Stop! Wait! I Am Pulling Down a Menu!
San Jose, CA, with the smallest officer-to-resident ration in the country, is named one of the safest cities in the United States. From 1990 to 2004, officers worked on a daily basis with a text-based mobile dispatch system, which they had no problem with.
A major issue happened when, in 2004, this system was replaced by a new Windows-based touch screen software, developed by Intergraph. In this new project, a new touch screen computer was installed in every patrol car. The idea of the software was correct, it was supposed to bring many benefits and simply help officers, make their life easier. The new software was designed to receive orders, send messages, write reports, receive maps of the city, and use the GPS to let officers know where they are located. The success of the software was not as planned. Even before it was installed, officers were already upset that their input was not asked about the design of the interface; nobody asked their opinion and suggestions for the creation of the new system. The software itself had way too many complications. Officers were not satisfied at all with it. Some of the issues included were the increasingly difficult to use code 99-emergency, the time it took them to find whether a person they stopped had violent criminal record, mapping and GPS inaccuracies, and unneeded information that took screen space along with difficult font to read. The software simply did not work, it crashed after two days of its debut. It was fixed and debugged, but still had major issues.
Dispatchers were also very dissatisfied with the Intergraph system because of the risky delays in task execution, because it could not perform multiple tasks simultaneously, between many more. They too, thought should have been consulted during the interface design stage. To fix these issues, SJPOA provided more training to officers and hired a consultant to see what could be done. The consultant realized there were too many
A major issue happened when, in 2004, this system was replaced by a new Windows-based touch screen software, developed by Intergraph. In this new project, a new touch screen computer was installed in every patrol car. The idea of the software was correct, it was supposed to bring many benefits and simply help officers, make their life easier. The new software was designed to receive orders, send messages, write reports, receive maps of the city, and use the GPS to let officers know where they are located. The success of the software was not as planned. Even before it was installed, officers were already upset that their input was not asked about the design of the interface; nobody asked their opinion and suggestions for the creation of the new system. The software itself had way too many complications. Officers were not satisfied at all with it. Some of the issues included were the increasingly difficult to use code 99-emergency, the time it took them to find whether a person they stopped had violent criminal record, mapping and GPS inaccuracies, and unneeded information that took screen space along with difficult font to read. The software simply did not work, it crashed after two days of its debut. It was fixed and debugged, but still had major issues.
Dispatchers were also very dissatisfied with the Intergraph system because of the risky delays in task execution, because it could not perform multiple tasks simultaneously, between many more. They too, thought should have been consulted during the interface design stage. To fix these issues, SJPOA provided more training to officers and hired a consultant to see what could be done. The consultant realized there were too many