552nd ACNS holds DevJam innovation event

  • Published
  • By Maj. Edward Wilson Jr.
  • 552 Air Control Network Squadron

Team Dune claimed victory when 22 civilian and military programmers participated in an agile peer programming development competition, Development Jamboree, while  social distancing at Fannin Hall on Nov. 10. 

The event consisted of four development teams that planned, briefed, and executed agile development. They debriefed training and captured lessons learned utilizing a new agile software process in alignment with the Air Control Wing’s goal of bringing the future faster.

“The innovation and adaptive learning displayed by these young Scorpions is exactly what we need in the ACG, Wing, and Air Force,” said Col. Kenneth Voigt, 552nd Air Control Group commander. “They have demonstrated why it is important to empower to the lowest level…that is where creative problem solving happens.”

During the summer the Air Control Networks Squadron overhauled the software engineering processes and standardized key roles to transition a legacy “waterfall” software development process to a new Develop, Secure, and Operate environment. 

The new documents established future foundations for an agile process to accomplish programing and scripting lines of effort at a rapid rate. This initiative closed a ten-year process gap and modeled improvements found in the commercial development sector.

“The team members coded and collaborated during the recent ice storms, which added difficulty with power and internet access. Despite this teams overcame those issues with initiative and creativity.” said A1C Yura Sim, a software developer with the 552 ACNS. 

Similar to how aircraft maintainers host rodeos and flyers dog fight, Sim organized and lead the competition in similar fashion in an effort to condition and practice how we fight. Sim won the first ACNS DevJam in June and was coined by Voigt.