Government Reference Architectures

 Standards and Interface Management

There have been dozens of disparate open architecture and consensus based standards initiatives across the AF, DoD, and industry.  These initiatives vary from mature to early development and from widely applicable to highly tailored for specific use cases.  As part of the DTO and in pursuit of digital modernization across the Department of the Air Force, there is a need to more clearly document and communicate what Government Reference Architectures (GRAs) and interface standards exist across the community.  This document attempts to bring these disparate GRAs and interface standards together into a single, coherent catalogue.

A Standard is defined as a formal agreement documenting generally accepted specifications or criteria for products, processes, procedures, policies, systems and/or personnel.  Technical Standards document specific technical methodologies and practices to design and implement (DOD Architecture Framework Version 2.02).

Interface Management is defined as the functional and physical characteristics required to exist at a common boundary or connection between persons, between systems, or between persons and systems.  A system external to the systems being analyzed provides a common boundary or service that is necessary for the system to perform its mission in an un-degraded mode (DAU Glossary). 

The Reference Architecture and Interface Management definitions are broad, leaving room for confusion about what can constitute a Reference Architecture.  Multiple government and industry standards contain elements that define interface management techniques, and because these standards provide constraints for systems, they technically meet the definition of Reference Architectures, or Government Reference Architectures if the standards were financed using Government funds.  Open Architecture Standards help provide common interface management techniques for certain architectural areas (usually targeted to specific domains and/or functional areas).  Government Reference Architectures designed to guide program decisions benefit from using one or more standards together to guide and constrain programs.  

Benefits of Government Reference Architectures

GRAs benefit the government in various ways.  They promote procurement efficiencies through consistent guidance for system requirements and the use of standard contracting language.  GRAs also shorten acquisition timelines, maximize component and subsystem reuse, limit non-recurring engineering, and reduce development cost.  GRAs increase commonality across systems that enables more efficient maintenance and readily interchangeable components.  Finally, GRAs enable improved system interoperability and help eliminate vendor lock.

GRAs also benefit the contractor by reducing risk through mature and familiar procurement requirements; reducing development costs by using well defined interfaces and standardized tooling; and sharing cost savings with the government via economies of scale and maximizing re-use of SW, HW, and engineering effort across systems.

GRAs and Standards 

The table below will sort standards and reference architectures into three groups and lists the current POC to request more information*:

1.     Reference Architectures that utilize Open Architecture Standards

2.     Open Architecture Standards containing reference architecture elements and interface management elements

3.     Open Architecture Standards that contain interface management element