So. What Does a 2nd Rotation Consist of, Anyway?

As my 2nd rotation is coming to a close (there are only 2 weeks left), I thought I'd use this chance to reflect back and write on some of the things I've worked on this rotation.  I had two projects this rotation in Aviation Systems, but I will talk about the main one. Before I get started, though, I thought I'd start out with some descriptions of the various businesses I worked with this rotation. GE Aviation is full of joint ventures and acquisitions, so things can get confusing quite easily. :-)

Aviation Systems - At GE Aviation, we are mainly known for producing engines themselves, but Aviation Systems is a component of GE Aviation, specializing on various aircraft components produced in numerous sites around the world. These products include: flight navigation systems, thrust reversers, landing gear, and more!  My assignments this rotation were all within the Aviation Systems organization.

Middle River Aircraft Systems (MRAS) - MRAS is one of the sites within Aviation Systems. It specializes in thrust reversers and is located in Baltimore, Maryland.

Aircelle - Aircelle is a company headquartered in France that specializes in nacelles (the casing that holds an aircraft engine) and thrust reversers.

Nexcelle - Nexcelle is a joint venture between MRAS and Aircelle, looking to provide a complete package of engine nacelles and subsystems.

My first main project this rotation involved working on the MRAS-Nexcelle portal.  Both MRAS and Aircelle have been creating their own Java JBoss web portal for their employees and customers. I have been working on the MRAS version. The goal is to allow federated security (aka SAML) to allow these users to seamlessly transfer to the other portal, where they can collaborate with other employees and customers associated with the other business partner in the joint venture.  For those of you unfamiliar with federated security (like I was at the beginning of my rotation), it allows multiple systems to recognize a user's login session, regardless of which system he or she logs into. So, for my project, if a user logs onto the MRAS-Nexcelle Portal, the federated security would continue to recognize his or her identity when he or she tries logging onto the Aircelle-Nexcelle Portal. This eliminates the need for the user to have to manually log into each portal separately. In addition, the look and feel of both portals will be the same, providing a truly seamless experience for our users.

I found the federated security technology to be very interesting. Here is a video that does a great of explaining how it works:

My deliverables for this project were to:

1. Get the MRAS-Nexcelle Portal into production
2. Implement the federated security setup between the MRAS-Nexcelle and the Aircelle-Nexcelle portals.
3. Begin migrating applications onto the MRAS-Nexcelle portal.

When my rotation comes to a close, we should be pushing our portal into production. The federated security implementation won't be fully completed, but we've made significant progress so far by allowing external users to navigate between both portals. Finally, we've begun the migration of two applications onto our portal, which will provide the various functionalities the business team needs.

Looking back, this has been a great rotation that provided me with a lot of new experiences. I got great insight into our digital Project Management Material (dPMM), a standardized online project planning system for managing projects. I also got to work firsthand with federated security and learn a new technology that I previously had zero knowledge of. Moreover, I got to experience the challenges and benefits of working with an international team. Finally, I was able to experience great visibility as I met with the Nexcelle CEO and CFO every week to update them on where the IT team was on the project.  All the skills I have learned this rotation will only help me even more as I begin my third rotation.