Architecture-Based Hierarchical Interoperability Modeling and Evaluation of Internet Systems

Internet-based information systems are usually built upon unified information model and standard protocols. Interoperability can be defined at various layers from infrastructure to platform, to information, and to applications. The paper analyzes the interoperability requirements of information systems in the Internet architecture. It identifies interoperation elements for different layers of the information systems, and ranks the capability into levels and sub-levels. Interoperability evaluation based on the capability framework is transformed to a decision making problem. The paper introduces a systematic calculation process following Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP) and Analytical Network Process (ANP) method.