The second-year bachelor of information technology students are designing a new way for the Catlins group's incident management team and management support team to communicate.
The LandSAR crew uses a ''cumbersome'' IMan program, where communication between the team that plans the operation and those who issue their directives to the radio crews controlling teams in the field ''looks like a spreadsheet rather than a conversation,'' student Ben Hormann said.
But one of the spin-offs from the design they are pursuing has the search and rescue outfit quite pleased.
When Leah Barron, Malcolm Landreth and Fraser Morris from Catlins LandSAR approached the institute they told students they needed to replace their current program, because it had a ''cluttered interface'' with too many options.
Volunteers who are not familiar with the program easily ''get lost''. The student team of Mr Hormann, Nikita Gorr, Jon Dunning and Paddy Wu believe their approach, where conversations look similar to text-messaging, is user-friendly enough for even the most inexperienced volunteer.
The prototype messaging system brought to Owaka this weekend had the Catlins crew pleased.
''If they're given a task, somebody off the street with keyboard skills could sit down and feel comfortable within five minutes,'' Mr Landreth said.
But the students were also told it had to be ''dependable'', and it had to be ''able to be expanded to 100 machines'' on any given search.
For that reason the students opted for a web-based application rather than the current local application.
Senior Constable Murray Hewitson, of Owaka, said this would allow specialists to assist in searches when those planning a search are hitting dead ends, or running out of time.
People who are not directly involved in the search could be given remote access to the ''conversation'' between the incident management team and the management support team to offer their assistance in the search.
By this time next year, the students said, they should have a robust replacement for the IMan program.
One that will be able to create an inventory of people and other resources involved in the search, manage the teams and allow for an intuitive approach to communication for the search and rescue crew.
By Hamish McLean.
