For the past decade, there has been a shift in the industry from a few core businesses handling many projects in the aerospace/defense industry to many vendors. This is especially prominent in the technology segment of the industry due to their ability to deliver solutions in a much shorter time frame and cost-effective way.
The Software Revolution, Inc. (TSRI) is a provider of automated legacy software system modernization services. TSRI’s toolset offers a variety of services to not only the Aerospace/Defense industry but any industry due to its vast adaptability. The company’s proprietary model-driven tool JANUS Studio® is completely language-agnostic and fully automated that helps to achieve nearly 100% automation level. This allows for TSRI to take in over 30 different languages of legacy code and produce modern code in the chosen target environment along with the applications underlying databases/user interfaces. TSRI’s toolset also has the ability to document and refactor these legacy systems for increased understanding, security, along with many other tasks. The company’s process also allows for legacy systems to be modernized targeting microservices, containers, and cloud architectures.
TSRI also recently released a new documentation as a service offering called DocsRev. This new offering allows the customers to have up to date, low cost, code-level documentation on a monthly license. This documentation is easily accessible through a secure web portal and is deployed on an AWS instance.
Pioneer behind TSRI
Philip Newcomb is the CTO and Founder of The Software Revolution Inc. Philip received his bachelors from Indiana State University and completed his grad work at the University of Washington, Carnegie Mellon University, and Ball State University sequentially. He then spent the next 13 years working at the Boeing Artificial Intelligence center performing applied research with a focus on the engineering, formal methods, and artificial intelligence based software engineering. This was the base upon which Philip created TSRI in 1995, and for the past 22 years has been an international leader in the modernization of legacy applications into modern languages/environments. In 2011, he received the Stevens award and currently serves as the international chair of the Object Management Group (OMG). He is considered as the thought leader in Architecture-driven reengineering, modernization, research, development & commercialization of automated renovation and tools.
TSRI has been a part of the implementation of many “suggestions” throughout its lifetime in the Aerospace/Defense field. A large-scale example of TSRI’s work is the European-traffic management system. Originally written in Ada 83, TSRI’s European partner achieved acceptance for the deployment of a new version of the flight data processing (FDP) system by transforming it into in real-time Java. This system was widely accepted and now operates at over 320 air traffic control centers worldwide, which presently covers 40% of the world’s airspaces and is considered a stable, highly functional platform.
TSRI’s Challenging Journey from Inception
With the experience of working at the Boeing Artificial Intelligence Center, Philip created TSRI in 1995 and for the past 23 years has been an international leader in the modernization of legacy applications into modern languages/environments. TSRIs initial focus was modeling patterns in software systems to remediate Y2K deficiencies but has since evolved into the fully automated AI and model-based documentation, transformation, and refactoring technologies.
In the beginning, TSRI faced many challenges on both the technical and business side of the industry. As for the technical side, building such an immense, complex, and revolutionary toolset called JANUS Studio® took insight from some of the top minds in the software and mathematics world. TSRI’s engine was built upon Philips expertise in software modeling and AI but has been supported by many personnel with doctorates in mathematics and software engineering. TSRI was able to overcome any challenge presented by building its automated toolset by thinking outside of the box and utilizing the strengths presented by experts in their fields. Through resiliency, success, and perseverance, TSRI has completed all of its over 200 modernization efforts successfully allowing for continued influence in this market.
Strategies for Success
The biggest change that the TSRI team observed is the mass migration to the cloud and the software and technology that comes from this highly demanded service. They have found that more of their clients are looking to get modernize to cloud architectures such as AWS or Azure. TSRI is increasingly engaged in transforming legacy systems in order to cloud enable them. This includes, developing, refactoring, and transformation solutions to target microservices architectures as outputs of their process. TSRI’s main strategy for this massive change in the industry is to offer flexibility for its customers to target architectures of their choosing and which will provide the most benefit to their transition to the modern world.
Future Roadmap
TSRI continually supports the development of new ideas, practices, products, and services that the company can provide to its customers along with dissolution of hierarchical roadblocks. This allows for anyone at TSRI to have a voice, and their input is heard which allows for the development of innovative ideas.
TSRI is constantly refining and in the further development of its AI engine. TSRI’s future is to strive continually automating and improving solutions surrounding maintenance, retention, transformation, and improvement of irreplaceable legacy systems. The company’s goal is to support and develop a mature capability in new languages, each year with a goal to handle eighty percent of all actively maintained software languages. For example, this year TSRI has undertaken new language gateway development in languages such as PL/1, PL/SQL, VAX Assembly, and Rust. The company also continues to expand its capabilities for automated refactoring, including remediating security vulnerabilities and re-architecting applications into cloud architectures.
Source :-The 10 Most Innovative Aviation and Aerospace Solution Providers 2018
