What is Raven?
Raven is a mobile, web-based command & control application for dynamically escalating incidents from first response to extreme-scale (all scale) that facilitates collaboration across Federal, Tribal, Military, State, County, Local/Municipal, Utility, Business, and civilian levels of Preparedness, Planning, Response, and Recovery for all-hazard events.
Raven is an advanced version of the Next-Generation Incident Command System (NICS) R&D project sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security Science & Technology Directorate, functionally specified by the First Responder, Emergency Management Response Community (operators), and technically developed by MIT Lincoln Laboratory.
Raven is a mix of tools, technologies, concepts of operation (CONOPS), and Services.
Raven is designed to develop and nurture situational awareness, particularly for those at the point of the sword looking directly at the threat and who have to make timely decisions under extreme pressure.
How is Raven a Service?
Raven is a service like any other service that organizations can purchase or subscribe to. Today that service has been provided as a part of the funding from the DHS Science & Technology Directorate. Since 2010 NICS has been provided to all emergency organizations at no cost.
In the near future, that service will be provided by organizations such as the Worldwide Incident Command Services Corporation. Departments and agencies will subscribe to Raven in various ways as they do with other services, in some cases at no cost.
Other Characteristics:
Open Standards
Community effort
Non-proprietary
Scalable
Rooted in ICS
What is WICS?
The Worldwide Incident Command Services Corporation (WICS) is a California Nonprofit Public Benefit Corporation. It is also the designated Department of Homeland Security S&T Technology Transition Partner chartered to transition the NICS (Next-Generation Incident Command System) R&D project to a fully sustainable, reliable, resilient, secure, and properly supported operating platform.
WICS was created at the urging of DHS and MIT LL to provide an organization that could take over daily technical & operational support tasks and fund the continuation of the project. WICS was formed in May 2014 and incorporated in the State of California in order to do this.
Under the California State Law for Nonprofit Public Benefit Corporations, WICS is strictly constrained in what it can and cannot do:
o It cannot be organized for the private gain of any individual or group
o It is governed by a board of directors who volunteer their time without compensation
o The compensation of all other personnel who are employed by the organization is strictly reviewed and must meet specific IRS standards for nonprofit organizations.
o Upon dissolution, all assets of the nonprofit have to be transferred to another nonprofit. No vendor can acquire any assets. There is no concept of equity.
Apps
Raven will continue to be grown, enhanced, and tailored via the development of plug-and-play Apps just like today’s consumer smart-phones and tablets. Anyone can develop and submit an App for inclusion into Raven (operators, researchers, small and large companies, academia, government labs, etc.).
What is the goal of Raven?
The goal of Raven is to develop and provide technology for the Tired – Dirty – Hungry responder under extreme stress. As such, it is designed to be:
Dirt-simple-to-learn & Dirt-simple-to-use.
If a new user knows how to turn on a computer, knows how to surf the web, and can find the neighborhood Olive Garden using Google Maps, then they can learn everything there is to know about Raven in 60 minutes or less.
How is Raven different from other approaches?
Primarily (but not exclusively) visually based rather that text based
Designed for the Tired – Dirty – Hungry
Uses an Apps model for growth, expansion, and tailoring of Raven; anyone can develop an app
Provided at no cost to all emergency response organizations
Like the Web, Raven will never be completed, but will always be undergoing improvements and transformations to meet new needs and uses
Who is developing Raven Tools, Technologies, CONOPS, and Services?
Raven was conceived, envisioned, and functionally specified by experienced first responders, many from the California emergency response community, and developed by scientists and engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratory (MIT LL), an FFRDC at Hanscom Air Force Base in Bedford, Massachusetts.
Who funded the R&D Portion Prior to Raven?
MIT LL (http://www.ll.mit.edu/) funded the initial phase of NICS development (2007-2010).
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science & Technology Directorate (S&T) (http://www.dhs.gov/st-organization) funded the second phase (2010-2014).
Additional funding was provided in 2013 by the County of San Diego, San Diego Gas & Electric (http://www.sdge.com), and the U.S. Coast Guard.
Is Raven Intellectual Property owned by a vendor? Is any part of Raven proprietary?
Raven is an open community project. No part of Raven is proprietary. No Raven intellectual property is owned by a vendor.
What are the guiding design principles for future Raven development?
Raven development is guided by eight design principles:
1) Adherence to the principles and operation of the Incident Command System (ICS) & the National Incident Management System (NIMS)
2) Seamless scalability – Same tools and approaches from initial dispatch through extreme scale events
3) Network to the edge – Reliable connectivity for those at the point of the sword
4) Technology neutral - Works with any device, any standard operating system, any browser [1]
5) App store approach for growth, expansion, and tailoring – Anyone can build an app
6) All hazard
7) Focuses on the Tired – Dirty – Hungry
8) A community project not owned by any vendor
9) Provided at minimal or no cost to emergency response organizations
[1] NICS works with any browser except Internet Explorer 8 and earlier. It works with IE 9 and later, FireFox, Safari, Chrome, and others.
How well does Raven scale? What are the goals?
Raven is intended to scale to 1000s of responders from 100s of organizations working dozens of incident at the same time. To date, Raven has been stress tested with up to 150 simultaneous users.
Can Raven support multiple incidents? If so, how many?
Raven can support multiple incidents with scores of users from dozens of organizations. To date an upper bound has not been reached. As the user base grows, performance will be continually assessed in order to benchmark scalability. On the TRAINING side of Raven’s predecessor it was not uncommon to have 90 or more open incidents.
What computers/devices, operating systems, and browsers does Raven work on?
Raven can run on any web-capable computer or device using any operating system.
Raven works on all browsers except Internet Explorer Version 8 and earlier. It works on Internet Explorer Version 9 and later. It also works on FireFox, Chrome, Safari, and others.
Does Raven work on Tablets & Smart-Phones?
Raven works on any computers or devices that can run the browsers listed above.
What is the current server physical distribution? Where are the primary and backup servers? What is the plan for future distribution of Raven servers?
In 2013, the runtime instance of Raven’s predecessor, NICS, was moved from the servers at MIT LL (Hanscom AFB, MA) to the servers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center on the campus of the University of California at San Diego. This was the first test of using a conventional host outside of the MIT LL R&D server farm.
Part of the research objectives of the predecessor program was to test and assess different configurations of servers and back up systems to achieve maximum resiliency during catastrophic events.
Presently Raven is being re-hosted onto the Amazon Cloud and will operate globally out of this configuration.
Who funded the hosting of NICS at the San Diego Supercomputer Center?
The San Diego Supercomputer Center operation of NICS was funded by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors under the leadership of Supervisor Ron Roberts. This site currently being taken over by CAL OES who plans to ultimately re-host NICS onto State of California computers.
How much computation is required to run Raven? How much Internet capability?
Raven is a conventional Web application. It can run on any adequately configured computer, even a laptop.
Is Raven HTML 5 compliant?
Raven is HTML 5 compliant. However, not all web browsers support full HTML 5. This is particularly true for some mobile browsers.
What is the Raven Users’ Group?
The Raven User’s Group is a volunteer organization of all Raven registered users and interested parties that has assumed incident command of the transition process for Raven.
How does Raven handle reports and data management used in the Incident Command System/National Incident Management System?
There are a number of forms, spreadsheets, and other ICS-based tools that have been added to Raven. Others are in the development pipeline, many which will dramatically streamline and improve the efficiency of information sharing and commander collaboration during incidents.
Work sponsored by the USCG will introduce additional forms pertaining to operational periods and resource tasking. Follow-on work will be funded to incorporate additional ICS forms and reports in FY14. There is a long list of items, features, and capabilities prioritized for development and implementation into Raven. This list can be provided upon request.