2Assumptions and Constraints IDAssumption or Constraint 1.2.1The new reservation system will be proficient in achieving the requirements. 1.2.2Design constraints for the new reservation system are based on budget limitations and migration issues since the resort has three different locations using different systems. 2.Business and Customer Requirements Enter any summary requirement information here. 2.1Strategic Business and Customer Requirements The goal is to implement a reservation system to cover all three of Baderman Island Resorts and assist in meeting business requirements. †¢Priority Legend: MH (Must Have) or WH (Want to Have) †¢Status Legend: (A: Approved, C: Cancelled, D: Delayed). Req IDDateRequirementPriorityStatus 2.2.104/06/2014The system would require that future guests make a reservation for a span of dates. MHA 2.2.204/06/2014Guests may reserve a type of room, but not a specific room. The specific room will be assigned to each guest at check-in. WHA 2.2.304/06/2014The room descriptor will include the type and number of beds available and other amenitiesMHA 2.2.404/06/2014Event or conference rooms may also be reserved.MH 2.2.504/06/2014Overbooking – Because there are many no-show reservations at the hotels, each hotel will allow a certain percentage of overbooking. This overbooking percentage must be available for each hotel and must be modified dynamically. MHA 2.2.604/06/2014The reservation system will collect customer and payment information. Future guests will use a credit card to secure their reservation. MH A 3.References Enter any references here. #Req ID RelatedReference DescriptionLocationOwner 3.1.1SR-bi-004Virtual Organization PortalBaderman Island ResortAnnamae Goodrick 3.1.2Oracle Websitehttp://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19636-01/819-2326/aavby/index.htmlOracle

City vs. Country

Podcasts – Themes – City vs. country Introduction Download the LearnEnglish Themes podcast. You’ll find more information on this page: http://www. britishcouncil. org/learnenglish-podcasts-themes. htm This support pack contains the following materials: †¢ the article that you can listen to in the podcast †¢ an optional language activity based on the article †¢ links to other activities on the LearnEnglish website on this theme (city vs. country). Read the article Town or country mouse? by John Russell Once upon a time, there were two mice – cousins. One lived in the town and the other in the country.The town mouse was a very superior mouse, who thought that living in the town was far better than living the country. So one day, he invited his country cousin to stay with him in his town house and experience the civilized lifestyle of the town. They sat down to a meal, which to the country mouse was a feast. â€Å"Goodness me† he said. à ¢â‚¬Å"If I was in the country, I would be having only simple bread and cheese in the quiet of my peaceful home. † Suddenly, there was a loud noise at the door. â€Å"Don’t worry,† said the town mouse, â€Å"that’s just my neighbour – the dog, he wants to join us for dinner. The country mouse ate a little faster. Another noise was heard outside, even louder this time. â€Å"Oh dear† said the town mouse, â€Å"the cat who lives facing my house wants to join us too. † Quickly eating the last of his meal, the country mouse said, â€Å"thank you, but I think I will return to the peace and quiet of my own house after all! † Then he ran back home as fast as his legs could carry him. This simple tale (taken from Aesop’s famous stories) shows that what may be a good place to live for one person, may not be good for another.A modern version of this story might look like this: Maria lives in a big city surrounded by the speed and c onvenience of urban life. She works in an office with 1000 other employees, and travels too and from there on a crowded Metro. Her home is a flat overlooking a busy city-street, which is always alive with the sound of traffic and people passing by. After work she meets with friends in a bar or restaurant before going on to a disco or nightclub. Weekends are spent in the shopping mall with its numerous shops, multi-screen cinemas, fast food and entertainment complexes. Alex, however, lives in a small village in the countryside.He cycles to work down country lanes every morning, the sound of tractors, birds and animals in his ears. In the evening, he relaxes at home in front of the fire with a good book to read. At weekends, he goes for long walks in the fields with his dog. Unfortunately, life is not as simple as stories make it. A lot of today’s ‘town mice’ such as Maria would be happy to live in the country. Many modern cities have very large populations (Tokyo or Mexico City – over 25 million) and can be crowded, dirty and dangerous places to live. More than half the world’s population now lives in cities.In much of Europe and North America this can be as high as much as 80% of a country’s population. (According to the United Nations, approximately 1 billion people in cities are living in slum conditions – overcrowded and unhealthy). The 18th Century marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the depopulation of the countryside, and the move to towns. The towns became places of mass employment in factories and offices. Today, many town dwellers wish to The United Kingdom’s international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations. We are registered in England as a charity.

Import Substitution vs. Export Promotion

Import Substitution vs. Export Promotion Econ 240 Term Paper Group (19) Members: Amjad Hussain (13020031) Awais Javed (13020529) Fahd Mukaddam (13020407) Haider Shah (13020528) Hassan Jamil (13020023) Muhammad Bilal Ayub (13020413) Words (using page 2): 371*7 = 2597 IS vs. EP 2 How do the strategies of international trade affect growth? Why at times countries adopted different strategies of international trade? How does Import Substitution Industrialization weigh against Export Promotion as a trade strategy?How does the empirical evidence help us understand this? Trade strategies are classified into two broad strategies, outward-looking development policies and inward-looking development policies. Outward-looking development policies encourage free trade and free movement of the factors of production. While inward-oriented development policies encourage greater self-reliance and restricted trade. Within these two broad approaches lies the debate between Import Substitution (protectio nism) and Export Promotion (free trade).Import substitution (IS) is a well tested way to industrialization which has been followed by most of the currently developed and industrialized countries. Alexander Hamilton’s â€Å"Report on Manufactures† (1791) argued in favor of tariffs to protect American manufacturers from inexpensive imports from Britain. In the mid 19th century, Germany, Russia and Japan also practiced protectionism to develop their domestic industries. After the great depression of 1930’s, LDCs particularly Latin American and some Asian economies started practicing ISI and in 1960’s IS became a dominant strategy for development.However in the next decade, when industries protected through import substitution failed to achieve targeted productive and allocative efficiencies, countries switched to export promotion strategies. Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore were among the first to adopt the export promotion strategy. Later, Chile , Thailand and Turkey also joined in. Over the years, the stance of countries has shifted from protectionism to free trade and globalization. So we will begin our paper by analyzing the arguments in favor and against ISI policies.Then we will discuss the benefits and drawbacks faced by the countries that switched to the export promotion strategy. The paper also explains the reasons for this transition. Finally, it concludes by giving empirical evidence of the real world regarding the effects of these strategies. It has always been in the vested interest of the economies to protect country’s large and strategic markets from foreign competition so that the local industry not only becomes self sufficient but also is in a position to induce industrialization led economic growth.In order to accomplish such goals, trends have shown (as mentioned above) countries’ increased dependence on Import IS vs. EP 3 substitution policies. Government plays a vital role in the implementa tion of these policies by imposing tariffs and quotas or altering the exchange rate and interest rate, using macroeconomic policies, to shield its local industries from the competitive foreign producers. Simultaneously, the foreign direct investments (FDIs) are expected to fill the gaps in technology and technical skills between the domestic and foreign industry.The introduction of IS policy can be attributed to the Infant Industry Argument (Import Substitution In General Equilibrium can be used to demonstrate that how the IS works in infant industry) 1, which favors the protection of domestic industry from international competition. The aim is to remove distortions between the out-dated locally produced goods and the industrialized high quality imports of similar products. Policies which governments adopt includes introduction of tariffs 2; discouraging cheaper import and at the same time encouraging production of the same goods domestically.Mostly consumer goods are produced under this strategy which ensures that the country is capable of meeting its basic necessities. Moreover, these types of goods require considerably less advanced technology, making the policy easier to adopt. Aristotle has said â€Å"What we have to learn to do, we learn by doing†; import protection is the best way to initiate this learning process because the economy is now producing goods that it previously imported – a process of development and learning by doing sets up. The economy can then move towards higher efficiency.This eventually improves the balance of payments as fewer consumer goods are now imported. It is essential that the learning process is followed by accumulation of capital. This requires the manipulation in Interest rates so as to encourage savings, and these savings can then be invested back in the protected industry. There are some macroeconomic gains associated with this policy, including reduced unemployment and increased tax revenue for the govern ment; increased local production is expected to generate job opportunities and at the same time, tariff on imports become a source of income for the government. See Appendix 1. 4. 1 & 1. 4. 2 See Appendix 1. 2 2 IS vs. EP 4 However, the IS policies have been criticized by economists for various reasons. According to them, the protection provided to the industries makes the industries inefficient because the firms start to rely on the provision of subsidies. They have no incentive to cut down costs to achieve minimum efficient scale of production and to increase productivity. Bhagwati in â€Å"Import substitution – a survey of policy issues† said that, â€Å"†¦such sheltered monopoly positions in import substituting industries are the prime cause of low productivity†.Also, the government protection to infant industries is for a limited time period, in which most industries that lurk behind the wall of tariffs never grow up. In import substitution, main focus is on the consumer goods, and therefore the prospects of economic growth are relatively short-lived. For countries to achieve long term economic growth, structural shifts are required towards the production of capital-intensive goods.However according to Jaleel Ahmad, the protection requires normally zero or low tariff on import of capital goods, hence discouraging development of forward linkages – manufacturing of the capital goods by local industries. Also for Import Substitution to be successful, according to Hirschman, forward and backward linkages need to be well-developed for the industries. This shows that for a country to have a manufacturing sector free from international dependence, it will need to develop other industries in consumer durables, non-durables, intermediate and capital goods.Another argument against ISI strategies is that it leads to the worsening of Balance Of Payments (BOP) due to the overvaluation of exchange rate, causing the prices of exports to rise but at the same time lowering the prices of imports. As a consequence, producers of exportable goods become less competitive in world market, causing a negative impact on the BOP. Keeping in mind the undesirable impacts of IS policies, economists felt the need to revise the trade strategies.Trade theorists therefore attempted to elucidate as to why nations engage in international trade, what combination of goods and services they trade, and how firms and consumers gain or lose from trade. It was observed that numerous international trade models rely primarily on the theory of Comparative Advantage (Appendix 1. 1), which describes trade patterns under assumptions of static conditions that hold the factors of production in fixed supply (Perkins). Theory of comparative advantage principally asserts that every country irrespective of its size can benefit from trade. Trade driven through exports of goods in which the country has aIS vs. EP 5 comparative advantage, benefits the count ry the most. Therefore an export promotion trade strategy involving goods that require raw material, that are abundant in supply, will allow a country to grow more rapidly as stated by the Hecksher-Ohlin model. Proponents of EP mainly argue that free trade utilizes previously unused resources such as land and labor, creates a vent for surplus of unused resources and allows a country to operate on its Production Possibility Frontier (PPF). In contrast, before the opening up of the economy, the market is constrained to the domestic consumers only.Once a country engages in free trade it acquires the opportunity to earn a global market share, thus earning higher revenues. As the market of local industries expands, demand for labor increases which raises the employment level in the country. This increase in exports stimulates domestic investment (an injection in the circular flow of the income of the country) which gives a multiplied effect on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the econ omy. Furthermore, the enhanced exports will lead to a greater demand of domestic currency in the exchange market leading to currency’s appreciation (given the floating exchange rate mechanism).According to the Marshall Lerner condition, which states that the sum of price IS vs. EP 6 elasticity of demand of exports and imports is lesser than 1 in short run, a currency appreciation will lead to an increase in the Balance Of Trade (BOT). 3 This relationship of BOT and time is shown through J-curve. An additional argument presented by the trade optimists states that the foreign exchange earned by selling different goods and services will relax the constraints of availability of financial capital or in other words, will fill the foreign exchange gap.This also helps in relieving the pressure on foreign exchange reserves built by the import of heavy machinery and capital goods. A further extension of export promotion policy is the process of export development. It involves innovatio n (of new export products) and penetration into new markets. Learning process is instituted and hence increased productivity is observed. This initiates a process of transfer of technology and foreign investment from developed countries, helping the industry to become efficient and gain the economies of scale through mass production – lowering costs and increasing profits.The increased profits of the industry promote higher savings and as the Harrod-Domar Model suggests, an increase in savings will lead to an increase in the growth rate of the economy. The Export promotion strategy is not free of criticisms as one might expect. The leading criticism of opponents of export promotion strategy is the sluggish growth in the demand of the primary goods. As developing country relies mainly on the export of primary goods, the sluggish growth enhances the volatility in the earnings of the economy. The Prebisch Singer Hypothesis explains this phenomenon in terms of income elasticity a nd price elasticity of demand.The thesis postulates that the price elasticity and income elasticity of primary goods are both inelastic i. e. less than 1. As the national income of the developed countries increases, the demand for the primary goods does not increase proportionately. This is also stated by Engel’s Law. A decrease in the prices of the exports will not lead the quantity traded to increase by the same percentage, thus resulting in fall of the exports revenue. This fall in exports revenue leads to a deterioration of Terms of Trade (TOT) of the country.Other factors that explain the slow growth in primary goods exports include the development of synthetic substitutes and protectionist measures taken 3 See Appendix 1. 3 IS vs. EP 7 by the developed countries. The population growth of developed countries being at replacement level translates into a stagnant demand for primary exports. Empirical evidence shows that heavy reliance on the export of the primary product m ay actually result in a phenomenon known as the Dutch disease; a country rich in natural resources actually suffers from slower growth as a result of that rich endowment.This is one of the often repeated facts of history when criticizing the strategy of export promotion. It was mentioned earlier that an appreciation in a country’s currency will lead to an increase in BOT, but this will only remain true for the short run. In long-run the sum of elasticity of demands of exports and imports becomes greater than 1 which consequently causes a fall in the net exports. Therefore the aforementioned argument is valid in the short-run only as in long-run it balances out its own effect on BOT 4 as shown below with the aid of diagram.In addition to the criticism mentioned earlier, Export Promotion strategy may lead to higher budget deficit. It is a usual practice of the governments to subsidize the exporting industries. These subsidies will be financed either by an increase in taxes or b y reducing the expenditure on public and merit goods such as health, education, infrastructure, national defense and other social services. Due to this practice, the development side of the country is often sidelined or overlooked.Example of China can be the best evidence for our claims about Export Promotion here. China was a closed economy until the 1970s. Nicholas R. Lardy in his article, Trade liberalization and 4 See Appendix 1. 3 IS vs. EP 8 its role in Chinese economic growth, states that around 1970s, China’s export goods had no comparative advantage and at the same time, high level of control on imports was also imposed. Hence quoting from the article, â€Å"China’s share of world trade dropped markedly, from 1. 5 percent in 1953 to only 0. 6 percent in 1977†.However, during the 1980s the process of trade liberalization began and by the time china entered WTO in 2001, her structure of trade policy was completely changed. China fully realized the signifi cance of the comparative advantage principle and concentrated on export of goods that were labor intensive in production, as the article states that â€Å"China’s fastest growing exports have been labor-intensive manufacturers— textiles, apparel, footwear, and toys. Between 1980 and 1998, export of these items rose more than ten-folds, from $4. 3 billion to $53. 5 billion†.Due to the trade liberalization, China experienced high rates of economic growth. Empirical evidence strongly suggests that pragmatism and eclecticism rules over any other single purpose approaches to trade. Thinking just in terms of an all out import substitution or an export promotion strategy can pose as an impediment to one’s clear understanding of the relationship between these strategies and growth. In future it would be better to avoid labels and to construct strategies from the components of either of these trade policies that seemed to have worked.Import substitution with its d ivorce of production decisions from market conditions seems to have lost its modern day relevance. In contrast, export promotion with its orientation towards world markets appears to be in line with the new phenomenon that is globalization. No single optimal prescription in terms of trade policy can be devised for the countries at large due to the dynamism of international trade. No strategy can be concluded as the best strategy for a country but what can be said is its relevance to a country at a point in time.Although empirical evidence shows that export promotion has helped countries like China to grow rapidly and improve its trade positions but we can also find other countries which developed after adopting import substitution policies like Latin American countries. This suggests that country have to adopt a trade strategy which is most compatible for their country at that time so that they can achieve maximum gains from trade. IS vs. EP 9 Appendix 1. 1 Comparative Advantage The ory: The concept of comparative advantage, attributed to David Ricardo, refers to the ability of a country to produce at a lower opportunity cost.It is the ability to produce the most efficient product as compared to other countries. It is best explained by a two-good, two country framework where countries differ in particular factor productivity or factor endowments. This theory explains that it is welfare enhancing for both countries to specialize in one good and import the other. The conclusion drawn from this theory is that each country gain by specializing in the good where it has comparative advantage and trading that good for other. 1. 2 Trade protectionism and Tariffs:Government impose trade restrictions in form of tariff in which it collects tax on goods imported by the people, thus discouraging the people to import goods and encouraging the local industries to produce good quality substitute goods. Introduction of tariff increases the world price, which reduces the amount of imports and increases the amount of locally consumed products. IS vs. EP 10 1. 3 Inverted J-curve for revaluation of currency: The inverted J-curve refers to the trend of a country’s trade balance following a revaluation or appreciation of the currency.A revalued currency means that exports are more expensive for the foreign countries, but as in the short run demand for the more expensive exports remain price inelastic so the quantity demanded for exports remains same although foreigners are paying higher prices. This leads to the improvement of balance of trade. Over the long term, as the foreign consumers are able to switch to the other goods, the quantity demanded for exports becomes price elastic so reduction in the export volume and hence export revenues.This leads to the deterioration of balance of trade and the gains in the short run are off-set by the losses in the long run. In case of devaluation of currency, there are opposite affects. IS vs. EP 11 1. 4 Infant In dustry Argument(ISI in general equilibrium) : IS vs. EP 12 From diagram 1. 4. 1 it can be seen that before the imposition of tariff the country was producing at point A while consuming C amount of goods under world terms of trade (favorable to its export).But after the imposition of tariff, production moves towards point B where more of the importable and less of exportable goods are being produced. Assuming that this does not affect the world prices, trade will take place at same TOT. So the new consumption is indicated by point E along the line BD (parallel to line representing world TOT). Initially, by practicing ISI polices, both consumers and trade welfare has fallen due to lower consumption and fewer imports and exports (BE