OneForceTracker
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Tracking and killing insurgents? There's an app for that.
The Guardian has a story on US military contractor Raytheon who's begun building a series of applications for the iPhone for use in the battlefield. Their first military app is called One Force Tracker and uses satellite positioning and mobile networks to turn soldiers into master tacticians, giving them constantly updating field maps that track the position of friendly troops and enemy fighters in real time. Jay Smart, chief technology officer of Raytheon's intelligence and information systems business, said, "Raytheon's experience with mobile communications in the tactical environment and the government customers' need for low-power, simple plug-and-play applications led to the development of a real-time situational awareness application using Apple's touch technologies," and that the decision to use the iPhone was "because building software for the gadget was cheaper and simpler than some of the expensive options specifically designed for military use." While it's probably a safe bet that One Force Tracker won't be appearing in the App Store anytime soon, another military application by Knight's Armament Company, an American weapons maker that supplies rifles to the Pentagon, has an app called BulletFlight [iTunes link] which helps snipers and sharpshooters to hit their intended target. Yo Joe! Thanks Charlie
Raytheon's iPhone app will track enemy combatants in real time
Raytheon, known more often than not in these parts for its ability to zap people at a distance with microwaves, has just announced a little something called One Force Tracker. Essentially an iPhone app, it leverages recent developments in location awareness and social networking to keep tabs on both friends and enemies in the field, displaying positions on maps in real time -- all the while enabling secure communications between soldiers. "If there is a building with known terrorist activities, it could automatically be pushed to the phone when the soldiers get near that area," said Raytheon CTO J. Smart. Of course, there is still quite a bit of work to be done to make this work: iPhones do not have removable batteries, nor do they support multi-tasking, meaning that some sort of ruggedized, battery-powered external case would be necessary to get this battle-ready -- as well some jailbreaking. There's no word on a possible release date yet -- which means, sadly, that it looks like the U.S. Army is stuck with its Celio REDFLYs for the time being.
