Developing m-Services: Lessons Learned from the Developers' Perspective

In recent years the Swedish Police Force (SPF) have encountered greater demands on availability and 24/7 services when dealing with errands that are regarded as low priority compared to regular police work, e.g. collecting tips from the public. One attempt to meet these increasing demands was the development of a mobile communications platform that allowed the public to communicate easily with the SPF using their own mobile phones by sending SMS and MMS. The focus of this paper is on the early phases of development of this m-service, in particular, on the specific technical issues such as interoperability and standards used by the actors on the scene affecting the development of mobile information systems. The learning experiences are as follows: First, mobile communication platforms have a large potential for contributing to the field of emergency management information systems since they can be based on open and nationally accepted standards. Second, global and national standards for sending multimedia messages are not always truly standardized. Operators and mobile phone manufacturers make minor alterations and interpretations of the standard and thereby some of the benefits found in standards disappear. Third, when developing mobile information systems we suggest and recommend that the analysis phase should be enhanced compared to traditional system development, and it should address the interoperability between mobile phones on one hand and operators on the other hand.