Home Builder Developer - Interior Renovation and Design

Brooklyn, New York (PRWEB) May 21, 2014

Thoughtful Systems announces the release of SM-Mobile 2.2, its mobile app for service businesses. SM-Mobile runs on Apple and Android devices and creates new efficiencies for management and field service employees. The new features help service business managers gain more control and optimize job scheduling. SM-Mobile works in harmony with Scheduling Manager Gemini, the desktop version, or Scheduling Manager Web Express, the online version of Thoughtful Systems multi-functional scheduling software for service businesses. SM-Mobiles new features include GPS tracking, time tracking, and photo sharing.

Thoughtful Systems produces field service business software for many industries, including carpet cleaning services, irrigation systems, maid services, fire and water damage restoration, HVAC and plumbing, home health care and fire extinguisher maintenance. Its management software for all aspects of service businesses, including job scheduling, customer data management, CRM features, payroll and more. Scheduling Manager Gemini has helped thousands of field service businesses world-wide organize their employee schedules more efficiently. It simplifies the task of organizing complex job schedules through the use of drag and drop calendars. Other features include payroll and accounts receivable. It interfaces with other accounting software, such as QuickBooks, Sage, and MYOB and mapping software like Microsoft MapPoint and Google Maps, and CRM software such as InfusionSoft.

The live GPS tracking feature in SM-Mobile lets managers track the location of employees throughout the day. Employees can get directions on their smart phones, tablets or iPads. Management at head office can see the location of all employees on a screen in Scheduling Manager Gemini. This also means that Scheduling Manager Gemini can find the optimal employee for a new job assignment geographic location and job skills are taken into account in performing employee scheduling, and providing optimal appointment times for clients. Optimization features in the software allow for generation of the best and shortest routes from job to job for each employee or team.

Employees can check in or out of the job site with the time-tracking feature. This records the time and GPS coordinates. The same thing happens upon check-out. This provides data that can be used for timecard, payroll and further employee scheduling functions.

Field technicians can take one or more photos of the job site and sync them to the desktop version of Scheduling Manager. This makes it easy to assess a job site for damage and restoration industries, handymen or home repair, HVAC technicians, basement waterproofers, and any other industry that needs a visual record of their jobs. An unlimited number of photos can be recorded in a customer's history, providing a valuable photographic record.

Importantly, SM-Mobile is a native app, so there's no need for a constant Wi-Fi or cell phone signal for all of these impressive features to function. These new features will help business owners identify customer needs and build a better relationship through all interactions either from the office with the desktop version of Scheduling Manager Gemini, or in the field with the SM-Mobile app and the Web Express version. All three work together to provide a powerful scheduling software solution for any service business.

About Thoughtful Systems:

Thoughtful Systems has been producing field service software for businesses specializing in fire extinguisher maintenance, maid services, irrigation systems, HVAC, plumbing, carpet cleaning services, home health care, fire and water damage restoration, and other field service businesses for over 25 years. Versions are available in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., the UAE, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and elsewhere. Those interested can find more at http://www.thoughtfulsystems.com/software/schedmgr/service-industry-software.asp or http:// http://www.thoughtfulsystems.com.

Read the original post:
SM-Mobile Latest Release of Mobile App Software for Service Businesses From Thoughtful Systems

The Anderson County Extension has been bombared with questions about the American Burnweed. American Burnweed, better known as Fireweed, is a particularly obnoxious weed in the early spring. It usually appears in April, seemingly out of the blue, and can look like its literally taking over your yard. It has big fat leaves that really stick out like a sore thumb in your in-the-process-of-greening-up lawn.

Fireweed comes from seeds blowing around in the spring storms. Fireweed produces small white or greenish flowers that go to seed like dandelion puffs, and then they go everywhere. The seeds float down and root in the thatch layer of your lawn. (This is little pieces of dead grass, leaves, and other lawn detritus thats on the dirt at the base of your grass.)

Since its not rooted into the soil, it pulls up very easily, and when the weather heats up, and you start mowing regularly, it will dry up and die. Until then, we can treat it with a good post-emergent broadleaf herbicide in April and May.

Post Emergence Control:

A three-way herbicide may be used on Bermuda grass, Zoysia grass, Centipede grass, St. Augustine grass and tall fescue. The active ingredients of a three-way herbicide often include the following broadleaf weed killers: 2,4-D, Dicamba, and Mecoprop (MCPP). Examples of a three-way herbicide are Ferti-lome Weed-Out Lawn Weed Killer with Trimec, Bayer Advanced Southern Weed Killer for Lawns, Spectracide Weed Stop Weed Killer for Lawns, Southern Ag Lawn Weed Killer with Trimec, and Lilly Miller Lawn Weed Killer Concentrate.

Note: Herbicides containing 2,4-D should be applied at a reduced rate on St. Augustine grass and centipede grass to prevent damage to these lawns. If a second application is needed, apply the herbicide in spot treatments. Repeated applications of a three-way herbicide should be spaced according to label directions.

In addition to three-way herbicides, Metsulfuron (such as in Manor and Blade) can be used for Fireweed control in Bermuda grass, Centipede grass, St. Augustine grass, and Zoysia grass. Metsulfuron is packaged for landscape professionals.

Due to the cost and application rate of this selective herbicide, it may be more practical to hire a landscape professional to apply the treatment. A non-ionic surfactant (such as Southern Ag Surfactant for Herbicides) is required at 2 teaspoons per gallon of spray mix for best control. Do not apply Metsulfuron to lawn if over-seeded with annual ryegrass or over-seed for 8 weeks after application. Do not plant woody ornamentals in treated areas for one year after application of Metsulfuron.

Do not apply Metsulfuron herbicides within two times the width of the drip line of desirable hardwood trees. Do not apply Metsulfuron to Fescue Lawns.

There is no pre-emergent for Fireweed, because it doesnt root in the soil in the first place.

The rest is here:
Anderson County Extension answers lawn questions about American Burnweed

Despite five-and-a-half million newborn and stillborn baby deaths each year, investment in newborn health remains very low. Thats one of the findings in a series of papers published in the medical journal The Lancet. The research also shows the vast majority of those deaths could be prevented. Listen to De Capua report on preventing newborn deaths Lead researcher Joy Lawn said the research is the most accurate estimate yet on the number of deaths of newborns and stillbirths. Every year there are two-point-nine-million babies who die in the first month of life -- and most shockingly a million who die on their birthday, the first day. And there are two-point-six-million stillbirths -- most shockingly, one-point-two-million who die while the woman is in labor. So together this is five-and-a-half-million babies, she said. Most of the deaths are in low and middle income countries. But rich nations, she said, are not immune. There are about 500,000 pre-term births in the United States every year. The three leading causes around the world are pre-term births, birth complications -- so where women dont get the right care during labor. And babies that are full-term can have damage and even die because of lack of care during labor and then, thirdly, infections, she said. Lawn is a professor and Director of the March Center at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and an advisor to Save the Children UK. She said many babies and their mothers could be saved for just a few dollars worth of medical care. In this series we show very clearly that 71-percent of newborn deaths can be prevented with solutions that we have already. And that together, three-million women, babies counting newborns and stillbirths could be saved every year with investments at the time of birth. So thats a triple return on investment with care at the time of birth, she said. That care includes simple things like keeping the baby warm; helping it learn to breastfeed and making sure it has skin to skin contact with its mother. Also, Lawn said there are injections that can greatly improve the odds of a babys survival. One injection prevents tetanus infections, a nearly always fatal condition for babies. Another contains corticosteroids and is given to women in pre-term labor. Corticosteroids affect stress and immune response and inflammation. They help premature babies improve their breathing. This is standard treatment in rich nations, but not in developing countries. It costs less than one dollar. Lawn said that its been known for many years that a large number of newborns die. Yet, funding to prevent the problem remains low. Of the billions of dollars that are given for child survival, only four-percent of that donor funding even mentions the word newborn. And yet 44-percent of under-five deaths are among newborns. So theres a major mismatch in what the funding is going to compared to where the deaths are now, she said. Much of the funding goes towards preventing deaths of mothers and children up to age five. In recent years, its become more common in the U.S. to issue birth certificates for stillborn babies. Lawn said it means a lot to parents to know that their child has been recognized. However, what the papers in The Lancet also show is that in many developing countries no record is kept. Lawn said, A women who loses a newborn death or a stillbirth in many of the places Ive worked in Africa there will be no piece of paper. The baby may not be named. Its very unlikely there will be any funeral or public recognition. And those things arent just sad for the woman, but they hide the whole problem. The fact that in this day and age you can have five-and-a-half million babies entering and leaving the planet without official record but also mostly without funerals or recognition actually stops us [from] acting. More than 50 experts from 28 institutions in 17 countries took part in The Lancet series. In June, a new international initiative is set to be launched called Every Newborn Action Plan. Its described as an evidence-based roadmap toward care for every women and a healthy start for every newborn baby.

Read the original post:
Millions of Newborn Deaths Reported

SANTUBONG: It was the experience of a lifetime for 135 undergraduates who took part in an International Student Charette My Sarawak Experience organised by Institute of Landscape Architect Malaysia (ILAM) at Sarawak Cultural Village (SCV) recently.

The three-day event was open to participants from local universities and also those from the Philippines, Australia, and Indonesia.

It was held in conjunction with the recent International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA) Asia Pacific Region (APR) Forum with Kuching as the hosting venue.

The event was also to expose participants to the rich traditions and cultures of the ethnic groups as well as to provide a hands-on experience as part of their landscape architectural programme.

ILAM president Mohd Fadrilla Mohd Taib highlighted that the purpose of the event was to engage participants in creative outdoor activity to inspire them to respect the environment as well as the communities at large.

My Sarawak Experience, according to Fadrilla, will enable participants to immerse themselves in Sarawaks culture and form meaningful people connections because the programme like no other will instill a true sense of accomplishment and pride.

Apart from having a taste of living in Sarawaks very own living museum, the participants were provided with exciting activities which include an introduction to its communities and culture, jungle trekking, rainforest survival cooking exercise, hands-on group competition Landscape Box and cultural shows.

On the first day, participants, after a guided tour to the ethnic houses, were taught how to perform Bidayuh traditional dance led by one of SCVs dance instructor Hamidah Mohd.

On the second day, students were divided into seven groups and given traditional names like Laja, Manggeng, Agau, Tadun, Totoi, Rentap, Tugau and Apui just before going for their one-hour long jungle trek via the Penan trail.

The participants were led by Stanly Marxtison Leo and the safety briefing conducted by Ibrahim Chong who congratulated them for being brave enough to venture into the foothill jungles of the legendary Mount Santubong.

Here is the original post:
Sarawak Experience of a lifetime for 135 undergrads at SCV

CAROL LINK | SPECIAL TO THE TIMES I snapped a shot of a bird flying around and landing in our backyard. Although I enjoy watching birds, I cant identify many, except for hawks, eagles, owls, redbirds, bluebirds, blackbirds, finches, robins, killdeers, wrens and a few others.

I suppose the word casual would best describe my bird watching. I am not a serious birder or ornithologist by a dictionary definition, but I enjoy watching birds as they flit and float about our yard. I dont watch birds through binoculars or a telescope, although I do use a zoom lens for taking bird photos. Generally, I observe birds with my naked eyes, and I enjoy listening to their songs and chirping.

Because we live on several acres in the country, we have a very large open yard. One recent morning, I looked out the kitchen window and saw what (at first glance) resembled blue Easter eggs scattered on the ground. Quickly, I realized a flock of bluebirds had landed in our yard and were pecking in the grass, nibbling on bird feeders, flying about the yard and sitting on tree limbs.

Ironically, I had seen the same thing a few years ago, only that time, a flock of redbirds had landed in our yard and were dispersed all around.

My thought then was that it appeared as if a load of red Christmas ornaments had been spilled all over the yard.

Early this spring, when Oscar was sitting in the office at the computer desk, directly in front of a window, a hummingbird flew up and hovered, looking at him, as if to ask, Where is my feeder? Im hungry!

Thirty years ago, right after we moved here, Oscar and I were working in the back yard when a mama quail sauntered across the yard, with a group of baby quail running along behind her.

Another time, a small bird slammed into the den window and dropped to the ground. From the window, I could see the little bird, lying on the ground, completely still, appearing to be dead. Oscar went out and picked up the little bird, placing him in the palm of his hand. The bird was lifeless. Using his index finger, ever so gently, Oscar rubbed the birds chest. First, the bird moved a little, then he aroused completely and flew away. Oscar had performed CPR on a bird and saved his life.

Each year, in early spring, to make sure each little hummingbird is well-nourished until they migrate south in the fall, we hang nectar feeders from the back porch. We can see the tiny birds from our kitchen table as they feed. Watching them is one of Oscars favorite pastimes. At times, though, he gets frustrated because there always is a bully sitting on a wrought iron post, protecting the feeders from all comers and chasing the other birds away, in an attempt to keep all the sugar-water for itself.

To attract birds to our landscape, we have situated colorful birdhouses throughout. A couple of bird feeders are suspended from a tree out back, another one is hanging in the gazebo and bird baths are in several locations.

Continue reading here:
CAROL LINK: Make your landscape attractive to birds with color, feeders, plants

In Tuesday's episode, character Catherine Cawood was savagely beaten As the show ended, she collapsed in the road with face covered in blood It followed the murder of a policewoman last week on lonely country road Average of 5.8million viewers tuned in to Happy Valley's first instalments

By Alasdair Glennie Tv Correspondent

Published: 15:30 EST, 21 May 2014 | Updated: 02:45 EST, 22 May 2014

408 shares

540

View comments

It is called Happy Valley, but the landscape of the BBCs new crime drama is unrelentingly bleak.

The programme has drawn criticism for showing gratuitous violence in a string of graphic scenes.

In Tuesdays episode, the lead character - police sergeant Catherine Cawood, played by Sarah Lancashire - was savagely beaten in a basement.

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

Continue reading here:
Did the BBC's brutal Happy Valley go too far?

Surgical land clearing-aerial footage of Patrick cleaning up around a pond
Clearing undergrowth around pond @ future home site. Terex PT 110 forestry with Loftness G3 mulching head.

By: John Pierce

See original here:
Surgical land clearing-aerial footage of Patrick cleaning up around a pond - Video

A burst of growth in the wake of drought-breaking rains across inland Australia in 2011 helped to turn the country into one of the world's biggest carbon sinks, new research has found.

While oceans and land typically absorb about half the carbon emissions caused by fossil-fuel burning and land clearing, the unusually strong La Nina weather event and associated heavy rains resulted in land vegetation alone accounting for 40 per cent of the CO2 take-up that year.

Australia contributed about 60 per cent of the additional worldwide carbon sink, revealing a larger role for semi-arid regions than previously known, the lead author of a paper published on Thursday in Nature journal, Benjamin Poulter, said.

''Semi-arid regions have been overlooked in the carbon cycle because they have low productivity and because they store low amounts of carbon in vegetation and soils in comparison with tropical or boreal systems,'' said Dr Poulter, now an assistant professor at Montana State University after leading the study at France's Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et l'Environnement.

Advertisement

The research also found Australia has been on a greening trend, with vegetation expanding 6 per cent since 1981. The carbon uptake of plants has apparently become four times as sensitive to rainfall.

However, the scientists wrote that while drier regions could rival rainforests in carbon take-up, the more transitory nature of the vegetation meant its role as a sink could quickly reverse.

''The carbon that was stored in vegetation in 2011 was relatively quickly returned back to the atmosphere because of annual mortality of semi-arid grasses or because of increased fire activity consuming the greater fuel loads,'' Professor Poulter said.

''Changes in the behaviour of dryland systems in the global carbon cycle are very short-lived, and contribute mainly to larger inter-annual atmospheric CO2 variability,'' he said.

An indication of how temporary those carbon gains are may be on display in the coming year. The Bureau of Meteorology confirmed on Tuesday that an El Nino event had at least a 70 per cent chance of forming this year.

Continued here:
Rain in outback helped extend world's carbon sink, finds paper

Hundreds of young people will be clearing weeds and planting trees from Hawaii to Vermont under a federal program that depends largely on private funding, the U.S. interior secretary said Thursday.

The government is putting in $1.9 billion of the $6.7 billion for the project announced by Interior Secretary Sally Jewell. Most of the rest is coming from Wells Fargo, according to Greg Knadle of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, a nonprofit created by Congress in 1984 to support wildlands. The group managed the donations for the young workers' project.

The crucial role played by the private sector underlines that the "budget situation is tight," Jewell told The Associated Press, saying internships and youth programs are the hardest hit at such times.

Jewell noted that when she was in the private sector, she tried to make clear to lawmakers that corporate support should not be a replacement for government funding. She said she hoped business leaders would continue to make that point.

"The term supplanting is something we worry about," said Jewell, who led outdoor retailer Recreational Equipment Inc., or REI, before being appointed interior secretary last year. Private efforts "should be the margin of excellence, not the margin of survival."

Jewell spoke at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge, once home to military chemical weapons and agricultural pesticides manufacturing. After a Superfund cleanup, the 15,000-acre refuge was opened in 2010, offering city dwellers access to a natural grassland. Some of the more than 600 young people employed under the public lands project this year will be working at the refuge near Denver.

Some 1,500 volunteers also will be involved in projects that, in addition to Colorado, are planned in Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Washington and Wyoming.

On Thursday, Jewell helped members of Groundwork Denver plant cottonwood trees at the arsenal wildlife refuge. Groundwork Denver is one of several groups across the country that had projects funded under the program announced Thursday. It will work with 18 young people from low-income, urban families at the refuge.

Dele Johnson, a 23-year-old from Arvada, said work with Groundwork over the past two years has taken him to Yellowstone, Rocky Mountain National Park and urban gardens.

"This kind of work has prepared me to advocate for natural places," said Johnson, who just completed a public relations degree at Metropolitan State University of Denver. He said he wanted a career in which he could encourage other minorities to explore and protect the outdoors.

See the original post:
Private Money Boosts Federal Public Land Program

Sacred burial grounds and community forests should be granted more protection under a new government proclamation issued this month, but rights groups and land-grab victims are wary that, without proper enforcement, it will amount to little in practice.

An interministerial proclamation, or prakas, signed by Minister of Agriculture Ouk Rabun and Minister of Environment Say Sam Ol on May 9 and obtained by the Post yesterday, aims to strengthen the management of economic land concessions (ELCs) to protect community areas, such as community forests and burial sites.

Each company must implement the tiger skin formula of guaranteeing that its ELC does not affect the farming lands of villagers, community forest and protected forest, the prakas says.

The tiger skin formula means that land inhabited by farmers must be cut out of the concession area.

The clearing [of land] must guarantee the preservation of the protected areas, including graveyards, jungle forest and spirit places, it says.

But rights groups and villagers were sceptical about how effective the prakas will be.

Chhay Thy, Ratanakkiri provincial coordinator for rights group Adhoc, said that the prakas has been issued too late and was more likely a public relations gambit.

The ministries just released it so it would look good. They do not have any real intention to protect the forest, he said.

According to Thy, companies have already cleared most of the protected forests and graveyards in the area and planted rubber trees in their place.

Sav Nork, 42, community leader of the Jarai ethnic group in OYadav district, said the authorities had taken no action when he lost land to an ELC.

View original post here:
Directive aims to stop ELC abuses