Successful product line development and sustainment: A DOD case study

The Engineering, Test, and Evaluation Department of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center - Division Newport (NUWC) has developed a software product line asset base, named RangeWare, to support test range operations. NUWC has also fielded a product line of range systems using the asset base. RangeWare provides an object services architecture to support integration of sensor and other range data for analysis and display by range equipment. After several pilot applications of RangeWare, NUWC is now taking RangeWare into a sustainment phase, expanding the coverage of the asset base in terms of object and distribution services as well as applying the assets to new systems. This case study describes RangeWare and NUWC's product line practices to sustain and support the evolution of RangeWare. These practices include 'Operations,' 'Data Collection,' 'Metrics and Tracking,' 'Software System Integration,' 'Configuration Management,' 'Tool Support,' 'Structuring the Organization,' 'Building a Business Case,' and others. The case study also examines NUWC's lessons learned and its plans for improved process definition for RangeWare product production.