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At least 757 records · Page 42

Space station data system analysis/architecture study. Task 2: Options development, DR-5. Volume 3: Programmatic options

Task 2 in the Space Station Data System (SSDS) Analysis/Architecture Study is the development of an information base that will support the conduct of trade studies and provide sufficient data to make design/programmatic decisions. This volume identifies the preferred options in the programmatic category and characterizes these options with respect to performance attributes, constraints, costs, and risks. The programmatic category includes methods used to administrate/manage the development, operation and maintenance of the SSDS. The specific areas discussed include standardization/commonality; systems management; and systems development, including hardware procurement, software development and system integration, test and verification.

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Improving a data-acquisition software system with abstract data type components

Abstract data types and object-oriented design are active research areas in computer science and software engineering. Much of the interest is aimed at new software development. Abstract data type packages developed for a discontinued software project were used to improve a real-time data-acquisition system under maintenance. The result saved effort and contributed to a significant improvement in the performance, maintainability, and reliability of the Goldstone Solar System Radar Data Acquisition System.

Howard, S. D.↗

GCS programmer's manual

A variety of instructions to be used in the development of implementations of software for the Guidance and Control Software (GCS) project is described. This document fulfills the Radio Technical Commission for Aeronautics RTCA/DO-178A guidelines, 'Software Considerations in Airborne Systems and Equipment Certification' requirements for document No. 4, which specifies the information necessary for understanding and programming the host computer, and document No. 12, which specifies the software design and implementation standards that are applicable to the software development and testing process. Information on the following subjects is contained: activity recording, communication protocol, coding standards, change management, error handling, design standards, problem reporting, module testing logs, documentation formats, accuracy requirements, and programmer responsibilities.

Lowman, Douglas S.↗

Risk management and expert system development methodology

A risk-based expert-system development methodology has been developed to provide guidance to managers and technical personnel and to serve as a standard for developing expert systems. Expert-system development differs from conventional software development in that the information needed to prepare system requirements for expert systems is not known at the outset of a project and is obtained by knowledge engineering methods. The paper describes the expert-system life cycle, development methodology, and the approach taken in this methodology to manage and reduce the risks in expert system development. Also examined are the risks of using and of not using a methodology, the studies undertaken to validate the provisions of the expert system development methodology, and the results of these validation studies.

Hull, Larry↗

Guide to object-oriented analysis and design

The purpose of this guide is to provide Marshall Space Flight Center personnel with guidelines for the use of object-oriented analysis and design and to describe how it can be accomplished within the framework of existing development directives, including the Software Development Plan. It is not intended as a detailed tutorial. The reader is referred to the Coad and Yourdon texts in the References.

Harrison, Harry C.↗

Selection of behavioral tasks and development of software for evaluation of rhesus monkey behavior during spaceflight

The results of several experiments were disseminated professionally during this semiannual period. These peer-reviewed papers that were accepted for publication represent the growth of our research areas, as follow-up experiments to previously published work in cognition and enrichment have been completed and are being published. The presentations not only reflect the latest interesting results that we have obtained, but also serve as a testament to the intense interest that is being expressed for our test system and findings.

Rumbaugh, Duane M.↗

Software packager user's guide

Software integration is a growing area of concern for many programmers and software managers because the need to build new programs quickly from existing components is greater than ever. This includes building versions of software products for multiple hardware platforms and operating systems, building programs from components written in different languages, and building systems from components that must execute on different machines in a distributed network. The goal of software integration is to make building new programs from existing components more seamless -- programmers should pay minimal attention to the underlying configuration issues involved. Libraries of reusable components and classes are important tools but only partial solutions to software development problems. Even though software components may have compatible interfaces, there may be other reasons, such as differences between execution environments, why they cannot be integrated. Often, components must be adapted or reimplemented to fit into another application because of implementation differences -- they are implemented in different programming languages, dependent on different operating system resources, or must execute on different physical machines. The software packager is a tool that allows programmers to deal with interfaces between software components and ignore complex integration details. The packager takes modular descriptions of the structure of a software system written in the package specification language and produces an integration program in the form of a makefile. If complex integration tools are needed to integrate a set of components, such as remote procedure call stubs, their use is implied by the packager automatically and stub generation tools are invoked in the corresponding makefile. The programmer deals only with the components themselves and not the details of how to build the system on any given platform.

Callahan, John R.↗

Expert system for scheduling simulation lab sessions

Implementation and results of an expert system used for scheduling session requests for the Systems Engineering Simulator (SES) laboratory at the NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) are discussed. Weekly session requests are received from astronaut crew trainers, procedures developers, engineering assessment personnel, software developers, and various others who wish to access the computers, scene generators, and other simulation equipment available to them in the SES lab. The expert system under discussion is comprised of a data acquisition portion - two Pascal programs run on a personal computer - and a CLIPS program installed on a minicomputer. A brief introduction to the SES lab and its scheduling background is given. A general overview of the system is provided, followed by a detailed description of the constraint-reduction process and of the scheduler itself. Results from a ten-week trial period using this approach are discussed. Finally, a summary of the expert system's strengths and shortcomings are provided.

Lund, Chet↗

How Emerging Technologies are Changing the Rules of Spacecraft Ground Support

As part of its effort to develop the flight dynamics distributed system (FDDS), NASA established a program for the continual monitoring of the developments in computer and software technologies, and for assessing the significance of constructing and operating spacecraft ground data systems. In relation to this, technology trends in the computing industry are reviewed, exploring their significance for the spacecraft ground support industry. The technologies considered are: hardware; object computing; Internet; automation, and software development. The ways in which these technologies have affected the industry are considered.

Boland, Dillard↗

Development of Software to Model AXAF-I Image Quality

This report describes work conducted on Delivery Order 181 between October 1996 through June 1997. During this period software was written to: compute axial PSD's from RDOS AXAF-I mirror surface maps; plot axial surface errors and compute PSD's from HDOS "Big 8" axial scans; plot PSD's from FITS format PSD files; plot band-limited RMS vs axial and azimuthal position for multiple PSD files; combine and organize PSD's from multiple mirror surface measurements formatted as input to GRAZTRACE; modify GRAZTRACE to read FITS formatted PSD files; evaluate AXAF-I test results; improve and expand the capabilities of the GT x-ray mirror analysis package. During this period work began on a more user-friendly manual for the GT program, and improvements were made to the on-line help manual.

Geary, Joseph↗

Avionics Simulation, Development and Software Engineering

This monthly report summarizes the work performed under contract NAS8-00114 for Marshall Space Flight Center in the following tasks: 1) Purchase Order No. H-32831D, Task Order 001A, GPB Program Software Oversight; 2) Purchase Order No. H-32832D, Task Order 002, ISS EXPRESS Racks Software Support; 3) Purchase Order No. H-32833D, Task Order 003, SSRMS Math Model Integration; 4) Purchase Order No. H-32834D, Task Order 004, GPB Program Hardware Oversight; 5) Purchase Order No. H-32835D, Task Order 005, Electrodynamic Tether Operations and Control Analysis; 6) Purchase Order No. H-32837D, Task Order 007, SRB Command Receiver/Decoder; and 7) Purchase Order No. H-32838D, Task Order 008, AVGS/DART SW and Simulation Support

Francis, Ronald C.↗

Avionics Simulation, Development and Software Engineering

During this reporting period, all technical responsibilities were accomplished as planned. A close working relationship was maintained with personnel of the MSFC Avionics Department Software Group (ED14), the MSFC EXPRESS Project Office (FD31), and the Huntsville Boeing Company. Accomplishments included: performing special tasks; supporting Software Review Board (SRB), Avionics Test Bed (ATB), and EXPRESS Software Control Panel (ESCP) activities; participating in technical meetings; and coordinating issues between the Boeing Company and the MSFC Project Office.

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Ten Commandments of Formal Methods...Ten Years Later

More than a decade ago, in "Ten Commandments of Formal Methods," we offered practical guidelines for projects that sought to use formal methods. Over the years, the article, which was based on our knowledge of successful industrial projects, has been widely cited and has generated much positive feedback. However, despite this apparent enthusiasm, formal methods use has not greatly increased, and some of the same attitudes about the infeasibility of adopting them persist. Formal methodists believe that introducing greater rigor will improve the software development process and yield software with better structure, greater maintainability, and fewer errors.

Bowen, Jonathan P.↗

Vacillation Made Easy: Distribution, Re-distribution, and Un-distribution of DOPL-based Processing

Distributed Objects Protocol Layer, or DOPL, Provides a simple and general data communication abstraction that can support the distribution of C++ applications software functionality among an arbitrary collection of processors. The purposed of the abstraction is to minimize the cost of revising processing distribution decisions throughout the software development cycle, including after software has beed delivered to users.

Vacillation↗

Ares I Avionics Introduction

The Ares I is the next generation human-rated launcher for the United States Constellation program. This system is required to provide single fault tolerance within defined crew safety and mission reliability limits. As part of the effort to achieve those safety goals, Ares I includes an avionics subsystem built as a multistring, voting architecture. The avionics design draws upon experience gained from building fly-by-wire systems for Shuttle, X- 38, and Seawolf. Architectural drivers for the avionics design include using proven technologies with existing suppliers of space rated parts for critical functions (to reduce overall development risk), easing the software development effort by using an off-theshelf, DO-178B certifiable, ARINC-653 operating system in the main flight computers, minimizing mutual data and power connections that might lead to a common-mode hardware failure of the redundant avionics strings, and centralizing overall Ares I command & control within the Upper Stage.

Marchant, Christopher C.↗