Dot21 Real-Time Systems - Typical Projects

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Area 3.6 - Software Engineering, Development, Programming and Network Support

When the Navy needed to deploy the AN/SPS-48E air search radar on at least fifteen new ships, they were faced with a major problem. The ADP (Auxiliary Data Processor) included in the AN/SPS-48E was based on obsolete computer processor boards and custom hardware - the parts to build fifteen new units were no longer available. The Virginia Beach Detachment of the NSWC (Naval Surface Warfare Center) PHD (Port Hueneme Division) selected Dot21 to upgrade the ADP.

The SPS-48E Radar ADP (Auxiliary Data Processor) upgrade was performed by Dot21 Real-Time Systems, Inc. as a subcontractor to Northrop Grumman under Navy Contract N63394-02-D-3106. Dot21 began by developing a new architecture for the ADP, which eliminated proprietary custom hardware interfaces in favor of mainstream COTS hardware. The existing software baseline was ported to the new hardware platform. Device drivers were developed for the new NTDS interface hardware and for a COTS-based high-speed I/Q data interface. The existing message oriented middleware was extended for use on local area networks and a Java version of this middleware was developed along with a modern graphical display for use by maintenance personnel. The graphical display incorporated the use of modern web-based technologies in its development. Several open source Java applications were employed, resulting in significant cost savings. In particular, Dot21 was able to leverage an open-source mapping application originally developed for the Department of Defense. A series of critical experiments were performed to verify the feasibility of using the mapping application. When the product was delivered to the Navy, the size of the total display application was 180,000 source lines of code: 90,000 were downloaded over the internet, cutting software development costs in half.

Dot21's defined software process was used throughout the design and development effort. This spiral development process offers opportunities for collaboration with the customer and software refactoring to improve product quality during each development stage. Software certification for this display was completed in July, 2004.

As a subcontractor to ITT Gilfillan on Navy Contract N00024-04-G-4301, Dot21 played a major role in defining an advanced computing architecture for the SPS-48G Radar digital signal processor. The proposed architecture achieves Navy Open Architecture Computer Environment (OACE) Category 3 compliance and identifies technologies and standards that can be applied to achieve the objectives of affordability, interoperability, availability, maintainability, and reduced life cycle costs. Dot21 performed benchmarks in key areas to verify the technologies could meet the performance requirements. Tradeoffs were performed in Non-Recurring Engineering (NRE) and life cycle costs to provide an optimal recommendation that brings enhanced war fighting capability in a cost effective manner.

Our work on the ADP upgrade and on the advanced computing architecture for the SPS-48G radar demonstrates Dot21's ability to technically support development of significant alterations to existing Navy surface ship combat systems to satisfy existing warfighting requirements. The successful deployment of the ADP upgrade validates our ability to systematically apply engineering processes to plan, design, code, test, integrate, and deliver high-quality software products resulting in significant cost savings to Navy programs.