At the end of this year the SWIM-SUIT user forum took place in Rome. The consortium leader SELEX organised this forum and gave several informative presentations about the work performed and issues encountered in the course of the project. As the Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) initiative will continue work in this area, a large number of SESAR representatives also attended the meeting.
From the technical side it was explained that System-wide Information Management (SWIM) was based on three SESAR-defined domains, the flight data domain (FDD), the surveillance data domain (SDD) and the aeronautical information domain (AID). In the FDD a so-called flight data object (FDO) is created, updated and read through publish-and-subscribe mechanisms. The same mechanism is used for SDD (working on the ASTERIX-62 format). For AID a request-and-report mechanism is applied. The SWIM services that are implemented in so-called SWIM boxes expose web services. Legacy systems are adapted to the SWIM boxes and communicate in a VPN SWIM network (through SOAP/XML). The different adapters observe the legacy systems and translate data to the FDO.
A number of legacy platforms are tested and validated for performance (feasibility, inetroperability, flexibility), safety and security. These systems can be found at the Italian and Portuguese ATC centres, CFMU, Heathrow Airport (BAA-CDM), Alitalia and Air France OCCs, Frequentis (EAD) and even in Alitalia Boeing cokpits (FMS). Thus, SWIM can be called the intranet of aviation.
Open issues discussed included, among others, US-European interoperability that could be achieved through translation services between the SWIM clouds (mainly ICOG to ERAM and ASTERIX to ASDI), legal aspects concerning liability (e.g. setting up a compensation fund) and data model standardisation for the different domains.
