I'm approaching "working alpha" state for a combination SMS/Phone call alerting system for ES and squadron activities.

Could those of you who are alerting officers describe your current process for alerting your ES membership?

Areas I'm interested in feedback on specifically:

1. How do you prepare your list of qualified members to contact? Is that pulled directly as a report from e-Services or do you use a list that you pre-qualify and update regularly outside of the alerting period?

2. Are you using phone, text, email, or some combination thereof to reach your membership?

3. How much information are you sending with the initial alert?

4. How much information are you collecting when you get responses?

5. In what format are you handing off that information you collect to the decisionmakers for a mission assignment?

Please also provide any feedback beyond this that you think would be constructive.

Member of the kiss club.

Text to pilots .... "Hey guys, got an Oride day next Saturday. Who is avail?"

One or two will text back in the affirm. Put their names in WMIRS, done deal.

Michigan Wing has a pretty good system that a member developed that is text based. He developed a UI that allows an alert to be sent to the entire Wing or just individual Squadrons, it pulls numbers and current quals from eServices so only those in trainee or above status get a message. Once the message is sent, recipients respond with availability and it goes into a dashboard the IC has access to with who's available, what are they qualified to do, and what assets (van, aircraft, comms etc) does the Squadron have. I haven't seen the interface personally but I've been on the other end receiving alert texts, it seems to be a pretty solid system. I would maybe reach out to MIWG IT and maybe they can give you an idea of the setup.

Quote from: etodd on May 20, 2021, 11:03:30 PMMember of the kiss club.

Text to pilots .... "Hey guys, got an Oride day next Saturday. Who is avail?"

One or two will text back in the affirm. Put their names in WMIRS, done deal.

You realize this is apples and oranges, right?  I know you have a serious need for everyone to know how low-frills you are in every area of CAP but this ain't it.

Quote from: Capt Thompson on May 21, 2021, 12:25:45 PMMichigan Wing has a pretty good system that a member developed that is text based. He developed a UI that allows an alert to be sent to the entire Wing or just individual Squadrons, it pulls numbers and current quals from eServices so only those in trainee or above status get a message. Once the message is sent, recipients respond with availability and it goes into a dashboard the IC has access to with who's available, what are they qualified to do, and what assets (van, aircraft, comms etc) does the Squadron have. I haven't seen the interface personally but I've been on the other end receiving alert texts, it seems to be a pretty solid system. I would maybe reach out to MIWG IT and maybe they can give you an idea of the setup.

I would love to see how this works. Is it reproducable in other wings?

Quote from: Capt Thompson on May 21, 2021, 12:25:45 PMMichigan Wing has a pretty good system that a member developed that is text based. He developed a UI that allows an alert to be sent to the entire Wing or just individual Squadrons, it pulls numbers and current quals from eServices so only those in trainee or above status get a message.

I was building something similar using CAPWATCH data at various points, but at the unit level it was never really worthwhile because, you know, how many mission pilots / UDF team members does the typical squadron have and how often does that change? Also a bit too much like the day job

You should encourage your wing team to share the technology via HUBCAP; the overwhelmingly vast majority of technology that's shared there at the moment is pretty primitive (spreadsheets, fillable PDFs etc).

Mass texting generally requires coordination with the cell providers and / or use of a commercial service.

Otherwise the result is generally a disconnected number or a bunch of undeliverable messages
due to their looking like spam.

There's also the happy-fun-time of members marking the messages as SPAM even though they
know they aren't.

Quote from: Eclipse on May 21, 2021, 04:29:45 PMOtherwise the result is generally a disconnected number or a bunch of undeliverable messages
due to their looking like spam.

There's also the happy-fun-time of members marking the messages as SPAM even though they
know they aren't.

"THERE CAN BE ONY ONNNNNEEEEEE..." (raises Highlander sword overhead)

V/r
Spam

CAWG has an opt-in availability list divided into three segments - North, Central, and South. You can sign up for any or all segments. You provide contact info and preferred means - text, email, etc. When an IC needs resources, a page is sent out with mission particulars, and response options are offered - YES, available, or NO, not available. The IC can aggregate the assets, and send out sorties.

It's been in place for a number of years, and seems to work well

Quote from: SarDragon on May 21, 2021, 10:21:09 PMCAWG has an opt-in availability list divided into three segments - North, Central, and South. You can sign up for any or all segments. You provide contact info and preferred means - text, email, etc. When an IC needs resources, a page is sent out with mission particulars, and response options are offered - YES, available, or NO, not available. The IC can aggregate the assets, and send out sorties.

It's been in place for a number of years, and seems to work well

Dave, do you know what platform this utilizes?

No, i

Quote from: Pace on May 29, 2021, 03:02:14 AM

Quote from: SarDragon on May 21, 2021, 10:21:09 PMCAWG has an opt-in availability list divided into three segments - North, Central, and South. You can sign up for any or all segments. You provide contact info and preferred means - text, email, etc. When an IC needs resources, a page is sent out with mission particulars, and response options are offered - YES, available, or NO, not available. The IC can aggregate the assets, and send out sorties.

It's been in place for a number of years, and seems to work well

Dave, do you know what platform this utilizes?

No, I do not, but I'll PM you some contact info.