Ensuring Software Performance within Large-Scale Undersea Combat Systems
Christine Moreira, Kevin Mattos, Mark Zingarelli, Morgan Bailey and Denis Coffey, PhD
The 17th IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering (ISSRE 2006) -- Government Track
Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, 7-10 November 2006
Abstract
The software within Undersea Combat Non Propulsion Electronics Systems (NPES) has been transformed from a single centralized computer system to a system that is comprised of multiple software strings, distributed processing and multiple local area networks. Systems currently consist of various operating systems developed by multiple vendors. The utilization and integration of these complex software intensive systems result in many software errors of various types. System performance requirements often do not distinguish between software error types. An argument is made that it is essential to isolate and categorize software errors to improve system performance. Undersea Warfare system requirements have been restructured to categorize software errors. This process includes incorporating the following key metrics: Mean Time Between Error (MTBE), Mean Corrective Maintenance Time (MCMT), and Maximum Corrective Maintenance Time (MaxCMT). These metrics are interrelated and are evaluated concurrently in order to control software errors in the delivered software and increase system performance.