Using tens of thousands of dollars of his own money, a U.S. Army soldier has created the world's first iPhone app for use on the battlefield.
Coming to the Apple App Store next month is Tactical Nav, an app that helps soldiers in combat map and survey battlegrounds, and then relay those coordinates to comrades. US Army Captain Jonathan J. Springer said the idea for Tactical Nav came to him in a dream in July 2010, and he's since sunk $26,000 of his own money into the app's development. With the help of a team of programmers, Springer's dream is now a reality, and he hopes Tactical Nav can become an important, useful tool for soldiers around the world.
"Since day one, I always believed that smartphones could be utilized by the US military for combat purposes," Springer told the New York Post. "The issue was the fact that these smartphones were being untapped by the army and I was motivated and determined to change that, even if it cost me my own money out of pocket to do so."
Say what you will about the wars in the Middle East; Johnson is on the ground over there, and he's using emerging technologies to aid himself and his compatriots, whose lives are in constant danger. You can't argue with self-reliance.
photo (cc) via Flickr user U.S. Army
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