Transport Management on the web

The web makes for great transport management. Well, by definition transporting things means they are moving and the Internet covers all areas (well with occasional dropouts). So what are the problems with getting transport management into the Internet cloud? Well, there is trust, there is connectivity and there is safety.

One of the problems of cloud computing is trust. How safe do you feel knowing that someone in a software company can view your data if it is loaded onto their servers. There is nothing I can do about this viewing problem, except to say that even if you had the the application loaded locally your feelings of security are largely misplaced. Most programmers would know how to transfer every bit of that data to some remote site. The relationship of client to application developer is essentially one of trust.

Another problem with cloud computing that if your not hosting with Amazon or Google, well you don't feel safe having all your data in your cloud. What if the hosting company disappears? One final issue with cloud computing is that if a client needs to interface their data with other in-house systems. It turns out these last 2 issues can be solved in 1 fell swoop with data replication.

What is required is that you run a process that polls the server, and downloads any changes to a local database. It is relatively easy for the local polling service to request all changes since ????, provided the database has been built correctly. This is how the problem at http://www.freightfreedom.com/ was solved. The last pieces to the puzzle was to make it cross-platform so that the database could download to Linux or to Windows, and to abstract the database layer so that the client could choose the database to store the local data into.

This solves both of the problems of connectivity and safety. You have a local copy of the data so you can connect other applications to it. You have a local copy of the data so that if the hosting company goes under you don't lose your data. It is in a database format that is you have skills to deal with, or you could find someone to help with.

So the solution to 2 of the problems is data replication. Sorry I don't have the answer for the issue of trust but, 2 out of 3 ain't bad you will just have to trust me on that.

Free route planner

Got a number of different destinations and don't know which is the best way to travel? Well, here is a tool to help you make the trip as efficiently as possible.
www.supplychaindomain.com
Select the "Free tools" tab.
You can put in as many addresses as you want re-arrange the rows as you see fit, then click the "REPLOT" button. The total distance will be calculated.
If you would like other features, just let me know.

Google gadgets for freight companies

Been looking around for some Google gadgets to help out freight companies who need some support.
Go to:
http://www.supplychaindomain.com/
Look for the Free tools link.
If you find anymore that would be worth including please let me know

Freight costing for free

I get a lot of people asking after software for transport management. They tell me that they are a small operation with a couple of vehicles. Quite often I hear that they currently quote clients by accessing whereis or google maps. They figure out how far it is and quote a cost based on that.
Now I don't want to put myself out of a job but if they feel they really can't afford an entire package ... well I thought I would create a free tool to help:
http://www.supplychaindomain.com/
Look for the link to "Freight calculation"
It will let you set the flag fall, rate per mile/km and other rating options and then you can calculate the distance (as well as getting driving instructions).
Use it as much as you want, hope it benefits someone.
Let me know if there is anything else you would like included.