Blog Posts
Integrating Safety and Security Engineering for Mission-Critical Systems
Critical systems must be both safe from inadvertent harm and secure from malicious actors. However, safety and security practices have historically evolved in isolation. In this blog post, we describe …
• By Sam Procter, Sholom Cohen
In Software Architecture
Automating System Security with AADL: 11 Rules for Ensuring a Security Model
This post presents an approach for modeling and validating confidentiality based on the Bell–LaPadula security model using the Architecture Analysis and Design Language (AADL). It also presents 11 analysis rules …
• By Aaron Greenhouse
In Software Architecture
When Your Software’s “Check Engine” Light Is On: Identifying Design Problems that Impact Software Failure
This blog post summarizes an effective roadmap for detecting design problems that can be used to improve software development and performance.
• By Judy Hwang
In Software Architecture
Requirements in Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE)
Although MBSE does not dictate any specific process, any MBSE process should cover four systems-engineering domains: requirements/capabilities, behavior, architecture/structure, and verification and validation. In this blog post, I describe how …
• By Nataliya Shevchenko
In Software Architecture
8 Steps for Migrating Existing Applications to Microservices
In this blog post, I describe a plan for how organizations that wish to migrate existing applications to microservices can do so safely and effectively.
• By Brent Frye
In Software Architecture
Addressing Open Architecture in Software Cost Estimation
Identifying, estimating, and containing the cost of software is critical to the effective deployment of government systems....
• By Michael Gagliardi, Michael Konrad, Douglas C. Schmidt
In Software Architecture
Impacts and Recommendations for Achieving Modular Open Systems Architectures --Fifth Post in a Series
In this series of blog posts, adapted from a recently published paper, we sought to demonstrate how layered business and technical architectures can leverage modular component design practices....
• By Nickolas Guertin, Douglas C. Schmidt
In Software Architecture
Why Software Architects Must Be Involved in the Earliest Systems Engineering Activities
Today's major defense systems rely heavily on software-enabled capabilities. However, many defense programs acquiring new systems first determine the physical items to develop....
• By Sarah Sheard, Suzanne Miller, Bill Nichols, Donald Firesmith, Mike Phillips
In Software Architecture
Three Architecture Recommendations for Sustainment Organizations
In a March 2019 report, the Defense Innovation Board (DIB) noted that the United States faces threats that are evolving at an ever-increasing pace....
• By Susan Crozier Cox
In Software Architecture
The AADL Error Library: 4 Families of System Errors
Classifying the way that things can go wrong in a component-based system is a hard challenge since components--and the systems that rely on them--can fail in myriad, unpredictable ways....
• By Sam Procter
In Software Architecture