The main objective of System Wide Information Management (SWIM) is to provide to the different Air Traffic Management (ATM) stakeholders (for instance, airlines, airports or aircraft) with the correct and dedicated information at the time they need to use it. This information can take different representations according to the end user it will reach. Thus, the important part of SWIM mechanisms is related to information representation and transformation during the information exchange. To do so, global interoperability and standardization guidelines are essential between the different actors involved .
3.1.1. Why does ATM need SWIM?
Today’s ATM system exchanges a lot of specific and varied information, mainly because of the wide variety of applications developed through the past decades for specific ATM purposes. Each entity involved in the information transfer can use specific communication protocols exchanging self-contained information. This information has been created and defined in an iterative manner depending on the needs of each new application, designed and integrated in the global ATM system from the very start.
This heterogeneity in the information representation introduces some complexity when different systems need to share and exchange some data, where there is a need for ATM engineers to design additional interfaces
between these systems in order to ensure information is represented in a consistent manner.
Moreover, the increase in aviation capacity and the economic pressure on this market will require more accurate and timely communication.
Information will have to be structured and organized in order to provide wide interoperability between the different ATM stakeholders.
Consequently, the idea behind SWIM is to equip the providers and users of ATM information with a complete integrated information management system in order to improve communication between them. With SWIM, it should soon be possible to move from the current and non-efficient ATM system, described in Figure 3.1, to a more efficient system, like the one described in Figure 3.2.
Figure 3.1. Sharing information today (without SWIM) (source: www.sesarju.eu)
Figure 3.2. Sharing information tomorrow (due to SWIM) (source: www.sesarju.eu)
3.1.2. SWIM principles
Different scientific communities (for instance, Internet technologies community) have been involved in information sharing for much longer than the ATM community. As such, SWIM has been designed by taking in consideration open standards inherited from different application fields, but dealing with the same objectives: delivered information should be of the right quality, provided at the right time and delivered to the right place.
Several principles have been proposed and designed through SWIM in order to achieve this objective:
– separation of information provision and consumption: even if in the ATM work almost every entity is both a producer and a consumer of information, it is not easy to plan in advance who will access a specific piece of information, received from whom and when. To handle this functional issue, producers and possible consumers of information have been separated.
The main advantage of such an approach will be to handle more easily the number and nature of possible consumers through time;
– using open standards: an open standard is publicly available and has different rights associated with its usage. It may also have various properties of how it was designed (e.g. open process). These open standards will have to be privileged into the SWIM design process;
– using service-oriented architecture: depending on the business processes and needs, specific network and software features of the final system are designed. Each feature is packaged and implemented in order to offer to the different entities of the SWIM system interoperable service primitives. Each of these primitives can be used by the different separate systems providing more flexibility for the different ATM stakeholders.
3.1.3. SWIM technical components
Based on the previous principles, the implementation of SWIM will involve deploying the following technical elements:
– ATM Information Reference Model (AIRM): this element will represent an implementation neutral definition of all ATM information. Two types of data will be included: well-known ATM elements such as
aerodrome, ATS route, airspace or flight procedure; and a common definition of fundamental modeling concepts including time and geometry.
This element of SWIM will be based on harmonized conceptual and logical data models providing global and shared information modeling to the different ATM stakeholders;
– Information Service Reference Model (ISRM): this element will represent the logical breakdown of the specific ATM information services. It will also provide their behavioral patterns. Based on service implementation specifications, some examples of information service definition could detail the services’ payload, pattern of exchange or Quality of Service (QoS);
– Information Management Functions: in order to safely handle the management of information, different system features will also have to be provided, such as user identity management, discoverability of resources, security aspects, notification services and registration. Rules, roles and responsibilities need to be defined for each stakeholder, taking into account the functional importance of the information they handle.
Consequently, SWIM infrastructure is the interoperable technical infrastructure (Ground/Ground and Air/Ground) over which data will be exchanged. From an implementation point of view, each ATM stakeholder will have to adapt its technical design depending on its specific needs. It should offer technical services based as much as possible on well-known and validated Information Technology (IT) technologies. These technical services will mostly be based on Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) products, even if for specific purposes ad hoc, specific software may need to be developed. As a matter of fact, the Pan European Network System (PENS) and the Internet will be used as basic Ground/Ground network infrastructures. Figure 3.3 describes some of the future usages that SWIM could offer to the different ATM stakeholders.
Deploying SWIM is a challenging step in the evolution of ATM.
Although many features are already available (and a number of existing applications could already be labeled as early SWIM adopters), full SWIM deployment will take time. Indeed, lots of new SWIM concepts will have to be prototyped and validated in order to propose new SWIM applications.
Moreover, the organization of commonly shared information will not be an easy task. SWIM designers will have to develop and implement the associated changes in the different user systems and applications. These major changes will require a close collaboration between the different ATM
stakeholders who have been involved, logically from the start by European actors (through the Single European Sky for ATM Research (SESAR) project) in the development of the SWIM requirements, prototypes, roadmaps and implementation plans.
Figure 3.3. Net centric information viewpoint (source: www.sesarju.eu)