What Is Off Peak Electricity?

Whether you are a homeowner or a renter of an apartment, everyone pays an electric bill. You power your lights, appliances, and devices throughout the month and your energy provider sends you the bill based on your electric plan and use. With Australia having some of the highest reported average electricity rates for both commercial customers and residential customers, many are looking for ways to save money or find a utility company that can offer them the best plan for their money. One great way to cut down on spending is to leverage off-peak electricity hours offered by electric utility companies to your advantage. If you have heard about off-peak electricity but want to know more, continue reading below to discover why off-peak electricity may be the break you’re looking for.

Saving on Energy What Is Off-Peak Electricity?
For the general population, work takes up most of the day, meaning that the majority of people come home to either take care of their daily chores like laundry or relax as they cook dinner and watch television. The sudden spike in the number of people using electricity during this time puts a strain on energy companies. In order to combat this widespread issue, many energy providers will offer discounted electric rates on what is known as “off-peak hours.” This provides people with an incentive to use energy during these times in order to save money on their energy bills. For those who fret about their utilities when the bill comes in the mail, it can be a better option to run appliances during these hours than to operate them during hours where pricing remains normal.

How Does It Work?
While offering off-peak electricity discounts is a common tactic used by electric companies, the specifics of how much you can save using this method will vary between different energy companies. Make sure to check with your supplier to see when your service area is using the least energy and what their cheap electric rates look like in comparison to your normal rates. Then, plan to use some of your top energy-consuming appliances during these off-peak hours. For example, you may want to run your heating, air conditioning, or washer and dryer during the off-peak times to save extra (if you don’t already have energy-efficient appliances in place). Of course, this can also help you to save money if you are taking additional steps to cut down on expenses such as making sure that you are heating or cooling a house that has been properly sealed, only using energy-efficient appliances, or considering renewable energy. If you supplement your off-peak hour electricity consumption with other power-saving practices, you will see the reflection of your efforts in your next bill from your supplier.

How Do I Get Started?
The best way to get started is to look around at energy companies near you to find the best provider doling out the best rates. Take a look at the top providers in your area to see how much they are charging for their basic electric plans and how much you will be paying when you’re not operating during off-peak hours as well. If you focus just on off-peak electric rates, you still may not receive the best option and may end up paying more with your energy provider down the road.

If you want to search through competitive prices and find the best option for you without the hassle, compare electricity providers with iSelect to discover how much you can be saving on your electric service and help you find a new plan today.

Electric rates in Australia are high, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t save money by reaching out to customer service and learning about deals offered by your electric company, looking for additional ways to save money on your electric service, and being smart about your energy consumption. If you rely more on your electric supplier than you do on a natural gas company, use the information provided above to save on off-peak hours.

Best Practices to Follow for Web Test Automation

Web applications are different from mobile applications and other software. A web app is like a website but behaves like an app. These apps are designed to run on web browsers and are light and function at a much higher speed and consistency when compared to the standard website. With the changing face of software testing – where there is the need for faster testing – calls for the implementation of automation. While there are quite a few good web test automation tools designed for the purpose – like QARA Enterprise, Katalon Studio and Watir – a good tool alone is not enough to get the best results out of the automated process of testing.

To ensure that the web test automation process yields the best results, it is recommended that QA teams follow the best practices. The best practices cover everything from testing for compatibility across different browsers, performance of applications, user experience, data security, and more. The best practices are designed to help QA teams get reliable and accurate results every time.

1] Giving Priority to Cross Browser Compatibility

Today people access websites and web applications from not one but an array of web browsers and their versions. To ensure that this does not come in the way of providing a superior user experience to every user, it is very important to ensure that the web application runs without any bugs or glitches on every web browser, as well as their multiple versions. Also, responsiveness across browsers is another issue that QA teams must take care of when conducting web test automation. A tool like QARA Enterprise that supports testing across multiple browsers can be used to get started with web application testing.

2] Understanding the Importance for Load Testing

While testing across multiple browsers and platforms is one thing that is very important, one should not also forget the importance of ensuring that the web application gives the best performance even under heavy loads. This calls for load testing which ensures there are no faults in the application code that results in its crashing under heavy loads. Load testing ensures that there are no glitches in the app that will lead to it crashing unexpectedly under very heavy loads.

3] Conducting Usability Testing with the Right Set of Parameters

Once the performance of the application is tested for under different browsers as well as different conditions of load, next comes usability testing, which is all about testing the application from the end users’ perspective. Usability testing is very important to ensure users like to spend more time on the app and perform various actions. There are quite a few different parameters defined for usability testing, such as the UI, intuitive design, navigation, font size and font type and so on, and ideally web test automation should focus on it.

4] Giving High Priority to Security Testing

Security testing is the most important aspect when testing any app and web test automation should focus on testing the app for vulnerabilities that can be exploited for data breaches and unauthorized access to sensitive information. Since data breaches can cause huge losses to organizations and the repercussions can be truly scary, the best thing is to focus on thorough security testing, so that no flaws in the web app go unnoticed before the app reaches the users.

That was about the key best practices to take note of when performing web test automation. Taking care of these points can go a long way in ensuring that the web app undergoes a thorough testing process and is ready to be launched to the users, who then use the app and like its smooth performance.

Why Your Business Needs Custom Software Development Services

75% of business owners prefer a customized software for their business over a off-the-shelf software available in the market. – Forrester

Today’s Times are highly competitive for businesses and the need of the hour is to stand apart from the competition and make a unique mark for oneself.a Business that is a part of a crowdhardly makes a difference in the eyes of the intelligent modern consumer. It’s common knowledge that every business is different with its own setof unique and specific goals and requirements. Today, when every other business is investing in its own journey towards digitisation and automation,a business today needs software that can help in making the goals a realityin a short time and with minimal efforts.

Talking about software, today software of every make is available off the shelf.Some of these softwarecome with the most advanced features and functionalities. Despite that, sometimes even the best off the shelf software is not enough to cater to the complex needs of a business. This is where custom software development services come into the picture. Today you have leading IT Solutions providers like The Digital Group and Hexawarethat provide world class custom softwareto meet the needs ofbusinesses across the globe. Given below are thetop five benefits that custom software development services can bring to a business.

1]FetchesGood ROI in the Long Term

Many argue that building a custom software from scratchcan be expensive and this isone factor that discourages many people investing in custom software development services.However,the fact remains thatinvesting in custom software fetchgood ROIin the long run.Also, the fact that in case of custom software,you onlypay for what you get, andit can sometimes be reasonable is compared to off the shelf productsthat have readymade functionalitiesthat one needs to pay for even if they are not using it.

2]Convenience of Unlimited Scalability

This is the most important benefit of custom software development services. Products bought off the shelf seldom offer much of customisation features.However,custom software is different as it has been developed keeping in mind requirements as well as thefuture growth of the organisation, which means it offers unlimited scalability and flexibility as per the growing needs of the organisation.

3]Best Designedfor the Needs of the Organisation

What means custom software stand out from the scores of off the shelf software is the fact that it has been designed specifically to meet the needs and requirements of the organisation. This means it brings to the table higher productivity and efficiency. It gives much higher performance than any other software bought from the market.

4]Easy and Hassle-Free Maintenance

Now this one is another major advantage of custom software development services.Software maintenance is of utmost importance to ensure the software is free from bugs and other issues.When one opts for custom software,maintenance is a part of the deal, which removes lot of hassles on the way. This way, one of the biggest concerns is taken care of, which is a plus.

5]Advanced Levels of Software Security

Commercial software available off the shelf is more vulnerable to threats and attacks of various kinds. This can put your business at a huge risk.Custom software development services, on the other hand, are far more secure as its not universally available.

Why Your Business Needs Custom Software Development Services

75% of business owners prefer a customized software for their business over a off-the-shelf software available in the market. – Forrester

Today’s Times are highly competitive for businesses and the need of the hour is to stand apart from the competition and make a unique mark for oneself.a Business that is a part of a crowdhardly makes a difference in the eyes of the intelligent modern consumer. It’s common knowledge that every business is different with its own setof unique and specific goals and requirements. Today, when every other business is investing in its own journey towards digitisation and automation,a business today needs software that can help in making the goals a realityin a short time and with minimal efforts.

Talking about software, today software of every make is available off the shelf.Some of these softwarecome with the most advanced features and functionalities. Despite that, sometimes even the best off the shelf software is not enough to cater to the complex needs of a business. This is where custom software development services come into the picture. Today you have leading IT Solutions providers like The Digital Group and Hexawarethat provide world class custom softwareto meet the needs ofbusinesses across the globe. Given below are thetop five benefits that custom software development services can bring to a business.

1]FetchesGood ROI in the Long Term

Many argue that building a custom software from scratchcan be expensive and this isone factor that discourages many people investing in custom software development services.However,the fact remains thatinvesting in custom software fetchgood ROIin the long run.Also, the fact that in case of custom software,you onlypay for what you get, andit can sometimes be reasonable is compared to off the shelf productsthat have readymade functionalitiesthat one needs to pay for even if they are not using it.

2]Convenience of Unlimited Scalability

This is the most important benefit of custom software development services. Products bought off the shelf seldom offer much of customisation features.However,custom software is different as it has been developed keeping in mind requirements as well as thefuture growth of the organisation, which means it offers unlimited scalability and flexibility as per the growing needs of the organisation.

3]Best Designedfor the Needs of the Organisation

What means custom software stand out from the scores of off the shelf software is the fact that it has been designed specifically to meet the needs and requirements of the organisation. This means it brings to the table higher productivity and efficiency. It gives much higher performance than any other software bought from the market.

4]Easy and Hassle-Free Maintenance

Now this one is another major advantage of custom software development services.Software maintenance is of utmost importance to ensure the software is free from bugs and other issues.When one opts for custom software,maintenance is a part of the deal, which removes lot of hassles on the way. This way, one of the biggest concerns is taken care of, which is a plus.

5]Advanced Levels of Software Security

Commercial software available off the shelf is more vulnerable to threats and attacks of various kinds. This can put your business at a huge risk.Custom software development services, on the other hand, are far more secure as its not universally available.