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Archive for the ‘Tac Apps’ Category

Brand New Tactical NAV App for Android Available

Monday, December 13th, 2021

After almost a year of non-stop development, the developer of Tactical NAV has finally finished the “brand new” Tactical NAV app for Android. He is a veteran himself and everything he does is based on his own experience and designed to help the men and women of the US military.

The great thing about the new app is that it’s a 100% direct translation of the iPhone app. And also, very soon, you’ll see real-time friendly and enemy force tracking (what the developer calls “troop tracking”) along with a landscape option, and many of the features that are available in ATAK.

Hopefully, the Android users out there like it as much as the iPhone users.

You can find the new Tactical NAV here play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tacnav.android

‘Can’t Miss’ Tactical Assault Kit Event Kicks Off Nov. 30

Thursday, November 25th, 2021

ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. (Nov. 22, 2021) — The United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM)-led Tactical Assault Kit (TAK) Product Center, in partnership with the Army, will host the eighth annual TAK Offsite in Colorado Springs, Colorado, from Nov. 30 to Dec. 3.

TAK is a map-based software application that enables coordination among operational users in the Department of Defense and other federal agencies with features such as positioning data, chat, mission planning and shared overlays. It is compatible with Android, Apple iOS and Windows.

“The TAK offsite is an excellent opportunity to collaborate with mission partners across various operational use cases to share feedback, to expand the capability, and to continuously make the products better,” said Bill Newmeyer of the Army’s Command, Control, Computers, Communications, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Center, where the TAK Product Center resides.

The C5ISR Center, part of Army Futures Command, supports the TAK development and user community by providing engineering expertise for the development and technical management of the core TAK software platforms as well as through participation in a Configuration Steering Board (CSB). Program Executive Office – SOF Digital Applications, part of USSOCOM, funds the product center, chairs the Configuration Steering Board and sponsors the TAK Offsite.

“The TAK community has grown from a dozen users to a hundred users to now over 200,000 users,” said Ryan McLean, TAK Product Center director. “As more users adopt TAK, we’ve continued to make TAK products more widely available. The TAK CSB amplifies and extends that growth through events such as the TAK Offsite.”

The TAK Offsite brings value to all stakeholders – users, developers, program managers, and even to people and organizations new to TAK. Real-world users attend and learn about new features and integration possibilities within TAK, while developers learn about how the TAK application programming interface (API) and core capabilities are constantly improving. Many program managers also attend the event to promote their initiatives that use TAK.

“TAK has been successful largely due to our open-architecture, open-source model that’s very developer-friendly,” said McLean. “That means staying synchronized with industry and listening to the needs of equipment providers and solution builders. TAK grows and improves not because of TAK alone, but because of TAK’s ability to break down the old barriers to system integration.”

As with previous years, the 2021 TAK Offsite will foster efforts to get more feedback to improve platforms and generate cross-team collaboration. This confluence of minds spurs the new waves of innovation in TAK development, integration, and use cases.

“This is a can’t-miss event for anyone developing situational awareness and geospatial capabilities. Anyone who attends should expect full immersion in the TAK community across four days packed with content,” said McLean. “If you use TAK, if you develop TAK, if you field capabilities that use TAK, or if you just want to learn about TAK, this is where you need to be.”

To register, attendees must create a TAK.gov account at tak.gov. Attendees may then register for the event under the Events page of TAK.gov. Questions should be directed to support@tak.gov with questions.

SMA to Young Army Leaders: There’s an app for That

Friday, November 19th, 2021

AUSTIN, Texas — Sgt. Maj. of the Army Michael A. Grinston visited Army Futures Command’s Army Software Factory (ASWF) in Austin, Texas, on Oct. 28 to meet with Army civilian and Soldier coders who are developing the Army software of the future.

ASWF is a first-of-its-kind, integrated software development initiative to teach, develop and employ self-sustaining talent from all ranks within the military and civilian workforce.

Grinston’s visit was part of the Army’s “This is My Squad (TIMS)” initiative, designed to build unit cohesion, create foundational leadership skills to build up today’s Army and prepare young leaders for the Army of the future.

“It’s about engaged leaders who know their Soldiers and build cohesive teams that are highly trained, disciplined and mentally and physically fit,” Grinston said.

One important tool in the TIMS campaign will be the MySquad mobile app, in its early stages of development by coders at ASWF. When complete, the app is planned to be an easily accessible, mobile way to enable squad leaders to communicate with and direct their Soldiers in real time, no matter where they are.

“It’s this question: ‘How do we manage our time better?’” Grinston said. “We’ve heard this for years: you get last-minute taskings, I didn’t know to go to this meeting, whatever it is.”

“That’s what squad leaders said – I want an app that helps me manage time and taskings. That’s the whole point of the MySquad app.”

The MySquad app, like other software developed at ASWF, is software “for Soldiers, by Soldiers.” ASWF brings the end-users of their software — squad leaders, in this case — into the development process in regular and meaningful ways. These Soldier touchpoints help to pinpoint end-user issues that may otherwise be overlooked by developers.

Integrating Soldier touchpoints in software design speeds up the development process, drives requirements and ensures the Army and ASWF are meeting Soldiers’ tactical and operational needs.

Currently, Soldiers from the 3rd Cavalry Regiment at Fort Hood, Texas, are testing an early version of the app and providing feedback directly to the development team.

“What I like about tying it from Fort Hood to here is the Soldiers are using it, the Soldiers are developing it, and as we want the technology to change, we change it,” Grinston said.

ASWF coders link information from Soldier touchpoints into the next iteration of prototyping to verify the value of the new additions, then build that functionality into the next version of the app. New versions of the app are returned to the testers, who provide further information to facilitate ongoing improvements. This creates a Soldier feedback loop that informs software development and helps Soldiers become stronger, better organized leaders.

“I like the fact that we were in direct communication with the team developing the application, and they considered all of our complaints,” said Staff Sgt. Kerry Cartwright, a cavalry scout with the 3rd Cavalry Regiment. “The developers listened to us and actually added those useful links as features.”

Grinston said that feedback is implemented immediately to see how it affects the overall functionality of the app. One example from the visit was incorporating the Golden Triangle — a tool leaders use to ensure that a Soldier’s friends and family can contact them in the event there is an issue with the Soldier.

“The Chief [of Staff of the Army] says ‘Here’s the Golden Triangle, we’ve got to connect these dots.’ In the app they’re all listed out with a button and you just hit the button to call them,” Grinston explained.

Though still in an early development phase, when complete, the MySquad app is planned to assist small-unit leaders in task tracking, counseling, event and appointment scheduling and training management.

Grinston said that taking these tasks from paper to the digital age will help leaders take care of Soldiers by providing better predictability in their schedules while improving overall readiness.

“It’s not ‘People First’ versus ‘Readiness’ — ‘People First’ is ‘Readiness,’ and this is a perfect example of that.”

Don’t look for MySquad at your app store quite yet, though.

According to Lt. Col. Vito Errico, ASWF co-director, “agile coding is an iterative process that allows us to continuously refine our software development by incorporating Soldiers’ input. We will continue refining and testing this app until it meets our high standards and our squad leader testers tell us it is fully ready for launch.”

Story by MSG Ben K. Navratil, Army Futures Command

Photos by Patrick Hunter

SOCOM-led Tactical Assault Kit Product Center Hosts Hybrid Workshop in Colorado Springs

Monday, November 8th, 2021

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The Tactical Assault Kit (TAK) Product Center is hosting a hybrid (in-person and virtual) workshop to expedite the development and integration of situational awareness tools Nov. 30 to Dec. 3.

The Tactical Assault Kit (TAK) is a map-based software application that enables coordination among thousands of users with features such as a position data, chat, mission planning and shared overlays. It is compatible with Android, Apple iOS and Windows.

The TAK offsite will offer an opportunity for stakeholders from across the Department of Defense (DoD), federal agencies and industry to exchange information and identify critical needs. The event will offer tracks for programmatic updates and training on the TAK platforms. A separate track for developers will be held virtually later this year.

“While programmatic briefs and demonstrations are important, feedback from previous TAK Offsites has been heavy on the value of hallway discussions and introductions between sessions,” said Mark Roberts, deputy director for the TAK Product Center. “This year’s hybrid event facilitates in-person meetings which are key to building strong, lasting relationships amongst community members while simultaneously enabling virtual participation from TAK users around the globe.”

As the central software development hub for all TAK efforts, including 13 federal programs of record, the TAK Product Center provides core development, software updates, cybersecurity and testing for an enhanced user experience.

To foster innovation, the TAK Product Center approved the public release of a non-military variant for federal and government agencies – known as the Android Team Awareness Kit-Civilian (ATAK-CIV) application – on Google Play and the open-source Standard ATAK Software Development Kit on TAK.gov.

“The crowd-sourced nature of the Team Awareness Kit (TAK) is unique among government materiel development programs. The TAK Product Center has proven that focusing on the user provides optimal solutions and wide adoption,” said Col. Paul Weizer, Program Executive Officer for SOF Digital Applications. “I expect open-source elements of the TAK software development/delivery model will become ubiquitous across government software program offices.”

Registration for the offsite is available at tak.gov/events/2021_Offsite until November 26th. Learn more about the event here:

By USSOCOM PAO

U.S. Army photo by SPC Joshua Cofield

AB-Synapse Garmin Delta Tactix Watch App

Saturday, March 6th, 2021

The all new AB-Synapse Garmin Delta Tactix Watch App is available now in android and iOS app stores.

Easily create and send custom ballistic profiles to the Garmin tactix Delta – Solar Watch with Ballistics, including full access to the Applied Ballistics Bullet Library that contains over 1200 custom measured bullets.

ADS App for iPhone

Wednesday, December 9th, 2020

ADS Inc has launched an app, available in the Apple Apps store which renders well on both iPad and iPhone.

The app provides direct access to ADS catalogs and other publications, offering a sampling of the thousands of products available for unit and agency orders from ADS, Inc. In fact, you can even request a quote, directly from the app. You’ll also have a calendar of ADS events, right at your fingertips.

Get yours at apps.apple.com/us/app/ads-inc

Army to Host Tactical Assault Kit Virtual Workshop for Industry, Federal Agencies

Thursday, September 24th, 2020

ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. (Sept. 23, 2020) — The U.S. Army is hosting a virtual workshop to expedite the development and integration of situational awareness tools Sept. 29 – Oct. 2.

The Tactical Assault Kit (TAK) is a map-based software application that enables coordination among thousands of users with features such as a position data, chat, mission planning and shared overlays. It is compatible with Android, Apple iOS and Windows.

The Tactical Assault Kit virtual offsite will offer stakeholders from across the Department of Defense (DoD), federal agencies and industry an opportunity to exchange information and identify critical needs. The event will offer tracks for software development, programmatic updates and training on TAK platforms.

“The intent of these sessions is to learn from issues that may have arisen in the past year, produce innovative capabilities and reduce duplicative efforts,” said Josh Sterling, director of the TAK Product Center at the The Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Center – a component of Army Futures Command’s Combat Capabilities Development Command.

“Any time we can get more feedback and lessons learned, it’s a data point we can use to improve the platform. I think this is a great way to generate cross-team collaboration that will spur both the development cycle and integration as we continue to push and facilitate a more universal type TAK operation.”

As the central software development hub for all TAK efforts, including 15 DoD programs of record, the C5ISR Center’s TAK Product Center provides software updates and testing for an enhanced user experience.

To foster innovation, the TAK Product Center approved the public release of a non-military variant for federal and government agencies – known as the Android Team Awareness Kit-Civilian (ATAK-CIV) application – on Google Play and the open-source Standard ATAK Software Development Kit on TAKmaps.com.

“TAK is an extensible platform, meaning that we give you a baseline and based on your mission requirements you can build on that baseline to bridge capability gaps,” said Mark Roberts, deputy director for the TAK Product Center.

“Anyone who has a job requirement to display point location information – the military, DoD and federal agencies, state and local authorities, firefighters and emergency responders – will benefit from these sessions. This is a great opportunity to give them a peek at what’s being done around the TAK community,” he said.

Registration for the offsite is available at tak.gov/offsite until Sept. 28.

By CCDC C5ISR Center Public Affairs

Army Futures Command Announces ‘Software Factory’ in Austin

Monday, July 20th, 2020

AUSTIN, Texas – U.S. Army Futures Command announced the establishment of the first Soldier-led Software Factory today.

The Austin-based Software Factory is a first-of-its-kind concept for the Army that will leverage a train-with-industry pipeline to empower Soldiers and Civilians to scope and solve problems with modern software practices.

This new capability will allow units to act faster and mitigate unforeseen risk inherent in multi-domain operations. It will teach Soldiers and Civilians how to solve Army problems with cloud technology and modern software, and to better prepare Soldiers for disconnected warfare in 2028 and beyond.

“The capability to develop software at the lowest tactical levels will help us provide better software products,” said Gen. John M. Murray, commanding general of Army Futures Command. “We anticipate long-term cost savings and expect the Software Factory to help us maintain a competitive advantage across Army modernization efforts.”

This new software factory complements the Army’s digital talent initiative based at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Penn. Army professionals will attend data science and engineering graduate programs, and 12 Soldiers will attend a boot-camp-style fellowship for cloud technicians to help solve Army problems through agile and secure software development processes.

“All of these efforts will develop and sustain the digital talent the Army needs for the future,” Murray said. “The CMU-trained engineers will build the data environment the Army needs. The technicians will maintain that environment. And the Software Factory will develop the skills to operate in that environment.”

By Army Futures Command