MIL-HDBK-61A, MILITARY HANDBOOK: CONFIGURATION MANAGEMENT GUIDANCE (07 FEB 2001)

MIL-HDBK-61A, MILITARY HANDBOOK: CONFIGURATION MANAGEMENT GUIDANCE (07 FEB 2001)., This military handbook provides guidance and information to DoD acquisition managers, logistics managers, and other individuals assigned responsibility for Configuration Management. Its purpose is to assist them in planning for and implementing effective DoD configuration management activities and practices during all life cycle phases of defense systems and configuration items. It supports acquisition based on performance specifications, and the use of industry standards and methods to the greatest practicable extent. This handbook is closely related to the following Electronic Industries Alliance (EIA) Standards: * ANSI/EIA-649-1998, "National Consensus Standard for Configuration Management," * EIA-836, "Consensus Standard for Configuration Management Data Exchange and Interoperability," and * ANSI/EIA-632-1998, “Processes for Engineering a System.” ANSI/EIA Standard 649 provides the basic configuration management principles and the best practices employed by industry to identify product configuration and effect orderly management of product change. EIA-836 (scheduled for initial draft publication in January 2001) EIA-836 facilitates the interoperability and exchange of configuration management data. The level of interoperability between dissimilar systems is determined by trading partner agreement. The extensible markup language (XML) facilitates data sharing and exchange among different systems. EIA-836 provides a set of standard definitions and business objects that can be used by XML frameworks in interfacing the content elements among one or more systems or databases. To be most effective, the capabilities of the process, tools or systems, should embody the CM principles in ANSI/EIA-649 in conjunction with the business objects and data element definitions in EIA-836. ANSI/EIA-632 describes the Systems Engineering process of which CM is an integral part. [See 4.2.2] The acquisition reform environment is significantly different from one in which the Government imposed its own management requirements on contractors by military standards. Configuration management activity must be applied to items at a level that is consistent with acquisition strategy, protects the interests of the government, and flexibly accommodates contractor standard methodology. With a major share of configuration control authority shifted to contractors, the DoD configuration management activity must still continue to provide assurance of supportability and interoperability of military equipment and software. This responsibility requires careful planning and implementation of a DoD configuration management strategy that is in concert with the acquisition, logistic support, and maintenance philosophy of each given material item. As the DoD transitions to performance based acquisition and the use of digital CM information interfaces, this handbook provides the insight necessary to: * Understand the application of the basic principles of CM articulated in ANSI/EIA-649 to the DoD acquisition and operational environment * Plan for and make prudent and cost effective choices in effecting DoD configuration management activities throughout the life cycle of a material item * Provide the necessary basis for CM in RFPs and Contracts * Evaluate contractor proposals and CM processes * Acquire and process necessary CM information * Use data models (schema), data dictionaries, and CM data object templates as a framework for translating and communicating configuration information among diverse, distributed, data bases in an integrated data environment * Measure CM performance effectiveness of both Government activities and contractors