The Field Systems Operations Center, within the Office of Operational Systems, provides overall National Weather Service management, direction, systems operational support, and software engineering for operational surface and upper air observing systems, Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) and other weather information processing systems, and their system interfaces.  It serves as the principal management liaison with the regions and field offices for their systems operations support and site system management activities and provides operations requirements for planned improvements to field systems.  It develops operating standards, procedures, and documentation; manages quality control of surface and upper air observations; and represents the NWS at international and interagency organizations and forums.  The Center designs, develops, maintains, and documents software for the NWS field operational weather systems and develops special equipment and network systems applications.