Getting Past Legacy Software Pains in Requirements Management

Legacy software refers to a business operating software that has been in use for a long time. This is older system software that is still relevant and fulfills the business needs. The software is critical to the business mission and the software operates on specific hardware for this reason.

Generally, the hardware in this situation has a shorter lifespan than the software. With time, the hardware becomes harder to maintain. Such a system will either be too complex or expensive to replace. For that reason, it continues operating.

What is a Legacy System?

Legacy software and legacy hardware are often installed and maintained simultaneously within an organization. The main changes to the legacy system typically only replace the hardware. That helps to avoid the onerous requirements management of the software certification process.

Which Businesses Have Legacy Systems?

Legacy systems operate in a wide range of business organizations, such as banks, manufacturing, energy companies, hospitals, and insurance companies. You can also find them in the defense industry, among other multifaceted business organizations.

Legacy Software Pains in Requirements Management

Only companies born in the digital age don't face the problem of chronic legacy system pains, i.e. the distress of a lack of digital transformation. Legacy systems can involve unbearable complexity, mismatched skills, lack of innovation, bureaucracy, and so on.

Legacy systems form in organizations for many reasons. First, compliance issues and a rollout are often challenging to carry out all at once. There may be an ongoing project that needs the old system. There are also instances where decision-makers don't like change.

However, the shortcomings of operating an old system are annoying and can also cause severe damage to the company. The pains of operating an old system include:

Legacy Systems Strategies are Not Prepared For Change

Legacy systems can include the 'Stop and Start' strategy. There are also long static periods or unchanging business, which was the mainstream way of running business operations throughout the industrial age. This means systems have a short period to make and adapt to any necessary changes, while business stops and waits for the wave of essential changes to finish.

The world doesn't work like this anymore. Intermittent changes allow organizations with old systems to persist up to the next phase of evolution.

Fortunately, there is an alternate option called lean IT. The model advocates for making positive changes and continuous improvements and is aimed at avoiding getting stuck in waiting mode.

The lean IT model is well suited to data-oriented and digital systems, and helps discourage the myopic views that legacy systems foster in the first place.

Legacy Systems Create Security Problems

Legacy systems can pose several data security problems in an organization. Security is a prominent feature of the lean IT model. Continuous improvements and positive changes help to curb the latest threats. Old systems, because of their age, struggle with this.

Legacy systems may pose various challenges when fixing specific vulnerabilities, due to their large and inflexible nature. Making a fix in legacy systems can face delays because developers find it challenging to create one. Also, creating a repair is often not on the development team’s priority list. As a result, the fix ends up being very expensive.

Old systems can enter into a period where there is a danger to the organization due to their outdated security measures.

Inability to Meet Customers on Their Terms

The digital age has created tremendous opportunities, including those related to changing a company's way of operations to benefit its users. Businesses that don't have legacy systems find that when technology moves, the industry can move with it. They are ready to use any new generation that comes out and are prepared to download and install any new application that becomes popular.

Under these conditions, challenges can mount for a company stuck with an old system. Legacy systems have restrictions on using new applications. Businesses that have many customer interactions can encounter serious challenges.

Customers often go for features on the latest applications available in this digital era, such as Instagram and Windows 10 updates. Both of these have chatting options that legacy systems can't enable. This is very much a missed opportunity.

Legacy Systems are Not Cost Effective

It may seem like legacy systems would be less expensive to maintain. However, that connotation changes over time, and circumstances often prove cost to be a pain point. Support and software updates for legacy systems are often much more expensive than current models, whose support and updates are always ready for seamless implementation.

The reason behind the additional maintenance cost is that knowledgeable software developers are hard to find. It involves a lot more work for software developers to offer the necessary continued care and updates for a legacy system than a current system.

Compatibility Issues Threaten Business Interaction

A legacy systems compatibility issue affects all users. We’re talking about the customers and business partners, suppliers, team members, and other associated users.

The legacy system will support file and data formats up to a certain point. But over time, these formats advance over and beyond what the legacy system can handle.

The evolution of support formats only takes a couple of years. In this event, the business will be stuck and experience pain points from using forms the customers or partners are no longer willing to use.

A company without legacy problems will adapt to successful implementation fast, aiming for better collaborations among users and team members. They also avoid waste in IT operations. Therefore, the future of the company's business remains adaptable.

Lack of Storage Availability and Budget

Legacy systems are often full of lurking, untested problems. Support is often difficult to come by, leading to frustrating support interactions.

Customer support is critical, especially when you have large data sets or tight deadlines. Modern software development techniques make it easy to release and access track records. System data storage matters a lot to the users, so data storage and accessibility are key features in new systems that also come in handy when support is necessary.

Unhealthy for Employee Training

Look at the IT team members' psychological aspects for a moment. What does operating a legacy system say to the workforce? It signals that it's okay to work with an old system on one end while putting off addressing worries until later. The system solutions from the past are still working.

But an organization should not encourage this view in their employees, especially when training employees in new skills.

The method may still function, but it will be a massive liability for connectivity and security. Legacy systems also reduce productivity, lower team members' morale, and repel some of the best talents. Employees with first-hand experience in new technology want to hold to that and have no interest in learning old systems.

"If it's not broken, don't fix it" is the IT professional's general attitude. Though it does not stem from any bad intentions, it can cause a company severe problems down the road.

Proprietary Tools are Not Fun

Legacy systems tend to be clunky, extensive, and very proprietary. Changing or customizing them poses a serious challenge. But modern IT professionals prefer to use the latest techniques and have no interest in mastering old systems.

Some organizations' software and hardware needs are different from other companies. Therefore, they need to build their custom software and hardware. New systems have smaller parts that make them flexible and easy to adopt. Specialized needs are no excuse for retaining legacy systems.

Getting Past Legacy Software Pains In Requirements Management

High-regulated industries have difficulty catching up with technology because of their complex systems. You may feel your company has outgrown its requirements management software, and you’re not alone.

The line between software and hardware becomes more and more blurred, and innovations are occurring faster than ever before. Requirements management providers may not supply the right software that matches the users' goals, regardless of the notable reputation or how complex the software is. That can create severe problems that affect productivity.

Here are some common methods for how to work your way out from a legacy system into something much more helpful for yourself and your customers:

Working with Multiple Stakeholders in Mind

Highly regulated industries interact with many different stakeholders and players, which is good for their business. It is essential to value the input of the various roles and skill sets.

But problems can arise if one of these users doesn't know how to use your requirements management software. Stakeholders bring their benefits to the company, but interfering with the system can be a recipe for compliance disaster.

To avoid such problems, look for software that flows with several roles and is seamless. Also, make sure your software integrates user-friendly traceability. Every user on the project needs to see the progress from beginning to end. This will prevent use problems from becoming a lasting problem and hindering productivity.

Timely Notifications to Help Meet Deadlines

Missing deadlines happen in many organizations. A team member needs to provide feedback but fails to do so on time. It could have been sent via email, Google, or Word document that someone didn’t know to monitor. Whichever means were used, the model of collaboration in place failed.

Review processes are quite complex these days, and you need collaboration software that sets clear intentions for the users. Real-time notification and editing will help keep team members on the truck.

Opt for a requirements management tool that prompts the next step to avoid falling into the trap. The requirements management software will help to prevent blame games - and it’s an excellent reason to suggest upgrading away from the legacy system altogether.

Accessibility and Intuitiveness

There may be instances where you want to carry out an essential process through the legacy system - but you are somehow locked out. You may have challenges finding the person who manages the system access rights and can get you back in the loop.

The situation can be frustrating and pose significant risks to the company, since one can attempt to break into the system for a couple of hours. This also wastes time. The desire to provide timely feedback with confidence is thwarted, which goes against the first intention of collecting the data.

The right requirements management tool should provide continuous data collection and growth. To achieve this, it should be open, accessible, and intuitive. The stakeholders will get motivation and provide constant input and collaboration, which is vital in keeping up with breakneck innovation.

An Upgrade Doesn’t Have to Spell Disaster

When an upgrade notification pops up on our screen, it’s normal to get skittish. There was once a very real fear of losing essential data and vital information with any kind of system update.

But this fear has dissipated with the advent of the cloud. A company no longer has to fear upgrading and fixing software requirements. It’s necessary to improve the security requirements and access some of the latest features.

It's crucial to have a system that adapts quickly to update requirements. When purchasing legacy software, consider the opportunity costs of not upgrading and encountering the headache of being locked out of various unsupported platforms.

Data Storage, Security, and Availability

As part of evaluating your current system, investigate data storage safety during software development. Find out from existing customers how well your system releases the accurate document.

Whatever system you choose will be around for a long time, so you will need to measure your predicted needs from the vendor. You will be putting some of your crown jewels on the system you want to buy. They need to be safe.

Conclusion

We live in an age with the most innovative and disruptive products available to more people than ever. We have ultra-fast electric cars, self-piloted spaceships, and lifelike prosthetics. We also have some of the brightest minds toiling to help propel us into the future.

This means the regulatory environment now is more stringent, especially on public safety and the marketplace demands. There is a need to have a team ready to meet the ever-increasing demands of compliance.

To be on the safer side, you need to put in place a collaborative infrastructure to keep the team organized and detect mistakes of disconnected persons in real-time. The future of your company depends on it.

Frequently Asked Questions

In what ways can one modernize a legacy system?

Migrate. This allows the business to perform critical processes immediately. Legacy software may not be flexible enough to allow the expected modification. Also, your old system may not offer its users the right results. Legacy migration can be the better choice in this case.

The other option is extension. You may not need to replace a legacy system that still performs its core functions (especially if it still has some years of warranty remaining). Despite that, you can still modernize it by extending its capabilities.

How do you handle management pushing legacy systems?

Try to make concrete and practical recommendations on how to make the legacy system better. Provide evidence on how the improvements will lead to better performance. You may change minds by presenting realistic situations where the legacy system can still be helpful in the future with just a few additions.

Reasons Why 3D Printing Technology is Underrated

3D printing technology is one of the most progressive methods of creating objects in the market today. There are four different types of production techniques in manufacturing. These include subtractive manufacturing, casting, formation, and additive manufacturing.

Reasons Why Additive Manufacturing is a Superior Form of Manufacturing

Additive manufacturing is the technique of production that 3D printers use to create physical objects. Additive manufacturing is the manufacturing process in which you create an object from scratch by directly layering the raw material.

This technique is different from others because it does not create waste like subtractive manufacturing. It does not require manual effort and time like the formation process where you add force to a material to shape it, and it does not require tools and molds like casting to produce a functional product.

In conclusion, additive manufacturing requires no tools, has no waste, and needs zero cutting and complex procedures.

How Does Additive Manufacturing Work?

There are various types of additive manufacturing in the market. All of these processes are suitable for their respective fields and functions. A production house can use one of these techniques to create its design.

Direct Casting

The large scale 3D printer allows the production company to create a mold and cast-in-motion with the help of a dual head. The cast-in-motion technique cuts a lot of time and steps from the traditional molding and casting procedure. This procedure includes four steps. The first step is to feed the information into the printer and print the design.

After the design is complete, cure the product in an oven to enhance its mechanical properties. The cast of the product comprises a water-breakable mixture. Therefore, in the third step, soak the mold in water. It will degenerate, and you can finish your product in the last step for further use.

This process is rapid, and your production, which took weeks, now only takes a few days.

FDM

Fusion deposition modeling is a typical process of manufacturing in an additive process. A domestic printer uses this process to create designs. This printer is easy to use as you need to fill the printer with filament from one end, and it will produce your design on the other end.

This process needs a design, the software cuts the design into thin digital slices, and once the data is in the printer, it will create the product automatically. It may be easy to use, but large-scale industries do not prefer it for its poor finish and fragile material.

SLA Printing

The process of Stereolithography is unique as it uses photosensitive resin to solidify the design out of liquid polymer. It is a precise way of creating objects from resin, and it does not require as much time as other printing methods. The UV rays cure the liquid polymer on top of the layers. It creates an illusion of an object being born from the liquid.

Laser Sintering

The laser sintering method is dangerous in public places, but it is practical for enormous industries. It uses refined metal powder as raw material. The machine uses a laser to create a solid object from this metal dust. The printer does have a container box for metal powder but inhaling this powder can be dangerous.

NASA and other mechanical corporations use this technique to build parts for air crafts, planes, cars, and other automobiles. If the production house follows all the SOPs, this method is one of the fastest methods of creating parts.

Poly Jet Method

The poly jet method is a mixture of FDM and SLA printing. The machine uses thin layers of resin and layers are like a filament, and the UV light instantly cures the resin in place. This technique is valuable for rapid prototyping, fixtures, and creating functional moving parts.

The Revolutionary Implications of 3D Printing

Multiple applications and implications of 3D printing suggest that it has revolutionized the world. 3D printing has minimized the connection between production and consumption. A consumer can directly produce a design in a short time. The time for a product to reach the consumer has drastically reduced.

The emergency disaster zone fixtures are possible with the help of instant 3D printing. It also inspires the younger generation to create and practically use their theoretical knowledge. It has inspired the world to connect virtual reality to physical reality. And all of this is just the beginning of what 3D technology has to offer.

JMP & LBL Instructions in Ladder Logic Programming

Hi friends, I hope you are very well; today in this tutorial, we will practice conditional jumping for performing some code at the occurrence of some conditions. Like any other programming language, jumping is one of the most common approaches to transfer the execution from its sequential mode to run different processes or instructions marked by a label and bypassing the lines of codes in between the last executed transaction before the jump instruction and the labeled instruction whom the program is going to move to. The good thing about this technique is shortening the scan cycle of the program due to not running the whole program. However, using jumping techniques in coding is very dangerous. It would help if you were careful of missing some open cases before going anywhere in the code. For example, let us say that we started one process. In the middle of the process’s sequence, one jump instruction is used to run some logic under some conditions, so jumping means leaving or skyping for some reason and going running some logic or code. Therefore, we should consider the skipped instructions’ effects and consequences on the whole process and program logic. In addition, because any jump instruction can target any label and many jump instructions can target the same label, you should pay great attention to make sure you name the correct label according to the designed logic to avoid losing the reason you plan your program to do. I know you might take it easy now and can not imagine someone right wrong label by mistake. But, when you will be writing a large-scale project which contains hundreds or even thousands of rungs and has couples of dozens of labels, in that case, you can quickly mistakenly write the wrong label.

JMP and LBL instructions

To perform jumping in the ladder logic program, two instructions are together, as shown in Fig. 1. The first instruction is JMP which tells the PLC you need to jump from where the jump instruction is to where you find the LBL instruction.

Fig. 1: JMP and LBL instructions

Now how to know the label to whom you want the program execution to go or jump? Well, that is an excellent question, and the answer is that you should specify the label name as a parameter of jump instruction and the label instruction. Therefore, you can notice, my friends, if Fig. 2, the JMP and LBL instructions have a question mark denoting you should specify the label name, which is the next station to programme execution.

Fig. 2: Jump and Label instruction showing the label name above of them

Jump instruction ladder logic example

Now friends, let us see how jump and label instructions work together, as shown in fig. Three depicts a straightforward example of ladder logic in which JMP and LBL instruction work together, referring to the same label Q2:0. In this example, if input contact I1/0 is activated, JMP instruction will take the execution where the Q2:0 label “LBL” instruction is. As a result, the rung 001 has been bypassed.

Fig. 3: ladder logic example for jump and label instructions

How about going with a situation where we need to employ JMP and LBL instruction? Yes, in the example shown in fig. 4, You can notice here in this example. There are a couple of motors and for these motors. We need to. Use Siri. The command of the jump. And in combination with the uh label instruction. 2. Let some motors work in one scenario. And in another scenario, we will let some of these motors worworkd the others are not working. So you can imagine if you are working with Couples of pumps and want to run all pumps together in one scenario, so you do not activate the JMP command. But, in another scenario, if you’re running some of these pumps. So what we are going to do here in this example is to activate the JMP command to bypass some of these pumps, which are between the JMP and LBL commands.

Fig. 4: a real example of jump instruction

Figure 5 depicts the execution of the sample program that demonstrates JMP instruction. This case shows what happened in the first scenario example. If we do not activate jump instruction in rung 3, then all motors 1,2,3,4,5,6 and 7 will run based on the status of their firing contacts which are I:0 0 to 7, respectively. And the program execution continues running other motors after the JMP as it is not activated by touch I:0 3.

Fig. 5: test when JMP is not activated

On the other hand, Fig. 6 depicts the second scenario when activating JMP instruction by contact I0:3 at run number 3. By activating the jump command, We can notice only the motor before jump instructions are running based on their command contacts when the pumps in between jumps and label commands are bypassed, and the other engines after label instruction are running. So motors 1,2 and 3 are running, motors 4,5 and 6 have been ignored by activation of jump command instruction, while motor seven is running, which is at label command.

Fig. 6: test when JMP is activated

What’s next,

I want to thank you all for following me in this short and essential tutorial that can help you utilize the jump and label command instructions to control the logic flow of your program based on the situations and the logic design of your program. So now you can perform safety control to avoid running some equipment under some circumstances to protect the operator and equipment. In addition, you can run many logic scenarios in one program based on the status of input and output devices. In the following tutorial, we will take something neer to jump, which is subroutines, showing you how you can make your program modular and divided into subroutines to be organized and readable and easy to maintain, follow, and being modified. So be ready, and let us meet soon to learn and practice the new ladder logic programming tutorial.

LinkedIn marketing strategies that can help expand your small business

Are you looking for ways to boost your small business? LinkedIn may be the answer. LinkedIn is a powerful platform that can help you reach a larger audience than ever before.

LinkedIn is a powerful social media platform for businesses of all sizes. It provides an opportunity to connect with a larger audience, build relationships with potential customers, and create brand awareness. But promoting your business on LinkedIn is not as easy as you might think. For one, LinkedIn is a professional network, which means that users are not always looking to be sold to. Secondly, LinkedIn’s algorithm favors content that is educational and informative over content that is promotional.

So how can you promote your small business on LinkedIn in a way that will reach your target audience and help you achieve your business goals? Here are the top LinkedIn marketing strategies that you can use to expand your small business.

Share engaging content

If you want to reach your target audience on LinkedIn, you need to share content that is interesting and engaging. This means creating content that educates, informs, or entertains your readers. For example, if you're a construction company, you could share articles about the latest industry trends, tips for remodeling your home, or interesting case studies.

The key is to make sure that your content is relevant to your target audience and provides value. If you're not sure what type of content to create, take a look at the content that your competitors are sharing. Chances are, their content will give you some ideas.

However, that doesn't mean you should write walls of words - avoid that at all costs. No one wants to read an essay on LinkedIn. Keep your posts short and to the point. Use images, infographics, videos, and LinkedIn banners to break up your text and make your content more visually appealing.

Know your target audience

You can't just start posting on LinkedIn with a blindfold on now, can you? You need to know who you're targeting first.

Creating personas for your target audience is a great way to get to know them better. Once you've created personas, take a look at where your target audience hangs out online. What type of content do they consume? What are their interests?

You can use this information to create content that appeals to your target audience. For example, if you're targeting millennials, you might want to create content that is relevant to their interests, such as entrepreneurship, travel, or personal development.

Create a company page

One of the best ways to promote your small business on LinkedIn is by creating a company page. Your company page is like a mini-website on LinkedIn, and it's a great way to showcase your products or services.

When creating your company page, make sure to include a strong headline, an engaging description, and relevant images. You should also take advantage of LinkedIn's SEO features by including keywords in your page content.

Once you've created your company page, start sharing content that will interest your target audience. This could include blog posts, product information, case studies, or even company news. You can also use your company page to run LinkedIn ads. LinkedIn offers several ad formats that you can use to promote your business, and they're a great way to reach a larger audience.

Optimize your LinkedIn profile

Your LinkedIn profile is one of the most important tools in your LinkedIn marketing arsenal, so optimizing your LinkedIn Profile is essential. It's your chance to make a good first impression, so make sure you're putting your best foot forward.

Start by optimizing your headline and summary. These are the first things people will see when they visit your profile, so make sure they're attention-grabbing and relevant. Include keywords that describe your business or industry, and make sure to mention your most important selling points. Your headline and summary are also a great place to showcase your personality.

Next, take a look at your profile photo. Is it professional and polished? If not, consider changing it to something that presents you in a positive light. Finally, take some time to update your work experience and education section. Include any relevant information that will help you stand out, such as awards or publications. By optimizing your LinkedIn profile, you'll be sure to make a good impression on potential customers and clients.

Join relevant groups

Another great way to reach your target audience on LinkedIn is by joining relevant groups. There are thousands of groups on LinkedIn, covering just about every topic imaginable. And chances are, there are several groups that would be a good fit for your business.

For example, if you're an apparel retailer, you could join relevant groups on LinkedIn to promote your business. These groups could include fashion professionals, small business owners, or even general interest groups.

When you join a group, make sure to participate in the discussion and add value to the conversation. This will help you build relationships with other members and position yourself as an expert in your field.

You can also use LinkedIn groups to collect leads. Many groups allow members to post their contact information in the group description. This makes it easy for you to get in touch with potential customers.

Generate leads with InMail

Did you know that you can use LinkedIn to generate leads? It's true! LinkedIn offers a feature called Sponsored InMail, which allows you to send messages directly to your target audience. Normally, on the free plan, you can't send priority messages to anyone. Therefore, InMail is a great way to promote your products or services, and it's an especially effective lead generation tool.

Sponsored InMail is a great way to reach out to potential customers and promote your products or services. You can use it to offer discounts, announce new products, or even invite people to events.

To get started, simply create a Sponsored InMail campaign and target your ideal customer. LinkedIn will then match your message with the right people, and you'll start seeing results in no time. Just make sure your message resonates with your target audience. Otherwise, you risk having it perceived as spam.

A final piece of advice

While the above marketing strategies will work like a charm when it comes to promoting your business and gaining new customers, bear in mind that every business is different and has a different target audience. Therefore, it's important to experiment with different strategies and find the ones that work best for you. Identifying the right marketing mix for your business is what you should be aiming for.

For example, you could use LinkedIn ads to reach out to your target audience if you're looking for immediate results. Or, if you're trying to build long-term relationships with potential customers, focus on creating a strong company page and sharing high-quality content.

Also, don't forget to harness the power of SEO! In simple words, SEO makes your content more visible in LinkedIn's search results, which means more people will see it. You can do this by optimizing your LinkedIn profile and company page for keywords, and you'll surely gain more traction on your LinkedIn profile.

Speech Recognition System Using Raspberry pi 4

Thank you for joining us for yet another session of this series on Raspberry Pi programming. In the preceding tutorial, we created a pi-hole ad blocker for our home network using raspberry pi 4. We also learned how to install pi-hole on raspberry pi four and how to access it in any way with other devices. This tutorial will implement a speech recognition system using raspberry pi and use it in our project. First, we will learn the fundamentals of speech recognition, and then we will build a game that uses the user's voice to play it and discover how it all works with a speech recognition package.

Here, you'll learn:

  • The basics of voice recognition
  • On PyPI, what packages may be found?
  • Utilize the SpeechRecognition package with a wide range of useful features.
Where To Buy?
No.ComponentsDistributorLink To Buy
1Raspberry Pi 4AmazonBuy Now

Components

  • Raspberry pi 4
  • Microphone
 

A Brief Overview of Speech Recognition

Are you curious about how to incorporate speech recognition into a Python program? Well, when it comes to conducting voice recognition in Python, there are a few things you need to know first. I'm not going to overwhelm you with the technical specifics because it would take up an entire book. Things have gone a long way when it comes to modern voice recognition technologies. Several speakers can be recognized and have extensive vocabulary in several languages.

Voice is the first element of speech recognition. A mic and an analog-to-digital converter are required to turn speech into an electronic signal and digital data. The audio can be converted to text using various models once it has been digitized.

Markov models are used in most modern voice recognition programs. It is assumed that audio signals can be reasonably represented as a stationary series when seen over a short timescale.

The audio signals are broken into 10-millisecond chunks in a conventional HMM. Each fragment's spectrogram is converted into a real number called cepstral coefficients. The dimensions of this cepstral might range from 10 to 32, depending on the device's accuracy. These vectors are the end product of the HMM.

Training is required for this calculation because the voice of a phoneme changes based on the source and even within a single utterance by the same person. The most probable word to produce the specified phoneme sequence is determined using a particular algorithm.

This entire process could be computationally costly, as one might expect. Before HMM recognition, feature transformations and dimension reduction methods are employed in many current speech recognition programs. It is also possible to limit an audio input to only those parts which are probable to include speech using voice detectors. As a result, the recognizer does not have to waste time studying sections of the signal that aren't relevant.

Choosing a Speech Recognition Tool

There are a few speech recognition packages in PyPI. There are a few examples:

NLP can discern a user's purpose in some of these programs, which goes beyond simple speech recognition. Several other services are focused on speech-to-text conversion alone, such as Google Cloud-Speech.

SpeechRecognition is the most user-friendly of all the packages.

Voice recognition necessitates audio input, which SpeechRecognition makes a cinch. SpeechRecognition will get you up to speed in minutes rather than requiring you to write your code for connecting mics and interpreting audio files.

Since it wraps a variety of common speech application programming interfaces, this SpeechRecognition package offers a high degree of extensibility. The SpeechRecognition library is a fantastic choice for every Python project because of its flexibility and ease of usage. The APIs it encapsulates may or may not be able to support every feature. For SpeechRecognition to operate in your situation, you'll need to research the various choices.

You've decided to give SpeechRecognition ago, and now you need to get it deployed in your environment.

Speech Recognition Software Installation

Using pip, you may set up Speech Recognition software in the terminal:

$ pip install SpeechRecognition

When you've completed the setup, you should start a command line window and type:

Import speech_recognition as sr

Sr.__version__

Let's leave this window open for now. Soon enough, you'll be able to use it.

If you only need to deal with pre-existing audio recordings, Speech Recognition will work straight out of the box. A few prerequisites are required for some use cases, though. In particular, the PyAudio library must record audio from a mic.

As you continue reading, you'll discover which components you require. For the time being, let's look at the package's fundamentals.

Recognizer Class

The recognizer is at the heart of Speech Recognition's magic.

Naturally, the fundamental function of a Recognizer class is to recognize spoken words and phrases. Each instance has a wide range of options for identifying voice from the input audio.

The process of setting up a Recognizer is straightforward. It's as simple as typing "in your active interpreter window."

sr.Recognizer()

There are seven ways to recognize the voice from input audio by utilizing a distinct application programming interface in each Recognizer class. The following are examples:

Aside from recognizing sphinx(), all the other functions fail to work offline using CMU Sphinx. Internet access is required for the remaining six activities.

This tutorial does not cover all of the capabilities and features of every Application programming interface in detail. Speech Recognition comes with a preset application programming interface key for the Google Speech Application programming interface, allowing you to immediately get up and running with the service. As a result, this tutorial will extensively use the Web Speech Application programming interface. Only the Application programming interface key and the user are required for the remaining six application programming interfaces.

Speech Recognition provides a default application programming interface key for testing reasons only, and Google reserves the right to cancel it at any time. Using the Google Web application programming interface in a production setting is not recommended. There is no method to increase the daily request quota, even if you have a valid application programming interface key. If you learn how to use the Speech Recognition application programming interface today, it will be straightforward to apply to any of your projects.

Whenever a recognize function fails to recognize the voice, it will output an error message. Request Error if the application programming interface is unavailable. A faulty Sphinx install could cause this in the case of recognizing sphinx(). If quotas are exceeded, servers are unreachable, or there isn't internet service, a Request Error will be raised for all the six methods.

Let us use recognize google() in our interpreter window and see if it works!

Exactly what has transpired?

Something like this is most likely what you've gotten.

I'm sure you could have foreseen this. How is it possible to tell something from nothing?

The Recognizer function recognize() expects an audio data parameter. If you're using Speech Recognition, then audio data should become an instance of the audio data class.

To construct an AudioData instance, you have two options: you can either use an audio file or record your audio. We'll begin with audio files because they're simpler to work with.

Using Audio Files

To proceed, you must first obtain and save an audio file. Use the same location where your Python interpreter is running to store the file.

Speech Recognition's AudioFile interface allows us to work with audio files easily. As a context manager, this class gives the ability to access the information of an audio file by providing a path to its location.

File Formats that are supported

This software supports various file formats, which include:

  • WAV
  • AIFF
  • FLAC

You'll need to get a hold of the FLAC command line and a FLAC encoding tool.

Recording data using the record() Function

To play the "har.wav" file, enter the following commands into your interpreter window:

har = sr.AudioFile('har.wav')

with harvard as source:

audio = r.record(source)

Using the AudioFile class source, the context manager stores the data read from the file. Then, using the record() function, the full file's data is saved to an AudioData class. Verify this by looking at the format of the audio:

type(audio)

You can now use recognize_google() to see if any voice can be found in the audio file. You might have to wait a few seconds for the output to appear, based on the speed of your broadband connection.

r.recognize_google(audio)

Congratulations! You've just finished your very first audio transcription!

Within the "har.wav" file, you'll find instances of Har Phrases if you're curious. In 1965, the IEEE issued these phrases to evaluate telephone lines for voice intelligibility. VoIP and telecom testing continue to make use of them nowadays.

Seventy-two lists of 10 phrases are included in the Har Phrases. On the Open Voice Repository webpage, you'll discover a free recording of these words and phrases. Each language has its own set of translations for the recordings. Put your code through its paces; they offer many free resources.

Segments with a start and end time

You may want to record a small section of the speaker's speech. The record() method accepts the duration term parameter, which terminates the program after a defined amount of time.

Using the example above, the first 4 secs of the file will be saved as a transcript.

with har as source:

audio = r.record(source, duration=4)

r.recognize_google(audio)

In the files stream, utilize the record() function within a block. As a result, the 4 secs of audio you recorded for 4 seconds will be returned when you record for 4 seconds again.

with har as source:

audio1 = r.record(source, duration=4)

audio2 = r.record(source, duration=4)

r.recognize_google(audio1)

r.recognize_google(audio2)

As you can see, the 3rd phrase is contained within audio2. When a timeframe is specified, the recorder can cease in the middle of a word. This can harm the transcript. In the meantime, here's what I have to say about this.

The offset keywords arguments can be passed to the record() function combined with a recording period. Before recording, this setting specifies how many frames of a file to disregard.

with har as source:

audio = r.record(source, offset=4, duration=3)

r.recognize_google(audio)

Using the duration and the offset word parameters can help you segment an audio track if you understand the language structure beforehand. They can, however, be misused if used hurriedly. Using the following command in your interpreter should get the desired result.

 

with har as source:

audio = r.record(source, offset=4.7, duration=2.8)

r.recognize_google(audio)

The application programming interface only received "akes heat," which matches "Mesquite," because "it t" half of the sentence was missed.

You also recorded "a co," the first word of the 3rd phrase after the recording. The application programming interface matched this to "Aiko."

Another possible explanation for the inaccuracy of your transcriptions is human error. Noise! Since the audio is relatively clean, the instances mentioned above all worked. Noise-free audio cannot be expected in the actual world except if the soundtracks can be processed in advance.

Noise Can Affect Speech Recognition.

Noise is an unavoidable part of everyday existence. All audiotapes have some noise level, and speech recognition programs can suffer if the noise isn't properly handled.

I listened to the "jackhammer" audio sample to understand how noise can impair speech recognition. Ensure to save it to the root folder of your interpreter session.

The sound of a jackhammer is heard in the background while the words "the stale scent of old beer remains" are spoken.

Try to translate this file and see what unfolds.

jackmer = sr.AudioFile('jackmer.wav')

with jackhammer as source:

audio = r.record(source)

r.recognize_google(audio)

How wrong!

So, how do you go about dealing with this situation? The Recognizer class has an adjust for ambient noise() function you might want to give a shot.

with jackmer as source:

r.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source)

audio = r.record(source)

r.recognize_google(audio)

You're getting closer, but it's still not quite there yet. In addition, the statement's first word is missing: "the." How come?

Recognizer calibration is done by reading the first seconds of the audio stream and adjusting for noise level. As a result, the stream has already been consumed when you run record() to record the data.

Adjusting ambient noise() takes the duration word parameter to change the time frame for analysis. The default value for this parameter is 1, but you can change it to whatever you choose. Reduce this value by half.

with jackmer as a source:

r.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source, duration=0.5)

audio = r.record(source)

r.recognize_google(audio)

Now you've got a whole new set of problems to deal with after getting "the" at the start of the sentence. There are times when the noise can't be removed from the signal because it simply has a lot of noise to cope with. That's the case in this particular file.

These problems may necessitate some sound pre-processing if you encounter them regularly. Audio editing programs, which can add filters to the audio, can be used to accomplish this. For the time being, know that background noise can cause issues and needs to be handled to improve voice recognition accuracy.

Application programming interface responses might be useful whenever working with noisy files. There are various ways to parse the JSON text returned by most application programming interfaces. For the recognize google() function to produce the most accurate transcription, you must explicitly request it.

Using the recognize google() function and the show all boolean argument will do this.

r.recognize_google(audio, show_all=True)

A transcript list can be found in the dictionary returned by recognizing google(), with the entry 'alternative .'This response format varies in different application programming interfaces, but it's primarily useful for debugging purposes when you get it.

As you've seen, the Speech Recognition software has a lot to offer. Aside from gaining expertise with the offsets and duration arguments, you also learned about the harmful effects noise has on transcription accuracy.

The fun is about to begin. Make your project dynamic by using a mic instead of transcribing audio clips that don't require any input from the user.

Using Microphone

For Speech Recognizer to work, you must obtain the PyAudio library.

Install PyAudio

Use the command below to install pyaudio in raspberry pi:

sudo apt-get install python-pyaudio python3-pyaudio

Confirmation of Successful Setup

Using the console, you can verify that PyAudio is working properly.

python -m speech_recognition

Ensure your mic is turned on and unmuted. This is what you'll see if everything went according to plan:

Let SpeechRecognition translate your voice by talking into your mic and discovering its accuracy.

Microphone instance

The recognizer class should be created in a separate interpreter window.

import speech_recognition as sr

r = sr.Recognizer()

After utilizing an audio recording, you'll use the system mic as your input. Instantiation your Microphone interface to get at this information!

mic = sr.Microphone()

For raspberry pi, you must provide a device's index to use a certain mic. For a list of microphones, simply call our Mic class function.

Sr.Microphone.list_microphone_names()

Keep in mind that the results may vary from those shown in the examples.

You may find the mic's device index using the list microphone names function. A mic instance might look like this if you wanted to use the "front" mic, which has a value of Three in the output.

mic = sr.Microphone(device_index=3)

Use listen() to record the audio from the mic

A Mic instance is ready, so let's get started recording.

Similar to AudioFile, Mic serves as a context manager for the application. The listen() function of the Recognizer interface can be used in the with section to record audio from the mic. This technique uses an input source as its initial parameter to capture audio until quiet is invoked.

with mic as source:

audio = r.listen(source)

Try saying "hi" into your mic once you've completed the block. Please be patient as the interpreter prompts reappear. Once you hear the ">>>" prompt again, you should be able to hear the voice.

r.recognize_google(audio)

If the message never appears again, your mic is probably taking up the excessive background noise. Ctrl then C key can halt the execution and restore your prompts.

Recognizer class's adjustment of ambient noise() method must be used to deal with the noise level, much like you did while attempting to decipher the noisy audio track. It's wise to do this whenever you're listening for mic input because it's less unpredictable than audio file sources.

with mic as source:

r.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source)

audio = r.listen(source)

Allow for adjustment of ambient noise() to finish before speaking "hello" into the mic after executing the code mentioned above. Be patient as the interpreter's prompts reappear before ascertaining the speech.

Keep in mind that the audio input is analyzed for a second by adjusting ambient noise(). Using the duration parameter, you can shorten it if necessary.

According to the website, not under 0.5 secs is recommended by the Speech Recognition specification. There are times when greater durations are more effective. The lower the ambient noise, the lower the value you need. Sadly, this knowledge is often left out of the development process. In my opinion, the default one-second duration is sufficient for most purposes.

How to handle speech that isn't recognizable?

Using your interpreter, type in the above code snippet and mutter anything nonsensical into the mic. You may expect a response such as this:

An UnknownValueError exception is thrown if the application programming interface cannot translate speech into text. You must always encapsulate application programming interface requests in try and except statements to address this problem.

Getting the exception thrown may take more effort than you imagine. When it comes to transcribing vocal sounds, the API puts in a lot of time and effort. For me, even the tiniest of noises were translated into words like "how." A cough, claps of the hands, or clicking the tongue would all raise an exception.

A "Guess the Word" game to Put everything together

To put what you've learned from the SpeechRecognition library into practice, develop a simple game that randomly selects a phrase from a set of words and allows the player three tries to guess it.

Listed below are all of the scripts:

import random

import time

import speech_recognition as sr

def recognize_speech_from_mic(recognizer, microphone):

if not isinstance(recognizer, sr.Recognizer):

raise TypeError("`recognizer` must be `Recognizer` instance")

if not isinstance(microphone, sr.Microphone):

raise TypeError("`microphone` must be `Microphone` instance")

with microphone as source:

recognizer.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source)

audio = recognizer.listen(source)

response = {

"success": True,

"error": None,

"transcription": None

}

 

try: response["transcription"] = recognizer.recognize_google(audio)

except sr.RequestError:

response["success"] = False

response["error"] = "API unavailable"

except sr.UnknownValueError:

response["error"] = "Unable to recognize speech"

return response

if __name__ == "__main__":

WORDS = ["apple", "banana", "grape", "orange", "mango", "lemon"]

NUM_GUESSES = 3

PROMPT_LIMIT = 5

recognizer = sr.Recognizer()

microphone = sr.Microphone()

word = random.choice(WORDS)

instructions = (

"I'm thinking of one of these words:\n"

"{words}\n"

"You have {n} tries to guess which one.\n"

).format(words=', '.join(WORDS), n=NUM_GUESSES)

print(instructions)

time.sleep(3)

for i in range(NUM_GUESSES):

for j in range(PROMPT_LIMIT):

print('Guess {}. Speak!'.format(i+1))

guess = recognize_speech_from_mic(recognizer, microphone)

if guess["transcription"]:

break

if not guess["success"]:

break

print("I didn't catch that. What did you say?\n")

if guess["error"]:

print("ERROR: {}".format(guess["error"]))

break

print("You said: {}".format(guess["transcription"]))

guess_is_correct = guess["transcription"].lower() == word.lower()

user_has_more_attempts = i < NUM_GUESSES - 1

if guess_is_correct:

print("Correct! You win!".format(word))

break

elif user_has_more_attempts:

print("Incorrect. Try again.\n")

else:

print("Sorry, you lose!\nI was thinking of '{}'.".format(word))

break

Let's analyze this a little bit further.

There are three keys to this function: Recognizer and Mic. It takes these two as inputs and outputs a dictionary. The "success" value indicates the success or failure of the application programming interface request. It is possible that the 2nd key, "error," is a notification showing that the application programming interface is inaccessible or that a user's speech was incomprehensible. As a final touch, the audio input "transcription" key includes a translation of all of the captured audio.

A TypeError is raised if the recognition system or mic parameters are invalid:

Using the listen() function, the mic's sound is recorded.

For every call to recognize speech from the mic(), the recognizer is re-calibrated using the adjust for ambient noise() technique.

After that, whether there is any voice in the audio, recognize function is invoked to translate it. RequestError and UnknownValueError are caught by the try and except block and dealt with accordingly. Recognition of voice from a microphone returns a dictionary containing the success, error, and translated voice of the application programming interface request and the dictionary keys.

In an interpreter window, execute the following code to see if the function works as expected:

import speech_recognition as sr

from guessing_game import recognize_speech_from_mic

r = sr.Recognizer()

m = sr.Microphone()

recognize_speech_from_mic(r, m)

The actual gameplay is quite basic. An initial set of phrases, a maximum of guesses permitted, and a time restriction are established:

Once this is done, a random phrase is selected from the list of WORDS and input into the Recognizer and Mic instances.

After displaying some directions, the condition statement is utilized to handle each user's attempts at guessing the selected word. This is the first operation that happens inside of the first loop. Another loop tries to identify the person's guesses at least PROMPT LIMIT instances and stores the dictionary provided to a variable guess.

Otherwise, a translation was performed, and the closed-loop will end with a break in case the guess "transcription" value is unknown. False is set as an application programming interface error when no audio is transcribed; this causes the loop to be broken again with a break. Aside from that, the application programming interface request was successful; nonetheless, the speech was unintelligible. As a precaution, the for loop repeatedly warns the user, giving them a second chance to succeed.

If there are any errors inside the guess dictionary, the inner loop will be terminated again. An error notice will be printed, and a break is used to exit the outer for loop, which will stop the program execution.

Transcriptions are checked for accuracy by comparing the entered text to a word drawn at random. As a result, the lower() function for text objects is employed to ensure a more accurate prediction. In this case, it doesn't matter if the application programming interface returns "Apple" or "apple" as the speech matching the phrase "apple."

If the user's estimate was correct, the game is over, and they have won. The outermost loop restarts when a person guesses incorrectly and a fresh guess is found. Otherwise, the user will be eliminated from the contest.

This is what you'll get when you run the program:

Recognition of Other Languages

Speech recognition in other languages, on the other hand, is entirely doable and incredibly simple.

The language parameter must be set to the required string to use the recognize() function in a language other than English.

r = sr.Recognizer()

with sr.AudioFile('path/to/audiofile.wav') as source:

audio = r.record(source)

r.recognize_google(audio, language='fr-FR')

There are only a few methods that accept-language keywords:

What are the applications of speech recognition software?

  1. Mobile Payment with Voice command

Do you ever have second thoughts about how you're going to pay for future purchases? Has it occurred to you that, in the future, you may be able to pay for goods and services simply by speaking? There's a good chance that will happen soon! Several companies are already developing voice commands for money transfers.

This system allows you to speak a one-time passcode rather than entering a passcode before buying the product. When it comes to online security, think of captchas and other one-time passwords that are read aloud. This is a considerably better option than reusing a password every time. Soon, voice-activated mobile banking will be widely used.

  1. AI Assistants

When driving, you may use such Intelligent systems to get navigation, perform a Google search, start a playlist of songs, or even turn on the lights in your home without touching your gadget. These digital assistants are programmed to respond to every voice activation, regardless of the user.

There are new technologies that enable Ai applications to recognize individual users. This tech, for instance, allows it to respond to the voice of a certain person exclusively. Using an iPhone as an example, it's been around for a few years now. If you want Siri to only respond to your commands and queries when you speak to it, you can do so on your iPhone. Unauthorized access to your gadgets, information, and property is far less possible when your voice can only activate your Artificial intelligent assistant. Anyone who is not permitted to use the assistant will not be able to activate it. Other uses for this technology are almost probably on the horizon.

  1. Translation Application

In a distant place, imagine attempting to check into an unfamiliar hotel. Since neither you nor the front desk employee is fluent in the other country's language, no one is available to act as a translator. You can use the translator device to talk into the microphone and have your speech processed and translated verbally or graphically to communicate with another person.

Additionally, this tech can benefit multinational enterprises, educational institutions, or other institutions. You can have a more productive conversation with anyone who doesn't speak your language, which helps break down the linguistic barrier.

Conclusion

There are many ways to use the SpeechRecognition program, including installing it and utilizing its Recognizer interface, which may be used to recognize audio from both files and the mic. You learned how to use the record offset and the duration keywords to extract segments from an audio recording.

The recognizer's tolerance to noise level can be adjusted using the adjust for the ambient noise function, which you've seen in action. Recognizer instances can throw RequestErrors and UnknownValueErrors, and you've learned how to manage them with try and except block.

More can be learned about speech recognition than what you've just read. We will implement the RTC module integration in our upcoming tutorial to enable real-time control.

Get To Know About Bluetooth Beacons For Indoor Positioning

Indoor positioning technology has become widely available in a variety of configurations and quality levels. It's a jungle out there, and no single established solution, unlike outdoor location using GPS satellite technology, has been adequate for all needs.

Since GPS satellite technology became widely available in the late 1990s, positioning systems have played an increasingly important role in people's lives. Almost, everyone now owns a device with positioning capabilities, whether it's a mobile phone, tablet, GPS tracker, or smartwatch with built-in GPS.

Though GPS transformed outdoor positioning, we're now moving on to inside positioning, which will require new technologies. Because the signal is attenuated and scattered by roofs and walls, satellite-based location does not function indoors or on narrow streets. Other technology standards, thankfully, have arisen that enable indoor positioning, albeit with a new form of infrastructure.

Indoor positioning is useful for a variety of purposes for individuals and organizations. From making travel easier to locate what you're looking for, delivering/receiving targeted location-based information, enhancing accessibility, and gaining useful data insights, there's a lot more.

What Is BLE Indoor Positioning And How Does It Function Properly?

The User's Position

Indoor location relies heavily on BLE beacons. The device can detect when it is in the range of a Bluetooth beacon and even determine its position if it is in reach of more than two beacons using this technology.

The original BLE-based positioning prototypes could only detect which beacon was closest to the user. Hence, today we can combine proximity data from multiple beacons to place the consumer in 2D space on an indoor map. The accuracy varies depending on the situation, but it can be as accurate as 1.5 meters.

This technology is improving, and it now uses magnetic field sensing, gyroscopes, accelerator meters, and Near Field Communication circuits to provide exact positioning.

Apps From The Customer/Standpoint Visitors

This technology is used by customers and visitors for navigation and receiving location-based content. They do it by installing an app on their smartphone, tablet, or watch. Indoor mapping and location-specific content distribution are common features of the app.

The Viewpoint Of The Organization - Content Management System (CMS)

BLE positioning systems are used by businesses to deliver a better experience for their visitors or customers. Almost any form of organization can profit from location-based technologies. For instance:

  • Museums can provide visitors with location-based narrations accompanied by a map of the venue, allowing for navigation and participatory learning.
  • Indoor positioning systems can be utilized in retail to provide customers with location-based marketing, navigation, and other location-based content.
  • Location-based data, such as turn-by-turn navigation, could be beneficial to airports and hospitals.

Organizations utilize the CMS online platform for managing their content, floor maps, and Bluetooth beacon positions. A content management system(CMS) is often a hosted software system that maintains track of every piece of material in the app that users or customers access. Organizations need a fully working CMS because it offers them full control over the material that consumers see.

UWB Vs. BLE:

Low power, low cost, and effectiveness as asset tracking systems are all characteristics shared by BLE and UWB. UWB, on the other hand, has significantly more precision than Bluetooth. This owes in part to UWB's exact distance-based method of location determination.

BLE commonly locates devices using RSSI, which has a much lower rate of precision because it is reliant on whether a device transmits a weak or strong signal about a Bluetooth beacon or sensors.

In comparison to UWB, BLE has a substantially lesser range and data rate. Bluetooth, on the other hand, is a widely used RF technology that can be integrated into a variety of indoor settings using flexible hardware, such as BLE beacons, sensors, and asset tags.

Benefits:

Low-Cost, Low-Power

  • BLE is an appropriate RF standard for BLE sensor, Bluetooth beacon, and asset or personnel tag because of its low energy consumption and cost-effective technology.

Ease of Deployment

  • BLE offers simple, easy-to-deploy solutions and versatile hardware alternatives that can be used on or off the network and seamlessly incorporate into your Bluetooth ecosystem.

Adaptable Technology

  • Extend the technology's capabilities to support a variety of location-aware applications, including asset monitoring, Bluetooth device identification, indoor positioning and navigation, proximity applications, and more.

Some Ways Of Using Bluetooth Beacons:

  • Stationary Beacons, Roaming Mobile Devices, And Traveling Asset Beacons Are Used In Tandem.

In some cases, tracking the position of assets within a workspace is desirable, yet mounting permanent BLE receivers is impractical. Without a device to detect asset location and communicate data back to a cloud service, asset monitoring becomes difficult. It can be avoided by piggybacking on a mobile device's location.

Bluetooth beacon is placed throughout a facility, and a mobile app is installed to track where each device is at all times, similar to the previous strategy. The app can detect adjacent assets by marking them with beacons and assigning them to the same position as the device based on nearby fixed beacons.

  • Combining A BLE Technology With GPS, Wi-Fi, Or Geo-Fencing Is The Preferred Technology.

Indoors, BLE beacons offer substantial advantages for tracking people and assets. Integrating this technique with more conventional location services, like GPS, or Wi-Fi but still has advantages. Assets with embedded beacons can be used to identify items, and then further mobile location technologies can be utilized to give context.

Connecting a Bluetooth beacon to the inside of the vehicle is used to track the whereabouts of mobile workers while they drive. It's also utilized to track asset location within an office building utilizing Wi-Fi enabled client tracking and asset tagging beacons.

Summing Up!

In a nutshell, we can say that Bluetooth will remain a popular RF technology for wireless devices, short-range communication, and indoor positioning. The proliferation of Access Points with incorporated Bluetooth low energy beacon and sensor systems out of the box, as well as more, equipped consumer wearable, IoT devices, asset tracking tags, employee badges, and customer Bluetooth trackers, will almost certainly continue and grow.

Basic knowledge of machining

Datum.

Parts are composed of a number of surfaces, each surface has a certain size and mutual position requirements. The requirements of the relative position between the surfaces of the parts include two aspects: the dimensional accuracy of the distance between the surfaces and the relative position accuracy (such as axes, parallelism, verticality and circular runout, etc.).

The study of the relative position relationship between the part surfaces can not be separated from the datum, and the position of the part surface can not be determined without a clear datum. In its general sense, the datum is the point, line and surface on the part on which the position of other points, lines and surfaces are determined. According to its different functions, the benchmark can be divided into two categories: design benchmark and process benchmark.

1. Design datum.

A datum is a point, line, or surface from which measurements are made. In the case of the piston, the design datum refers to the centerline of the piston and the centerline of the pinhole.

2. Process datum.

The datum used by parts in the process of machining like turning and assembly is called process datum. According to different uses, the processed datum is divided into positioning datum, measuring datum and assembly datum.

1) Positioning datum: The datum is the point of reference from which all other measurements are taken. When positioning the datum, it is important to take into account the size and shape of the workpiece, as well as the type of machining operation being performed. According to the different positioning elements, the most commonly used are the following two categories:

Automatic centering positioning: such as three-claw chuck positioning.

To make a positioning sleeve, such as a stop plate, into a positioning sleeve.

Others are positioned in the V-shaped frame, positioned in the semicircular hole, and so on.

2) measuring datum: A measuring datum is a physical reference point used to take measurements. The datum provides a starting point from which all other measurements are taken. without a measuring datum, it would be difficult to take accurate measurements.

3) Assembly datum: the datum used to determine the position of the part in the assembly or product during assembly, called assembly datum.

Installation of workpieces.

In order to produce a surface that meets the specified technical requirements on a certain part of the workpiece, the workpiece must occupy a correct position relative to the tool on the machine tool before machining. This process is often referred to as the "positioning" of the artifact. After the workpiece is positioned, due to the action of cutting force, gravity and so on, a certain mechanism should be used to "clamp" the workpiece so that its determined position remains unchanged. The process of holding the workpiece in the correct position on the machine tool and clamping the workpiece is called "installation".

The quality of workpiece installation is an important issue in machining, which not only directly affects the machining accuracy, the speed and stability of workpiece installation, but also affects the productivity. In order to ensure the relative position accuracy between the machined surface and its design datum, the design datum of the machined surface should occupy a correct position relative to the machine tool when the workpiece is installed. For example, in the precision turning ring groove process, in order to ensure the circular run out of the ring groove bottom diameter and the skirt axis, the design basis of the workpiece must be coincident with the axis line of the machine tool spindle.

[caption id="attachment_171666" align="aligncenter" width="800"] Design & Engineering Verification[/caption]

When machining parts on different machine tools, there are different installation methods. The installation methods can be summarized as direct alignment method, marking alignment method and fixture installation method.

The main results are as follows:

1) when using this method, the correct position of the workpiece on the machine tool is obtained through a series of attempts. The specific way is to install the workpiece directly on the machine tool, use the dial meter or the needle on the needle plate, visually correct the correct position of the workpiece, and correct it at the same time until it meets the requirements.

The positioning accuracy and speed of direct alignment depend on the accuracy of alignment, the method of alignment, the tools of alignment and the technical level of workers. Its disadvantage is that it takes more time, the productivity is low, and it has to be operated on the basis of experience and requires high skills of workers, so it is only used in single-piece and small batch production. Such as hard to imitate the shape of the alignment belongs to the direct alignment method. .

2) the method of line alignment this method is a method of using a needle on a machine tool to correct the workpiece according to the line drawn on the blank or semi-finished product, so that it can get the correct position. It is obvious that this method requires an additional marking process. The drawn line itself has a certain width, and there is a marking error when marking, and there is also an observation error when correcting the position of the workpiece, so this method is mostly used in the rough machining of small batch production, low blank precision, and large workpieces that are not suitable for the use of fixtures. For example, the determination of the pin hole position of the two-stroke product is to use the marking method of the indexing head to correct it.

3) fixture installation method: the process equipment used to clamp the workpiece and make it occupy the correct position is called machine tool fixture. The fixture is an additional device of the machine tool, and its position relative to the tool on the machine tool has been adjusted in advance before the workpiece is installed, so it is no longer necessary to find the correct position one by one when machining a batch of workpieces, which can ensure the technical requirements of machining, which saves both labor and trouble. It is an efficient positioning method and is widely used in batch and mass production. Our current piston processing is the fixture installation method used.

  1. The operation of keeping the positioning position of the workpiece in the machining process after positioning is called clamping. The device in the fixture that keeps the positioning position of the workpiece in the machining process is called the clamping device.
  2. The clamping device should meet the following requirements: when clamping, the positioning of the workpiece should not be destroyed; after clamping, the position of the workpiece in the machining process should not change, and the clamping should be accurate, safe and reliable; the clamping action is fast, easy to operate and labor-saving; the structure is simple and easy to manufacture.
  3. matters needing attention when clamping: the clamping force should be appropriate, too much will cause deformation of the workpiece, and too small will cause displacement in the machining process and destroy the positioning of the workpiece.
 

Mechanical concept of roughness

Surface roughness is a measure of the irregularities in the surface of a material. It can be caused by a variety of factors, including manufacturing defects, wear and tear, and environmental exposure. Surface roughness can have a significant impact on the performance of a material, as it can affect its resistance to wear, corrosion, and other forms of damage. The term "roughness" refers to both the size and frequency of the irregularities on the surface of a material. The size of the irregularities is typically measured in micrometers or nanometers, while the frequency is typically measured in cycles per inch (CPI).

Surface roughness can also be characterized by its wavelength, which is the average distance between adjacent peaks or troughs. The most common method of measuring surface roughness is with a profilometer, which uses a stylus to trace the contours of the surface and generate a profile. The profile is then analyzed to determine the roughness parameters.

[caption id="attachment_171667" align="aligncenter" width="800"] Engineering Tolerances[/caption]

Roughness representation.

There are 3 kinds of surface roughness height parameters:

  1. Arithmetic mean deviation of contours Ra.

Within the sampling length, the arithmetic mean of the absolute distance between the point on the contour line along the measuring direction (Y direction) and the baseline.

  1. Micro-roughness 10-point height Rz.

It refers to the sum of the average peak height of the five maximum contours and the average valley depth of the five maximum contours within the sampling length.

  1. Maximum height of contour Ry.

The distance between the top line of the highest peak and the bottom line of the lowest valley within the sampling length.

Nowadays, Ra is mainly used in the general machinery manufacturing industry.

The influence of Roughness on the performance of parts.

The surface quality of the machined workpiece directly affects the physical, chemical and mechanical properties of the machined workpiece, and the working performance, reliability and service life of the product depend to a large extent on the surface quality of the main parts. Generally speaking, the surface quality requirements of important or key parts are higher than ordinary parts, because the parts with good surface quality will greatly improve their wear resistance, corrosion resistance and fatigue resistance.

Surface roughness is an important consideration in many engineering applications, as it can have a significant impact on the performance of a component or system. For example, surface roughness can affect the tribological properties of a material, such as its friction and wear resistance. It can also affect the ability of a material to resist corrosion and other forms of damage.

In addition, surface roughness can influence the optical properties of a material, such as its reflectivity and transmittance. Surface roughness is also a concern in many manufacturing processes, as it can cause defects in the finished product. For example, surface roughness can cause problems with adhesion, machining, and metallurgy. Surface roughness can also make it difficult to achieve desired tolerances in manufacturing processes. As a result, surface roughness is an important factor to consider in the design and manufacture of components and systems.

There are many ways to reduce surface roughness, including using methods such as honing, grinding, lapping, and polishing. In addition, surface treatments such as electroplating, ion implantation, and vapor deposition can also be used to improve the surface smoothness of the material.

Cutting fluid.

1) the function of cutting fluid.

Cooling effect: the cutting heat can take away a large amount of cutting heat, improve the heat dissipation conditions, and reduce the temperature of the tool and the workpiece, thus prolonging the service life of the tool and preventing the dimensional error caused by thermal deformation of the workpiece.

Lubrication: the cutting fluid can penetrate between the workpiece and the tool, forming a thin adsorption film in the tiny gap between the chip and the tool, reducing the friction coefficient, so it can reduce the friction between the chip and the workpiece, reducing the cutting force and cutting heat, reduce the tool wear and improve the surface quality of the workpiece, which is especially important for finishing and lubrication.

Cleaning function: the tiny chips produced in the cleaning process are easy to adhere to the workpiece and the tool, especially when drilling deep holes and twisted holes, the chips are easy to block in the chip-holding groove, affecting the surface roughness of the workpiece and the service life of the tool. The use of cutting fluid can wash away the chips quickly, so that the cutting can be carried out smoothly.

2) types: there are two kinds of common cutting fluids.

Emulsion: mainly plays a cooling role, emulsion is made by diluting emulsified oil with 15-20 times water, this kind of cutting fluid has high specific heat, low viscosity, good fluidity and can absorb a lot of heat. This kind of cutting fluid is mainly used to cool tools and workpieces, improve tool life and reduce thermal deformation. The emulsion contains more water and has poor lubrication and antirust function.

Cutting oil: the main component of cutting oil is mineral oil, this kind of cutting fluid has low specific heat, high viscosity and poor fluidity, and mainly plays the role of lubrication. Mineral oil with low viscosity is commonly used, such as engine oil, light diesel oil, kerosene and so on.

Everything You Need to Know About MIG Welding

What Is MIG Welding?

MIG welding is the process of joining metal parts by melting the base metal and fusing it with a filler metal. The name is derived from the phrase "Metal Inert Gas," which is commonly used. The process involves using an arc between an electrode and the workpiece, which melts the base metal and fuses it with the filler metal.

Mig welding is an extremely versatile process that can be used to create virtually any shape or configuration of the welded joint. You can also use it for many different metals, including low carbon steel, stainless steel, and aluminum alloys.

Mig Welding Equipment

The MIG welding equipment you'll need includes:

Torch

The torch supplies the heat needed to melt the wire. It has a handle, an on/off trigger, and a tip where the wire feeds. The torch also has an air regulator that controls how much oxygen is mixed with natural gas going into the burner head (the part of the torch where you attach your wire). You need to use this setting depending on what type of metal you're working with.

Gas Cylinder

This holds the compressed gas used as fuel for the welding process. Welding torch to combust inside and heats up when activated by pressing down on your trigger switch or button. You'll also see these bottles or tanks. Still, they're all essentially identical in function—they vary slightly in size based on their gas capacity.

Welder’s Helmet

Protects your eyes from any spark produced by friction during MIG welding processes such as spatter creation during stick electrode usage.

Welding wire

The thickness of welding wire is measured in thousands of an inch (thou) or mils. The most common sizes of welding wire are as follows: 22-gauge (0.023"), 24-gauge (0.024"), 26-gauge (0.025"), and 28-gauge (0.028")

The gauge refers to the thickness of the wire and the higher the number, the thinner it is and the less heat it can take before melting or burning out on you when you're trying to weld with it.

MIG Welder Settings

You can adjust these settings to improve the quality of your weld or reduce the amount of heat you apply to the weld.

Welding Wire Diameter

This controls how much material is deposited in each pass and determines how much heat will be required to melt it. A smaller diameter wire requires less energy and produces a cleaner weld, but it also requires more passes to build up a good bead.

Feed Speed

This is how quickly you move through the molten pool when welding; too fast and you'll get porosity; too slow and it may take longer than necessary for each pass due to poor cooling.

With the Right Equipment, You Can Get Started on Some Solid Metalwork

MIG welding is a great way to get started in welding. It's really easy, and it's safe for beginners. You can use Mig welding for various projects, including light steelwork, ironmongery, and aluminum.

Mig welders are versatile, meaning they can handle almost any metal you want to weld with their different settings. They also include gas supplies that provide the shielding gas needed during the process, which makes them good value for money compared with other welder types.

Mig welding is a skill that anyone can pick up with only a little time and practice. If you're interested in learning how to weld but don't know where to begin, here are a few options:

  • You can start with instructional videos on Youtube; many makers have uploaded videos that walk new welders step-by-step. The most famous one is *How To Weld Like A Pro - Using Gas Metal Arc Welding (Mig)*, by the YouTube channel OneMinuteUkeleleLessons.
  • Consider finding an experienced professional welder who's willing to teach you one-on-one. Most welders are happy with any excuse to talk shop! They'll give you tips that you couldn't find even in the most detailed book.
  • Take a course at your local community college or trade school. This could be an excellent way of getting basic hands-on experience in ideal conditions before moving on to more difficult tasks.

MIG Welding Frequently Asked Questions

Can You Use a TIG Welder as a MIG welder?

Yes, you can use a TIG welder as a MIG welder. If your TIG welder has adjustable amperage, you can follow the steps listed above. TIG welders tend to have higher amperage settings than MIG welders, but they still require the same power as a MIG welder. Since a TIG welder is more versatile, it's worth investing in one if you're regularly using welding equipment or want more control over your project.

How does a flux core welder work?

The machine uses a hollow wire and is filled with flux. Flux is the material that covers the weld and protects it from contamination when welding. You can use a flux core welder outdoors because the wind doesn't affect the weld because of the flux inside the wire. A flux core welder can also be used indoors with no gas if the welding material thickness is 1/2" or less. It isn't recommended to use Flux Core Welding for thinner materials on higher amperage settings, as there will be too much spatter and smoke

Does a MIG welder need gas?

This is a common question, and the answer is: yes, but it depends on the type of wire you are using. Flux core wire doesn't need shielding gas, while solid welding wire does need shielding gas.

The type of work you do will determine whether you need a machine that uses shielding gas or flux core wire. For example, if you are working outdoors or inside with wind, you can use flux core wire since it does not require an external gas cylinder.

Top Reasons for Microsoft SQL Database Failure 

Today all businesses utilize databases for practically all operations, ranging from sales & marketing to CRM. Hence, whenever organizations face a database failure, they are susceptible to losing crucial data that may be costly for the entire business. Microsoft SQL is a popular RDMS in all firms or organizations for professionally managing valuable data. SQLServer is incredibly useful in the business circuit, yet it has some corruption issues and errors that DBAs need to tackle strategically.

Because of SQL database errors, users are unable to access their valuable data, and it is their responsibility to fix the issues promptly to make sure that there are no severe data loss issues. There are some predominant database corruption errors and issues. You may promptly resolve them to avoid undesirable severe data loss. We will know more about database corruption errors, issues, and perfect solutions for fixing SQL server database problems.

Causes of SQL Database Corruption 

Usually, there are three main reasons behind database failure. Let us examine each of them and identify ways to recover and restore your lost data.

File System Damage

If a computer or server is shut down improperly, or if it encounters a power outage or surge or something occurs that abruptly interrupts the process of writing data to the files, there are chances of the OS files getting corrupted or damaged severely. This may lead to critical data loss. After encountering such a crisis, you are advised to repair or at least, examine the filesystem to safeguard against any data loss in the future. For modifying or mounting a file system, a repair may be necessary. Even though a thorough check may not report or reveal any severe damage, you might still need to repair the filesystem.

File Corruption

According to Small Business Chron, organizations of all sizes depend on SQLServer database from Microsoft for organizing and securing critical information. If one or even more database files are corrupted or damaged, they may result in database failure at your file-level leading to corruption. Files may be damaged because of numerous reasons. Primary files that are capable of corrupting the entire database, may themselves get corrupted because of any SQLServer account changes, file header corruption, and accidental data deletion, among many others. In case of corruption in secondary files, the SQL database will be inaccessible. When you attempt to access the damaged database, you will be getting different types of error messages. You may be several solutions for effectively repairing a corrupt database, but these solutions will not guarantee or assure you that there will be100 percent data recovery. You may consider using the log files for restoring the database. But remember that the log files are not adequate t help recover lost data in corruption cases since often backup files may get damaged if corruption seems to be severe.

Another effective way of repairing the corrupt or compromised database is by utilizing database console commands like CHECKDB, DBCC, or DBCC DEBREPAIR. These commands could help fix minor database issues. However, they are not efficient enough to tackle or resolve critical corruption cases.

Hardware & Software Failure

Hardware failures will be including memory issues, bad disk sectors, disk crashes, and even disk with errors, among many other issues. Hardware failures could be because of design errors, overloading, and poor quality control at the time of fabrication, and degradation of mechanical parts. Software failures will be including issues associated with software like DBMS software, operating system, application programs, etc.

Irrespective of how trustworthy, your DBMS seems, it is not in a position to guarantee a failure-free seamless transaction each time. To prevent any kind of database failure, the most logical and proactive step is to consult with expert DBAs. Once the overall database health is analyzed, you may rest assured to avoid serious problems down the line.

Avoiding SQL Database Corruption: Some Expert Tips

  • Do not consider rebooting the server
  • During any ongoing script execution or other running database, jobs avoid abrupt shutting down the SQLServer.
  • Always keep proper backup and then upgrade your SQLServer
  • Don’t connect or re-connect the database.

Users should regularly back up their SQL database to restore the database, in case of corruption or damage. Backup is certainly the most effective way of dealing with corruption. Keep in mind that some data may be missing between the time when disaster struck and the last backup. You may consider using commands like DBCC CHECKDB to examine and resolve corruption issues. However, you may fail to repair and restore severely corrupted files using this command.

Conclusion

You may use SQL data recovery tools recommended by experts to repair and resolve corrupt database file issues due to a lack of a backup. Some cutting-edge tools are helpful in the recovery of deleted objects, and they even display a preview. SQL recovery could prove to be a daunting and stressful job. However, you may use some advanced SQL recovery tools for getting your databases back into action!

Data Normalization - The Art of Structured Data

Industries from sales to healthcare rely on data to make business decisions and project key metrics. Tracking troves of the customer, purchasing, and logistical data reveals trends that can boost revenue or uncover missed savings.

Storing and analyzing big data is essential for process audits. For example, a company’s ongoing shipping audits explained several issues, including patterns of overcharges and delayed deliveries. A customer experience audit can yield similar findings by noting bottlenecks in the customer journey. All of these processes require the input of large sets of readable data.

Businesses need a data normalization process to store and filter raw data into useful information that can inform these valuable processes.

What is Data Normalization?

Data normalization is an automated process that organizes information into a database or table. As a result of normalization, data is searchable and verifiable. Normalized data is also easier to scan for errors, such as missing data or redundancies.

Without normalization, data becomes overwhelming and unstructured. As raw data contains errors, it can lead to poor or uninformed decisions. Unfiltered data can degrade a sales team’s ability to identify viable leads. On the other side, companies may fail to notice that investment is providing a low or negative return.

Most data normalization tables categorize data by recognizable fields. For example, a table of customer information would most likely contain their names, contact information, and job titles. Company data may contain labels such as product SKUs or employee identification numbers.

Data normalization tables prevent a phenomenon known as inconsistent dependency. This occurs when unrelated data items are entered in the same table. Data input should be logical so that anyone searching for a piece of information knows exactly where to find it.

Many software-as-a-service platforms, such as invoicing or customer management solutions, automatically normalize data. To reduce errors in automated normalization, companies must set a standard format for inputting data. Some commonly used conventions are abbreviations for addresses and job titles, or no hyphens or spaces in telephone numbers. Once data is normalized, it is easier to carry out important data analysis processes, including cleaning and interpretation.

Forms of Normalization

Normalization tables come in several normal forms, known as NFs. Each NF has its own rules for organizing and displaying data. For example, a 1NF table restricts any cell from containing more than one piece of data. Additionally, no entry can be duplicated.

For example, if a data table contains a product that comes in several sizes, each size will be listed as a separate row rather than a distinct column. In a 2NF table, the searcher can pull up a separate table to view all of the color options for a particular product.

As normal forms advance, they build off one another. A 2NF pulls data from 1NF tables, a 3NF from a 2NF table and so on. While there are many normal forms to choose from, most databases only need up to 3NF to process and store data.

Choosing the correct normal form and preparing the data can be time-consuming. As a result, more developers opt to outsource this process to automated software.

Benefits of Data Normalization

As data collection has become ubiquitous, data normalization has become indispensable. Firstly, normalization corrals data into one depository. This reduces storage space by eliminating duplicate information. Browsing through normalized data also saves time as databases contain search functions that quickly identify the needed information.

Normalized data also lends itself well to segmentation. During segmentation, the analyst will filter the data through parameters, such as location, gender, or average purchase value.

Segmentation allows marketers to target specific demographics with tailored messaging. This process can also benefit internal business processes. For example, human resource departments may search for employees demonstrating signs of burnout, such as higher than normal call-outs, and connect them to resources.

Data normalization is also essential for monitoring metrics and performance. Normalization makes it possible to create visual dashboards to measure common indicators such as sales targets, vendor costs, and revenue.

Final Word

Data normalization is an essential step in any business’s data strategy. As a developer, you can make you and your client’s jobs much easier by considering normalization as you create your projects and database structures.

Most developers follow the decades old principles created by relational database pioneer Edgar Codd. Codd’s 12 rules, since expanded to more than 300, outline the existential criteria for relational database management systems. While no system follows every rule, they are a foundational step for approaching normalization projects.

Syed Zain Nasir

I am Syed Zain Nasir, the founder of <a href=https://www.TheEngineeringProjects.com/>The Engineering Projects</a> (TEP). I am a programmer since 2009 before that I just search things, make small projects and now I am sharing my knowledge through this platform.I also work as a freelancer and did many projects related to programming and electrical circuitry. <a href=https://plus.google.com/+SyedZainNasir/>My Google Profile+</a>

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Syed Zain Nasir