Tickets, the First Open Source Emergency Services Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) System Version 2.11 Release
Waldorf, Maryland – In the world of emergency services, open source software is a rarity. Emergency service agencies, and those who help support those agencies, often have to make due with improvised software solutions or nothing at all. The Open ISES Project (http://openises.sourceforge.net/) is dedicated to help solving that problem by creating and offering no cost open source solutions for the emergency service community. Today, we are pleased to announce the latest major upgrade to our flagship software program, Tickets Version 2.11. Tickets is a web-based computer aided dispatch (CAD) program that leverages the power of Google maps to bring a high-end open source CAD product to the emergency services community.
Tickets can perform a number of functions including phone number look-up, driving directions, schedule events, and more. One new feature allows you to set up facilities such as hospitals and clinics, and provide driving directions between facilities. This can be useful when tracking an ambulance to an incident, and then from the incident to the hospital. Another use envisioned includes dispatching for special events. The facilities function can be used to locate First Aid Stations and allow easy dispatching of units to the stations. There are more new features such as;
● Email route directions to unit
● Hide units when unavailable
● Scheduled incidents
● Additional callboard features include mileage record per run, expanded comments field
and a new listing screen which shows additional details about incidents and responses.
● Frequent service users
● Full screen pop-up feature allows you to bring up a map of the area in a full screen.
Tickets is a general-purpose solution that is well suited for organizations that often provide services along side the traditional emergency service community (such as HAM radio operations and Search and Rescue organizations). Tickets offers the ability to be setup and used on a laptop in an ‘ad-hoc’ installation, and through the use of Google’s maps provides immediate, built-in access to powerful map features and capabilities - without the need for GIS specialists.
Standard Features
● Mapping functions based on Google maps, which include zoom, pan, and satellite views.
● Address lookup which shows the map location of most lookups for street address or town.
● Driving directions - via both text and map - from unit location to incident location.
● Closest unit determination – automatically identifies the closest unit to the incident.
● The Call Board function provides a display of current incident-unit assignments. (In effect, a Situation Management tool.)
● In writing up a new call, the automatic lookup is fairly effective for residential land-line phones, names (with city/state information), and street address. When found, these return map locations. (AKA geo-coding.)
● Any number of units may be committed to a given incident.
● Automatic map centering based on the calculated center of current tickets.
● Selective map view by incident severity - i.e., layers in GIS-speak.
● An interface with the Automatic Position Reporting System (APRS) Network.
● Automated installation through an included installation script - along with detailed instructions.
● User management and login functions using sessions.
● Most configuration values are accessed via the interface; no database knowledge is needed.
● Search capabilities - with results highlighted.
● It’s designed to be readily tailored to users’ needs via built-in features without having to modify the software, although the latter is inherently available. Some users have already done so, problem-free.
● There’s a light-weight chat function available, which some teams find useful for in-thecenter chat.
There are two downloads available. One is a complete install for new installations (you will need a web server with PHP and MySQL). The other is an update patch for those already running a copy of Tickets. For more information on this major update, visit our Tickets 2.11 page at http:// openises.sourceforge.net/tickets_update_2.html.
Tickets is beginning to find wide spread use among the volunteer amateur emergency radio community where it is often used on special events to track aid stations and responders. It is also seeing use with volunteer services that simply cannot afford the price of a proprietary CAD package. For example, you can read about the Nevada-Sierra Amateur Radio Emergency Services’ use of Tickets at http://openises.sourceforge.net/tickets_neveda.html.
Tickets is open source and free of charge (as are all of the software products at the Open ISES Project). It utilizes the MySQL database and is written primarily in PHP. In addition to software we also offer training materials for EMS, leadership and emergency management.
Background
Tickets was written by Arnie Shore (shoreas@gmail.com) as an adaptation of the original written by Daniel Netz (netz at home dot se) using PHP, Apache and MySQL 3.x/4.x on Linux. Tickets is a major upgrade to a mature and well-respected ticket-tracking application, PHP-Ticket. The original author, having frequented the OpenTicket system used at KTHNOC (Network Operations Center at Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden) which is the node at which SUNET, NORDUNET and national ISPs connect (PoP), felt a need to list tasks and troubles at work (being a sysadmin) to keep track of what needs to be done and to give other people a chance to read and post tickets. KTHNOC OpenTicket is available at http://www.noc.kth.se/opentickets/index.html
Free as in Beer, Free as in Speech
Tickets is being made available to the public safety community in the same sense of ‘giving back’ volunteerism that informs so many public safety organizations. It is designed to be usable by the part-time or occasional user who has no real access to an expanded training schedule. Tickets is open-source software released under the GNU General Public License (GPL). The use of the GPL guarantees, in perpetuity, a users right to freely use the Tickets software, freely redistribute the software and freely modify the software to meet their needs or the needs of others. Any software derived from Tickets is similarly bound by the GPL.
About The Open ISES Project
With the formation of The Open ISES Project (Open Information Systems for Emergency Services, located at http://openises.sourceforge.net), emergency service agencies not only have a choice in specialty software focused on the needs of emergency service agencies, but it allows the emergency service provider to be an integral part of the development process. We are offering application software that is specifically targeted to the needs of the emergency service community. With the software being open source, agencies can not just view the underlying code, but can make as many or few modifications as they feel are necessary to have a product that works for them. With the vast majority of the software being web based, there is no single vendor ‘lock-in’ allowing an agency to use whatever type of software that meets their needs.
The Open ISES Project is an on-line community designed to bring together emergency service providers and open source developers to discuss the technology needs of the emergency service community and create the software that is needed. The Open ISES Project is different from proprietary software projects in that the emergency service providers have a direct voice in the creation and development of the software. Further, all of the Open ISES Projects are open source and available for free, helping to reduce the need to choose between expensive propriety software or equipment to protect the community.
We are looking for emergency service professionals and developers who wish to share with other providers, whether through training materials or computer expertise. We are looking for providers to work with our volunteer developers to help create the software you need. We are looking for instructors who are willing to make their training materials available for others to use. If you feel that this would help your agency as well as other agencies across the country and around the world, consider being a part of the Open ISES Project. We are asking for your help to be able to meet your needs. Come and join us.
The members of the Open ISES Project follow in the long standing tradition of emergency services by volunteering their talents and services to help their local communities. We are a community of software developers and emergency service personnel with a goal of creating open source software and resources tailored to the needs of emergency service organizations.