Managing the Transition to Object-Oriented Technology for Department of DefenseInformation Management Systems

摘要

This document presents the findings and recommendations for managing theimplementation of object-oriented technology (OOT) in the DoD within specific information technology areas. This document explores some of the technology transition issues related to OOT implementation and identifies alternative strategies for such a transition within the DoD. The approach to this task was to consider the implementation of OOT with regard to current and planned DoD policy, current and anticipated DoD needs as expressed by DoD representatives, and the general state of maturity of OOT theory and practice. A key premise of this effort is that OOT has matured to the state whereby it may be considered for use within the DoD information technology areas. OOT appears to offer significant advantages over process and datadriven software development approaches, such as increased maintainability and reusability. OOT also facilitates distributed computing. However, there still exists a diversity of concepts and notations for development methodologies and a variety of mechanisms for object oriented database technology. There appear to be relatively few, if any, impediments within DoD information system lifecycle management and software development standards to using OOT.