The Standardization Process: What Works; What Doesn’t
Abstract
For many reasons, it is often asserted that various segments of the space community need to adopt standards or need to create standards where ostensibly none exists. Phrases like “build standard spacecraft busses”, “create plug-and-play interfaces”, or “adopt commercial standards” have become almost commonplace utterances. However, such discussions often revolve around inappropriate comparisons with the commercial marketplace or misunderstandings of the standardization process, rather than solutions to clearly stated problems. Substantial work has been expended on many standardization efforts that have not achieved their intended goals. Various parallel backplane computer bus standards can be used to illustrate how standards arise – or don’t. This paper presents three examples of the standardization process. The Futurebus+ (Profile S) standardization activity is contrasted with the adoption of VMEbus and cPCI by the space community. The Ada programming language development, standardization, and subsequent mandate for use are contrasted with the grass-roots evolution of C and C++. The PC/AT bus and PC/104 buses are discussed in their market contexts and contrasted with the closed architecture of the Macintosh. Finally, a framework for cost-effective standards development based on similarities with free-market entrepreneurial activity is presented.
The Standardization Process: What Works; What Doesn’t
For many reasons, it is often asserted that various segments of the space community need to adopt standards or need to create standards where ostensibly none exists. Phrases like “build standard spacecraft busses”, “create plug-and-play interfaces”, or “adopt commercial standards” have become almost commonplace utterances. However, such discussions often revolve around inappropriate comparisons with the commercial marketplace or misunderstandings of the standardization process, rather than solutions to clearly stated problems. Substantial work has been expended on many standardization efforts that have not achieved their intended goals. Various parallel backplane computer bus standards can be used to illustrate how standards arise – or don’t. This paper presents three examples of the standardization process. The Futurebus+ (Profile S) standardization activity is contrasted with the adoption of VMEbus and cPCI by the space community. The Ada programming language development, standardization, and subsequent mandate for use are contrasted with the grass-roots evolution of C and C++. The PC/AT bus and PC/104 buses are discussed in their market contexts and contrasted with the closed architecture of the Macintosh. Finally, a framework for cost-effective standards development based on similarities with free-market entrepreneurial activity is presented.
