(Example 1) Department has 10 full time officers and processes about 100 cases per year. Those 100 cases produce about 500 items of evidence per year. A typical integration within a police department will consist of pushing data from a RMS type system to the Tracker system. This effectively cuts down on the amount of data that is being duplicated; entered into the Tracker system and the RMS system.

• 100 Cases Per Year.
• 5 Minutes per case (typing case and person data into the Tracker system).
• 500 Minutes per year spent entering duplicate data to Tracker
• Average cost of manpower is $30 per hour.
• Total = Department will spend $1,800 per year entering duplicate data.

Solution: If this department were considering a cost of $5,000 to integrate the system, it will take almost 4 years to realize any cost savings. You could make an argument either way to complete the integration but the cost savings will be a long term benefit.

(Example 2) Department has 300 full time officers and processes about 5,000 cases per year. Those 5,000 produce about 50,000 items of evidence per year.

• 5,000 Cases Per Year
• 5 Minutes per case typing case and person data to the Tracker system
• 25,000 Minutes per year spent entering duplicate data to Tracker
• Average cost of manpower is $30 per hour.
• Total = Department will spend $12,500 per year entering duplicate data.

Solution: If this department were considering the same $5,000 cost to integrate the system, then there would no question about it. This department would pay for the cost of integration within the first 6 months of implementation. Even if the integration cost were $10,000 you are easily going to save that money in the first year.

Why do I need integration

It's amazing how many people think they need to integrate systems just because it sounds like a neat idea. This guide was designed to help you consider the facts about data integration. Here are a few things that will help you determine whether or not you need to pursue integration:

1. The cost of doing an integration is less than the cost of not doing it.
2. There is a valid demand for the integration.
3. Integration will result in a significant time savings.
4. Other systems will greatly benefit from the data being shared.

Pushing or Pulling data

In almost 98% of all Tracker integrations, data is being pushed FROM another system TO our system. The Tracker system will then work with that copied or mirrored data. It is VERY rare to have data passed FROM Tracker TO another system. If another system will need the Tracker data for any reason, we prefer to open access to the data level and allow the other system to pull the necessary information.

What data is being pushed or pulled

You need to determine what data needs to be passed in each system and where that data will reside in the other system. In most cases that will be a simple Excel document or drawing that shows data in both systems and a line pointing to where that data will go. All data being pushed or pulled has to go somewhere!

How much data is being pushed or pulled and how often

This typically has little effect on the cost of an integration but it should be discussed. This will help in determining if there are any network issues to take in to account when building the integration.

What system is Tracker integrating with

This is typically the biggest hurdle in any integration. We have worked with vendors that are very pleasant to work with and we have unfortunately, had some people that were rather difficult or refused to help. It is a necessity that we have participation from the other vendor or designer in order to build the bridge for data to flow. In some cases, we have circumvented the vendor or designer all together, but this is NOT the ideal solution.

We have completed integrations with many systems in the past, however, there are no other systems that we integrate with out of the box. All integrations will require some level of setup and customization.

What is the architecture of the other system

We need to know as much as possible about the other system and how it was developed. Can data be pushed to or pulled from another database? If so, what type of database is it? Will we be doing a direct data push/pull OR will we be passing stored data through files, such as XML or other types?

Hosted Version of Tracker

We do not currently support integration with other systems through Tracker's hosted environment. All hosted sites are restricted to the tools that are available within the product.

Example

Over the years, we have done some basic integrations and some more advanced setups. Examples include:

• Police - Pulling case and person data from a RMS or similar system.
• User Admin - We routinely connect Tracker with Active Directory or other types of user authentication systems.
• Billing - Pulling data from our system to another in order to bill client for storage purposes.
• Comparison Data - Pulling information to run data comparisons in other system.