Collaboration Opportunities in System Interoperability and Dependability
Interoperability
System-of-Systems Practices from an Organizational Perspective
Organizational involvement in complex systems of systems requires more emphasis on effective collaboration across organizations and response to dynamic customer demands. The SEI is developing a set of principles, practices, and tools that enable organizations to adapt to this increasingly complex world. Examples of tools we are exploring include
- scenario-based interoperability analysis
- alignment analyses
- supply and demand context modeling
We are looking for partners in the development of those and other tools and practices. The SEI is also interested in case studies and lessons learned from organizations that have successfully implemented system-of-systems practices.
System-of-Systems Practices from an Acquisition Perspective
The SEI is looking for collaborating organizations to pilot new approaches for acquiring highly complex systems of systems. The successful acquisition of systems of systems that will be interoperable requires (1) the application of practices that proactively address legal issues, policies, procedures, and culture governing or influencing acquisition; (2) shared knowledge about schedule, cost, risk, and performance; and (3) use of effective tools and models for specification, reasoning, and execution of relevant acquisition practices. The SEI is interested in partnering with organizations that are embarking on an interoperable acquisition or that have successfully completed one to help refine our ideas and test concepts and potential products.
System-of-Systems Practices from an Engineering Perspective
The SEI is looking for collaborating organizations to explore practices that lead to successful construction and execution of systems of systems. The successful development of complex systems of systems requires a new set of concepts, a revised set of life-cycle activities, attention to the role of emergence, and the application of a different set of technologies and techniques. The SEI is seeking partners who are developing or applying new strategies embodied in practices for system-of-systems engineering.
Cost Drivers and Risks of Interoperability
The SEI seeks partners to develop and use methods for modeling, tracking, and measuring the costs and risks associated with the acquisition and development of interoperable systems of systems. The SEI is investigating how interoperability risks vary in successful and unsuccessful systems-of-systems efforts and correlating those patterns of risk to performance measures such as cost and schedule.
SOA Research Agenda
The SEI seeks collaborators to (1) evolve a long-term research agenda for SOA that was initially developed in 2007; (2) participate with an international community of interest that is carrying out parts of the research agenda; and (3) carry out parts of the research agenda and disseminate the results through the international community of interest.
Network-Centric Operations
The SEI is investigating ways to develop and acquire systems of systems that operate in a network-centric way. The SEI is seeking defense organizations tasked to develop systems that feature a collaborative network-in infrastructure and that will be assembled dynamically as dictated by evolving mission needs. The SEI is also looking for industrial collaborators desiring to be connected to all entities that form its supply chain—from suppliers of raw materials to consumers.
Performance and Dependability
Predictive Modeling
The SEI seeks collaborative research with organizations applying predictive modeling techniques to operational quality attributes such as performance, security, reliability, and safety criticality in real-time and embedded systems. The techniques are part of a model-based approach to software engineering and include the use of models for predicting system behavior and improving system performance before code is written.
Assurance Cases for Systems of Systems
Assuring the safety, security, or reliability of a system of systems is quite difficult. Test-based assurance approaches are insufficient to demonstrate adequately that dependability requirements have been met. Systems of systems present special assurance difficulties not only because of their size, complexity, and continuing evolution but also because they can exhibit undesired emergent behavior—that is, unanticipated component interactions that impair safety, security, or reliable operation. The SEI seeks system-of-systems collaborators to investigate new assurance approaches for reaching sound conclusions about system of systems safety, security, and reliability.
Fault Containment
The SEI seeks partners to pilot approaches for discovering why system-level failures still occur despite the use of fault tolerance techniques and fault containment strategies. The SEI has identified system-wide design rules that must be satisfied to limit propagation of seemingly minor faults throughout a system. The SEI has also developed a formalized analysis framework for system fault containment and stability management.
Advanced Processor Performance
The SEI is developing engineering-based solutions to make efficient use of advanced processor hardware architectures without sacrificing predictable execution times. The SEI model-based engineering team is seeking organizations to pilot approaches to reducing worst-case execution time and avoiding execution time variation due to cache/pipeline.
Data Management for Distributed Systems
The SEI seeks collaborating organizations that are dissatisfied with the task-centric methodologies for designing real-time systems to pilot the use of a data-centric framework. The SEI model-based engineering team advocates that data needs must be explicitly modeled early in the development process.
Mission Success
Mission Success Management Framework
The SEI is developing a framework for managing risk and opportunity within an enterprise and across multi-enterprise missions. This framework extends the traditional view of risk management and will be the basis for mission success research and development activities. This includes addressing gaps in traditional risk management approaches; developing a means of aligning risk management activities within an enterprise; and developing methods, tools, and techniques for managing a mission’s potential for success across the life cycle and supply chain. The SEI seeks partners to assist in developing and testing the framework.
Mission Success Management Methods, Tools, and Techniques
The SEI seeks collaborators to co-develop risk-based methods, tools, and techniques specific to organizational missions and consistent with the principles of SEI MOSAIC. Organizations will be able to evaluate and manage the potential for successful missions using innovative, risk-based methods, tools, and techniques. Such collaboration allows organizations to gain early access to SEI research, create organization-specific methods, and participate in advancing the state of the practice for risk management and mission success.The SEI combines focused research in cooperating and consulting relationships with a mandate to directly transition technology into practice.