The Boeing Company

Theboeing Company

Ben C Forbes

Tri Minh Phan

Michael A D'Annunzio

C L Fagan

Rolf P Dietiker

Steven A Johnson

Christopher R Payne

Configuration of hardware and software onboard a mobile platform may be dynamically managed without significantly impacting a data stream from the mobile platform. Configuration data for equipment and resident software aboard a mobile platform is electronically reported in the form of a part number and a serial number. The configuration data is transferred to a terrestrial database via a mobile communications network. The configuration data is displayed to stakeholders, such as the network-provider enterprise and its customers. Invalid configurations may cause alerts.

Dynamic configuration management

A status reporting system for components used in a mobile platform includes a fault manager within the mobile platform for assigning a state indicator to each component. Each state indicator indicates the operational current state of the component. A management system external to the mobile platform, in one example being a ground based management system, is in communication with the mobile platform via a wireless communication link. A component summary including the state indicators of all the components is periodically transmitted from the mobile platform as an information packet, via the wireless link, to the management system for review. The management system can thus remotely monitor the operational status of various important components on a periodic basis, for example every five minutes. This saves significant bandwidth over that which would be required if a continuous wireless link was to be employed to remotely monitor various components on the mobile platform.

Status reporting system and method

Exemplary methods and systems manage a mobile network. A mobile network node is managed when the node is connected to the network. However, an alarm is not necessarily generated when the node is not connected to the network. A status message is periodically generated and transmitted from the mobile network node to a network control facility. The status message may include any status information regarding the mobile network node as desired. When the status message is indicative of a predetermined condition, an alarm is automatically generated. When no status message is received from the mobile network node, a determination is made whether connectivity exists between the mobile network node and the network. If connectivity does not exist between the mobile network node and the network, then no alarm is generated. If connectivity does exist between the mobile network node and the network, then an alarm is generated.

Management of mobile networks

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Ben C Forbes