"Military tech hothouse DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] have announced that they would like some apps written for the iPhone or for handsets running Google's Android OS - 'with potential relevance to the military specifically and the national security community more generally,'" Lewis Page reports for The Register.

In today's military, handheld systems are characterized by a tight integration of specialized hardware with a narrowly focused software suite. Most of the handheld devices are heavily optimized for a particular task and are ill-suited for general-purpose use. A soldier's radio, for example, has very limited data capability and essentially no multimedia capability. Current language translation devices support neither messaging nor collaboration of any form... A transformation in technical approaches and business processes is called for. - DARPA

Page reports, "But it won't be a transformation powered by Windows Mobile. DARPA specifies that "initial interest will focus on apps developed on the iPhone or Android platforms... Famously there are already apps for the iPhone which can make ballistic calculations for a sniper. Other existing software which would obviously help a soldier could include various kinds of navigation kit, user interfaces for remote drones - again, several of which are already on offer - and so on."

Full article here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader "Dirty Pierre le Punk" for the heads up.]