French to U.S. on weapons development: How do you work with so many people?!?
Mr. Shapero: They [the French] make good aircraft, and they have also had disasters. But they do it much more cheaply than we do. Spending […]
Technology
F-16 running on Kubernetes and the challenges of a disconnected environment
Just like almost everything else, military organizations increasingly depend on software, and they are turning to an array of open source cloud tools like Kubernetes […]
Zuckerberg wisely advocates big bets on tools and people, not outputs
The government is the largest and most important funder of science, but the grants tend to be very spread out across a lot of people. […]
How shared equipment dramatically lowers barriers to deep tech R&D
In the same way that AWS dramatically lowered the bar to start a software company, you’re seeing the same thing of multiple labs-as-a-service companies that […]
Agile at scale, decoupling teams, and enterprise software in the DOD
One of the issues we see is programs trying going straight to the scaled agile development framework, like SAFe. We issued a memo highly discouraging […]
Explaining the valley of death in defense technology
I’m going to walk though some an excellent set of slides on the “valley of death” problem from Gary Hagan over at DAU. Let’s start […]
Risk identification, the acquisition process, and system resiliency
“We want to expand people’s view about what technology is; it includes people and process and is part of a sociotechnical system,” Mineweaser said. “The […]
Out with the heel-to-toe acquisition process, in with DevOps
We realized it was time to stop the heel-to-toe acquisition process of developing a concept and then going to Combats Development to develop a requirement, […]
How cost-plus contracting slowed space technologies, and the shift back to mission-based specs
It starts back in the 1960s with the Apollo program being successful. The way that space used to work back then was that everything was […]
Agile, modular, and digital engineering — Roper’s tenants for the fighter-building business
But how we build aircraft, that doesn’t make sense. Approaching NGAD [next-generation air dominance] the way we did the F-35 would put us at great […]
How has DIU performed in transitioning technologies?
Since 2015, millions of dollars have been invested in the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit, the agency watched as some of its projects fell flat, and […]
Complexity science, “if-then” propositions, and how to make decisions
I’m interested in complexity science, which, if you’re actually doing complexity science, it releases complexity. For example, in real complexity science, there’s an issue with […]
Basic science and the transition to useful military products
Here is more from the Combat Capabilities Development Command’s commanding general Cedric Wins on the US Army CCDC In the Lab Podcast. You have to […]
US Army R&D endorses mission command
I think frankly, what they thought was [we had] an industrial age model that existed and as we move into the 21st century and what […]
Simulators, software, and complexity in weapons platforms
Replicating platforms accurately in simulations remains one of the biggest challenges for the Army, according to a service official. “As many of you know, […]