To second this ...


I wonder if cfast is using VFP ???

jp


>In June 1998 Mac Rubel wrote a very nice article in FoxPro Advisor entitled "U.S. Military's Secret Weapon". This was one of the most impressive descriptions of VFP technology ever published.
>
>Is now the time for someone to update the article and once again show the power of using VFP with other technologies? Seems like this type of positive use story on VFP would do a world of good. If the department of defense has invested this much time and money into VFP they are big believers in its use, power and future. Perhaps a new article could be coupled with the introduction of VFP 9 which is not too far away.
>
>Here is a March 2003 news article that briefly describes JFAST:
>
>http://www.wbir.com/News/news.asp?ID=11873
>
>
>"We basically moved the city of Atlanta and its infrastructure halfway around the world," explains Brian Jones, the Vice President of a Knox County company that helped coordinate the deployment of troops and supplies in Operation Iraqi Freedom.
>
>The computer system that got a city of soldiers, sailors, and all their supplies overseas is called JFAST -- the Joint Flow and Analysis System for Transportation. It was born at the Oak Ridge National Lab, and now a Knoxville company called DPRA owns it. DPRA is a Department of Defense contractor.
>
>"It models the movement of military units from their origin, like Fort Campbell," Jones explains, "all the way to their destination and ultimately their tactical assembly areas. If we're just moving a pile of 'stuff' it's easier. But this 'stuff' is rolling stock. We've got tanks, we've got trucks."
>
>The military decides who it needs to move, what they need to take and where they need to go. JFAST figures out the fastest, most efficient, most cost-effective way to get everyone, and everything there.
>
>The program takes into effect whether it's night or day, how close to capacity planes and ships are, even no fly zones, and it's not uniquely American. Coalition forces use it too.
>
>"It's hard enough to bring just US soldiers to any particular operation," explains DPRA's Chief of Information Systems. "But when you begin to bring coalition forces, they have different equipment, different policy, different procedures. Without having that overall view of what your deployment plan is going to look like, you are not able to effectively implement it."
>
>DPRA has people working at Central Command right now, monitoring Operation Iraqi Freedom on JFAST. This computer program means what used to take days, now takes minutes. Mundane planning maneuvers are left to machines, so officers can perform their art on the battlefield.
>
>"You can see evidence of things you are doing being used at the national level," explains DPRA Director of Operations Denis O'Keefe. "So it makes a difference. It's more than a paycheck. We all feel very good that we're doing something that helps the individual soldiers."
>
>O'Keefe, Alexander, and Jones are all former military, so they know what it used to be like to plan a deployment. They say JFAST makes it much faster, and they're working on a companion system called CFAST that'll make it even faster.
>
>JFAST will also help bring the troops home, when the war is over.