Configuration management (CM) is a process for establishing and maintaining consistency of a product's performance, functional, and physical attributes with its requirements, design, and operational information throughout its life. The CM process is widely used by military engineering organizations to manage changes throughout the system lifecycle of complex systems, such as weapon systems, military vehicles, and information systems. Outside the military, the CM process is also used with IT service management as defined by ITIL, and with other domain models in the civil engineering and other industrial engineering segments such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings.
In NATO, a standardization agreement defines processes, procedures, terms, and conditions for common military or technical procedures or equipment between the member countries of the alliance. Each NATO state ratifies a STANAG and implements it within its own military. The purpose is to provide common operational and administrative procedures and logistics, so one member nation's military may use the stores and support of another member's military. STANAGs also form the basis for technical interoperability between a wide variety of communication and information systems (CIS) essential for NATO and Allied operations. The Allied Data Publication 34 (ADatP-34) NATO Interoperability Standards and Profiles which is covered by STANAG 5524, maintains a catalogue of relevant information and communication technology standards.
In software engineering, software configuration management is the task of tracking and controlling changes in the software, part of the larger cross-disciplinary field of configuration management. SCM practices include revision control and the establishment of baselines. If something goes wrong, SCM can determine the "what, when, why and who" of the change. If a configuration is working well, SCM can determine how to replicate it across many hosts.
ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207Systems and software engineering – Software life cycle processes is an international standard for software lifecycle processes. First introduced in 1995, it aims to be a primary standard that defines all the processes required for developing and maintaining software systems, including the outcomes and/or activities of each process.
Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) is an IEEE standard for conducting real-time platform-level wargaming across multiple host computers and is used worldwide, especially by military organizations but also by other agencies such as those involved in space exploration and medicine.
The Construction Specifications Institute (CSI) is a United States national association of more than 8,000 construction industry professionals who are experts in building construction and the materials used therein. The institute is dedicated to improving the communication of construction information through a diversified membership base of allied professionals involved in the creation and management of the built environment, continuous development and transformation of standards and formats, education and certification of professionals to improve project delivery processes, and creation of practice tools to assist users throughout the facility life-cycle. The work of CSI is currently focused in three areas being standards and publications, construction industry professional certifications, and continuing education for construction professionals.
NATO Joint Military Symbology is the NATO standard for military map symbols. Originally published in 1986 as Allied Procedural Publication 6 (APP-6), NATO Military Symbols for Land Based Systems, the standard has evolved over the years and is currently in its fifth version (APP-6D). The symbols are designed to enhance NATO's joint interoperability by providing a standard set of common symbols. APP-6 constituted a single system of joint military symbology for land, air, space and sea-based formations and units, which can be displayed for either automated map display systems or for manual map marking. It covers all of the joint services and can be used by them.
Ranks and insignia of NATO are combined military insignia used by the member countries of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
A STANAG magazine or NATO magazine is a type of detachable firearm magazine proposed by NATO in October 1980. Shortly after NATO's acceptance of the 5.56×45mm NATO rifle cartridge, Draft Standardization Agreement (STANAG) 4179 was proposed in order to allow NATO members to easily share rifle ammunition and magazines down to the individual soldier level. The U.S. M16 rifle's magazine proportions were proposed for standardization. Many NATO members, but not all, subsequently developed or purchased rifles with the ability to accept this type of magazine. However, the standard was never ratified and remains a "Draft STANAG".
NATO EPVAT testing is one of the three recognized classes of procedures used in the world to control the safety and quality of firearms ammunition.
Allied Standards Avionics Architecture Council, or ASAAC, is an effort to define and validate a set of Open Architecture Standards for Avionics Architecture, particularly in the field of Integrated Modular Avionics.
ISO 10007 "Quality management — Guidelines for configuration management" is the ISO standard that gives guidance on the use of configuration management within an organization. "It is applicable to the support of products from concept to disposal." The standard was originally published in 1995, and was updated in 2003 and 2017. Its guidance is specifically recommended for meeting "the product identification and traceability requirements" introduced in ISO 9001:2015 and AS9100 Rev D.
STANAG 6022 – Adoption of a Standard Gridded Data Meteorological Message is a NATO Standardization Agreement for gridded meteorological data for operational use in Artillery fire control systems, NBC Automated Warning, Reporting and Prediction Systems, and various computer-based Battlefield Decision Aids (BDAs). The message format is referred to as METGM.
STANAG 4119 - Adoption of a Standard Cannon Artillery Firing Table Format is a NATO Standardization Agreement to describe standardized requirements for the development and publication of tabular firing tables for artillery and appropriate mortar cartridges in both complete and abridged formats.
The NATO Standardization Office (NSO) is a NATO agency created in 1951 to handle standardization activities for NATO. The NSA was formed through the merger of the Military Agency for Standardization and the Office for NATO Standardization. During the Agency Reforms, the NSA was transformed to the NATO Standardization Office (NSO) on 1 July 2014, headed by the Director of the NATO Standardization Office (DNSO).
The Allied Quality Assurance Publications (AQAP) are standards for quality assurance systems developed by NATO
ANSI/EIA-649, "National Consensus Standard for Configuration Management", is an industry standard for configuration management.
NATO STANAG 4671 is the NATO Standardized Agreement 4671 which is the UAV SYSTEM Airworthiness REQUIREMENTS (USAR). It is intended to allow military Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to operate in other NATO members airspace.
SX000i - International guide for the use of the S-Series of Integrated Logistics Support (ILS) specifications, is a specification developed jointly by a multinational team from the Aerospace and Defence Industries Association of Europe (ASD) and Aerospace Industries Association (AIA). SX000i is part of the S-Series of ILS specifications.
Copies of NATO Configuration Management publications are available, for free, at the NATO Standardization Office web sites below, or at this site:
