TOBYHANNA ARMY DEPOT, Pa. -- Out-of-the-box thinking helped three Tobyhanna visionaries realize a goal of minimizing human errors by reducing human participation in a process.
It was an innovative idea made real by Information Technology (IT) specialists Brian Medwetz, Patrick Noel and John Kostiak. Using a computer-based, simulated environment they were able to develop the capability, then prove the feasibility of automating the functional testing of the Tactical Ground Reporting (TIGR) system. TIGR provides Soldiers with the means to digitally capture, report and retrieve patrol data such as common incidents, residents and leaders of a village.
Automating the process also cut costs by reducing the number of hours personnel spend manually performing the test. A demonstration confirmed the functional test duration for the TIGR system was reduced from eight hours to 30 minutes. The test is conducted about four times a month, which adds up to 30 hours saved. Medwetz, Noel and Kostiak work in the Production Engineering Directorate's Cyber Security Services Branch.
Maintaining Information Assurance Vulnerability Alert (IAVA) compliance is always a challenge," said Donna Askew, chief, Production Engineering Directorate's Cyber Security Services Division. "While performing IAVA work, Tobyhanna continues to look for opportunities to improve processes. The efficiencies gained will improve Army readiness allowing for shorter timelines to mitigate Cyber vulnerabilities in the field."
During a recent visit to the depot, Maj. Gen. Randy Taylor recognized the team for efficiencies gained in the use of automated testing and virtualization. Taylor is the commanding general of the U.S. Army Communications - Electronics Command (CECOM) and senior commander of Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland.
"Tobyhanna is taking steps to automate functional tests to the maximum extent possible on additional programs supported at the depot." Askew said. "Methods and techniques used here have been shared with our partners at CECOM's Software Engineering Center, which led to establishing an organic capability to tackle software sustainment workload."
Kostiak created the virtual space that gave Medwetz and Noel the freedom to bring their idea to fruition. His solution enhances capability for rollback or restore, and minimizes rework if the software baseline requires modification.
"John set up the environment that allowed us to virtualize all the test systems and create automated tests that can almost run independently," Noel said. "The computerized test is doing the exact same thing a person does during the manual test."
On average, it took two employees four hours each to enter keystrokes and verify the test was conducted according to the manual. The manual consists of more than 40 pages of step-by-step instruction that directs an employee to perform simple tasks.
"The automated process will never miss steps or mistype something or click and drag the wrong items onto the page," Medwetz said. "It may take 30 minutes to run, but it only takes a mouse click to start, then the employee could focus on something else. Hopefully, in the future there will be a web interface where the quality assurance specialist can log in from their computer to monitor and sign off on the test."
This just the beginning, added Medwez, the team is looking forward to automating more testing procedures.
With this technology, the team can create and destroy virtual machines on a whim, according to Noel. He noted that it's possible to stand up an entire weapon system, load patches, functionally test it and then tear it all down and start over again.
"Within the virtual environment it is so much easier to stand up machines and make changes than it is to work on pieces of equipment or components," Kostiak said. "Plus, we have access to every variation of the project stored in the cloud if we want to revert to an earlier stage."
Kostiak, Noel and Medwetz have applied a combined 21 years of depot experience to achieve their goal of introducing automation to software sustainment initiatives to improve warfighter readiness.
"Leadership provided the environment for us to succeed," Noel said. "Their support helped us turn this concept into a reality. The plan is to continue automating processes to save customers money and streamline time consuming processes."
Tobyhanna Army Depot is a recognized leader in providing world-class logistics support for command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance systems across the Department of Defense. Tobyhanna's Corporate Philosophy, dedicated work force and electronics expertise ensure the depot is the Joint C4ISR provider of choice for all branches of the Armed Forces and industry partners.
Tobyhanna's unparalleled capabilities include full-spectrum logistics support for sustainment, overhaul and repair, fabrication and manufacturing, engineering design and development, systems integration, post production software support, technology insertion, modification, foreign military sales and global field support to our Joint Warfighters.
About 3,200 personnel are employed at Tobyhanna, which is located in the Pocono Mountains of northeastern Pennsylvania. Tobyhanna Army Depot is part of the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command. Headquartered at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, the command's mission is to research, develop, acquire, field and sustain communications, command, control computer, intelligence, electronic warfare and sensors capabilities for the Armed Forces.
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