A NEW ‘FACE’ FOR AVIATION ACQUISITION
customers, including government pro- gram managers, with assurance that the software is, in fact, reusable and portable in a FACE environment.
Adopting an open architecture based on a common set of standards promotes devel- opment of capabilities that can be reused across multiple platforms. Tis eliminates or greatly lessens design and development efforts and reduces integration timeline costs. It is also more efficient. If a base- line profile of the specific requirements of these common capabilities is created by analyzing the platform systems and subsystems, then specific software prod- ucts can be developed to target these common capabilities. Figure 2 illus- trates how some of these capabilities (situational
awareness, navigation and
communications) developed to meet the requirements of one or more of the FACE operating system segments can be reused across multiple aircraft platforms.
FIGURE 2
WHY THE CONSORTIUM APPROACH WORKS Adopting a standards-based open archi- tecture like the FACE approach can reduce nonrecurring engineering costs— those things that are paid for once during product development. Under the cur- rent acquisition process, each platform develops separate systems independently despite having the same requirement. Tat means each pays separately to develop an individual solution at a cost similar to the other platforms. Devel- oping one standard solution to employ across all platforms saves money by elim- inating the cost of producing separate, redundant systems. Figure 3 illustrates the reduction in cost that occurs when a software solution is developed once and used across all platforms. Tis sav- ings could be applied to other unfunded requirements, thus contributing to an overall increase in warfighter capability that otherwise would not occur.
A real-life example that illustrates the principles
behind that
the FACE Consor-
tium’s approach is the Federal Aviation Administration’s requirement
all
aircraft, including military and civilian, have Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B) technology. Tis new positioning surveillance technology is more advanced, using satellites to identify the position of an aircraft instead of the older radar-based tracking system.
ADS-B is composed of two parts: the ADS-B out, which broadcasts aircraft position-related information,
and the
ADS-B in, which receives information from ground control and other aircraft. Te position of an aircraft is identified by satellites, then the information is broad- cast to ground control and other aircraft via the ADS-B out. Information is then received by the ADS-B in.
Suppose platforms A and B are legacy systems and need to be fitted with an ADS-B out. Platform A has agreed to pay supplier A to develop and install an ADS-B out. Supplier A’s ADS-B out is tightly coupled with proprietary hard- ware and software on platform A, so it is more difficult and costly to add to other aircraft. Software that is tightly coupled tends to work in one system and usually requires significant reprogramming to work in another system, thereby reducing the capacity for integration.
USE ACROSS PLATFORMS
Capabilities developed for one FACE operating system segment can be reused across multiple aircraft platforms. (Source: The Open Group)
Platform B has contracted with supplier B for the development and installation of a different ADS-B out. Supplier B has aligned the components of ADS-B out with the FACE technical standard, meaning that key interfaces are used to allow information to be passed between existing software and hardware on the platform and the new ADS-B out. Supplier B’s ADS-B out has also been developed and tested, so the costs to fit it
34
Army AL&T Magazine
October-December 2017
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