As an aside, would it not be handy to have a mirror/staff account/etc, just so that we can familiarise ourselves with it in order to explain it to cadets?
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That would help me as well, or a âsandpitâ area?
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Will the cadets have access to ACPs, ACTOs, AP1358C etc?
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Hurrah! Thatâs one person on-side 
Cadets will only see event-related documents/attachments that you specify and which documents they see or not is completely up to you. It will all make sense, promise!
The only thing a cadet will see is their own personal record and the names of cadets who have signed up for the different events on each individual event page (just like with an events list on a noticeboard in the Sqn HQ) - they will not see anything else or nor do they need to.
I hope we donât disappoint - and I donât think we will 
It may well be but we havenât got that far yet - and I agree with the logic and you are not the first person to suggest this.
The process is that we are building MVP at the moment. Once we have achieved that, Cadet Portal will be penetration tested and we will then (likely) have some corrective actions to take.
We will be taking the project to the Command Board to demonstrate what we have done and seek permission to carry on with a controlled beta testing phase, corrective action/continuous improvement following Command Board comment and then a phased deployment.
However, there are some projects that need to be completed before we are able to move to a Corps-wide deployment - like the SharePoint migration for instance. Office 365 had to be there before we could even start etc etc.
Yes is the simple answer - and the plan is that they will have access to the correct version from SharePoint so if the source TG21 is updated, they will be accessing the correct up to date version.
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How long is it expected to take to complete it?
I am not going to answer that one - there are too many complexities to provide a useful response and I donât want to raise expectations and, worst case, fail to meet them.
What I will say is that it is a software development project and things donât always go to plan.
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James
Will you be looking for Cadets to beta test in due course? I know some whoâd be interested.
As regards the idea itself - Iâve been asked by Cadets if something like this would be possible. So yes fully in favour.
I think this is a perfect step forward. After all, this might hopefully reduce the admin burden even further! There are too many negative people when they donât even know how this will turn out yet. Seeing as the world now is online this, online that then I think this will appeal very much to the Cadets.
James - will there be a function for cadets to request events?
Will there be a facility to complete TG21/23 online before an event? Will there also be push notifications to remind cadets etc?
Yes, but not yet!
Excellent news and good to hear.
This project is a key component of the Valuing Our Volunteers workstream and the intention is that it will streamline some of the local processes and procedures at a unit level. However, as each cadets record is fed by SMS, if SMS is poorly maintained, then that will directly impact the cadets experience of Cadet Portal. What is highly likely to happen is that cadets come to the office proactively to ask why a certain qualification or promotion has not been added to their recordâŚjust one to consider there.
We are not hiding from the fact that there will be an increased importance placed on SMS data quality and the âcustomerâ (if the cadets are in fact the customer of the ATC, which I would argue they are) may well be displeased if the adult staff are not playing their part.
HummmâŚnot one we have considered yet but we are only in the development stage of the initial Minimum Viable Product (MVP). If you drop me a PM with how you envisage this working, we can discuss on there or feel free to email me directly.
My initial reaction would be âcould they not just ask you for an event or activityâ? Or emailâŚor ask on final paradeâŚor ask their Cadet NCO team to bring it up with the staff etc etcâŚ
Not in MVP but there is no reason that kind of facility couldnât be offered in a future version. I have made a note on the potential features list for the future iteration of Cadet Portal after MVP (Case ID 236 - if you quote that number to me, I will be able to track it). Great suggestion!
That is the intention but probably not in MVP. Since this project is completely official and authorised, we are legitimately able to make use of the cadets e-mail address for notification and I can anticipate some kind of notifications page ala Facebook which tell them various things. Again, it is very much on the radar/roadmap for a future version Case number 237 for that one.
(I appreciate the generic âpossibly in a future versionâ comment is well used and often not followed through, but we are carefully tracking all of the potential new features that people suggest to us and it isnât just written on a post-it note somewhere!).
Also, please bear in mind that we are a small volunteer team and we all have the same pressures that you do. We would love to be able to do this project full time but we have to work, pay the mortgage, look after the family, do our other ATC duties and deliver this as well, so we are not always as quick as we would like to be!
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Thanks for the detailed reply, it seems a great concept and wish you and your team all the best to make this work.
What is your direct email address? I can ask around my squadron and wing to email you with any suggestions or if they are willing to help
No worries and see PMs for email.
I must admit I do have my reservations about this cadet portal. Having recently talked to ATF staff about the implementation of this and what they have planned cadets will be able to do on there, I just see the OC/Adj having to do just as much, if not more to rectify mistakes cadets make!
I am interested to hear this as we have not directly briefed ATF staff on what the Cadet Portal will and will not do - leave it with me and appreciate the feedback.
They were only speaking of what they had heard through the grapevines. Tbf it was not a negative impression they gave, but I just have a few concerns about the idea
No worries - if you PM me with any specific concerns, I will be happy to answer where I can.
Lurking forever and finally pulled in!
I think it is a great idea to utilise the wider skills of any CFAV willing to lend it. Yes development attracts good money so to do anything for free might seem mad and similarly yes many CFAVs generally do what we do to provide some sort of life balance against the day job. But If there is someone out there willing and able then more power to them.
@james_elliott I am going to presume that we work in the same field given your language and I know that if you work high enough up you know the challenges that face you in terms of finding the right person who can offset contractual obligations to their employer around their skill set, the requirement to do it for free (or use VA at the sacrifice of using it for their squadron/sections activities) and being able to get them to HQRAFAC when required - and that is before even getting to the nitty gritty of developing your agile MVP.
I donât envy you the task, but wish you the best all the same!
We had lunch with some old friends at the weekend and the wife is, among her jobs, an administrator of a parent and pupil portal at her school and had spent last week âtidying upâ before the start this week. She said they have it because apparently people wanted it, but in the 6 years theyâve had it she said only 5% of parents have ever looked at it for more than online payments and only last year because they started putting homework on, had more than 2% of all pupils looked at it. So while this is probably an interesting project for those looking to undertake it, is there a real need, Iâve never heard a cadet say they wanted anything like this. Is this a tech solution to solve a problem that doesnât exist or provide something that no one knows they need. Which is like a lot of apps.
TBH many people only used Bader because of teddy throwing at HQAC.
Iâve known more people have a less positive view or working at HQAC, as they are the enthusiastic, dynamic get things done types and as they said HQAC isnât that sort of environment, as they found HQAC arenât really in control of things like weâd like to imagine.
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@virgil I agree completely, and it would be interesting to see how a full software development project is managed in the voluntary sector when everyone(?) involved is volunteers, and so the budget/time restraints are very different than in the (non-commercial) industry I work in. I have actually done a lot of volunteer coding in the past (various websites for various organisations, Sqns, etc) and wouldnât have been opposed to helping @james_elliott with this, but .NET is the one set of languages I have never used (if it had been java, python, php, perl, R, Matlab, any SQL dialect (including pl/sql, pl/python, etcâŚ), graph databases etc etc etc then I could probably have been of more use!), and I was slightly put off by the more lengthy application process, more so than for most actual jobs Iâve had(!) - although I can understand why theyâve managed it like this.