{"id":364082,"date":"2017-10-22T17:38:14","date_gmt":"2017-10-22T17:38:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=364082"},"modified":"2017-10-22T17:38:14","modified_gmt":"2017-10-22T17:38:14","slug":"digital-address-system-amateurish-not-new-franklin-cudjoe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/10\/digital-address-system-amateurish-not-new-franklin-cudjoe\/","title":{"rendered":"Digital address system amateurish, not new – Franklin Cudjoe"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
President of policy think tank, IMANI Ghana, Franklin Cudjoe, has said the country\u2019s digital address system is not\u00a0 novel, contrary to what government is trying to make Ghanaians believe.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia<\/a>,\u00a0<\/strong><\/span>had prior to the launch of the system, showered it with a lot of accolades saying it surpasses the ones used in the United States and the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n

But Franklin Cudjoe thinks otherwise.<\/p>\n

[contextly_sidebar id=”wrKSa4KUlecIIqrGEHgvBEClwryu637S”]To him, some of the data-sets being used by the app had long existed. He also raised issues with the integrity of the app with regards to security.<\/p>\n

A data-set is a collection of related sets of information, composed of separate elements, and can be manipulated as a unit by a computer.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo think that these basic mistakes are coming on the back of an app that has obviously been touted as something novel, the point really is that, it isn\u2019t particularly novel given that it\u2019s using engines that already exist. It\u2019s just a location sharing thing. To think that you can call it innovative when basically you can input anything to generate any type of address is for me just not on. And I think that the developers should have taken time to deal with these basic challenges. These are not technologically challenging challenges at all, they are too basic,\u201d Franklin Cudjoe argued on Citi FM<\/strong>\u2019s news analysis programme, The Big Issue<\/strong> on Saturday.<\/p>\n

President Akufo-Addo last Wednesday launched<\/strong><\/a><\/span> the National Digital Property Addressing System, also known as the Ghana Post GPS in Accra, aimed at providing an effective means of addressing every location and place in the country, using an information technology application.<\/p>\n

The app has been criticized by some experts in the technology space.<\/p>\n

Franklin Cudjoe, who has been a major critic of the app, had claimed that it might have been copied from existing applications.<\/p>\n

He clarified that \u201cthe part about copying was not to suggest that they did something illegal \u2013 the point is that, location address using satellites or maps are not necessarily that new.\u201d<\/p>\n

Address generation bit amateurish <\/strong><\/p>\n

The policy think tank boss also described the address generation part of the app as amateurish, and not well thought through.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve read quite a number of reviews by industry watchers, and some of the comments they\u2019ve made are not necessarily helpful \u2013 to think that you could input just any data and generate an address in itself sounds amateurish. There are basic web portals where you input any kind of data it could reject it, especially when you are filling forms. And to hear that obviously, that it is something with this app is quite troubling,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Hosting of app problematic <\/strong><\/p>\n

IMANI Ghana\u2019s president also complained about suggestions that the app is being hosted outside the borders of Ghana.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople have also talked about the hosting of this app. Some are saying it\u2019s being hosted by Amazon and data protection issues are being raised.\u201d<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

By: Godwin Akweiteh Allotey\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana
\nFollow @AlloteyGodwin<\/a>
\n