Data and Services Deployment (DSD)

Achieving a rich information environment demands a cultural shift regarding how information is considered. Today’s data silos support an approach in which information is hidden and hoarded. Meeting the needs of unanticipated users requires information to be visible and shared. The world wherein information is power is shifting to a culture that embraces and leverages the power of information.

The net-centric vision assumes a rich information sharing environment in which data and services will be widely available, easily discoverable, usable and trusted across the GIG. Sufficient context will be available to understand the data and services that are available and to determine suitability for a particular purpose. All data and services that exist will be visible and accessible. As a result, information stovepipes will be eliminated and decision-making agility and speed increased. Regardless of time or place, users will be able to say, “I can get the information I need to perform my mission.”

The DSD priority focuses the Department on the challenges of transforming its approach from deployment of systems to the delivery of information and services and provides definitions, rules and principles that will guide us in achieving the net-centric vision.

Enabling the Data and Services Environment

Services and support for information providers and consumers must ensure information in a net-centric environment is secure, properly available and effectively used. Different ways to fund and sustain IT solutions will be required as DoD increasingly seeks shared information, solutions, processes and resources. Near-term issues include:

 

  • Practicing Service Orientation - As capabilities are defined, solutions should be made available in the net-centric environment through services. Training to foster a common understanding of key Service-Oriented Architecture concepts, such as separation of interfaces from implementations, or separation of business logic from infrastructure functions, will be critical. Additionally, related practices such as the current DoD Information Assurance Certification and Accreditation Process will need to be adjusted to facilitate the rapid deployment of new services across an accredited, net-centric infrastructure.
  • Developing Communities of Interest (COIs) - The COI approach is key to solving high priority data, information and services issues. COIs address information sharing gaps by identifying the most important data and capabilities needed to support agile and collaborative community business processes.
  • Enabling Information Discovery - The ability to find data and services in the net-centric environment is critical. It must be possible for any user to obtain services from authorized sources. Information must be tagged with metadata at the time of creation, not retroactively. Content discovery brokers must be developed to scan information/service registries across the GIG to locate requested information content.
  • Formalizing Service Interfaces - Services must be discoverable, understandable, and usable. That will require information providers to register their services and provide details that will allow consumers to use, manipulate or transform data..
  • Defining Business Models for Service Operations and Sustainment - Traditional funding strategies in the “stove-pipe” model provide end-to-end solutions for applications, data and underlying hardware. New approaches must be developed that accommodate shared expenses between information providers and consumers.
  • Establishing Enterprise Governance for Common Services - Increasing the value of data and services and easing the impact on consumers will require common functionality and interfaces for the essential core services. Establishing technical, operational, and programmatic oversight and governance is essential to the emergence of a functioning ecosystem of providers and consumers.

     

    Definition: Defense Information Enterprise

      The Department of Defense information resources, assets, and processes required to achieve an information advantage and share information across the Department and with mission partners. It includes: (a) the information itself, and the Department's management over the information life cycle; (b) the processes, including risk management, associated with managing information to accomplish the DoD mission and functions; (c) activities related to designing, building, populating, acquiring, managing, operating, protecting and defending the information enterprise; and (d) related information resources such as personnel, funds, equipment, and information technology, including national security systems.

    The DoD CIO governed Defense Information Enterprise enables a new, net-centric way of working – it is constructed from the information itself, as well as a set of standards, services and procedures that enable information to be widely available to authorized users. It is a set of services and tools that provide information and capabilities that enable end-user communities to more effectively and efficiently support mission operations. Finally, the Defense Information Enterprise includes the networks over which information travels and the security protocols that protect it.

    Communities of Interest must decide the specific information their users need to perform their missions. Each community must determine, design and implement solutions based on business process review and engineering efforts that leverage enterprise resources to meet mission needs.

    Enterprise Services

    As the net-centric environment evolves, an ever increasing number of information services will become available to users across DoD. It will be critical to maintain acceptable and measurable levels of support for all Enterprise capabilities. Users will have certain expectations regarding the pedigree, reliability and availability of Enterprise Services, and these attributes should be consistent across all such services. Being able to do this requires Enterprise Services to be defined and characterized.

    An Enterprise Service is any capability provided for broad use across the Department of Defense that enables awareness of, access to or delivers information across the GIG.

     

    • Enterprise Services may be provided by any source within the Department of Defense - or any of its trusted partners.
    • Enterprise Services providing data or information shall be authoritative and, thus, trusted as being accurate, complete and having assured integrity. Authoritative information has a pedigree that can be traced to a trusted source.
    • Enterprise Services must be hosted in environments that meet minimum GIG computing node standards in terms of availability, support and backup.

    A small set of Enterprise Services, designated as Core Enterprise Services, are mandated for DoD-wide use by the DoD CIO in order to provide enterprise-wide awareness, access and delivery of information via the GIG.

    Principles and Business Rules

    The principles and rules detailed on the next page define how data and services will be treated in the net-centric environment and, thus, apply to all appropriate DoD IT investments regardless of Component or portfolio.