The Navy recently wrapped up system integration testing on the USS Lincoln (CVN-72) strike group of a common computing environment that is serving as a risk mitigator for the Consolidated Afloat Network and Enterprise Services (CANES) program.
Dubbed the Early Adopters Initiative, the common computing environment provides combat systems information officers a better way to manage hardware virtualization, software updates and patches, information security, and standardized training, according to Lockheed Martin [LMT].
The company designed, tested, built, and fielded the common computing environment, which is a huge upgrade on top of what the legacy networks were, Dan Phelan, program manager, technology collaboration center west, told sister publication Defense Daily recently.
Phelan was the program manager for the Integrated Shipboard Network System (ISNS) under which the Navy bought the hardware for the CANES Early Adopters Initiative.
According to Phelan, the Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) in San Diego, Calif., recognized there were disparate hardware systems aboard ships. Officials wanted to get to a common computing environment because these shipboard network systems were old.
SPAWAR looked to replace the legacy hardware with a standard set of equipment, he added. Then, Navy officials put their software into this common computing environment.
“They used blade servers which allow for high-density computing and allows you to put one processor rack or server rack in place of three or four legacy racks,” Phelan said. “In that sense, the Navy recovered a bunch of space on board the ships. It minimizes the amount of power and that resulted in savings on training and, frankly, operations, because it is modern equipment and ends up automating a lot of things the sailor does today.”
For example, the Navy relies on these shipboard networks not just for e-mail, but for tactical programs. “They consider it a warfighting network and they are becoming more and more dependent on it,” Phelan said.
To that end, the Navy wanted to be able to back-up the network every night. To do that, they used tapes to store the data. What the Navy found was that as long as there were no mechanical issues everything went fine, Phelan added.
The problem was when personnel tried to restore the data. On an aircraft carrier, for example, it took four to five days to restore it, he noted. “You just had three to four sailors there with a pile of tapes feeding these things in.”
“With this new hardware…they also had modern storage…storage elements, designed for business and entertainment companies,” Phelan said.
The new system has a really responsive automated function, he added.
“They put this storage element in there, which automatically does everything and it was a huge upgrade,” Phelan said. “Of course, it is not just about equipment, just as CANES is not just about equipment. There is a software element that goes on top of that and there is an interface that has to allow all those legacy networks to have confidence in bringing their legacy software to ride on this new common environment.”
Phelan added there was a little bit of cultural change for a lot of the personnel that used to have responsibility for their software and servers. “It’s all on the ship and they know it works.”
In switching to the common computing environment, personnel had to trust somebody else delivering their system and yet trust that everything was going to work, he said.
“It was a huge challenge and that’s what the Navy had to prove–that one group could deliver this common hardware and everybody else could just show up with their software–and they achieved that on the Lincoln Strike Group,” Phelan said.
Besides the Lincoln, Lockheed Martin has installed the common computing environment on the USS Shoup (DDG-86), the USS Cape St. George (CG-71), USS Paul Hamilton (DDG-60) and the USS Boxer (LHD-4) expeditionary strike group, as well as a number of other vessels, he added.
The Navy’s Networks, Information Assurance and Enterprise Services Program Office, PMW 160, came to Lockheed Martin a few years ago and said they needed the company to deliver this equipment in roughly 18 months, which is far faster considering it had not yet been designed, Phelan said.
“We signed up for that, made the financial commitments, assigned a team to do it and then ultimately we even provided spaces at the SPAWAR campus…to integrate those ship sets for the Lincoln, the Boxer and the Cape St. George,” he said. “Because this equipment was brand new, we just delivered it, and they were not completely familiar with it. We worked hand-in-hand with them while they did the system level integration.”
Lockheed Martin is still delivering ISNS equipment, Phelan said.
“In fact, we delivered several hundred of the individual computer racks and, of course, there are 50 of those on a carrier and perhaps 12 to 14 on a DDG and Lockheed Martin is the only group that is building that today,” he noted.
As CANES comes there will be the handoff from ISNS to CANES, Phelan added. “In fact, the government has referred to ISNS, which is the current program of record, as the entry point into CANES, or CANES Increment 0. And, of course, we are competing on CANES Increment 1.”
Low-Rate Initial Production for CANES is scheduled for 2012.