San Juan, PR – May 13, 2009 – Edikon Corporation has developed a state-of-the-art web-based registration system for the “5k En Familia de San Patricio” held in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The race is an annual fundraiser event that benefits the Hospital del Niño de Puerto Rico, the only pediatric healthcare facility in Puerto Rico that offers prolonged care and recovery to patients from 0 to 21 years old.

The web-based registration system allowed event organizers to register all race participants in a more convenient and efficient way. The registration system handles logistics such as assignment of unique bib numbers, RFID (radio-frequency identification) chip assignment and validation, and tracking of each participant’s time and results during the race. The seamless web-based process not only allowed the atomization of all the logistics, but also propelled the race’s overall registration outreach by providing a decentralized, 24×7 outlet for participants to register.

“Edikon provided us with a highly efficient management process. Thanks to this, we were able to quickly register, assign bib numbers, classify runners into their respective categories, and track the performance of over 2,000 participants in a much more accurate and simple way than in previous years, all without any chance of error”, said Miguel A. González, President of the organizing committee. “We feel honored to have them as our partner, their assertive technical knowledge, and outstanding service and support have elevated this event to a higher level. Our new ability to handle a larger number of participants in such a simple way is a welcome prospect for next year.”, concluded González.

About Edikon Corporation:

Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Atlanta, Edikon provides expert consulting, application development and enterprise hosting solutions that help our customers succeed. Our technical specialists learn about a client’s unique IT challenges, and then recommend and execute a customized solution that not only fits current needs, but also will be able to grow with their vision of the company’s future. For more information please visit http://www.edikon.com.

San Juan, PR – January 21, 2009 – Heineken City, a virtual landscape that lets you live in the world of Heineken, selected Edikon Corporation to develop, host, and manage their e-commerce website. Starting on December 22, 2008, Edikon Corporation launched the hstore, a store for the residents of heinekencity.com.  Heineken enthusiasts are able to shop for their favorite Heineken-brand premiums on the web site and have them shipped for delivery.  Edikon is working in partnership with Plan C, an e-commerce infrastructure outsourcing provider, for the on-going management of the Heineken hstore.   
 
“We are pleased to work with Edikon based on their leading edge hosting solutions, industry knowledge, and superior support. We knew that they would provide the best available resources and would make this effort a complete success”, said Mari Carmen Zamora, manager and owner of Plan C.   “We are very enthusiastic about working on future projects together.” 
 
In addition, Edikon worked with Plan C to build the back-end integration and logistics solution for the Heineken City store to ensure that all the orders are properly fulfilled and shipped to the clients. 
 
“Edikon’s team is ready to meet and surpass all of Heineken City’s requirements in order to provide an excellent service and the best experience for shoppers.  The entire ordering process is fully integrated with Plan C’s back-end operations providing a better overall user experience and customer service.”, said Pablo Martinez, President of Edikon.  
 
About Edikon Corporation: 
 
Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Atlanta, Edikon provides expert consulting, application development and enterprise hosting solutions that help our customers succeed. Our technical specialists learn about a client’s unique IT challenges, and then recommend and execute a customized solution that not only fits current needs, but also will be able to grow with their vision of the company’s future. For more information please visit http://www.edikon.com.  

About Plan C:  

Plan C provides outsourced e-commerce infrastructure to companies that wish to sell online.  Outsourcing to Plan C provides a substantial cost-benefit that has low impact on current operating procedures for participating companies.  

About Heineken City:  

HeinekenCity.com is a web community for Heineken brand enthusiasts that is aimed at the Puerto Rico market. HeinekenCity.com is operated by Méndez and Co. which is Heineken’s distributor in Puerto Rico.

If you are considering upgrading to GIS 4.3, the first question that comes to mind is whether you should perform an upgrade of your existing installation or whether you should start a new installation (aka, install from scratch).  The answer to that question depends on several factors, in this article we provide some considerations for each approach.

Upgrading GIS

If you need to maintain the data that you already have then the upgrade is the way to go. Upgrading GIS would be the simplest method as well.  Sterling Commerce provides an easy way to migrate your old 4.1 or 4.2 version of GIS to the newer 4.3.  Please note that this option is available for single-node installation in an i-series environment.  On Window and Unix the upgrade can be performed in both single-node and clustered setups.

New Installation

However, if you have the resources and the knowledge to start from a new installation, this approach is also a very good idea.  The reasons you may want to migrate to a new installation are:

1. Fresh database with no old and corrupted data
2. Clean the hard drive of old logs and configuration files
3. Fresh look at your BPs and configuration that could result in performance improvements.

It is important to consider that starting a new installation will increase the complexity of the upgrade.  In order to migrate your system configuration you will need to feel comfortable with the process of exporting your settings and configuration, performing imports, modifying files based on new version requirements, and other tasks that are best kept on a check-list.

Database Upgrade

A separate but interesting option that is also worth considering is whether you should take this opportunity to upgrade your database. If your installation is using the old MS SQL 2000, the upgrade (or new install) allows to move into a brand new MS SQL 2005.  The benefits of MS SQL 2005 over 2000 are:

1. Enterprise scalability
2. Granular security
3. Business intelligence is included
4. Improved management studio bringing all functionality to a single interface

If you wish to move from one database brand to another using the GIS upgrade scripts, you’re out of luck. A fresh install is your only option.

For further information and notes on upgrade Gentran Integration Suite (GIS) to version 4.3 please check the official Sterling Commerce upgrade documentation for GIS 4.3 at http://www.sterlingcommerce.com/Documentation/GIS43/Upgrade.htm

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Gaizka Llona is a Senior Systems Integration Consultant and Project Manager at Edikon Consulting.

For more information go to www.edikon.com.

Atlanta, GA – November 19, 2008 – Refrigiwear, a leading manufacturer of insulated industrial outwear for over 50 years based in Dahlonega, GA, has hired Edikon Corporation to host its e-commerce website www.refrigiwear.com.

Refrigiwear’s decision to select Edikon among other providers was based on the company’s experience and ability to provide hosting reliability, security, and PCI compliance for their e-commerce web site.  “At Refrigiwear we are extremely proud of the quality and value that we offer our customers in the products we sell, and by choosing Edikon, we are confident that we will be able to provide an excellent service to our e-customers as well”, commented Robert Scarboro, IT Director of Refrigiwear.

Edikon Corporation is ready to help Refrigiwear grow by providing a customized and reliable hosting environment, and enhancing its customer’s experience by providing web solutions that will let them navigate their e-commerce web site and purchase in an easier and more convenient way.

About Edikon Corporation:

Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Atlanta, Edikon provides expert consulting, application development and enterprise hosting solutions that help our customers succeed. Our technical specialists learn about a client’s unique IT challenges, and then recommend and execute a customized solution that not only fits current needs, but also will be able to grow with their vision of the company’s future.  For additional information go to www.edikon.com.

At Edikon we have team members that are in the cube next door, across the country, and in many cases, somewhere around the globe.  We are constantly dealing with the fact that we need to collaborate with each other on different subjects.  We use several tools that help us organize shared documentation, email, calendars, task lists, and more.  However, we hadn’t really found a whiteboard tool that was easy to use and immediately useful to us.  We have been looking a good way to share a web site, document, or picture and be able to quickly make notes or point at items while we hold our virtual meetings.  Surely, we have tried many alternatives and so far none had presented a viable solution for us.

Well, the search is over!  We recently bumped into Twiddla and have to say it’s a wonderful solution that fills the need we were looking to resolve.  Twiddla offers the ability to quickly and easily setup a collaborative space where our team members can mark up websites, graphics, and photos, or start brainstorming on a blank canvas. It is also very easy to browse the web with team members (Twiddla calls this co-browsing)  or make our conference calls more productive as we are all seeing the same thing at the same time.  Best of all, there are no plug-ins or downloads to contend with and it runs on just about any browser on any platform.  Since we have folks on PC, Mac, and Linux, this makes it a tool that we use without worry. Also, the folks at Twiddla have been extra careful to keep the interface as intuitive as anything else we’ve come across. Anyone accessing Twiddla for the first time will have no trouble understand what they can do.  

Give Twiddla a try!  You are bound to find a good reason to keep Twiddla bookmarked for future reference.

Want to know how fast your Internet connection is?  We have found a solution that is fast, cross-platform compatible, geographically accurate, and does not require you to install any software.  The best part of all is that it’s free! 

Using the http://www.speedtest.net service you will be able to determine the speed at which you can browse the web for both incoming and outgoing transfers.  There’s lots of information to work from and you are given many options that will help you troubleshoot your connection based in geographic preferences.  This tool is a good place to start if you are experiencing slow performance and want to rule out whether your connection to the Internet is the bottleneck.  The steps to follow are as follows:

1. Open your web browser from your PC, Mac, or Linux desktop.
2. Point your browser to http://www.speedtest.net.
3. Run the speed test and view the results.