Family of Standards
An aligned group of modular open standards is implemented in military platform embedded systems. The use of a modular design approach results in a minimization of size and weight. It promotes rapid technology cycle time, reduces cost, and improves modularity. HOST, SOSA, and CMOSS comprise this family of standards that define electronic hardware, network interfaces, and interoperability between electronic components. These systems are broadly applied in military platforms. HOST serves as a hardware specification compatible with all of the following standards.
FACE™ (Future Airborne Capability Environment) is a software architecture standard for constructing open, vendor-neutral airborne computing applications.
- Portability of applications across multiple FACE systems and vendor
- Standards that support a robust architecture and enable quality software development
- The use of standard interfaces that will lead to reuse of capabilities
The C4ISR/EW Modular Open Suite of Standards, referred to as CMOSS, allows the communication components of military vehicles to share a common platform. CMOSS consists of a suite of layered standards that are individually useful and can be combined to form a holistic converged architecture.
- Vehicular Integration for C4ISR/EW Interoperability (VICTORY): provides network-based interoperability using to share services such as Time and Position
- OpenVPX: a hardware form factor for fielding capabilities as cards in a common chassis
- Modular Open RF Architecture (MORA): drives functional decomposition to share resources such as antennas and amplifiers
- Software frameworks: includes REDHAWK, Software Communications Architecture (SCA), and Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE) to enable software portability
SOSA™ (Sensor Open Systems Architecture) specifies open architecture and hardware for communications, electro-optical, infrared, electronic warfare, radar, and signals intelligence sensors.
- Initiated by AFLCMC at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH
- Independent Open Group consortium stood up in November 2017
- Air Force, Army, Navy, and industry participation with over 70 member organizations
- Maximize platform and system affordability, reconfigurability, performance, and re-use
- Define open interface standards for sensor modalities: RADAR, EOIR, SIGINT, COMMS, EW
Alignment
Alignment between HOST, SOSA, and CMOSS standards is achieved between technical and component specifications among each standard. Because FACE, OMS, and VICTORY primarily define networking and software architecture for embedded systems, HOST, SOSA, and CMOSS coexist with these other standards because they specify complementary hardware. HOST, SOSA, and CMOSS use concurrent OpenVPX planes, plug-in cards, and mezzanine profiles – ensuring that all three standards are in agreement.
Statements Proving HOST/SOSA Alignment
The team responsible for the development of HOST are active members of the SOSA consortium. SOSA Technical standard refers to the intended use of HOST in SOSA systems, citing a corresponding ANSI/VITA standard:
“The HOST and ANSI/VITA 46.11 standards provide a large array of commands and parameters, a subset of which will be used to support the SOSA hardware management architecture.”
“SOSA hardware platform management leverages and builds upon the Hardware Open Systems Technology (HOST) 3.0 system management architecture and requirements which itself is highly leveraged from ANSI/VITA 46.11.”
Collaboration between HOST and FACE
