23 May 2010

Victoria Day, Seasonal Variations and Daylight savings time!

Victoria Day (in French: Fête de la Reine), colloquially known as May Long Weekend, May Two-four, May Long, or May Run, is a federal Canadian statutory holiday celebrated on the last Monday before or on 24 May, in honour of both Queen Victoria’s birthday and the current reigning Canadian sovereign’s official birthday, and is also considered an informal mark of the beginning of the summer season. It has been observed since before Canada was formed, originally falling on the sovereign’s actual birthday, and continues to be celebrated in various fashions across the country on the fixed date of the first Monday on or before 24 May. Royal Salutes, or 21-gun salutes, are fired in each provincial capital and in the national capital at noon on Victoria Day to mark the Sovereign’s Birthday. However, since the Quiet Revolution in Quebec, the same day was unofficially known in the province as Fête de Dollard until 2003, when provincial legislation officially named the same date as Victoria Day the National Patriots’ Day.

Seasonal variation is a component of a time series which is defined as the repetitive and predictable movement around the trend line in one year or less. It is detected by measuring the quantity of interest for small time intervals, such as days, weeks, months or quarters. Organizations facing seasonal variations, like the motor vehicle industry, are often interested in knowing their performance relative to the normal seasonal variation. The same applies to the ministry of employment which expects unemployment to increase in June because recent graduates are just arriving into the job market and schools have also been given a vacation for the summer. The moot point is whether the increase is more or less than expected.

Organizations affected by seasonal variation need to identify and measure this seasonality to help with planning for temporary increases or decreases in labor requirements, inventory, training, periodic maintenance, Marketing and online advertising and so forth. Apart from these considerations, the organizations need to know if the variations they have experienced has been more or less would be expected given the usual seasonal variations Daylight saving time (DST) is the practice of temporarily advancing clocks so that afternoons have more daylight and mornings have less. Typically clocks are adjusted forward one hour near the start of spring and are adjusted backward in autumn. Modern DST was first proposed in 1895 by George Vernon Hudson. Many countries have used it since then; details vary by location and change occasionally.

The practice is controversial. Adding daylight to afternoons benefits retailing, sports, and other activities that exploit sunlight after working hours, but causes problems for farming, evening entertainment and other occupations tied to the sun. Traffic fatalities are reduced when there is extra afternoon daylight. Its effect on health and crime is less clear. Although an early goal of DST was to reduce evening usage of incandescent lighting, formerly a primary use of electricity, modern heating and cooling usage patterns differ greatly, and research about how DST currently affects energy use is limited or contradictory. Non the less Summer time is here and we are set to start promoting seasonal business here at Nexonta Technologies Inc for a very profitable 2010 season.

Nexonta Technologies Inc