Defense Science Board Task Force on Embedded Computer Resources (ECR) Acquisition and Management.
Abstract
Enclosed is the final report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Embedded Computer Resources (ECR) Acquisition and Management. Most of our attention was absorbed by the question of whether the Department should adopt a policy of standardizing the so-called Instruction Set Architectures (ISAs) of militarized computers. This issue has been hotly debated in many forums and was a principal motivation for the establishment of the Task Force. Much of the controversy here is because of the natural differences between producers and consumers. We looked very carefully at the needs and points of view of both sides of this question. Our conclusion is that the needs of the Department for battlefield survivability and sustainability are paramount. We found that limiting ISA choice to a few is a big help in meeting those needs. Individual companies do precisely this for economic reasons; DoD must adopt this approach if there is to be any possibility of capping the exploding logistics and software costs. Language standardization is not sufficient by itself, as many claim. We recommend that proposed DoD Instruction 5000.5x be issued immediately. There are programs under way in each of the Military Departments which implement 5000.5X. We recommend that those programs proceed with some relatively minor changes. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Nov 01, 1982
- Accession Number
- ADA125519
Entities
Organizations
- Defense Science Board