A Common Operating Picture for the Masses

Managing personnel operating across a wide area is challenging. Where are the team members? How best to communicate the geographic characteristics of the operating area? How can partner organizations, agencies, or experts be included within a secure common operating picture (COP)? Managing personnel operating across a wide area is challenging. Where are the team members? How best to communicate the geographic characteristics of the operating area? How can partner organizations, agencies, or experts be included within a secure common operating picture (COP)? How best to comply with the Dingell Act Resource Tracking (DART) requirements for wildland firefighting efforts?

Fortunately, advanced mobile broadband services, as well as basic data communications overlays such as mesh connectivity, provide a foundation. Since releasing a civilian variant of the US Department of Defence software suite for tactical team collaboration in the field, the Team Awareness Kit (TAK), agencies have had an answer at their fingertips. TAK is gaining momentum as the tool of choice for complex dispersed operations that demand an interoperable COP.

No-Charge and Extensible

The TAK suite of software is available at no charge to private users or government agencies. The suite's plugin architecture offers an extensible framework that accommodates changing technologies, such as drone support, wildland fire sensors, weather reporting systems, aviation tracking, and maritime tracking. TAK can operate in a disconnected environment if all devices are on the same subnet. A TAK server provides the synchronized message exchange between devices on different IP subnets.

Thanks to the rich functionality and no-charge software cost, law enforcement and fire service staff are increasingly deploying TAK to support operations. Support often comes from home-grown in-house technology experts who stand up servers, create data packages, and help end users. In other cases, agencies turn to turn-key Software as a service (SaaS) offers that reduce the deployment burden on local agencies. Beyond public safety operations, TAK is also proving valuable for supporting large-venue event operations such as marathons, music festivals, and sporting events.

Community Support Smooths Deployment

To better appreciate TAK's potential and hurdles, I embarked on my own deployment effort. Following the helpful YouTube videos produced by Corona Fire Department Captain Andreas Johansson and TAK subject matter expert Greg Albrecht, I successfully deployed a CritComm Insights TAK server on a Digital Ocean Droplet. I then installed clients on all major platforms: Windows PC, Samsung Android, and Apple IoS.

The experience was more straightforward than expected, but not without stumbling blocks. A step-by-step recipe provided in Captain Johansson's TAK Server deployment made easy video helped smooth the way. But finding my way through the intricacies of public key encryption certificates proved a challenge. After additional reading and experimentation, I could generate the certificates and create data packages for basic operation. The community support and online resources make this a viable approach for many agencies. Of course, a non-trivial cloud-based TAK server deployment calls for sustained change management that includes version updates and user management. Rolling your own server may not be the best option for small or mid-size agencies. A more practical option may be the services available from TAK service providers in the market, such as PAR Government's Sit(x) SaaS solution.

The effort was valuable and boosted my confidence that TAK has a significant role in dispersed operations. In the coming months, I will dive into the expanding ecosystem of communications, software, and service offerings that add to this rich collaboration environment.