Common Extensible Architecture for Integrated Mission Systems (CEAMS)

Today"s Navy airborne mission platforms use computing systems that are stand-alone collections of hardware and software tied to specific programs and vendors. These stovepiped systems lack common data formats and cannot communicate with one another without substantial ad hoc interface engineering work. Cobbled together mission systems are badly fragmented, inflexible, and difficult to extend, adapt, upgrade, or reuse for other purposes. Charles River Analytics proposes to address this problem by designing and demonstrating a Common Extensible Architecture for Integrated Mission Systems (CEAMS), a service-oriented architecture (SOA)-based framework uniquely and specifically designed from the ground up to work in environments characterized by low communications bandwidth and poor connectivity. CEAMS uses a common metadata environment manager to provide common component communication, and a topic-based messaging system to regulate how applications interact with users and each other. It uses market-based optimization to prioritize messages using user-defined criteria and regulate overall system performance. The CEAMS framework supports system-wide communication between sensors, data sources, applications, and human users, enabling full interoperability between system components. It also supports modular, easily extensible business logic, enabling flexible system integration with both existing mission support tools and newer software supporting intelligent reasoning over the complete operational environment.