Introduction - Project Abacus

In military affairs and business today there is a severe lack of communication and documentation in an organized flow at the basic soldier/employee level. Project Abacus is redefining and enhancing that ability as the most advanced information management system ever created. With instant messaging and email organization, collaboration utilities, creating/filing/editing/publishing mission critical information, records organization, manual and regulations editing and bookmarking, course refreshment and occupational specialty training -- a list of a plethora of information at the lowest levels of the organization. This is all done within a process that can be used to scale everyday work procedures to years worth of operation tables and goals.

Gathering the Information

Due to the way that the military has handled it's contracts with the private sector, as well as their own information handling, this necessary evil that we call information management has become a living hell in and of itself. Common information needed for everyday/practical use has become almost unavailable to newly recruited soldiers and even seasoned veterans. Because of this Project Abacus will be gathering, sorting, and displaying this information in an easy-to-view, and more importantly, easily understandable method.

After spending the last month or so doing nothing but going from government website to government website, textbooks, technical/field manuals, and the dozen other information zones that the military uses to supply Standard Operating Procedures(SOP) in...I have found that a lot of information out there is really just hanging in the air, and the only way to get a straight answer is from some experience that a soldier having the exact same problem over the past decade was able to solve through a shuffle of paper and asking his superiors the same question.

This is NOT how this process should work, from the freshest soldier, all the way up to joint operations within the military there should be a set standard for information filing and searching.

Much like when you walk into a public library you expect to have the Dewey Decimal System already in place to easily find the book or reference in which you're seeking, the same should be set with military information. Unfortunately, the military doesn't have a system set in place like this that encompasses ALL of it's information handling.

While the military has a system in place like this, concerning that of "Staffs", it does not track all information this way as this is used mostly for operational purposes. After studying the largest areas of information and documentation though, I've found that these "Staffs" could actually be used as the general basis for ALL military information and that if anyone were to take the time to process and organize all this data that it would work quite well.

According to the definition located for this "Staffs" system, I've found the following:

Quote:
A military staff is a group of officers and enlisted personnel that provides a bi-directional flow of information between a commanding officer and subordinate military units.

Below is the breakdown of how the "Staffs" system is organized:

S-1: Personnel and Administration
S-2: Intelligence and Security
S-3: Operations
S-4: Logistics
S-5: Plans
S-6: Signals and Communications
S-7: Training
S-8: Finance/Resource Management
S-9: Civil Affairs

At a glance, this system serves fairly well in the ability to house everything an operational military group would need to handle the flow of information and mission critical events. Unfortunately, no one is updating or properly handling the information from the top all the way down with these channels. Which again, defines the whole purpose of the Abacus Project.

Some areas of the military have become so big that in Project Abacus' system that's being created it's separating the shops down further. Such as Medical(which is currently listed as Logistics), Maintenance(which is currently listed as Logistics), and Legal(which is a mix of Finance, Personnel and Administration, and Civil Affairs). Not to say that the current "Staffs" can't house this information, but for viewing and filing issues for the individual soldier and operations of the smallest unit it's being dubbed down.

Challenges

After researching exactly why a method for this information consolidation has never been done, I quickly found out...It's a damn headache. I definitely have my work cut out for me on this project, but I'm assured that it's one worth following through with. The backing I've gotten from both my state officials(thanks Dad for the connections :D ) and my brigade have been more than enough to keep me on track.

1) MOS and ACC(Army Correspondence Courses) consolidation - From what I gather I'm actually the first individual to make these connections and organize them in a productive manner to compliment each other, this took about a week's time to do and after about 2,000 printed pages worth of information I was able to do it successfully in a .PDF document format.

2) Learning the Language - This is definitely my brick wall in this project, creating the display program that is fast enough and easy enough that all military hardware can run it will be a task for the ages. Especially just starting out learning programming.

3) Security - This is the most common question I've been asked when referring to this project...the security measures that would need to be put in place to allow such mass information to be in one place, in sometimes very highly secured areas, is something that will have to be implemented in every part of the design of Project Abacus.

4) Information Consolidation - Thankfully, I have a plethora of resources that most soldiers do not have. After holding several positions, within different sections of the military, I've been able to find the proper routes for finding and identifying pertinent information that will make this consolidation process much easier, not that it will be easy in the first place.


I'm going into this project as the sole individual trying to accomplishment this monumental task, wish me luck.