DO-178C: Software for NextGen Avionics, UAVs and More

While DO-178C was published in 2012, with an Advisory Circular (AC) following in 2013, it continues to breathe life into the software development, coding, verification, configuration management, quality assurance, and liaison process of engineers creating software — and not only for airliners and business aircraft.

Even software in the autonomous cars, beyond-line-of-sight unmanned aerial vehicles, and spacecraft of 2017 and beyond are using that document (based on software foundational thinking of 1982), mainly as a best-practices guide. After all, airborne software is one of the vital elements in the safety-critical structure of airborne technologies and components that carry passengers under civil aviation rules.

After the initial document was published in 1982, it was updated twice over the next 12 years, to DO-178A and DO-178B. The latter established five levels of specified objectives, activities, and evidence for airborne software. Although DO-178C is not so different from -178B at its core and overall framework, experts say, understanding is still becoming normalized in the industry as the document is picked up by a new generation of aerospace engineers all over the world.

“DO-178C, the core document, is very similar to DO-178B. All of the changes are clarifications, but if you stick to the core document the changes are somewhat minimal. It’s not very difficult to go from developing software under DO-178B to DO-178C, if you do not have to use any of the supplements,” says Cyrille Comar.

Cofounder and managing director of AdaCore Europe, Comar was involved in the original RTCA Special Committee 205 that defined DO-178C. He says that document and its supporting supplements just started becoming more accepted and normalized in the industry in recent years as Designated Engineering Representatives (DERs) and experts handling avionics software development have become more experienced with them.

“If you’re writing code for avionics software on new platforms, DO-178C is mandatory,” says Comar. “You cannot use DO-178B anymore. New programs and projects require you to follow DO-178C.”

Source: DO-178C: Software for NextGen Avionics, UAVs and More