How to Make the Most of COTS Technologies July 2014

Transcription

1 How to Make the Most of COTS Technologies July 2014 Primary Contact Charlie Kawasaki CTO PacStar SW Sequoia Parkway #100 Portland, OR P : F : Executive Summary Today s communicators can deploy incredible communications power at the edge based on rapidly shrinking COTS software. However, the management complexity of these solutions is outpacing the availability of trained operators. PacStar IQ-Core Software addresses this issue through a unified approach and a simplification of use cases, designed specifically for the lightly trained communicator. Table of Contents Introduction... 2 Warfighter challenges with COTS complexity.. 2 Interoperability as a gating factor... 2 Technical complexity as a gating factor... 2 Availability of trained personnel as a gating factor 3 COTS adoption strategies... 4 The Solution: PacStar IQ-Core Software... 5 Powerful features assist advanced IT professionals... 6 IQ-Core Software is available to Programs, LSIs and OEMs for custom system development... 7 U.S. DoD Ready... 7 PacStar Proprietary Information Page 1 of 7

2 Introduction The rapid advance of communication/information technologies, driven in large part by the development of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions, offers the U.S. armed forces unprecedented opportunities to enhance situational awareness, decision superiority, and battlefield coordination. However, the ability of the military to effectively procure and utilize advanced technologies particularly in an increasingly budget constrained environment is negatively impacted by a handful of key factors that are in some cases delaying or wiping out the full benefits these technologies can deliver. Relative to custom-built hardware and software, COTS technology offers military organizations the potential to reduce costs and shrink the acquisition timeline. However, the integration and deployment of COTS technologies introduces several technical complexities. This paper examines these complexities; and puts forth a set of recommendations for consideration by defense systems integrators, developers of COTS technologies, and defense acquisition programs. Warfighter challenges with COTS complexity Programs supporting warfighters can pick from a vast array of technologies in order to better meet mission objectives. These technologies can provide capabilities such as unified communications, (IP-based voice, video, messaging, conferencing, etc.) as well as access to a vast array of C4ISR information all available via myriad device types such as PCs/laptops/tablets, smart phones, vehicle-mounted displays and digital radio handsets. In order to deliver advanced capabilities to warfighters in the field, today s networks must overcome unique limitations imposed by the austere environment in which warfighters operate. These constraints include lack of broadband voice/data infrastructure in-theater, and expensive, slow and unreliable WAN/satellite links. COTS technologies enable warfighters to overcome these limitations, but only if COTS deployment and integration complexities are addressed. Even for operations modest in size, organizations must deploy systems akin to mini-data-centers and mini-isps systems that are inherently complex. These complexities present several gating factors to success for enabling advanced capabilities for warfighters. Interoperability as a gating factor Successfully integrating best-of-breed COTS technologies into a comprehensive system capable of meeting mission requirements requires careful planning and testing and making tradeoffs by freezing technology sets into a baseline set that can be managed. The Army s tactical programs, for example, have made strong progress defining sets of technologies to be driven through their acquisition programs together. These capability sets help reduce the combinatorial growth of interoperability complexity by minimizing the change of the communications components included in a set of technologies. It also centralizes the integration and interoperability testing work, taking those burdens off of the operational units. Technical complexity as a gating factor To leverage COTS technologies, many warfighter programs create systems composed of hardware and software readily available and in use in enterprise IT/network systems. This approach is unquestionably the right one every day tens of thousands of engineers go to work adding many new features and capabilities that our warfighters can benefit from. However, this blended PacStar Proprietary Information Page 2 of 7

3 hardware/software approach has also introduced an unintended negative side effect for the operators (comms specialists/signal officers) in the field: a usability nightmare and an intractable learning curve. Approximately 80 percent of features added to COTS software/hardware systems are seldom or never used 1. PacStar engineers have encountered this usability conundrum first hand. In one instance, an integrated communications system included a firewall, wireless access point and encryption gateway; a router and switch; voice gateway; server with an IP UC manager; and user directory system; and a digitally monitored UPS. Each system component designed and manufactured by a different COTS vendor, and each with its own user interface and set of commands. The firewall component alone came with 5,000 pages of documentation, and required the operations staff to undertake multiple training programs. Moreover, this was just one of a suite of eight devices integrated into a single system. Availability of trained personnel as a gating factor An additional critical gating factor is the availability of capable, trained personnel. While integrated systems can be pre-configured to provide significant baseline capabilities, adapting such systems to rapidly changing situations in the field requires extensively trained signal officers. In addition to the downward budgetary pressure on today s armed forces, future network plans envision a dramatic expansion of the number of soldiers equipped with network access, with network management pushed down to a lower (and more populated) echelon. Combined, these trends will widen an already critical gap in the availability/supply of operators capable and trained in operating and managing these advanced systems a gap partially filled through reliance on expensive civilian contractors. It is possible to reduce the growing gap between a system s difficulty of use and the supply of available operators. Accomplishable through the adoption of new requirements in the system design/acquisition process, and through the adoption of a system architectural approach focused on simplifying user experience. This two-part approach, described below, can provide a significant impact on these issues while still providing the cost and innovation benefits of using COTS technology. As the capability set approach to system deployment continues to gain deserved popularity in the acquisition community, there is an opportunity to address the usability and training curve issues to substantially drive down operator-visible complexity. As a result, training requirements are reduced, along with the costs associated with supporting systems in the field. However, typical acquisition and evaluation programs have not included a focus on addressing these issues in the requirements definition phases. To address system usability from the process perspective, programs supporting the evaluation and acquisition of systems should consider the following additions: a) Detailed network/configuration usability requirements into system requirements, specifying a maximum number of user interfaces basic operators must train on to perform threshold level tasks. b) Detailed network setup/configuration use case definitions into system requirements, and specify maximum times/maximum times for users to complete key configuration tasks. 1 Jim Johnson of the Standish Group, Keynote Speech XP 2002 PacStar Proprietary Information Page 3 of 7

4 c) User representation in the development of requirements and use cases, and in ongoing integration and evaluation including test fielding and evaluation of training requirements. Because the rate of innovation from the commercial sector will only continue to increase, it is safe to assume that COTS-based systems will continue to be comprised of technology solutions from multiple vendors, with discrete user interfaces and configuration management processes. To meet complexity, training and setup-time objectives associated with COTS adoption, it is critical to adopt unified user interfaces designed and focused on implementing the program-specific use cases, while hiding seldom-used and unused features. Thus, programs reap the benefits of COTS technology inside while operators of systems benefit from a user-centric, integrated view of the system on the outside. The resulting solutions can be much more intuitive for operators to use, driving down training requirements. COTS adoption strategies To adopt COTS solutions from a systems perspective, acquisitions programs and their supporting integrators and OEMs should consider: a) Adopting use case and user-centric development principles. b) Including complexity-reduction in the core design of solutions, rather than as an afterthought. c) Hiding systems complexity under unified management software interfaces that expose only the features needed to implement use cases removing the 80 percent of feature bloat from the training and interoperability requirements. PacStar Proprietary Information Page 4 of 7

5 COTS solutions can typically be deployed via application software that integrates the view of systems from a management perspective and when restricted to critical use cases, can be delivered in relatively lightweight implementations. By making these types of capabilities available in the field, it enables systems support in the field by operators with little training in turn closing the gap between the complexity of the systems and the availability of capable operators. The Solution: PacStar IQ-Core Software PacStar, a leading developer and integrator of deployable communications systems, invested nearly 10 years of software engineering time in developing application software that solves the issues discussed above. With a high degree of collaboration between DoD communications programs, on the ground communicators and support specialists, PacStar developed solutions to many common issues routinely encountered incorporated into the widely deployed PacStar IQ- Core Software communications management platform. IQ-Core Software is a robust communications management software platform providing: An intuitive user interface making set-up and operation by non-technical personnel quick and easy to learn with significantly fewer mis-configuration errors. Powerful wizards and alerts with common user interfaces across all hardware and software components automating complex and routine tasks. PacStar Proprietary Information Page 5 of 7

6 Interoperability with a broad range of tactical and enterprise communications hardware and systems, enabling easy, consistent operation even with upgrade and replacement of system components. An extension of advanced IP-enabled unified communications (voice, video, data sharing, etc.) to the edge without any increase in complexity of operation. Vendor agnostic remote management with the ability to monitor, change device configurations and troubleshoot from anywhere in the world. Originally designed to meet the stringent demands of tactical and enterprise deployments for the US DoD, the National Guard, and state and local emergency responders, IQ-Core Software provides the following field-proven, key benefits: Technology optimized for the edge Unlike enterprise network management software packages that prove too complex for all but the most advanced IT personnel to configure and manage, PacStar developed IQ-Core Software which manages products and technology outside-in, creating an intuitive user experience for the user. A unified view Provides network monitoring and diagnostics in a unified interface with real-time snapshot of the health of the network, and ability to provide backup and restorations of entire network. Adapts to user level While IQ-Core Software is designed for non-specialists, it offers the flexibility and capabilities to meet the needs of advanced power users. For more advanced power users, IQ-Core Software provides command line access and automation from a single solution, enabling advanced IT professionals to complete tasks faster. Drives down costs Deploy Commercial off the Shelf (COTS) solutions and reduce the number of communication specialists required to stand up and manage communications equipment while minimizing the training required to operate equipment. Saves costs compared to pushing enterprise network management software down to edge operations. Enhances Ability to Meet Mission Objectives Reduces setup time allowing comms to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances. Improves uptime allowing personnel to focus on fighting the fight, not fighting the network. Vendor-agnostic interoperability Unlike many enterprise software solutions that only integrate with specific product families and lock customers into one path, IQ- Core Software integrates with a broad range of tactical and enterprise communications hardware and systems, enabling organizations to easily upgrade, replace, or reconfigure deployable systems. Powerful features assist advanced IT professionals In addition to providing ease-of-use capabilities for lightly-trained operators, advanced IT administrators benefit from IQ-Core Software s power as well. Through the integration of many devices into one unified view, IQ-Core Software saves time, hassle, and helps avoid misconfiguration by unifying access to network/communications device, and automating bulk/routine and repetitive tasks that are prone to error through typos or other moving too fast errors. Benefits for advanced IT professionals include: Automated configuration backup on configuration change, including configuration change comparison tools Bandwidth utilization graphs/reports, for troubleshooting 24 7 unattended, remote monitoring enabling systems to be fielded to harsh/austere environments without advanced IT professional in-field attendance PacStar Proprietary Information Page 6 of 7

7 Built in, advanced console/terminal with auto-login and integrated communications channels (reducing IA issues) Command-line scripting, enabling automation of repetitive tasks Unified SYSLOG receiver collecting alerts in a single location in the field, reducing bandwidth consumption Change audit log, enabling review of changes by entry-level operators IQ-Core Software is available to Programs, LSIs and OEMs for custom system development IQ-Core Software is designed to be tailored to most application-specific needs, including Unified Communications, mobile, satellite, video surveillance, and RoIP, using a wide variety of industry standard protocols. PacStar can quickly adapt IQ-Core Software to customer-specific systems or new OEM equipment, and can quickly create new wizards to meet customer-defined use cases. U.S. DoD Ready In addition to deployments around the world with commercial, homeland security and first responder organizations, PacStar has extensive experience meeting U.S. DoD certification, interoperability and information assurance (IA) requirements. IQ-Core Software has undergone extensive IA analysis and testing, and has thousands of copies deployed in the field. The result: warfighters can focus on fighting the battle on the field, instead of on the network. PacStar Proprietary Information Page 7 of 7