For more than a decade, military ground vehicle projects and programs have
leveraged ubiquitous communication technologies such as Transmission Control
Protocol (TCP), User-Datagram Protocol (UDP), Internet Protocol (IP) and
Ethernet. Open standards such as Data Distribution Service (DDS) and the
Vehicular Integration for Command, Control, Computers, Communication,
Intelligence, Surveillance [C4ISR] Interoperability (VICTORY) typically are
built on top of this traditional UDP, TCP/IP, and Ethernet networking suite
which has resulted in a dramatic increase in the ability to connect and
integrate systems on Army ground vehicles. Systems that are built using this
approach enjoy the high-performance, scalability, interoperability and other
desired architectural attributes that are foundational to the Modular Open
System Approach (MOSA), however for the most part they lack critical
characteristics such as synchronization, redundancy, guarantees for bounded
latency and jitter; these deficiencies make the aforementioned approach largely
unsuitable for constructing cyber physical systems which perform safety-related
functions (e.g., weapon systems). Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) is a
collection of open-standards that enhance traditional Ethernet in a way that
remedies these deficiencies, and this paper will explore the features of TSN and
how it might be applied in U.S. Army ground vehicles.