Interoperability
Cross-domain interoperability involves multiple social, organizational, political, legal entities working together for a common interest or information exchange.
[citation needed] Open standards rely on a broadly consultative and inclusive group including representatives from vendors, academics and others holding a stake in the development that discusses and debate the technical and economic merits, demerits and feasibility of a proposed common protocol.
Availability of such data is not equivalent to an open standard, because: Speaking from an e-government perspective, interoperability refers to the collaboration ability of cross-border services for citizens, businesses and public administrations.
Exchanging data can be a challenge due to language barriers, different specifications of formats, varieties of categorizations and other hindrances.
[5] Cities and urban areas worldwide are expanding, which creates complex spaces with many interactions between the environment, infrastructure and people.
Additionally NATO defines interoperability more generally as the ability to act together coherently, effectively and efficiently to achieve Allied tactical, operational and strategic objectives.
At this level, interoperability issues center on harmonizing world views, strategies, doctrines, and force structures.
Interoperability is an element of coalition willingness to work together over the long term to achieve and maintain shared interests against common threats.
The benefits of interoperability at the operational and tactical levels generally derive from the interchangeability of force elements and units.
These approaches were inadequate and, in the US, the lack of interoperability in the public safety realm become evident during the 9/11 attacks[13] on the Pentagon and World Trade Center structures.
The State Interoperability Executive Committee[15] (SIEC), established by the legislature in 2003, works to assist emergency responder agencies (police, fire, sheriff, medical, hazmat, etc.)
at all levels of government (city, county, state, tribal, federal) to define interoperability for their local region.
The Department of Homeland Security's Office for Interoperability and Compatibility (OIC) is pursuing the SAFECOM[16] and CADIP and Project 25 programs, which are designed to help agencies as they integrate their CAD and other IT systems.
This program will use case studies to identify the best practices and challenges associated with linking CAD systems across jurisdictional boundaries.
These lessons will create the tools and resources public safety agencies can use to build interoperable CAD systems and communicate across local, state, and federal boundaries.
For instance, in 2021 the European Commission, after commissioning two impact assessment studies and a technology analysis study, proposed the implementation of a standardization – for iterations of USB-C – of phone charger products, which may increase interoperability along with convergence and convenience for consumers while decreasing resource needs, redundancy and electronic waste.
Over time, open-system containers were developed to create a virtual desktop environment in which these applications could be registered and then communicate with each other using simple publish–subscribe patterns.
The Open Service for Lifecycle Collaboration[23] community is working on finding a common standard in order that software tools can share and exchange data e.g. bugs, tasks, requirements etc.
The European Union Microsoft competition case shows how interoperability concerns important questions of power relationships.
By doing so, Microsoft was able to protect its dominant market position for work group server operating systems, the heart of corporate IT networks.
Microsoft was ordered to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation, which could enable rival vendors to compete on an equal footing (the interoperability remedy).
Interoperability can have a significant impact on the organizations concerned, raising issues of ownership (do people want to share their data?
At the 2016 Regulatory Affairs Professionals Society (RAPS) meeting, experts in the field like Angela N. Johnson with GE Healthcare and Jeff Shuren of the United States Food and Drug Administration provided practical seminars on how companies developing new medical devices, and hospitals installing them, can work more effectively to align interoperable software systems.
For passenger rail service, different railway platform height and width clearance standards may also affect interoperability.
[citation needed] North American freight and intercity passenger railroads are highly interoperable, but systems in Europe, Asia, Africa, Central and South America, and Australia are much less so.
Internationally, Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium facilitates global interoperability across borders, language and technical barriers.
[42] A related initiative is the ongoing National Information Exchange Model (NIEM) work and component repository.
