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Building Bridges

Vendors work to effectively weave wireless into larger infrastructures.

Adding wireless technology to existing applications hasn't been easy; but the situation is about to change. Rather than maintaining stand-alone solutions, vendors are beginning to integrate wireless middleware with application servers, enabling government to move many of its pilot wireless projects into full-scale operations.

Middleware is the glue connecting the two applications. In short, middleware helps agencies become interoperable. For the public sector, the value of middleware is its ability to extend electronic functions to new environments using wireless technology.

There are different types of middleware for different applications. Database middleware hides the incompatibility of data on different platforms, networks and programming languages by translating requests from one database to another. Message-oriented middleware provides different functions for message delivery among applications. Object-oriented middleware is designed to reduce the difference between computing systems, enabling developers to write applications that ask for information without worrying about the hardware or operating system.

"Wireless is part of a larger infrastructure. It's part of hardware, software and services," said Sonil Soares of IBM's Pervasive Computing Solutions division. "We really look at wireless as one of the pillars within multichannel access infrastructure. You think of the Web as one pillar, you think of wireless as a second pillar and you think of voice as a third pillar."

The key to wireless applications is the ability to roam between different networks "without actually breaking the application," Soares said.

Faster Data Exchange
The use of wireless devices in Toronto Police Department squad cars is one recent deployment that applies wireless as part of a broader infrastructure.

Toronto, which has the fourth largest police department in North America, will use IBM's Everyplace Wireless Gateway (EWG) to power the department's Enterprise Case and Occurrence Processing System (eCOPS). The system, which is in development, will enable wireless devices in police cruisers to seamlessly roam between lower-speed and wider-reaching radio networks, and strategically placed Wi-Fi networks, facilitating faster data exchange.

Each Toronto squad car will be equipped with mobile client applications so officers can log information, missing persons, tickets and run reports, and all information will enter the main records management system.

The application will allow officers to file reports in real time, regardless of their locations. Another benefit is the system's ability to put key information in the hands of officers in a matter of seconds.

The system also can roam to a faster network, which is crucial; sending some information over slower networks would take too long due to the current radio network's smaller bandwidth.

Seamless Data Access
The Capitol Wireless Integrated Network (CapWIN) project in Washington D.C., is an interoperable wireless system that will provide seamless data access to multiple jurisdictions. The system will enable officials from more than 40 local, state and federal agencies in Washington D.C., Maryland and Virginia to communicate with each other in real time. The communication bridge will allow officers to obtain information from the whole area, not solely from their own department's records management system. The system will also give firefighters, police, transportation officials and other authorized emergency personnel wireless access to government data sources during critical incidents.

Officials will communicate over the network via an instant messaging application deployed on industry-standard devices, such as PCs, PDAs and data-enabled mobile phones. Authorized users will set up response teams, including restricted access and "high-performance" chat rooms designed to handle the load during unexpected events, such as natural disasters, traffic collisions, fires or terrorist threats.

If necessary, a police officer responding to a car accident may communicate simultaneously with key personnel, including ambulance drivers, firefighters, transportation response units and others.

CapWIN, which should be operational sometime next year, will be implemented without much impact on the existing systems, Soares said. IBM, the prime contractor for the project, will use industry-standard technology that will mesh with legacy systems.

Integration at all Levels
Boeing's Incident Command System (ICS) will improve crisis communication and information sharing in emergency situations. ICS was developed by Boeing's Mobile Broadband Solutions group with technology from IBM and Cisco Systems. The system provides integrated, high-bandwidth, mobile, wireless connectivity that supports the coordinated operations of teams with members from all agencies, at all levels of government, and in all functional areas, including police, fire, medical and military.

The system consists of satellite, wireless local area, GPS and cellular networks that allow emergency response personnel in the field to access critical databases, the Internet and other systems at any time, from any location. Functionality is provided as a series of "building blocks" of capability that allow users to pick the options they need and tailor an ICS configuration to their requirements.

The ICS is an open system architecture that takes advantage of commercially driven advances without redesign. It accommodates a variety of off-the-shelf devices, such as laptops, cell phones, PDAs, video cameras and two-way radios. So anyone in the field can exchange large volumes of information as easily as they could from their office computers. IBM's EWG enables wireless devices to roam between different types of networks, including wireless LAN, cellular, private mobile radio and satellite networks.

"People typically think of wireless solutions in terms of mobile phones and PDAs," Soares said. "But it will be an integrated infrastructure -- technology, hardware, software and services -- and enabling communication between many devices that will emerge as the key to the growth of wireless solutions."

Soares explained that business and government are steadily turning to wireless technology to solve challenges in extending communications to new environments, a point reflected in the explosive growth of the wireless industry, according to figures released recently by the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association. The organization found that: