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Android Goes To the Battlefield
wiseandroid writes "Google's mobile operating system Android has won plenty of adherents among cellphone makers and gadget manufacturers since its 2007 debut. Now defense contractor Raytheon is preparing it for a more urgent mission: saving lives in places like Afghanistan and Pakistan. Using Android software tools, Raytheon engineers have built a basic application for military personnel that combines maps with a buddy list. Raytheon calls the entire framework the Raytheon Android Tactical System, or RATS for short. Mark Bigham, a vice president of business development in Raytheon's Intelligence and Information Systems unit, says the company selected Android because its open source nature made developing applications easy."
I always wanted to kill with multitouch from anywhere!
Why do breathless writers always say "saving lives" when they refer to military applications? They're about taking lives. Just taking different ones.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
You would think ARTS would be a more psychologically pleasing acronym than RATS, but what do I know, I'm just a code monkey...
I wonder if they have an enemies list to complement the buddies list. Tactical systems are funny like that. You have users of the application -- the enemy combatants -- who don't really want to be users of your application.
Raytheon is preparing it for a more urgent mission: saving lives in places like Afghanistan and Pakistan.
That's right, our military are there to SAVE lives, like the red cross. They're not in the business of taking lives like the brutal killers of Eurasia^WEastasia.
Android apps don't have to pass through a central app store to get widely distributed to a set of Android phones. So the military can limit distribution of the apps. They could even distribute an Android OS distro with a crypto key that is bonded to that phone's serial#, which is needed by any app to run or even to decompress/decrypt from the distribution package, so military apps can't be used or inspected outside the military's own phones.
Is there any way to do something like that on iPhones? Like at least just developing an app that doesn't get run through Apple at all (signing or uploaded to the App Store), but is just an install package downloadable from a website (perhaps with a password) and installable on a phone, perhaps with an unlock code. AFAICT, that's all locked out by Apple's iPhone architecture. Has anyone figured out how to do "distributed distribution", without needing Apple at the center of all of it? On iPhones that aren't jailbroken, just the stock iPhones that anyone can have?
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make install -not war
Once again, Sci-Fi begets reality. This time toys go to the battlefield.
http://www.toyarchive.com/STAForSale/NEW2001+/GiJoe/MOSC/AFAPacRatMachineGun85a.jpg
I believe there were three, and I had all of them as a kid. Seems like they were super flimsy and basically fell apart without even touching them.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
It sounds good, but then again so did Land Warrior.
I can see it being useful in an urban environment, but can see a lot of issues with it in the mountains of Afghanistan. First being connectivity. Relying on a cell network in a 3rd world country doesn't seem like all that good of an idea. Getting a reliable signal in the mountains is hard as it is. It would be very bad for a unit to get used to using this system, and then get somewhere that it no longer works.
Second problem is EM signature. Cell phones broadcast as long as they are on. In urban areas, with lots of cell phones this isn't all that big of deal. In areas with very low populations, a cell phone being on can easily give away a platoons position. Frequency hoping helps with this on regular military radios and cell phones can't do this.
Mark Bigham, a vice president of business development in Raytheon's Intelligence and Information Systems unit, says the company selected Android because its open-source nature made developing applications easy." (emphasis mine)
If that was the case, then Open Source systems would have more applications than closed source counterparts. But this is hardly the case.
In addition, I see far more substandard, half-baked software on "open" systems than closed ones. What's going on?
An example: Open Source OO.o is still as buggy and a pain to use on its Open source native OS (read Linux), though it runs and feels better on closed source Windows. This is after a decade of development. Do not tell me OO.o does not have resources. I just do not understand this argument.
My concern is that this type of software application is too generally available. There is a reason why governments around the world use custom created software for their major military projects. Don't get me wrong, if a widely available technology can be used to aid in conflicts then I am all for it but I would suggest that putting trust in software that wasn't designed with a military purpose in mind is a dangerous mindset for people to get in.
Is this thing on?
Is there any way for contributors to the free software movement to block use of their software by military contractors?
That would be contrary to the goals of the GPL, which aims to grant freedom to use the software for any purpose and to modify it to achieve those purposes. You'd need to use a different license to achieve your aims.
To summarise the summary of the summary: people are a problem. ~ h2g2
Android apps don't have to pass through a central app store to get widely distributed to a set of Android phones. ... Is there any way to do something like that on iPhones?
Uh, this is the Department of Defense.. They have a budget of two thirds of a trillion dollars. Do you think they could modify an iPhone if they wanted to?
The US's wars right now are not a very good example, but sometimes wars ARE about saving lives and helping people, not just about mobilizing one's political base, handing money to VP's friends, grabbing oil and avenging daddy's rep.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Use words and modify your license, or write your own license from scratch, all depends on if the code is really yours or not or which license you start out with, etc. Varies widely. It maybe wouldn't block them, but if you found out they took it you could sue them.
This is an article based on a Raytheon press release. What hardware does said application run on? Even the article suggested there's no established contract yet.
I like the idea that open source/free software is getting more traction in this area, but no platform, no contract suggestes this is just fluff. Whether or not your bullshit meter started twitching that they've been working on this for two years is up to you.
Bonus BS points that they throw in the "Oh, and it could also be a biometric scanner". Feature creep comes early.
No. Because that would violate the law, alienate Apple (which is a major US corp, with all the politics and kickbacks that implies) which works on projects with DoD, and very likely result in a lawsuit that could set precedents against the DoD (not to mention consume some of that big budget without either its defense or its contractor kickback results) that pushed it away from some grey areas where it already does so (ie. violate the DMCA), and probably create trouble with congressmembers who are paid by the intellectual property industry to protect closed IP from tinkering by anyone.
Or they could just do it on Android, without any of that hassle.
However, if the DoD has done it, then that would be exactly the answer to my question. So if you really know anything about the DoD's ability to do such a thing, try answering the question instead of posting some anonymous snotty answer that doesn't answer anything.
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make install -not war
Fuck Ratheon.
That is all.
Raytheon Android Tactical Force Urban Command & Kontrol
Android's been getting a lot of tech press lately. I'm not sure who that press impacts - and while we're smarmy about the new Droid ad, I'm not sure who that's impacting either - the existing Android faithful or a new market.
Now Forbes - the darling of investors and managers - is telling that audience that a major defense contractor with an iconic American name in electronics has selected Android.
To top it off, the follow-on links given to Forbes readers are:
Motorola CEO Talks Android
Google's Android To Invade Homes
I think that this one story just did a lot to validate Android as mainstream-ready to corporate America - and that it's good for personal use, too (second tagged story alone).
Anyway - those are just my ideas. I don't really know what the inflection points for new tech-product demand are - I'm one of those clowns that tends to adopt any new tech as soon as reasonably practical - if not before.
Maybe I'm romanticizing - but I seem to recall a lot of stories about soldiers getting GPS units from home back in Desert Storm, sent by parents buying them from Radio Shack. I think that that really raised awareness and GPS units proliferated and prices dropped.
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
They have a budget of two thirds of a trillion dollars.
That you know about... The other two thirds is off the books.
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Is there any way for contributors to the free software movement to block use of their software by military contractors?
OK - so you want to restrict military contractors from using Linux, anything GNU and any other F/OSS?
Did you just wake up?
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
... is marketing bullshit.
What is a US provider of "defense" doing abroad, instead of defending the US?
Did Raytheon miss the announcement that linux is open source too?
...run Android?
If you shoot a projectile that contains embedded GPL'd code do you have to provide the victim with a copy of the code since there was a "distribution"?
They spent that on three toiliet seats.
Actually, that's unfair. It was three toilet seats and ten hammers.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Great, now Google is one step from being a defense contractor.
That's the one thing about open source/open architecture; although it's great that anyone can write apps for the android, sometimes "anyone" includes defense contractors and the military...
is known as RATS ARSE.
Only if he asks you for the code afterwards. In other words, don't miss.
If you shoot a projectile that contains embedded GPL'd code do you have to provide the victim with a copy of the code since there was a "distribution"?
Silly question -- the Geneva Conventions prohibit anything viral in a warhead.
Geneva conventions? What part of "you are free to use the program for any purpose" don't you understand?
If the military in my country relied on proprietary software written by a foreign corporation I would be very afraid for my country.
Don't read this - I mis-moderated someone >.
Slashdot is too nerdy for me.
This is an article based on a Raytheon press release. What hardware does said application run on? Even the article suggested there's no established contract yet.
Looks like they're using T-Mobile.
http://www.raytheon.com/newsroom/rtnwcm/groups/public/documents/image/rtn_iis_rats_graphic.jpg
I hear the terrorists are working on an iPhone app as well to help them with their roadside bombs... its called iExplode.
Can we see real killer apps now?
"For example, the GPLv2 in no way limits your use of the software. If you're a mad scientist, you can use GPLv2'd software for your evil plans to take over the world ("Sharks with lasers on their heads!!"), and the GPLv2 just says that you have to give source code back. And that's OK by me. I like sharks with lasers. I just want the mad scientists of the world to pay me back in kind. I made source code available to them, they have to make their changes to it available to me. After that, they can fry me with their shark-mounted lasers all they want. "
-- Linus Torvalds
to the battlefield. most technology in the United States invariably finds its way into our war machine. Since we spend the majority of our GDP on war, we have seen everything from tabasco sauce to laptops, go carts and exploding anti-tank dogs, an operating system based almost entirely on the notion of freedom and now an internet enabled cellphone.
one could argue war as we have waged it in modern times has been a thinly veiled product placement campaign. We will know when real war appears as it wont involve a new hummer to buy, a new cellphone on the "front lines" or a new iphone app. It will involve silence, discipline, remorse, depression, and an endless crashing wave of violence and destruction that will not be twittered, vblogged, or podcasted because the soldier at their cracked and bloodied Android hasnt any fingers left with which to hold anything more than his muddied rifle.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Whooosh - the joke's on the word "viral" in PP's post.
If you shoot a projectile that contains embedded GPL'd code do you have to provide the victim with a copy of the code since there was a "distribution"?
Maybe. :-)
Distribution will only be successful if the projectile fails to detonate.
Double points if the source code CD also works as a death frisbee.
"The most sensible request of government we make is not, "Do something!" But "Quit it!"