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forecast:
II. SUMMARY OF ISSUES
The Fundamental Issue: Reprise. How important is information manag
ment to OSSA's mission? The functions and objectives listed on page 2,
Chapter I, tend to imply a need for large and sophisticated data gather
ing, storing, and distributing capabilities. Indeed, the Committee under-
stood that NASA and OSSA already have considerable information management
capabilities, and that the requirements for considerably--greater capabiJi-
ties are destined to grow much larger. Even the combined impact of the
Challenger disaster and the forced budget reductions stemming from the
Gramm-RuUman-Hollings Act have served only to slow down the implementation
of NASA's and OSSA's plans; the planning goes on.
e-
-
One example is EOS. OSSA's EOS Data Pane] has made the following
"The EOS data and information system will be required to
handle daily more data than any system ever conceived. In
genera] terms, EOS wild produce several orders of magnitude more
data per day and is envisioned to have a duration exceeding any
mission ever before proposed." ... "Clearly, the operation of
an EOS data and information system will create management
problems of a magnitude that cannot even be fully appreciated -
this time by either NASA management or the scientific research
community who must cope with these data in their research."*
.
The Earth System Sciences Committee of the NASA Advisory Council has
emphasized the increasing interaction, interdependence, and synergism of
the Earth-science disciplines,** and asserted the following:
* Report of the Eos Data Pane] (Robert R. P. Chase, et-a1.), NASA
Technical Memorandum 87777, Volume ITa, 1986, p. 27.
** The Earth System Science disciplines include Atmospheric Physics and
Dynamics, Marine Biogeochemistry, Ocean Dynamics, the Stratosphere and
Mesosphere, Terrestrial Ecosystems, Terrestria1-Surface Moisture and
Energy Balance, and Tropospheric Chemistry.
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"Of paramount importance to the successs of Earth System
Science is an advanced information system that will promote
productive use of globe] data. The worldwide space and in situ
observations required for a deeper understanding of the Earth
System can be utilized only if the research community has effec-
tive access to them. The design, development, and management of
the requisite information system are tasks that approach, in
scope and complexity, the design, development, and operation of
space-based observing systems themselves." ... "Such an
information system is clearly a formidable undertaking, but it is
essential to the pursuit of Earth System Science."*
Evidence such as the foregoing tends to indicate that information
management is very important to the OSSA mission and will become even more
important as future science discipline programs emerge and undergo
development. The Committee has heard the Chairman of the Earth System
Sciences Committee and others say that the future success of NASA is tied
to the development of integrated, interdisciplinary, multi-task missions.
Future missions will become more complex and wild depend much more on
coordination and collaboration across the staff. The associated
information systems will be much more complex than their present-day
counterparts, which generally support single-discipline, single-task
missions in support of a single staff activity and which may not be
compatible with one another in software or protocols.
Introduction to Issue #1 - Centralization of Management Functions.
One might then ask whether OSSA's~existing information management o~rgani-
zation and processes can handle the tasks to be faced. The Committee
members felt intuitively, in the absence of definitive evidence to the
contrary, that the scope of future tasks is of such magnitude that they
would be beyond the capabilities of the existing organization and pro-
cesses. This presumption is based on the fo1 lowing:
The authority and responsibility for information systems manage-
ment is distributed among the ISO and the science directorates,
with most of the authority residing in the latter; however, none
of these activities is in charge of the overall effort, and the
Committee believes it to be essential that someone be placed in
charge.
The ISO in its present form is simply too small to handle by
itself the workload associated with the types of future missions
envisaged or to provide much in the way of leadership and direc-
tion on information systems to the science directorates.
* Earth System Science Overview: A Program for Global Change, Earth
System Sciences Committee (Francis Bretherton, et al.), NASA, 1986.
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There are strong indications that OSSA recognizes the problem. The
recent assignment of EOS information systems management responsibility to
the ISO tends to indicate an inclination within OSSA toward centralization
of information management responsibilities. Indeed, the continued exis-
tence of the ISO can be interpreted to mean that some degree of centraliza-
tion is favored. However, it is not clear to what extent the ISO's
authority or resources wild be increased through this action, or whether
any such increases wild be sufficient to enable that office to provide
central direction of the overall future information systems planning and
management workload.
Based on the foregoing, the Committee identified the following as an
issue that warrants further, more detailed examination:
Issue #1: To what degree should information systems management and
.
planning be further centralized?
According to the briefings and literature the Committee received, a
great deal of work is being accomplished effectively with the present
organization and process. The question is not whether OSSA is doing its
information systems job--because it has been--but whether its management
and technological approaches can be improved to enable it to discharge the
much more complex tasks demanded by such upcoming missions as EOS and the
Earth System Science program. However, during the course of this study,
the Committee reached certain conclusions that support the idea that OSSA
ought to examine this issue closely. For example:
The fragmentation of information systems functions within OSSA
might well impede any significant progress toward OSSA's goad of
interoperable systems with a minimum of standardization, but with
provisions for adaptability and growth.
There are numerous instances in which benefits have been realized
in other government agencies and in industry through the selective
application of centralized management principles. By strengthen-
ing the information systems organization through some degree of
further centralization, OSSA probably could realize improvements
in the following areas:
e Strategic, long-range information systems planning.
The allocation of resources for internal or external acquisi-
tion of new technology and for internal or external pursuit of
research and development (R&D) in information systems.
Shortening of procurement and acquisition cycles, to ensure
timely emplacement of effective, current technology and to
facilitate cost-effective Jife-cycles for information systems.
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o Development and implementation of a cohesive plan for the
creation and control of software, similar to the unified
approaches taken within the commercial sector.
See Chapter Ill for further discussion of Issue #I.
Introduction to Issue #2 - InteroperabiJity. NASA's successes in
implementing space science and applications missions over the last two
decades are well known. Most of these missions and their supporting data
and information systems embodied the latest technological practices in
existence at the time. Much of the data still exists and is used by the
scientific community on a regular basis. However, in most cases the data
remains in its original form and format, and it resides in data archives
and is accessed by information systems that were developed for specialized
purposes that are not compatible with systems being used today or, in some
cases, with one another.
OSSA has recognized this problem and has supported activities by its
ISO that move toward remedying it. OSSA's pilot data systems were
designed by the ISO to have a degree of standardization and interopera-
biiity, but not necessarily among each other. The situation is not so
favorable among other existing systems, and future systems are expected to
have more extensive and demanding requirements. This could continue the
problems of the past, in which researchers in one discipline were unable
to use their data network to access the data base of another discipline.
The complexity of future systems and their supporting data and infor-
mation systems makes it all the more imperative that suitable standards be
selected and adopted soon. Unfortunately, there are no simple solutions
and the Committee considers the following to be a second issue that should
be examined in greater detail by OSSA:
Issue #2. How can interface requirements be established that would ensure
interoperabiiity with a minimum of standards?
If OSSA had but one information system, or if its information systems
enjoyed a high degree of homogeneity, interconnection and interoperability
would not be an issue. Unfortunately, OSSA's information systems are
largely inhomogenous in their data base formats and languages, their
operating systems, and the composition of their network protocols.
Several aspects of the interoperability problem are being addressed by
OSSA, the Office of Space Tracking and Data Systems (OSTDS), GSFC, and
JPL. These include development of the NSSDC On-Line Data Catalog System
(NODES) and important work on Standard Formatted Data Units (SFDU).
An important part of the interoperabiJity and interconnection issue is
that of data transport among information systems. It has been concluded
that the Department of Defense (DoD) program to establish interoperability
among its networks succeeded primarily because DoD mandated the use of its
Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and Internet Protocol (IP), which were
developed in the 1970s. In 1983, the International Standards Organization
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("ISO"), adopted a new Transport Protocol (TP-4) as a Draft International
Standard.* However, DoD TOP is not compatible with "ISO" TP-4. To gi ve
itself maximum flexibility' DoD plans to adopt its TCP/IP and the "ISO"
TP-4/IP as coequal standards after a satisfactory demonstration of TP-4's
suitability for use in military networks and TP-4 products are
commercially available.**
During 1986 both industry and the government embarked on programs to
expedite the eventual migration to TP-4, or, more accurately toward the
"ISO"-sponsored Open Systems Interconnect (OSI) architecture of which TP-4
is a part. The Corporation for Open Systems (COS), which was formed in
January 1986 by a group of computer and communications manufacturing com-
panies, is establishing conformance and interoperability test programs to
verify member-companies' product compliance with the "ISO" OSI standards.
The purpose is to to assure acceptance of an open network architecture in
world markets by accelerating the introduction of interoperable, multi-
vendor products and services. COS presently has 61 members, including
three British companies, one Italian company, and representatives of the
British and Canadian governments. In early September 1986, the government
announced establishment of the OSI Users Committee, whose goal is to
determine an OSI standard for the government. The government also is
considering a revision of its procurement policies to prohibit the pur-
chase of commercial products that do not conform to the standard, which
the committee hopes to develop during 1987. NASA and 15 other agencies
belong to the committee.
Current estimates range from two to five years for the establishment
of networks that are compatible with the OST architecture. OSSA should
use the time available to deal with the problems associated with its older
networks and to map out its approach to the problem of interoperability
for the future, including the establishment of a clear migration path to
the OS] architecture.
The Committee believes OSSA is proceeding on the proper course for
this issue, and we encourage them to continue to exercise caution in the
move toward interoperability.
This issue is discussed in more detail in Chapter IV.
Since the acronyms for the International Standards Organization and
OSSA's Information Systems Office are the same, "ISO" is used in this
report to indicate the former and ISO is used to indicate the latter.
** See Transport Protocols for Department of Defense Data Networks, a
report of the Committee on Computer-Computer Communications Protocols,
Board on Telecommunications and Computer Applications, NRC, National
Academy Press, Washington, D e C., February 1985.
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Introduction to Issue #3 - User Involvement. As indicated earlier, it
will take a massive effort to have a data system in place for systems such
as the EOS in 1995. Although the scope of the overall effort cannot be
determined yet, it is clear that OSSA will need to marshal] virtually al]
of its information systems resources to complete the task.
OSSA has a tremendous experience base available to it, especially that
part embodied by the users, for the development of its information
systems. The Committee believes that the fundamental purpose of OSSA's
information systems is to support its users, so it is gratified to note
that OSSA obviously values the viewpoints of its information systems
users. An indication of this is OSSA's encouragement of the independent
assessment and constructive criticism by user-oriented groups such as the
Committee on Data Management and Computation (CODMAC), which was
established in 1978 at OSSA's request by the Space Science Board (SSB) of
the National Research Council's (NRC) Commission on Physical Sciences,
Mathematics, and Resources.
While it is cd ear that OSSA has gotten its users involved in
information systems planning and management, the Committee found that all
too often OSSA involves users early in the information system design
phase, but does not develop a continuing dialogue with them during the
development phase.
The Committee acknowledges that it is extremely difficult to decide
just how far to go in promoting user involvement in the entire information
systems process. Because of this inherent difficulty, the following is
considered to be an issue that requires further study:
Issue #3. To what extent should OSSA involve its users in the devel-
opment of and changes to information systems, while still maintaining
control?
OSSA personnel with whom the Committee dealt acknowledged the need to
involve users in defining the limits of its data systems. It makes no
sense to field a data system if reasonable use of its output has not been
pre-determined. The Committee notes that some of the existing Pilot Data
Systems provide more data than the users can absorb. Likewise, the design
limits of data systems should be considered when designing spacecraft and
instruments. The Committee believes that most users will participate
gladly in the identification and evaluation of trade-offs between data
system costs and research funding.
The Committee considers the International Solar-Terrestria] Physics
program to be a good examples of iterative (and effective) user invo~ve-
ment in the planning. Conversely, the design of the high resolution
imaging spectrometer (HIRIS), which is part of the EOS instrument package,
is an example in which OSSA does not seem to be interacting quite so
effectively with the users.
See Chapter V for further discussion of this issue.
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Introduction to Issue #4 - Information Systems Technology. OSSA knows
that the increasing emphasis on interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary
scientific work will change the way information systems are structured.
With the arrival of the Space Station era, mission and discipline bound-
aries wild overlap, and huge volumes of data will be collected by NASA and
others to support a large number of interdisciplinary projects involving
hundreds of scientists. Comprehensive planning has already been initiated
for such missions and for the associated data and information systems to
handle the huge volumes of data and the product requirements of the users.
But the Committee is concerned about the apparent trend toward development
of higher data-rate instruments for use in remote sensing. There is
evidence that the current digital magnetic recording and compact disk (CD)
read-only memory (ROM) technologies cannot cope with anticipated data
rates in the Space Station era. Further, commercial database management
systems currently do not have the features required to manage large vo1-
umes of space-derived data. Therefore, the following is suggested as the
fine] major issue to be addressed by OSSA in the context of this study:
Issue #4: How can the projected information systems technologies keep
pace with future sensor outputs?
Additional areas of technological concern are: (1) the need for
cohesive planning and a unified approach to the creation and control of
software, and (2) the fragmented electronic communication and problems of
transferring data in many incompatible formats among elements of the OSSA
and the user community.
These technological problems are compounded by such management and
operational considerations as the need to control costs (which potentially
affects OSSA's ability to support the users) and the need to support the
users (which influences costs).
This issue is discussed further in Chapter VI.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
information management
