What is the Architectures Standards and Engineering Library (ARSENL)?
The Architectures and Standards Engineering Library website was initiated by the DAF Chief Architects Office that launched in 2022 and transitioned to the Air Force Material Command Engineering Directorate in 2023. A.R.S.EN.L houses Controlled Unclassified Modular Open Systems Approach (MOSA) enabling standards, Government Reference Architectures (GRA’s), as well as contains a data sheet summarizing how Weapon System Program Offices store their architecture and interface data. The ARSENL site does not replace or duplicate any work in the Defense Logistics Agency ASSIST site but supplements the ASSIST content with products that do not fit into the Department Standards Office process manual.
Single Source site for Government Reference Architectures and Modular Open Systems Enabling Standards
The Air Force has been working on MOSA Enabling Standards and GRA’s for years, however, leadership support of the Standards and GRAs vary. Up until 2023, leadership used mandate memorandums to notify the workforce which GRA’s and Standards to use. Some mandate memorandums were created at a Center Level, some at the Secretary of the Air Force level, and some at the Department of Defense Level. ARSENL simplifies the need to keep multiple mandate memorandums on hand. ARSENL contains Mandate Memorandums for record, but now, if a product is housed within ARSENL, it can be considered Air Force Approved. Programs managing standards and GRA’s get to maintain the configuration control of their products and post the latest version of final products on ARSENL.
How To Register for ARSENL
ARSENL has a public facing website on the Virtual Distribution Library (VDL). Click Here for access to the public page. The public page houses general information for ARSENL, but the bulk of content is housed on a restricted page. See the instructions below on how to create a VDL account and request access to the ARSENL restricted page. ARSENL uses a restricted page to limit access to DoD, DoD contractors, and Academia supporting DoD mission sets.