An iPhone app for troops
Capt. Jonathan J. Springer from Fort Wayne, IN said it came to him a dream, then he spent $26,000 of his own money to develop an application for the iPhone to help soldiers navigate and call for indirect fire. From Fox News;
Tactical Nav, which is expected to be available through Apple’s App Store next month, assists soldiers in mapping, plotting and photographing waypoints on a battleground and conveying coordinates to supporting units.
Springer used a variety of armored vehicles, remote observation posts and harsh combat conditions to test the accuracy of his invention, which can also be used to direct artillery fire on enemy positions or call in helicopter support.
Who knows what soldiers need more than soldiers.
Thanks to Old Trooper for the link.
Category: Military issues
Tens of millions of dollars have been spent to do just this; and this kid shortcuts the system. The colonel is going $&!+ himself! Too awesome!
Suh-flipping-WEET!!
Similar happened back in 2006(?). Marine officer teamed with two friends: one a police officer, the other a computer programmer and came up with the solution to tracking Iraqis. Think it was the LA Times was reporting on it just as the Pentagonians were beginning their kickoff conference on how they would solve the problem of tracking Iraqis.
Want to save money? Get rid of the acquisition folks entirely!
It seems that the military may be suffering the same problem that a lot of civilian companies are suffering right now: they forget how bright their “employees” really are. That comes from the ivory tower types not getting out enough and learning what kind of talent works for them.
I have to say that it mystifies me, why companies behave this way. My hubby’s saying is this: “You know what an expert is, don’t you? An ‘ex’ is a has-been, and a s’pert is a fast drip under pressure!”
PN, the way most acquisition work is this:
A vendor has a product to sell.
The vendor convinces a congressperson (already paid for) that one or more services really need the product they’re selling.
Congressperson puts purchase of the product into the budget legislation.
Service is required to come up with a requirement for the product.
Soldiers die in the meantime.
Product delivered, over the price, over the time, and usually doesn’t work as advertised.
The product enters “The Legacy” – all those systems that will last for decades.
The services know their folks are plenty smart. But none of them write laws or control spending.
DaveO, I am absolutely sure that your assessment is correct. And if the services know how smart their people are, then the problem is higher up and can be laid at…
(…sigh…)
…the feet of our elected officials.
Now why doesn’t this scenario surprise me? /sarc
I guess I will have to buy it just to help him recoup.
Obviously this kind of skill and initiative must be immediately crushed. This man has no future in the Army.
The question is, “How much other crap can we now add to this app until it becomes unworkable and loses its interoperability?”
Seriously, good on the young officer.
@LTC Tim
Asides adding a bunch of worthless crap to the app we now have to get contract out to northrop grumman, boeing, L3 you name it to field a special device to run this app. We’ll call it the Defense Originated Geometric Combined Reporting And Position device. It’ll be a box that is 1 foot tall by 4 foot long by 2 feet wide, weigh 85 pounds,take a four man lift, has a laser than can blind you, require a 60K Generator to run, and can only be used in the clean room environment or it will explode and kill everyone in the 6 foot kill zone.
Expected cost 3 million per unit, expected wait time 5 years.
In the mean time don’t allow soldiers on the battlefield to use it for fear that the information can somehow be corrupted.
Now that’s how you take a good idea and turn it into a pain in the ass.
I gotta g with DaveO. If Congress needs to cut in DoD, start in Acquisitions… and cashier all those useless officers.
I gotta go with DaveO. If Congress needs to cut spending in DoD, start in Acquisitions… and cashier all those useless officers.
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Well done, Capt Springer! HOOAH! I agree with Dave O too. Let’s run him for Congress or something!
Great initiative- but how are you going to run this program in Afghanistan? On the Roshan network? Does it require that you jailbreak the iPhone and void the warranty? What about COMSEC? Lockheed Martin has been working on a secure program like this called MONAX, but setting up a local secure network has been the major issue.
“Lockheed Martin has been working on a secure program like this called MONAX, but setting up a local secure network has been the major issue.”
Ah….you must be from Lockheed-Martin, working on their project and seriously ticked off that a grunt beat yall to it? Just about everybody and their dog knows the best security for any computer is one not connected to a network.
The biggest security problem I can envision, is another “Manning”(generically speaking)type individual ending up somewhere in the loop and network admin’s asleep on their admin consoles, not reading security event logs and never grant anyone permissions or access to cd/dvd drives. My opinion only.