STS developed and now supported the maintenance and improvements to the Department of Defense Joint Staff J7 Lessons Learned Information System (JLLIS) for more than a decade. This system is used by every Service, Combatant Command and DoD Agency as the System of Record for Lessons Learned / Knowledge Management and Sharing. This project evolved from storyboards within the United States Marine Corps to the system being selected as the best of breed, and then System of Record for the Department of Defense. The technology evolved from a single server on an incubation network to multiple servers on three different security-classification networks supporting more than 100,000 users. We worked with numerous DoD stakeholders to develop this process, and evolved the software to meet the end users’ needs. To create JLLIS, we integrated the individual lessons learned systems utilized by the individual commands and migrated the consolidated system from the USMC incubation servers in Quantico to production facilities at Fort Huachuca. We subsequently transitioned to JLLIS the lessons learned systems for the US Army, Army ISR, CCO, DISA, DoS, HPRC, NCCS, and USUHS and later consolidated all JLLIS instances into a single codebase while retaining each user organization’s ability to customize the system.
This single codebase approach removed the inefficiencies associated with maintaining a separate development path for each customer that diverged from the original platform. The new model, called N-Tier, enabled each organization, or tier, to apply customization to the software by adding modules to the underlying application that could be toggled on or off by administrators at the appropriate level. For example, the Navy required a port visit module that was of limited utility to other users. Using N-Tier, we developed a module that provided the requested functionality, but was visible only to Navy organizations. This modular approach allows us to provide a level of customization to the end user, but ensures that the base code of the application does not diverge into multiple development paths, providing tremendous flexibility to the government at a reasonable cost.