Construction Software

Posts Tagged ‘Training’

Calibrate Drawing Scales. Electronic drawings can be scanned, reduced or changed in small ways which can affect the scale on the printed plan. With our Scale Calibration you can quickly check the scale to be sure your take off is right the first time.

Automatically save scales when setting drawing scales. Choose from a set menu or customized scales in Imperial or Metric measurements.

Calibrate Drawing Scales. Electronic drawings can be scanned, reduced or changed in small ways which can affect the scale on the printed plan. With our Scale Calibration you can quickly check the scale to be sure your take off is right the first time.

Making software training videos is quite popular in software industry. The software developers find it simple and impressive to introduce their software to the customers entirely, telling people how to use it from basic points to intensive features. In another hand, software training videos are also another way of promoting software for the business of software vendors. You can upload it to online video sites like YouTube or submit them to software review sites in order to get more potential users.

For people who want to find some programs which can help them solve certain problems, they can find a step-by-step tutorial videos to learn how to master them. It’s much easier and clearer to understand and follow than to read help document in text. Software training videos provide a very helpful opportunity to link up software end users and developers. It’s a win-win solution to both sides.

However, don’t consider that building software training video is just a simple presentation recording process. There’re many things in detail you have to pay attention to. In this article, we note down some of the most important items for you to make better training videos, no matter software providers or end users you are.

What you need Experience of using software Screen recorder and webcam (the latter is optional) Microphone Outline of training video The four steps of building software training video

Step 1 Check all things in order

Once you decide to record presentation for software, write down all points you want to show to your audience in your training video on paper in advance. Then choose one screen recording software which allows you to record what you can see on your computer screen and save it as a video file. Here are many choices depending on what kind of software you introduce and what kind of training video you want make.

Camstudio: an open source freeware. DemoCreator: simple and easy app with video editing features, shareware $99. Camtasia: well-known for its professional and stunning visual video features, shareware $299.

Microphone is also essential since majority of screen recorders allow you to record narration during the video recording, indicating more information can be shared in video, so prepare a good microphone at $15 is really worthy.

Step 2 Start software presentations

In this part the major thing is to demonstrate to your audience your software and how to use it, simply regarding it as a process of presentation and explanation. You can quickly go through it once you are well-prepared on your outline, but there are still something you should pay attention to.

Describe in order: arrange your presentation in order if the software is moderate enough to tell everything one by one. Another way is to make a series of training videos which aim at one specific feature in each video. Emphasize the keypoint: don’t attempt to put all things in your training video, that can only make your audience confused since they don’t know what’s the key feature you want to show to them. Take advantages of some video recording effect like zoom-n-pan, highlight and narration to remind people which part should be given specific focus to. Keep your mouse calm: beware of moving your mouse on and on while giving presentation. That’s a bad habit most video authors pay little attention to. If you are not doing any click actions, leave your hands off your mouse and remove all unnecessary movements. Control the length of video: the concentrated duration of your audience is limited so you should handle your video time. Generally speaking, 5 minutes or less is properly accepted by most of video watchers.

Step 3 Enhance the video in post production

You can ignore this part if you’re a user of Camstudio since most of freeware don’t offer video editing features like adding callout, zoom-n-pan, highlight, animation and so on. Your video can be more impressive and interactive by inserting these special effects.

Callout: a dialog box which allows you to write text in it. It’s mainly used for making title or giving tips to certain operation and can be placed anytime and anywhere in your video. Zoom-n-pan: it presents a magnifier effect what allows you to zoom and pan in a specific area showing only the relevant parts of your scene in specific details. And that’s one of the most frequently used features to focus your audience’s attention on important screen movements or actions. Highlight: emphasize a specific area of your screen by adding a frame or shade. Insert objects: with this feature you can insert picture, Flash movie, logo and other objects to decorate your training video and realize multiple ways of explanation. Audio editor: some screen recording software like DemoCreator offers a solo audio editor so you can edit or remake your narration for software training video. What’s more, inserting WAV or MP3 file as back ground music is also available.

Step 4 Publish your training video

The last step is to save your software presentation as video file. Screen recording software can generate video in different formats but the most common ones are AVI and WMV. Some programs have already supported up-to 7 popular video formats including FLV, MP4, MPEG, 3GP and some other documentation standards for education and learning.

Another thing is that you should choose the most suitable video codec for your video or the video quality can be terrible and the video file can be huge. Generally, many screen recording software set Microsoft video 1 as the default video codec, you can try different codec to find out the best video performance for your software presentation.

Summary

That’s the main process of making video presentation for software. It helps your audience to get familiar with your software and prepare to master it without reading boring book or attending expensive training courses. The training video is also easy to share online and digs out more users to popularize your program. Now get ready to building your software training video with screen recorders, it can be pleasant and fun.

This article is based on a true story and is meant to show how software installations, despite management’s best intentions, can go wrong. The name of the company has been left out for obvious reasons.

Every day, I speak with various users of manufacturing and construction software who are disappointed with their current system. They come to me looking for advice in selecting a new package that will better meet their needs and will solve the problems that they believe their current system is creating. In most cases, their concerns are real and they probably will be better off with a new system. However, I would estimate that about 20% of the cases that I see are companies that are destined to be just as disappointed with a new system. Why? Because the software isn’t the main problem in the first place – the users are. In fact, you don’t have to be talking about construction software or manufacturing software specifically – the bottom line is that any software is only as good as the user that uses it.

Several years ago, I spoke with a medium sized electrical contractor that had a very short amount of time to complete several jobs. They were using a very old version of one of the more common construction management software packages that lacked some of the modern features of new software, such as allowing multiple people to be logged in to the system at the same time. This lack of functionality in their software was having a serious negative impact on the company’s productivity.

Of course, the first thing that popped in to their heads was to get new software that was more powerful and had the features that they needed. I spent some time researching various packages for them and finally arrived at a package that wasn’t completely state of the art, but was more than adequate for their uses. After viewing several demos, everyone concluded that the software looked like a good fit. The final step before purchasing and installing the new software was to have their primary accounting person sit down and try the software out since she would be the one using it the most. Since they were on such a tight schedule, this had to be done late at night and after normal work hours.

Several months passed without progress. Nobody in management positions for this company volunteered to help this lady out and since the assignment was difficult, it kept getting pushed back. Finally, after TWO years, the company decided to buy the software, install it, and do some basic training. The staff and end users were hesitant to use the new software and were not very technologically inclined themselves, so they decided to use both the new software AND their old software in parallel for a period of 12 months. Why? Because there was nobody in management positions that gave the time and effort to ensure that proper training was done and there was nobody overseeing the transition process. In turn, the company did twice the amount of work required for an entire YEAR due to fear and poor management. Undoubtedly, hours upon hours of productivity were lost, as was money!

This case, although funny in it’s own right, teaches us several lessons about the process of evaluating and implementing new construction or MRP software. First, managers need to be involved in every step – from the initial meetings to the training sessions to the implementation time line planning and so on. Second, if management is not fully committed to moving to a new platform, they will likely pass the job on to somebody in the company that is not qualified to complete it. In this case, the company learned later that several employees were skipping the training sessions put on the by the accountant because they knew there would be no supervising manager involved.

Therefore, if your company is in the process of selecting and implementing new software, make sure that you have the support and commitment of upper management. Managers need to know what resources will be required to get the system up and running in a timely manner and must be held accountable if those time frames are not met. It is imperative that the right people are selected to learn and train your staff on how to use new software, and if the management isn’t even committed to making that decision properly, is it realistic to expect positive results from the new software?

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