Do you SWIM?
For those who are in the business, the air navigation services [ANS] world is known for the awkward selection of acronyms which make up our daily jargon. However, through random or forced attempts, we do sometimes manage to come up with meaningful [or apparently so] words. And there we go, finding ourselves making bridges between the ANS world and the private one outside, because of these phenomena…
SWIM stands for System Wide Information Management [now I don't know what came first, whether it was the term or the acronym... maybe you do, in which case, please do let me know, tnx]. It ss a concept that once put in practice would enable enhanced information sharing between different actors in the Air Traffic Management [ATM] system [yes I am watching my acronyms today]. Some have compared it with the ATM System’s intranet.
The concept for me makes sense, even if there are practical challenges to put it in practice. From what I understand, the idea is that the ATM community sets to define and apply a series of protocols that enable different information types to be shared across a network and made available in an easy [but secure, reliable, etc.] manner to those who need it; at the right time and in an effective way. A series of services would then be able to be developed [maybe not unlike web services] that would be able to extract the right information necessary for the particular actor to get the job done or to take a decision.
Basically SWIM stands on three principles:
- The enhancement of the sharing of information
- A common interface [or protocols]
- A series of services which are developed to extract the information at the right place and the right time.
Would you like to know more? SWIM is still a concept and the descriptions I could find available to the general public are still quite fuzzy, however, I suggest trying the SESAR Concept of Operations; D3 [it is not an easy read, but it has some interesting parts if you know the trade and if you stick hard enough to it!] that you can find at the European ATM Master Plan portal: www.atmmasterplan.eu, in the info box called: Popular Documents.
… and yes now that the bridge is made, everytime I think of something as pleasurable as swimming, I find myself thinking of the ATM’s intranet. I absolutely prefer unpronouncable, meaningless acronyms. FOIPS anybody?
