XML Tactical Chat (XTC) the Way Ahead for Navy Chat
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Calhoun: The NPS Institutional Archive Theses and Dissertations Thesis Collection 2007-09 XML Tactical Chat (XTC) the way ahead for Navy chat DeVos, Daniel A. Monterey, California. Naval Postgraduate School http://hdl.handle.net/10945/3312 NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA THESIS XML TACTICAL CHAT (XTC): THE WAY AHEAD FOR NAVY CHAT by Daniel A. DeVos September 2007 Thesis Advisor: Don Brutzman Second Reader: Don McGregor Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited. THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK REPORT DOCUMENTATION PAGE Form Approved OMB No. 0704-0188 Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time for reviewing instruction, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden, to Washington headquarters Services, Directorate for Information Operations and Reports, 1215 Jefferson Davis Highway, Suite 1204, Arlington, VA 22202- 4302, and to the Office of Management and Budget, Paperwork Reduction Project (0704-0188) Washington DC 20503. 1. AGENCY USE ONLY (Leave blank) 2. REPORT DATE 3. REPORT TYPE AND DATES COVERED September 2007 Master’s Thesis 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE: 5. FUNDING NUMBERS XML Tactical Chat (XTC): The Way Ahead for Navy Chat 6. AUTHOR Dan DeVos 7. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES) 8. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION Naval Postgraduate School REPORT NUMBER Monterey, CA 93943-5000 9. SPONSORING /MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES) 10. SPONSORING/MONITORING N/A AGENCY REPORT NUMBER 11. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES The views expressed in this thesis are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Government. 12a. DISTRIBUTION / AVAILABILITY STATEMENT 12b. DISTRIBUTION CODE Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited. 13. ABSTRACT The motivation for pursuing XML-based tactical chat includes the great potential of this technology and fixing limitations of current chat programs. XTC capabilities have the potential to completely upgrade and restructure all tactical military communications. The current tools for military chat include IRC, Yahoo, MSN, AIM, ICQ, and NKO. None of these provides the full functionality or interoperability needed in a joint environment. Moreover, if a nonproprietary chat protocol is developed, it can lead to a decision-support environment in which data, text, audio, and video can be logged, evaluated and managed, all in a Web environment where no additional specialized software or hardware is needed. Chat technology challenges for the military fit into three areas: tactical, technical, and administrative. Tactically, there are many ways chat can be used, but effective practices are not yet defined in procedures or doctrine. Joint forces use a myriad of chat programs that don’t interoperate and are usually proprietary. Technically, many chat programs are barred by firewalls and lack a robust interface to allow logging and searching past chats. From an administrative prospective, plain-text chat has no structure. Scheduling and controlling who attends or converses remains undefined. Within DoD there is no standard for how, when, and by whom chats ought to be conducted. Possible approaches to these problems include adopting a proprietary chat system or customizing an open-source implementation. Proprietary solutions are costly, do not interoperate well, and are too inflexible for a technology that is evolving rapidly. Open-source software can provide a solution that is adaptable, extensible, quick to implement, straightforward to maintain, and relatively inexpensive. This thesis provides a preliminary assessment of XML-based tactical chat (XTC) using an open- source, open-standards solution. Promising initial results demonstrate that an XML document can be sent from a XHTML page in a Web browser to an off-the-shelf Jabber client via a Web server. Further, available server and client implementations can enable a research and development plan for rapid development. 14. SUBJECT TERMS XML, Tactical chat, XML, Jabber, XHTML, XTC, IRC 15. NUMBER OF PAGES 187 16. PRICE CODE 17. SECURITY 18. SECURITY 19. SECURITY 20. LIMITATION OF CLASSIFICATION OF CLASSIFICATION OF THIS CLASSIFICATION OF ABSTRACT REPORT PAGE ABSTRACT Unclassified Unclassified Unclassified UU NSN 7540-01-280-5500 Standard Form 298 (Rev. 2-89) Prescribed by ANSI Std. 239-18 THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK ii Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited XML TACTICAL CHAT (XTC): THE WAY AHEAD FOR NAVY CHAT Daniel A. DeVos Lieutenant Commander, United States Navy B.S., United States Naval Academy, 1995 Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE IN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT from the NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL September 2007 Author: Daniel A. DeVos Approved by: Don Brutzman Thesis Advisor Don McGregor Thesis Co-Advisor Dan Boger Chair, Information Sciences Department iii THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK iv ABSTRACT The motivation for pursuing XML-based tactical chat (XTC) includes the great potential of this technology to fix limitations of current chat programs. XTC capabilities have the potential to completely upgrade and restructure all tactical military communications. The current tools for military chat include IRC, Yahoo, MSN, AIM, ICQ, and NKO. None of these provides the full functionality or interoperability needed in a joint environment. Moreover, if a nonproprietary chat protocol is developed, it can lead to a decision-support environment in which data, text, audio, and video can be logged, evaluated and managed, all in a Web environment where no additional specialized software or hardware is needed. Chat technology challenges for the military fit into three areas: tactical, technical, and administrative. Tactically, there are many ways chat can be used, but effective practices are not yet defined in procedures or doctrine. Joint forces use a myriad of chat programs that don’t interoperate and are usually proprietary. Technically, many chat programs are barred by firewalls and lack a robust interface to allow logging and searching past chats. From an administrative prospective, plain-text chat has no structure. Scheduling and controlling who attends or converses remains undefined. Within DoD there is no standard for how, when, and by whom chats ought to be conducted. Possible approaches to these problems include adopting a proprietary chat system or customizing an open-source implementation. Proprietary solutions are costly, do not interoperate well, and are too inflexible for a technology that is evolving rapidly. Open- source software can provide a solution that is adaptable, extensible, quick to implement, straightforward to maintain, and relatively inexpensive. This report provides a preliminary assessment of XML-based tactical chat (XTC) using an open-source, open-standards solution. Promising initial results demonstrate that an XML document can be sent from a XHTML page in a Web browser to an off-the-shelf Jabber client via a Web server. Further, available server and client implementations can enable an implementation and evaluation plan for rapid development. Further work on XTC is justified and needed. v THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK vi TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................1 A. FOREWARD....................................................................................................1 B. PROBLEM STATEMENT .............................................................................1 C. REQUIREMENTS OVERVIEW...................................................................1 D. MOTIVATION ................................................................................................3 E. OBJECTIVES ..................................................................................................5 F. DOCUMENT ORGANIZATION...................................................................6 II. RELATED WORK ......................................................................................................7 A. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................7 B. MULTICAST BACKBONE (MBONE).........................................................7 C. SELECTIVELY RELIABLE MULTICAST ................................................7 D. EXTENSIBLE 3D (X3D) GRAPHICS...........................................................8 E. LARGE-SCALE VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS (LSVES).......................10 F. EXTENSIBLE MODELING AND SIMULATION FRAMEWORK (XMSF)............................................................................................................11 G. DISTRIBUTED INTERACTIVE SIMULATION (DIS) PROTOCOL DIS-JAVA-VRML PROJECT......................................................................11 H. COMMAND AND CONTROL INFORMATION EXCHANGE DATA MODEL (C2IEDM)...........................................................................12 I. XML SCHEMA-BASED BINARY COMPRESSION (XSBC) .................12 J. SUMMARY ....................................................................................................13 III. CURRENT CHAT INITIATIVES ...........................................................................15