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Forrester Research, a research and consulting firm in its report says that, jobs that are getting lost in the United States due to software outsourcing are basically low salary IT jobs such as software programming or computer support specialists or computer operators. However, on the other hand, high paying jobs like system analysts, network analysts and research analysts are continuing dominating the market. In fact, jobs in this sector are growing at the steadily rate of 4 to 5% every year. Normally, these jobs require excellent domain knowledge and idea about the internal working of IT systems and business process. In software outsourcing these qualities are difficult to find.

Jobs that not get affected by software outsourcing

Higher skilled jobs such as system analysis and application development are increasing at the rate of 6% per year. That’s because, their demand is growing continuously. Also, software outsourcing can be shifted to India or other offshore software development countries, where buyers need in-house workforce to customize and upholder software.

Reasons for decrease in Software outsourcing in future

Are you the one afraid from this boom of software outsourcing? If yes, there is news which can lower down your fear for a great extent. According to a report, attraction of cost saving in software outsourcing is yet very high and because of that, increase in jobs like software programmer will be very less. That further results into very low increase in software programming jobs, salary rise will also hardly 1% in next few years. In fact, salary of computer operators and database administrators will also grow at the minimal rate of 1%. However, salaries of computer research scientists and information system managers will have highest growth at around 3.5% every year whereas salaries of analysts and system administrators will grow at the rate of 2 to 3% every year.

Offshore software development

It is also predicted that the market of software outsourcing which has major costs saving today will decrease by 2008. The main reason behind this will be the decreasing gap between the US salary and the outsourcing countries such as India. As, it will lower the salary in US, while in India and other offshore software development countries, because of lack of availability of resources, salary rise will be very high. It will also decrease the costs saving. Finally, companies will prefer their in-house resources rather then offshore outsourcing.

Author is famous IT expert.

Microsoft Great Plains, Great Plains Software eEnterprise and Dynamics needs to know the key questions for Microsoft Dynamics GP version upgrade. Especially, when Great Plains is heavily customized and integrated with other parts of ERP/MRP/CRM and legacy systems. When you have relatively old (3-4 years old) Great Plains system in production, you need to resolve not just version upgrade, but probably database platform and server and WS hardware revision to name a few questions

• MS SQL Server 2005. The best final of your upgrade project should include MS SQL 2005. Microsoft Dynamics GP 9.0 (10.0 is coming in late 2006). There is special MS SQL moving procedure, however in our opinion it should be done by Microsoft Business Solutions / Microsoft Dynamics partner

• Upgrade Path. Microsoft Business Solutions suggests version upgrade passes, this is important to know when you are on old version, such as 6.0, 5.0 or earlier

• Annual Enhancement Program. This is sometimes surprising for customers who stopped annual payment and now has to be re-enrolled (with some penalty) into annual enhancement program. You should pick new VAR or contact your old VAR and arrange payment and re-enrollment through them. When you are back on annual support - you will have registration key for new version

• Dexterity Customization. You should have DYNAMICS.DIC with customization code (or sometimes dexterity developer provide you with EXTRACT.DIC, having the same code, forms, and other custom object)

• Onsite Upgrade. MBS Partner with local representation, of if you are large company - nation-wide partner could send consultants onsite. However be sure that onsite visit is more expensive option

• Remote upgrade, installation and going live with the help of your IT team is preferable. If you are in other US, Australia, New Zealand or European location - MBS partner does upgrade via remote desktop, VPN connections plus web sessions

• Reports Upgrade. ReportWriter reports has the list of reports which needs to be re-designed with new version, due to the fact of original report redesign by MS Dynamics GP development team in Microsoft. FRx reports are normally easy to upgrade. If you invested in Crystal Reports - you might consider switch to MS SQL Server reporting services, but Crystal will still be OK

• Legacy Databases. The last version, supporting Pervasive SQL and Ctree was Microsoft Great Plains 7.5. You need to migrate to MS SQL Server, which is relatively easy to do, but it should be done by consultant

• Third Party upgrades. If you use Horizon Manufacturing, Wenn Soft Job Cost, Mekorma, Trinity, DynamicsZip, Avalara Tax or other third party - please check on third party version availability.

Give us a call 1-866-528-0577 or help@albaspectrum.com if you need additional information or directions.

Andrew Karasev is technical consultant at Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com http://www.ronix-systems.de http://www.enterlogix.com.br ), serving clients in Illinois, California, Texas, New York, Florida, Louisiana, Georgia, New Jersey, Washington, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, and having locations in Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Germany, Mexico