GAO report on DoD mission-critical spending

[srctran@world.std.com (Gregory Aharonian)]

 
    The GAO monthly publishes reports about its analyses of the operations of
the rest of the government.  Many involve DOD operations, especially software
and hardware development.  What follows are abstracts to reports issued in
the past few months. Single copies of the report are available for free from:
 
U.S. General Accounting Office
P.O. Box 6015
Gaithersburg, MD  20877
 
Cite the report number and title, and they will send you a copy.
______________________________________________________________________________
 
                           MISSION CRITICAL SYSTEMS:
           DEFENSE ATTEMPTING TO ADDRESS MAJOR SOFTWARE CHALLENGES
 
              GAO/IMTEC-93-13
 
         ABSTRACT
 
     Billions of dollars in current and future Defense Department (DoD)
weapons and command, control, communications, and intelligence systems depend
on high-performance, correctly functioning, real-time computer systems that
hold up under severe stresses.  Yet the Pentagon's mission-critical systems
continue to be plagued by a host of long-standing software development
problems, including cost, schedule and performance shortfalls.  This report
provides an overview of earlier GAO work on mission-critical systems.  Many
studies both by the GAO and DoD have pointed out a variety of deficiencies,
ranging from a lack of management attention to ill-defined system requirements
to inadequate testing.  Why has this situation persisted so long?  GAO notes
that the understanding of software as a product and of software development as
a process is not keeping pace with the growing complexity of existing and
emerging mission-critical systems.  The Pentagon is trying to overcome this
dilemma through two main programs - the software action plan working group
and the Corporate Information Management initiative.  Whether these efforts
will solve the military's formidable software problems is uncertain; there
are no easy answers.
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Greg Aharonian
Source Translation & Optimiztion
P.O. Box 404, Belmont, MA 02178