Thread: DII(F) - Better or worse than the system you had?

There is always a lot of discussion about Defence IT and whether we are getting it right.

No-one ever believes the consortium that is delivering as the cynical chip kicks in and no-one believes what comes out of Whitehall. So I am actually interested to know whether the real end user is deriving benefit, getting an improvement in capability or just the same as before.

Before the alarm bells go off, yes I work for 'that' consortium and I believe that here is an untapped resource of real time information about performance.

Pse feel free to discuss or PM me.

Originally Posted by mysteron

There is always a lot of discussion about Defence IT and whether we are getting it right.

No-one ever believes the consortium that is delivering as the cynical chip kicks in and no-one believes what comes out of Whitehall. So I am actually interested to know whether the real end user is deriving benefit, getting an improvement in capability or just the same as before.

Before the alarm bells go off, yes I work for 'that' consortium and I believe that here is an untapped resource of real time information about performance.

Pse feel free to discuss or PM me.

You might want to wait a while mate. Give yourselves more time to get the system on the ground and for it to bed in with the people who use it.

I guarantee if you wait 6 months the results from the poll would be different.

Boney

Still got DII(C). Too slow, and not used probably by the Regt. Plus all of the terminals are allocated to Sp sqn - the Troops don't even have them.

All army applications - JPA/JAMES/UNICOM run on DII. If we don't have any machines, then how can we access these applications?

My opinion - leaders in IT my arse. The IT systems are at best an embarrassment and at worst impossible to get hold of.

CH

Who was responsible for the distribution of the machines? Who specified that the Sp sqn required all the machines while the troops don't? Did ATLAS decide this themselves, or did someone from the customer side do it?

Originally Posted by TA_sig

Who was responsible for the distribution of the machines? Who specified that the Sp sqn required all the machines while the troops don't? Did ATLAS decide this themselves, or did someone from the customer side do it?

However much Atlas like to tell you your business need, you will have a local DII/F POC who is responsible for the unit DII planning. He cant do too much about numbers of UAD's you get, but he can do alot about where they go. Dependent of how much DII cabling infrastructure you've got - and how much ATLAS will put in for you.

Some people are better at fighting their corner than others, thats becoming obvious in the F roleout - but if the bloke planning it for you has treated it as a bone job and put no effort in, the results will be obvious to you.

Originally Posted by TA_sig

Who was responsible for the distribution of the machines? Who specified that the Sp sqn required all the machines while the troops don't? Did ATLAS decide this themselves, or did someone from the customer side do it?

Believe it or not it's the customer, or at least someone at Brigade level who is given a scaling ie 100 troops = 10 UAD's. Then the bun fight starts, Atlas are given a location for each UAD and plan accordingly.
Someone moves office at the unit or throws teddy in the corner because the haven't a UAD to play Solitaire on, New meeting, new plan, Atlas charge money for changing the MEP and go away to re plan the install.
A few weeks later, new officer joins the unit, can't play Solitaire.................. you get the drift

Originally Posted by ChickenHeart

Still got DII(C). Too slow, and not used probably by the Regt. Plus all of the terminals are allocated to Sp sqn - the Troops don't even have them.

All army applications - JPA/JAMES/UNICOM run on DII. If we don't have any machines, then how can we access these applications?

My opinion - leaders in IT my arse. The IT systems are at best an embarrassment and at worst impossible to get hold of.

CH

HQ LAND determine the scalings per unit, the unit determines to whom these will be allocated.

Can't report on the performance of (F) but I believe that it will finally deliver a semblance of IS coherence across Defence.

What does concern me, however, is the seeming inability of ATLAS to produce a coherent roll-out plan. In fact any roll out plan at all would be welcome, instead of the current piecemeal sticking plaster strategy that seems to be the accepted way of doing business.

Top tip - synchronise the roll-out with the OCP, you'll find life gets a whole lot easier.

PAW

Originally Posted by pombsen-armchair-warrior

What does concern me, however, is the seeming inability of ATLAS to produce a coherent roll-out plan.

I take it you havent seen their glossy about the "proven" 48 week roll out plan then. In my last job, and seeing it slip right by 60 weeks, i had little faith in the "proven" aspect of the plan.

I await the Atlas reply about MOD moving the goalposts with baited breath.

Beleive me lads, ATLAS is a farce, particulary the leaders, EDS. Amatuerish, dis-organised and incapable.
Yesterdays comms. Tomorrow

WIth regards to the locations though, that should be down to the unit, ATLAS do put them where they are told

Slipping only sixty weeks? You might want to take a look at a few of the Navy sites Boney. Slippage there is now well over 100 weeks and still galloping to the right.
In order to keep the contract Atlas have to deliver the UAD's agreed for increment 1. The only way they can achieve this is a bulk roll out at one site, so Abbeywood was moved to increment 1 in April with a first user live date August 1st and over 7000 UAD's rolled out before Xmas. This will meet the contractual target, rather that actually delivering the small number of UAD's to a large number of small sites actually awarded as part of the increment 1 contract. In short the people who actually have no RLI connectivity still have nothing and an existing working system is replaced and no doubt hailed a great success!

Spin springs to mind.

Originally Posted by Baldrick66

Spin springs to mind.

Absolutely. It would be interesting to see a statistic about how this is impacting JPA accessibility. But i doubt there are any statictics.

Originally Posted by boney_m

Originally Posted by Baldrick66

Spin springs to mind.

Absolutely. It would be interesting to see a statistic about how this is impacting JPA accessibility. But i doubt there are any statictics.

Well on another project, the Polar bear bde seems to have migrated to the new app fine, part of ATLAS recommended the largest garrison in London and 145 Bde areas to not migrate over (but it did). Had it first cancellation this week, another London & SE barracks still had 3rd world ICS provision.

Strangely this part of ATLAS decided to only put Terminal Services servers onto DII(F) with the remainder of the system out of the DII(F) arena.

Started to read the DII(F) application developers guide last week - gave up and suggested the approach above.

Originally Posted by polar

Originally Posted by boney_m

Originally Posted by Baldrick66

Spin springs to mind.

Absolutely. It would be interesting to see a statistic about how this is impacting JPA accessibility. But i doubt there are any statictics.

Well on another project, the Polar bear bde seems to have migrated to the new app fine, part of ATLAS recommended the largest garrison in London and 145 Bde areas to not migrate over (but it did). Had it first cancellation this week, another London & SE barracks still had 3rd world ICS provision.

Strangely this part of ATLAS decided to only put Terminal Services servers onto DII(F) with the remainder of the system out of the DII(F) arena.

Started to read the DII(F) application developers guide last week - gave up and suggested the approach above.

Polar, you on the gin again? That post is hard to grasp mate. Kind of like Atlas and a delivery schedule, you know what i mean.

Originally Posted by boney_m

Polar, you on the gin again? That post is hard to grasp mate. Kind of like Atlas and a delivery schedule, you know what i mean.

Sorry been ATLAS'd, coherent posts are no longer possible. Work colleagues accuse me of being assimilated, whats wrong with 'reaching in'.

Watch out for the flexible working debacle. If you are offered a DII(C) laptop be aware there are currently two types. One designed to be lugged around to any DII MOD establishment and married to a touchdown point (EDS version) or the other type which allows you access the the MOD intranet through a 3G card (Fujitsu version). In fairness the EDS version also has a 3G card, just dosen't work. Been told the DII(F) ones will work ok. Believe what you will.

The C in DII(C) stands for CRAP, any suggestions what the F in DII(F) stand for?