• Purchase an Android device with NFC capabilities. Our electronic security tour system uses various technologies, one of which is NFC, or "Near Field Communication" which is a protocol allowing cell phones to communicate with other devices (you may be familiar with Android Pay). Once you've narrowed down your search for a cell phone to use with SOVA, before buying, be sure to review your chosen phone here and here to ensure it can read NFC. It's best to check a few different sources for this information because you might find conflicting spec sheets if for example you do research on the various carrier websites (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint, Cricket, etc.). This is because adding an NFC chip to a phone is sometimes carrier dependent meaning that one carriers phone may have NFC and the exact phone from a different carrier may not. If you encounter any issues like this, or would like us to review a device for you, shoot us an email and we will look into your selected device to ensure it will work with SOVA. When you finally decide, it's a good idea to purchase locally and from a reputable company, so if you find that your selected phone does not have the capacity to scan NFC, then you can exchange it promptly for another model.
  
• Remove your device from the box, install the battery (if necessary) and power the device on.
  
• Allow the device to go through it's startup sequence, which may require you to accept licensing agreements for the manufacturer and/or Android.
  
• Connect to WiFi. This could be a temporary WiFi access point, or the access point setup at your company to run SOVA. Depending on your network setup, you might need to supply your IT Department with the WiFi MAC address, the IMEI number, or both. This will allow them to "whitelist" the specific device, thus preventing you from having to repeatedly login to the access point (some timeout after 24 hours of access). Whitelisting a device can also prevent "throttling" or limiting data for the device for a better overall experience.
  
• Create a new Google account, or use the one that we may have already created for your business (we'll let you know if we've done this step already).
  
• Open Google Maps and accept policy.
  
• Open Chrome and accept policy.
  
• Allow Android time on WiFi to complete any required app or system updates. This could take several steps with the device rebooting several times automatically, depending on the operating system the devices have shipped with and the particular device itself.
  
• Set the desktop weather widget to your City and State
  
• Open the settings menu, and make these changes:
  

• Gestures - motion sensor calibration (lay device flat on a table for calibration)
  
• Location - turn on location services to allow accuracy by device sensors / GPS only. THis will help conserve the battery.
  

• Change your device name to something that uniquely identifies the device. To do that, open Settings on your phone (look for a gear icon at the top right), scroll to About and tap on it (in newer versions of Android, you might need to scroll to the right first and select the "General" tab, then scroll down to the About item to click it). On the resulting screen, tap on Phone Name. In the popup, type the desired name for your device in the text field and select Save.
  

• Download and install the two free apps listed below from the Play Store which are complimentary to SOVA (although not required). You can search for these app titles in the Play Store:
  

• TeamViewer QuickSupport - allows our support staff to perform remote troubleshooting to the device with your permission. You can make the support request from within the SOVA mobile application after calling us and setting up an appointment or submitting a help ticket. You will want to launch TeamViewer after installing as sometimes the app needs to download a small file to allow it to work with your chosen device. Better to do that now before you request support for the first time.
  
• SwiftKey - our preferred keyboard app for Android. Has a great predictive engine, so you type "IR" once (for incident report) and it will predict this for you next time. As the security industry has shorthand phrases that are often used in incident reports and in communicating generally between officers, it is good to have a keyboard that learns the language of security which can make your typing faster and more efficient the more you use it.
  

• Search for SOVA Guard Tracker in the Play Store and install.
  
• Once installation completes, launch SOVA by taping the SOVA icon on your mobile device (looks like an orange eye).
  
• Accept the SOVA software subscription agreement.
  
• Enter the Activation ID that you were provided. If you cannot find the email we sent with your activation ID, please send an email to support@sovasystems.com. Once we can validate that you are an authorized user, we will supply you with your activation ID. If you need it quicker, call us.
  
• After entering your activation ID and trying to proceed, a screen opens asking you to enter details about yourself and your device with a message that the device is not yet authorized for the chosen location. Simply complete the form and submit it.
  
• Open a support ticket to request that your newly added devices be provisioned to your property.
  
• Our support staff will respond and update your ticket to in process. This may take up to 24 hours. They may require additional information from you, and will communicate with you through the ticketing system. After we are finished provisioning your devices, we will reply to the ticket and mark it as closed. If you do not hear back from us within 24 hours of adding your ticket, please send an email to the support address above.
  
• Once you receive a reply to your ticket that the devices are provisioned and ready, enter your activation ID once more in your device (it should already be auto-filled).
  
• The device will sync data from the server and complete the final configurations automatically.
  
• Enter the default password for the Admin Dashboard and if this is a device replacement, verify that all data has successfully transferred by clicking the Tours or Tasks buttons, and reviewing the information there. If this is a new device, you can begin setting up your tours.