DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Svetlana Shasharina

The goal of the Center for Technology for Advanced Scientific Component Software is to fundamentally changing the way scientific software is developed and used by bringing component-based software development technologies to high-performance scientific and engineering computing. The role of Tech-X work in TASCS project is to provide an outreach to accelerator physics and fusion applications by introducing TASCS tools into applications, testing tools in the applications and modifying the tools to be more usable.

GERICOS: A Generic Framework for the Development of On-Board Software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Plasson, P.; Cuomo, C.; Gabriel, G.; Gauthier, N.; Gueguen, L.; Malac-Allain, L.

2016-08-01

This paper presents an overview of the GERICOS framework (GEneRIC Onboard Software), its architecture, its various layers and its future evolutions. The GERICOS framework, developed and qualified by LESIA, offers a set of generic, reusable and customizable software components for the rapid development of payload flight software. The GERICOS framework has a layered structure. The first layer (GERICOS::CORE) implements the concept of active objects and forms an abstraction layer over the top of real-time kernels. The second layer (GERICOS::BLOCKS) offers a set of reusable software components for building flight software based on generic solutions to recurrent functionalities. The third layer (GERICOS::DRIVERS) implements software drivers for several COTS IP cores of the LEON processor ecosystem.

Using an architectural approach to integrate heterogeneous, distributed software components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Callahan, John R.; Purtilo, James M.

1995-01-01

Many computer programs cannot be easily integrated because their components are distributed and heterogeneous, i.e., they are implemented in diverse programming languages, use different data representation formats, or their runtime environments are incompatible. In many cases, programs are integrated by modifying their components or interposing mechanisms that handle communication and conversion tasks. For example, remote procedure call (RPC) helps integrate heterogeneous, distributed programs. When configuring such programs, however, mechanisms like RPC must be used explicitly by software developers in order to integrate collections of diverse components. Each collection may require a unique integration solution. This paper describes improvements to the concepts of software packaging and some of our experiences in constructing complex software systems from a wide variety of components in different execution environments. Software packaging is a process that automatically determines how to integrate a diverse collection of computer programs based on the types of components involved and the capabilities of available translators and adapters in an environment. Software packaging provides a context that relates such mechanisms to software integration processes and reduces the cost of configuring applications whose components are distributed or implemented in different programming languages. Our software packaging tool subsumes traditional integration tools like UNIX make by providing a rule-based approach to software integration that is independent of execution environments.

A Software Engineering Approach based on WebML and BPMN to the Mediation Scenario of the SWS Challenge

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brambilla, Marco; Ceri, Stefano; Valle, Emanuele Della; Facca, Federico M.; Tziviskou, Christina

Although Semantic Web Services are expected to produce a revolution in the development of Web-based systems, very few enterprise-wide design experiences are available; one of the main reasons is the lack of sound Software Engineering methods and tools for the deployment of Semantic Web applications. In this chapter, we present an approach to software development for the Semantic Web based on classical Software Engineering methods (i.e., formal business process development, computer-aided and component-based software design, and automatic code generation) and on semantic methods and tools (i.e., ontology engineering, semantic service annotation and discovery).

Knowledge base methodology: Methodology for first Engineering Script Language (ESL) knowledge base

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Peeris, Kumar; Izygon, Michel E.

1992-01-01

The primary goal of reusing software components is that software can be developed faster, cheaper and with higher quality. Though, reuse is not automatic and can not just happen. It has to be carefully engineered. For example a component needs to be easily understandable in order to be reused, and it has also to be malleable enough to fit into different applications. In fact the software development process is deeply affected when reuse is being applied. During component development, a serious effort has to be directed toward making these components as reusable. This implies defining reuse coding style guidelines and applying then to any new component to create as well as to any old component to modify. These guidelines should point out the favorable reuse features and may apply to naming conventions, module size and cohesion, internal documentation, etc. During application development, effort is shifted from writing new code toward finding and eventually modifying existing pieces of code, then assembling them together. We see here that reuse is not free, and therefore has to be carefully managed.

A Component Approach to Collaborative Scientific Software Development: Tools and Techniques Utilized by the Quantum Chemistry Science Application Partnership

DOE PAGES

Kenny, Joseph P.; Janssen, Curtis L.; Gordon, Mark S.; ...

2008-01-01

Cutting-edge scientific computing software is complex, increasingly involving the coupling of multiple packages to combine advanced algorithms or simulations at multiple physical scales. Component-based software engineering (CBSE) has been advanced as a technique for managing this complexity, and complex component applications have been created in the quantum chemistry domain, as well as several other simulation areas, using the component model advocated by the Common Component Architecture (CCA) Forum. While programming models do indeed enable sound software engineering practices, the selection of programming model is just one building block in a comprehensive approach to large-scale collaborative development which must also addressmore » interface and data standardization, and language and package interoperability. We provide an overview of the development approach utilized within the Quantum Chemistry Science Application Partnership, identifying design challenges, describing the techniques which we have adopted to address these challenges and highlighting the advantages which the CCA approach offers for collaborative development.« less

Hirabayashi, Satoshi; Kroll, Charles N.; Nowak, David J. 2011. Component-based development and sensitivity analyses of an air pollutant dry deposition model. Environmental Modelling & Software. 26(6): 804-816.

Treesearch

Satoshi Hirabayashi; Chuck Kroll; David Nowak

2011-01-01

The Urban Forest Effects-Deposition model (UFORE-D) was developed with a component-based modeling approach. Functions of the model were separated into components that are responsible for user interface, data input/output, and core model functions. Taking advantage of the component-based approach, three UFORE-D applications were developed: a base application to estimate...

Design and Implementation of Scientific Software Components to Enable Multiscale Modeling: The Effective Fragment Potential (QM/EFP) Method

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gaenko, Alexander; Windus, Theresa L.; Sosonkina, Masha

2012-10-19

The design and development of scientific software components to provide an interface to the effective fragment potential (EFP) methods are reported. Multiscale modeling of physical and chemical phenomena demands the merging of software packages developed by research groups in significantly different fields. Componentization offers an efficient way to realize new high performance scientific methods by combining the best models available in different software packages without a need for package readaptation after the initial componentization is complete. The EFP method is an efficient electronic structure theory based model potential that is suitable for predictive modeling of intermolecular interactions in large molecularmore » systems, such as liquids, proteins, atmospheric aerosols, and nanoparticles, with an accuracy that is comparable to that of correlated ab initio methods. The developed components make the EFP functionality accessible for any scientific component-aware software package. The performance of the component is demonstrated on a protein interaction model, and its accuracy is compared with results obtained with coupled cluster methods.« less

Electronic Health Record for Intensive Care based on Usual Windows Based Software.

PubMed

Reper, Arnaud; Reper, Pascal

2015-08-01

In Intensive Care Units, the amount of data to be processed for patients care, the turn over of the patients, the necessity for reliability and for review processes indicate the use of Patient Data Management Systems (PDMS) and electronic health records (EHR). To respond to the needs of an Intensive Care Unit and not to be locked with proprietary software, we developed an EHR based on usual software and components. The software was designed as a client-server architecture running on the Windows operating system and powered by the access data base system. The client software was developed using Visual Basic interface library. The application offers to the users the following functions: medical notes captures, observations and treatments, nursing charts with administration of medications, scoring systems for classification, and possibilities to encode medical activities for billing processes. Since his deployment in September 2004, the EHR was used to care more than five thousands patients with the expected software reliability and facilitated data management and review processes. Communications with other medical software were not developed from the start, and are realized by the use of basic functionalities communication engine. Further upgrade of the system will include multi-platform support, use of typed language with static analysis, and configurable interface. The developed system based on usual software components was able to respond to the medical needs of the local ICU environment. The use of Windows for development allowed us to customize the software to the preexisting organization and contributed to the acceptability of the whole system.

Managing Scientific Software Complexity with Bocca and CCA

DOE PAGES

Allan, Benjamin A.; Norris, Boyana; Elwasif, Wael R.; ...

2008-01-01

In high-performance scientific software development, the emphasis is often on short time to first solution. Even when the development of new components mostly reuses existing components or libraries and only small amounts of new code must be created, dealing with the component glue code and software build processes to obtain complete applications is still tedious and error-prone. Component-based software meant to reduce complexity at the application level increases complexity to the extent that the user must learn and remember the interfaces and conventions of the component model itself. To address these needs, we introduce Bocca, the first tool to enablemore » application developers to perform rapid component prototyping while maintaining robust software-engineering practices suitable to HPC environments. Bocca provides project management and a comprehensive build environment for creating and managing applications composed of Common Component Architecture components. Of critical importance for high-performance computing (HPC) applications, Bocca is designed to operate in a language-agnostic way, simultaneously handling components written in any of the languages commonly used in scientific applications: C, C++, Fortran, Python and Java. Bocca automates the tasks related to the component glue code, freeing the user to focus on the scientific aspects of the application. Bocca embraces the philosophy pioneered by Ruby on Rails for web applications: start with something that works, and evolve it to the user's purpose.« less

Automated Reuse of Scientific Subroutine Libraries through Deductive Synthesis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lowry, Michael R.; Pressburger, Thomas; VanBaalen, Jeffrey; Roach, Steven

1997-01-01

Systematic software construction offers the potential of elevating software engineering from an art-form to an engineering discipline. The desired result is more predictable software development leading to better quality and more maintainable software. However, the overhead costs associated with the formalisms, mathematics, and methods of systematic software construction have largely precluded their adoption in real-world software development. In fact, many mainstream software development organizations, such as Microsoft, still maintain a predominantly oral culture for software development projects; which is far removed from a formalism-based culture for software development. An exception is the limited domain of safety-critical software, where the high-assuiance inherent in systematic software construction justifies the additional cost. We believe that systematic software construction will only be adopted by mainstream software development organization when the overhead costs have been greatly reduced. Two approaches to cost mitigation are reuse (amortizing costs over many applications) and automation. For the last four years, NASA Ames has funded the Amphion project, whose objective is to automate software reuse through techniques from systematic software construction. In particular, deductive program synthesis (i.e., program extraction from proofs) is used to derive a composition of software components (e.g., subroutines) that correctly implements a specification. The construction of reuse libraries of software components is the standard software engineering solution for improving software development productivity and quality.

The image-guided surgery toolkit IGSTK: an open source C++ software toolkit.

PubMed

Enquobahrie, Andinet; Cheng, Patrick; Gary, Kevin; Ibanez, Luis; Gobbi, David; Lindseth, Frank; Yaniv, Ziv; Aylward, Stephen; Jomier, Julien; Cleary, Kevin

2007-11-01

This paper presents an overview of the image-guided surgery toolkit (IGSTK). IGSTK is an open source C++ software library that provides the basic components needed to develop image-guided surgery applications. It is intended for fast prototyping and development of image-guided surgery applications. The toolkit was developed through a collaboration between academic and industry partners. Because IGSTK was designed for safety-critical applications, the development team has adopted lightweight software processes that emphasizes safety and robustness while, at the same time, supporting geographically separated developers. A software process that is philosophically similar to agile software methods was adopted emphasizing iterative, incremental, and test-driven development principles. The guiding principle in the architecture design of IGSTK is patient safety. The IGSTK team implemented a component-based architecture and used state machine software design methodologies to improve the reliability and safety of the components. Every IGSTK component has a well-defined set of features that are governed by state machines. The state machine ensures that the component is always in a valid state and that all state transitions are valid and meaningful. Realizing that the continued success and viability of an open source toolkit depends on a strong user community, the IGSTK team is following several key strategies to build an active user community. These include maintaining a users and developers' mailing list, providing documentation (application programming interface reference document and book), presenting demonstration applications, and delivering tutorial sessions at relevant scientific conferences.

The component-based architecture of the HELIOS medical software engineering environment.

PubMed

Degoulet, P; Jean, F C; Engelmann, U; Meinzer, H P; Baud, R; Sandblad, B; Wigertz, O; Le Meur, R; Jagermann, C

1994-12-01

The constitution of highly integrated health information networks and the growth of multimedia technologies raise new challenges for the development of medical applications. We describe in this paper the general architecture of the HELIOS medical software engineering environment devoted to the development and maintenance of multimedia distributed medical applications. HELIOS is made of a set of software components, federated by a communication channel called the HELIOS Unification Bus. The HELIOS kernel includes three main components, the Analysis-Design and Environment, the Object Information System and the Interface Manager. HELIOS services consist in a collection of toolkits providing the necessary facilities to medical application developers. They include Image Related services, a Natural Language Processor, a Decision Support System and Connection services. The project gives special attention to both object-oriented approaches and software re-usability that are considered crucial steps towards the development of more reliable, coherent and integrated applications.

HelioScan: a software framework for controlling in vivo microscopy setups with high hardware flexibility, functional diversity and extendibility.

PubMed

Langer, Dominik; van 't Hoff, Marcel; Keller, Andreas J; Nagaraja, Chetan; Pfäffli, Oliver A; Göldi, Maurice; Kasper, Hansjörg; Helmchen, Fritjof

2013-04-30

Intravital microscopy such as in vivo imaging of brain dynamics is often performed with custom-built microscope setups controlled by custom-written software to meet specific requirements. Continuous technological advancement in the field has created a need for new control software that is flexible enough to support the biological researcher with innovative imaging techniques and provide the developer with a solid platform for quickly and easily implementing new extensions. Here, we introduce HelioScan, a software package written in LabVIEW, as a platform serving this dual role. HelioScan is designed as a collection of components that can be flexibly assembled into microscope control software tailored to the particular hardware and functionality requirements. Moreover, HelioScan provides a software framework, within which new functionality can be implemented in a quick and structured manner. A specific HelioScan application assembles at run-time from individual software components, based on user-definable configuration files. Due to its component-based architecture, HelioScan can exploit synergies of multiple developers working in parallel on different components in a community effort. We exemplify the capabilities and versatility of HelioScan by demonstrating several in vivo brain imaging modes, including camera-based intrinsic optical signal imaging for functional mapping of cortical areas, standard two-photon laser-scanning microscopy using galvanometric mirrors, and high-speed in vivo two-photon calcium imaging using either acousto-optic deflectors or a resonant scanner. We recommend HelioScan as a convenient software framework for the in vivo imaging community. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The South African Astronomical Observatory instrumentation software architecture and the SHOC instruments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

van Gend, Carel; Lombaard, Briehan; Sickafoose, Amanda; Whittal, Hamish

2016-07-01

Until recently, software for instruments on the smaller telescopes at the South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) has not been designed for remote accessibility and frequently has not been developed using modern software best-practice. We describe a software architecture we have implemented for use with new and upgraded instruments at the SAAO. The architecture was designed to allow for multiple components and to be fast, reliable, remotely- operable, support different user interfaces, employ as much non-proprietary software as possible, and to take future-proofing into consideration. Individual component drivers exist as standalone processes, communicating over a network. A controller layer coordinates the various components, and allows a variety of user interfaces to be used. The Sutherland High-speed Optical Cameras (SHOC) instruments incorporate an Andor electron-multiplying CCD camera, a GPS unit for accurate timing and a pair of filter wheels. We have applied the new architecture to the SHOC instruments, with the camera driver developed using Andor's software development kit. We have used this to develop an innovative web-based user-interface to the instrument.

Component Technology for High-Performance Scientific Simulation Software

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Epperly, T; Kohn, S; Kumfert, G

2000-11-09

We are developing scientific software component technology to manage the complexity of modem, parallel simulation software and increase the interoperability and re-use of scientific software packages. In this paper, we describe a language interoperability tool named Babel that enables the creation and distribution of language-independent software libraries using interface definition language (IDL) techniques. We have created a scientific IDL that focuses on the unique interface description needs of scientific codes, such as complex numbers, dense multidimensional arrays, complicated data types, and parallelism. Preliminary results indicate that in addition to language interoperability, this approach provides useful tools for thinking about themore » design of modem object-oriented scientific software libraries. Finally, we also describe a web-based component repository called Alexandria that facilitates the distribution, documentation, and re-use of scientific components and libraries.« less

NA-42 TI Shared Software Component Library FY2011 Final Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Knudson, Christa K.; Rutz, Frederick C.; Dorow, Kevin E.

The NA-42 TI program initiated an effort in FY2010 to standardize its software development efforts with the long term goal of migrating toward a software management approach that will allow for the sharing and reuse of code developed within the TI program, improve integration, ensure a level of software documentation, and reduce development costs. The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has been tasked with two activities that support this mission. PNNL has been tasked with the identification, selection, and implementation of a Shared Software Component Library. The intent of the library is to provide a common repository that is accessiblemore » by all authorized NA-42 software development teams. The repository facilitates software reuse through a searchable and easy to use web based interface. As software is submitted to the repository, the component registration process captures meta-data and provides version control for compiled libraries, documentation, and source code. This meta-data is then available for retrieval and review as part of library search results. In FY2010, PNNL and staff from the Remote Sensing Laboratory (RSL) teamed up to develop a software application with the goal of replacing the aging Aerial Measuring System (AMS). The application under development includes an Advanced Visualization and Integration of Data (AVID) framework and associated AMS modules. Throughout development, PNNL and RSL have utilized a common AMS code repository for collaborative code development. The AMS repository is hosted by PNNL, is restricted to the project development team, is accessed via two different geographic locations and continues to be used. The knowledge gained from the collaboration and hosting of this repository in conjunction with PNNL software development and systems engineering capabilities were used in the selection of a package to be used in the implementation of the software component library on behalf of NA-42 TI. The second task managed by PNNL is the development and continued maintenance of the NA-42 TI Software Development Questionnaire. This questionnaire is intended to help software development teams working under NA-42 TI in documenting their development activities. When sufficiently completed, the questionnaire illustrates that the software development activities recorded incorporate significant aspects of the software engineering lifecycle. The questionnaire template is updated as comments are received from NA-42 and/or its development teams and revised versions distributed to those using the questionnaire. PNNL also maintains a list of questionnaire recipients. The blank questionnaire template, the AVID and AMS software being developed, and the completed AVID AMS specific questionnaire are being used as the initial content to be established in the TI Component Library. This report summarizes the approach taken to identify requirements, search for and evaluate technologies, and the approach taken for installation of the software needed to host the component library. Additionally, it defines the process by which users request access for the contribution and retrieval of library content.« less

Update on PISCES

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pearson, Don; Hamm, Dustin; Kubena, Brian; Weaver, Jonathan K.

2010-01-01

An updated version of the Platform Independent Software Components for the Exploration of Space (PISCES) software library is available. A previous version was reported in Library for Developing Spacecraft-Mission-Planning Software (MSC-22983), NASA Tech Briefs, Vol. 25, No. 7 (July 2001), page 52. To recapitulate: This software provides for Web-based, collaborative development of computer programs for planning trajectories and trajectory- related aspects of spacecraft-mission design. The library was built using state-of-the-art object-oriented concepts and software-development methodologies. The components of PISCES include Java-language application programs arranged in a hierarchy of classes that facilitates the reuse of the components. As its full name suggests, the PISCES library affords platform-independence: The Java language makes it possible to use the classes and application programs with a Java virtual machine, which is available in most Web-browser programs. Another advantage is expandability: Object orientation facilitates expansion of the library through creation of a new class. Improvements in the library since the previous version include development of orbital-maneuver- planning and rendezvous-launch-window application programs, enhancement of capabilities for propagation of orbits, and development of a desktop user interface.

Feature-based component model for design of embedded systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zha, Xuan Fang; Sriram, Ram D.

2004-11-01

An embedded system is a hybrid of hardware and software, which combines software's flexibility and hardware real-time performance. Embedded systems can be considered as assemblies of hardware and software components. An Open Embedded System Model (OESM) is currently being developed at NIST to provide a standard representation and exchange protocol for embedded systems and system-level design, simulation, and testing information. This paper proposes an approach to representing an embedded system feature-based model in OESM, i.e., Open Embedded System Feature Model (OESFM), addressing models of embedded system artifacts, embedded system components, embedded system features, and embedded system configuration/assembly. The approach provides an object-oriented UML (Unified Modeling Language) representation for the embedded system feature model and defines an extension to the NIST Core Product Model. The model provides a feature-based component framework allowing the designer to develop a virtual embedded system prototype through assembling virtual components. The framework not only provides a formal precise model of the embedded system prototype but also offers the possibility of designing variation of prototypes whose members are derived by changing certain virtual components with different features. A case study example is discussed to illustrate the embedded system model.

Software components for medical image visualization and surgical planning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Starreveld, Yves P.; Gobbi, David G.; Finnis, Kirk; Peters, Terence M.

2001-05-01

Purpose: The development of new applications in medical image visualization and surgical planning requires the completion of many common tasks such as image reading and re-sampling, segmentation, volume rendering, and surface display. Intra-operative use requires an interface to a tracking system and image registration, and the application requires basic, easy to understand user interface components. Rapid changes in computer and end-application hardware, as well as in operating systems and network environments make it desirable to have a hardware and operating system as an independent collection of reusable software components that can be assembled rapidly to prototype new applications. Methods: Using the OpenGL based Visualization Toolkit as a base, we have developed a set of components that implement the above mentioned tasks. The components are written in both C++ and Python, but all are accessible from Python, a byte compiled scripting language. The components have been used on the Red Hat Linux, Silicon Graphics Iris, Microsoft Windows, and Apple OS X platforms. Rigorous object-oriented software design methods have been applied to ensure hardware independence and a standard application programming interface (API). There are components to acquire, display, and register images from MRI, MRA, CT, Computed Rotational Angiography (CRA), Digital Subtraction Angiography (DSA), 2D and 3D ultrasound, video and physiological recordings. Interfaces to various tracking systems for intra-operative use have also been implemented. Results: The described components have been implemented and tested. To date they have been used to create image manipulation and viewing tools, a deep brain functional atlas, a 3D ultrasound acquisition and display platform, a prototype minimally invasive robotic coronary artery bypass graft planning system, a tracked neuro-endoscope guidance system and a frame-based stereotaxy neurosurgery planning tool. The frame-based stereotaxy module has been licensed and certified for use in a commercial image guidance system. Conclusions: It is feasible to encapsulate image manipulation and surgical guidance tasks in individual, reusable software modules. These modules allow for faster development of new applications. The strict application of object oriented software design methods allows individual components of such a system to make the transition from the research environment to a commercial one.

Development of an Ada programming support environment database SEAD (Software Engineering and Ada Database) administration manual

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Liaw, Morris; Evesson, Donna

1988-01-01

Software Engineering and Ada Database (SEAD) was developed to provide an information resource to NASA and NASA contractors with respect to Ada-based resources and activities which are available or underway either in NASA or elsewhere in the worldwide Ada community. The sharing of such information will reduce duplication of effort while improving quality in the development of future software systems. SEAD data is organized into five major areas: information regarding education and training resources which are relevant to the life cycle of Ada-based software engineering projects such as those in the Space Station program; research publications relevant to NASA projects such as the Space Station Program and conferences relating to Ada technology; the latest progress reports on Ada projects completed or in progress both within NASA and throughout the free world; Ada compilers and other commercial products that support Ada software development; and reusable Ada components generated both within NASA and from elsewhere in the free world. This classified listing of reusable components shall include descriptions of tools, libraries, and other components of interest to NASA. Sources for the data include technical newletters and periodicals, conference proceedings, the Ada Information Clearinghouse, product vendors, and project sponsors and contractors.

Hybrid Modeling for Testing Intelligent Software for Lunar-Mars Closed Life Support

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Malin, Jane T.; Nicholson, Leonard S. (Technical Monitor)

1999-01-01

Intelligent software is being developed for closed life support systems with biological components, for human exploration of the Moon and Mars. The intelligent software functions include planning/scheduling, reactive discrete control and sequencing, management of continuous control, and fault detection, diagnosis, and management of failures and errors. Four types of modeling information have been essential to system modeling and simulation to develop and test the software and to provide operational model-based what-if analyses: discrete component operational and failure modes; continuous dynamic performance within component modes, modeled qualitatively or quantitatively; configuration of flows and power among components in the system; and operations activities and scenarios. CONFIG, a multi-purpose discrete event simulation tool that integrates all four types of models for use throughout the engineering and operations life cycle, has been used to model components and systems involved in the production and transfer of oxygen and carbon dioxide in a plant-growth chamber and between that chamber and a habitation chamber with physicochemical systems for gas processing.

A database for TMT interface control documents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gillies, Kim; Roberts, Scott; Brighton, Allan; Rogers, John

2016-08-01

The TMT Software System consists of software components that interact with one another through a software infrastructure called TMT Common Software (CSW). CSW consists of software services and library code that is used by developers to create the subsystems and components that participate in the software system. CSW also defines the types of components that can be constructed and their roles. The use of common component types and shared middleware services allows standardized software interfaces for the components. A software system called the TMT Interface Database System was constructed to support the documentation of the interfaces for components based on CSW. The programmer describes a subsystem and each of its components using JSON-style text files. A command interface file describes each command a component can receive and any commands a component sends. The event interface files describe status, alarms, and events a component publishes and status and events subscribed to by a component. A web application was created to provide a user interface for the required features. Files are ingested into the software system's database. The user interface allows browsing subsystem interfaces, publishing versions of subsystem interfaces, and constructing and publishing interface control documents that consist of the intersection of two subsystem interfaces. All published subsystem interfaces and interface control documents are versioned for configuration control and follow the standard TMT change control processes. Subsystem interfaces and interface control documents can be visualized in the browser or exported as PDF files.

Judicious use of custom development in an open source component architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bristol, S.; Latysh, N.; Long, D.; Tekell, S.; Allen, J.

2014-12-01

Modern software engineering is not as much programming from scratch as innovative assembly of existing components. Seamlessly integrating disparate components into scalable, performant architecture requires sound engineering craftsmanship and can often result in increased cost efficiency and accelerated capabilities if software teams focus their creativity on the edges of the problem space. ScienceBase is part of the U.S. Geological Survey scientific cyberinfrastructure, providing data and information management, distribution services, and analysis capabilities in a way that strives to follow this pattern. ScienceBase leverages open source NoSQL and relational databases, search indexing technology, spatial service engines, numerous libraries, and one proprietary but necessary software component in its architecture. The primary engineering focus is cohesive component interaction, including construction of a seamless Application Programming Interface (API) across all elements. The API allows researchers and software developers alike to leverage the infrastructure in unique, creative ways. Scaling the ScienceBase architecture and core API with increasing data volume (more databases) and complexity (integrated science problems) is a primary challenge addressed by judicious use of custom development in the component architecture. Other data management and informatics activities in the earth sciences have independently resolved to a similar design of reusing and building upon established technology and are working through similar issues for managing and developing information (e.g., U.S. Geoscience Information Network; NASA's Earth Observing System Clearing House; GSToRE at the University of New Mexico). Recent discussions facilitated through the Earth Science Information Partners are exploring potential avenues to exploit the implicit relationships between similar projects for explicit gains in our ability to more rapidly advance global scientific cyberinfrastructure.

Automating Risk Analysis of Software Design Models

PubMed Central

Ruiz, Guifré; Heymann, Elisa; César, Eduardo; Miller, Barton P.

2014-01-01

The growth of the internet and networked systems has exposed software to an increased amount of security threats. One of the responses from software developers to these threats is the introduction of security activities in the software development lifecycle. This paper describes an approach to reduce the need for costly human expertise to perform risk analysis in software, which is common in secure development methodologies, by automating threat modeling. Reducing the dependency on security experts aims at reducing the cost of secure development by allowing non-security-aware developers to apply secure development with little to no additional cost, making secure development more accessible. To automate threat modeling two data structures are introduced, identification trees and mitigation trees, to identify threats in software designs and advise mitigation techniques, while taking into account specification requirements and cost concerns. These are the components of our model for automated threat modeling, AutSEC. We validated AutSEC by implementing it in a tool based on data flow diagrams, from the Microsoft security development methodology, and applying it to VOMS, a grid middleware component, to evaluate our model's performance. PMID:25136688

Automating risk analysis of software design models.

PubMed

Frydman, Maxime; Ruiz, Guifré; Heymann, Elisa; César, Eduardo; Miller, Barton P

2014-01-01

The growth of the internet and networked systems has exposed software to an increased amount of security threats. One of the responses from software developers to these threats is the introduction of security activities in the software development lifecycle. This paper describes an approach to reduce the need for costly human expertise to perform risk analysis in software, which is common in secure development methodologies, by automating threat modeling. Reducing the dependency on security experts aims at reducing the cost of secure development by allowing non-security-aware developers to apply secure development with little to no additional cost, making secure development more accessible. To automate threat modeling two data structures are introduced, identification trees and mitigation trees, to identify threats in software designs and advise mitigation techniques, while taking into account specification requirements and cost concerns. These are the components of our model for automated threat modeling, AutSEC. We validated AutSEC by implementing it in a tool based on data flow diagrams, from the Microsoft security development methodology, and applying it to VOMS, a grid middleware component, to evaluate our model's performance.

Distributed Computing Framework for Synthetic Radar Application

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gurrola, Eric M.; Rosen, Paul A.; Aivazis, Michael

2006-01-01

We are developing an extensible software framework, in response to Air Force and NASA needs for distributed computing facilities for a variety of radar applications. The objective of this work is to develop a Python based software framework, that is the framework elements of the middleware that allows developers to control processing flow on a grid in a distributed computing environment. Framework architectures to date allow developers to connect processing functions together as interchangeable objects, thereby allowing a data flow graph to be devised for a specific problem to be solved. The Pyre framework, developed at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and now being used as the basis for next-generation radar processing at JPL, is a Python-based software framework. We have extended the Pyre framework to include new facilities to deploy processing components as services, including components that monitor and assess the state of the distributed network for eventual real-time control of grid resources.

A GUI Based Software for Sizing Stand Alone AC Coupled Hybrid PV-Diesel Power System under Malaysia Climate

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Syafiqah Syahirah Mohamed, Nor; Amalina Banu Mohamat Adek, Noor; Hamid, Nurul Farhana Abd

2018-03-01

This paper presents the development of Graphical User Interface (GUI) software for sizing main component in AC coupled photovoltaic (PV) hybrid power system based on Malaysia climate. This software provides guideline for PV system integrator to design effectively the size of components and system configuration to match the system and load requirement with geographical condition. The concept of the proposed software is balancing the annual average renewable energy generation and load demand. In this study, the PV to diesel generator (DG) ratio is introduced by considering the hybrid system energy contribution. The GUI software is able to size the main components in the PV hybrid system to meet with the set target of energy contribution ratio. The rated powers of the components to be defined are PV array, grid-tie inverter, bi-directional inverter, battery storage and DG. GUI is used to perform all the system sizing procedures to make it user friendly interface as a sizing tool for AC coupled PV hybrid system. The GUI will be done by using Visual Studio 2015 based on the real data under Malaysia Climate.

A Core Plug and Play Architecture for Reusable Flight Software Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wilmot, Jonathan

2006-01-01

The Flight Software Branch, at Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), has been working on a run-time approach to facilitate a formal software reuse process. The reuse process is designed to enable rapid development and integration of high-quality software systems and to more accurately predict development costs and schedule. Previous reuse practices have been somewhat successful when the same teams are moved from project to project. But this typically requires taking the software system in an all-or-nothing approach where useful components cannot be easily extracted from the whole. As a result, the system is less flexible and scalable with limited applicability to new projects. This paper will focus on the rationale behind, and implementation of the run-time executive. This executive is the core for the component-based flight software commonality and reuse process adopted at Goddard.

Open source electronic health record and patient data management system for intensive care.

PubMed

Massaut, Jacques; Reper, Pascal

2008-01-01

In Intensive Care Units, the amount of data to be processed for patients care, the turn over of the patients, the necessity for reliability and for review processes indicate the use of Patient Data Management Systems (PDMS) and electronic health records (EHR). To respond to the needs of an Intensive Care Unit and not to be locked with proprietary software, we developed a PDMS and EHR based on open source software and components. The software was designed as a client-server architecture running on the Linux operating system and powered by the PostgreSQL data base system. The client software was developed in C using GTK interface library. The application offers to the users the following functions: medical notes captures, observations and treatments, nursing charts with administration of medications, scoring systems for classification, and possibilities to encode medical activities for billing processes. Since his deployment in February 2004, the PDMS was used to care more than three thousands patients with the expected software reliability and facilitated data management and review processes. Communications with other medical software were not developed from the start, and are realized by the use of the Mirth HL7 communication engine. Further upgrade of the system will include multi-platform support, use of typed language with static analysis, and configurable interface. The developed system based on open source software components was able to respond to the medical needs of the local ICU environment. The use of OSS for development allowed us to customize the software to the preexisting organization and contributed to the acceptability of the whole system.

Component Prioritization Schema for Achieving Maximum Time and Cost Benefits from Software Testing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Srivastava, Praveen Ranjan; Pareek, Deepak

Software testing is any activity aimed at evaluating an attribute or capability of a program or system and determining that it meets its required results. Defining the end of software testing represents crucial features of any software development project. A premature release will involve risks like undetected bugs, cost of fixing faults later, and discontented customers. Any software organization would want to achieve maximum possible benefits from software testing with minimum resources. Testing time and cost need to be optimized for achieving a competitive edge in the market. In this paper, we propose a schema, called the Component Prioritization Schema (CPS), to achieve an effective and uniform prioritization of the software components. This schema serves as an extension to the Non Homogenous Poisson Process based Cumulative Priority Model. We also introduce an approach for handling time-intensive versus cost-intensive projects.

Component-Based Visualization System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Delgado, Francisco

2005-01-01

A software system has been developed that gives engineers and operations personnel with no "formal" programming expertise, but who are familiar with the Microsoft Windows operating system, the ability to create visualization displays to monitor the health and performance of aircraft/spacecraft. This software system is currently supporting the X38 V201 spacecraft component/system testing and is intended to give users the ability to create, test, deploy, and certify their subsystem displays in a fraction of the time that it would take to do so using previous software and programming methods. Within the visualization system there are three major components: the developer, the deployer, and the widget set. The developer is a blank canvas with widget menu items that give users the ability to easily create displays. The deployer is an application that allows for the deployment of the displays created using the developer application. The deployer has additional functionality that the developer does not have, such as printing of displays, screen captures to files, windowing of displays, and also serves as the interface into the documentation archive and help system. The third major component is the widget set. The widgets are the visual representation of the items that will make up the display (i.e., meters, dials, buttons, numerical indicators, string indicators, and the like). This software was developed using Visual C++ and uses COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) software where possible.

Thermomechanical Multiaxial Fatigue Testing Capability Developed

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1996-01-01

Structural components in aeronautical gas turbine engines typically experience multiaxial states of stress under nonisothermal conditions. To estimate the durability of the various components in the engine, one must characterize the cyclic deformation and fatigue behavior of the materials used under thermal and complex mechanical loading conditions. To this end, a testing protocol and associated test control software were developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center for thermomechanical axial-torsional fatigue tests. These tests are to be performed on thin-walled, tubular specimens fabricated from the cobalt-based superalloy Haynes 188. The software is written in C and runs on an MS-DOS based microcomputer.

NASA Operational Simulator for Small Satellites: Tools for Software Based Validation and Verification of Small Satellites

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grubb, Matt

2016-01-01

The NASA Operational Simulator for Small Satellites (NOS3) is a suite of tools to aid in areas such as software development, integration test (IT), mission operations training, verification and validation (VV), and software systems check-out. NOS3 provides a software development environment, a multi-target build system, an operator interface-ground station, dynamics and environment simulations, and software-based hardware models. NOS3 enables the development of flight software (FSW) early in the project life cycle, when access to hardware is typically not available. For small satellites there are extensive lead times on many of the commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) components as well as limited funding for engineering test units (ETU). Considering the difficulty of providing a hardware test-bed to each developer tester, hardware models are modeled based upon characteristic data or manufacturers data sheets for each individual component. The fidelity of each hardware models is such that FSW executes unaware that physical hardware is not present. This allows binaries to be compiled for both the simulation environment, and the flight computer, without changing the FSW source code. For hardware models that provide data dependent on the environment, such as a GPS receiver or magnetometer, an open-source tool from NASA GSFC (42 Spacecraft Simulation) is used to provide the necessary data. The underlying infrastructure used to transfer messages between FSW and the hardware models can also be used to monitor, intercept, and inject messages, which has proven to be beneficial for VV of larger missions such as James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). As hardware is procured, drivers can be added to the environment to enable hardware-in-the-loop (HWIL) testing. When strict time synchronization is not vital, any number of combinations of hardware components and software-based models can be tested. The open-source operator interface used in NOS3 is COSMOS from Ball Aerospace. For testing, plug-ins are implemented in COSMOS to control the NOS3 simulations, while the command and telemetry tools available in COSMOS are used to communicate with FSW. NOS3 is actively being used for FSW development and component testing of the Simulation-to-Flight 1 (STF-1) CubeSat. As NOS3 matures, hardware models have been added for common CubeSat components such as Novatel GPS receivers, ClydeSpace electrical power systems and batteries, ISISpace antenna systems, etc. In the future, NASA IVV plans to distribute NOS3 to other CubeSat developers and release the suite to the open-source community.

Domain specific software architectures: Command and control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Braun, Christine; Hatch, William; Ruegsegger, Theodore; Balzer, Bob; Feather, Martin; Goldman, Neil; Wile, Dave

1992-01-01

GTE is the Command and Control contractor for the Domain Specific Software Architectures program. The objective of this program is to develop and demonstrate an architecture-driven, component-based capability for the automated generation of command and control (C2) applications. Such a capability will significantly reduce the cost of C2 applications development and will lead to improved system quality and reliability through the use of proven architectures and components. A major focus of GTE's approach is the automated generation of application components in particular subdomains. Our initial work in this area has concentrated in the message handling subdomain; we have defined and prototyped an approach that can automate one of the most software-intensive parts of C2 systems development. This paper provides an overview of the GTE team's DSSA approach and then presents our work on automated support for message processing.

Integrated Systems Health Management (ISHM) Toolkit

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Venkatesh, Meera; Kapadia, Ravi; Walker, Mark; Wilkins, Kim

2013-01-01

A framework of software components has been implemented to facilitate the development of ISHM systems according to a methodology based on Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM). This framework is collectively referred to as the Toolkit and was developed using General Atomics' Health MAP (TM) technology. The toolkit is intended to provide assistance to software developers of mission-critical system health monitoring applications in the specification, implementation, configuration, and deployment of such applications. In addition to software tools designed to facilitate these objectives, the toolkit also provides direction to software developers in accordance with an ISHM specification and development methodology. The development tools are based on an RCM approach for the development of ISHM systems. This approach focuses on defining, detecting, and predicting the likelihood of system functional failures and their undesirable consequences.

Reducing Risk in DoD Software-Intensive Systems Development

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-03-01

intensive systems development risk. This research addresses the use of the Technical Readiness Assessment (TRA) using the nine-level software Technology...The software TRLs are ineffective in reducing technical risk for the software component development. • Without the software TRLs, there is no...effective method to perform software TRA or reduce the technical development risk. The software component will behave as a new, untried technology in nearly

Active Learning through Modeling: Introduction to Software Development in the Business Curriculum

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roussev, Boris; Rousseva, Yvonna

2004-01-01

Modern software practices call for the active involvement of business people in the software process. Therefore, programming has become an indispensable part of the information systems component of the core curriculum at business schools. In this paper, we present a model-based approach to teaching introduction to programming to general business…

Reuse Metrics for Object Oriented Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bieman, James M.

1998-01-01

One way to increase the quality of software products and the productivity of software development is to reuse existing software components when building new software systems. In order to monitor improvements in reuse, the level of reuse must be measured. In this NASA supported project we (1) derived a suite of metrics which quantify reuse attributes for object oriented, object based, and procedural software, (2) designed prototype tools to take these measurements in Ada, C++, Java, and C software, (3) evaluated the reuse in available software, (4) analyzed the relationship between coupling, cohesion, inheritance, and reuse, (5) collected object oriented software systems for our empirical analyses, and (6) developed quantitative criteria and methods for restructuring software to improve reusability.

An efficient approach to the deployment of complex open source information systems

PubMed Central

Cong, Truong Van Chi; Groeneveld, Eildert

2011-01-01

Complex open source information systems are usually implemented as component-based software to inherit the available functionality of existing software packages developed by third parties. Consequently, the deployment of these systems not only requires the installation of operating system, application framework and the configuration of services but also needs to resolve the dependencies among components. The problem becomes more challenging when the application must be installed and used on different platforms such as Linux and Windows. To address this, an efficient approach using the virtualization technology is suggested and discussed in this paper. The approach has been applied in our project to deploy a web-based integrated information system in molecular genetics labs. It is a low-cost solution to benefit both software developers and end-users. PMID:22102770

The integration of the risk management process with the lifecycle of medical device software.

PubMed

Pecoraro, F; Luzi, D

2014-01-01

The application of software in the Medical Device (MD) domain has become central to the improvement of diagnoses and treatments. The new European regulations that specifically address software as an important component of MD, require complex procedures to make software compliant with safety requirements, introducing thereby new challenges in the qualification and classification of MD software as well as in the performance of risk management activities. Under this perspective, the aim of this paper is to propose an integrated framework that combines the activities to be carried out by the manufacturer to develop safe software within the development lifecycle based on the regulatory requirements reported in US and European regulations as well as in the relevant standards and guidelines. A comparative analysis was carried out to identify the main issues related to the application of the current new regulations. In addition, standards and guidelines recently released to harmonise procedures for the validation of MD software have been used to define the risk management activities to be carried out by the manufacturer during the software development process. This paper highlights the main issues related to the qualification and classification of MD software, providing an analysis of the different regulations applied in Europe and the US. A model that integrates the risk management process within the software development lifecycle has been proposed too. It is based on regulatory requirements and considers software risk analysis as a central input to be managed by the manufacturer already at the initial stages of the software design, in order to prevent MD failures. Relevant changes in the process of MD development have been introduced with the recognition of software being an important component of MDs as stated in regulations and standards. This implies the performance of highly iterative processes that have to integrate the risk management in the framework of software development. It also makes it necessary to involve both medical and software engineering competences to safeguard patient and user safety.

A Linguistic Model in Component Oriented Programming

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Crăciunean, Daniel Cristian; Crăciunean, Vasile

2016-12-01

It is a fact that the component-oriented programming, well organized, can bring a large increase in efficiency in the development of large software systems. This paper proposes a model for building software systems by assembling components that can operate independently of each other. The model is based on a computing environment that runs parallel and distributed applications. This paper introduces concepts as: abstract aggregation scheme and aggregation application. Basically, an aggregation application is an application that is obtained by combining corresponding components. In our model an aggregation application is a word in a language.

Airland Battlefield Environment (ALBE) Tactical Decision Aid (TDA) Demonstration Program,

DTIC Science & Technology

1987-11-12

Management System (DBMS) software, GKS graphics libraries, and user interface software. These components of the ATB system software architecture will be... knowlede base ano auqent the decision mak:n• process by providing infocr-mation useful in the formulation and execution of battlefield strategies...Topographic Laboratories as an Engineer. Ms. Capps is managing the software development of the AirLand Battlefield Environment (ALBE) geographic

Integrated design optimization research and development in an industrial environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, V.; German, Marjorie D.; Lee, S.-J.

1989-04-01

An overview is given of a design optimization project that is in progress at the GE Research and Development Center for the past few years. The objective of this project is to develop a methodology and a software system for design automation and optimization of structural/mechanical components and systems. The effort focuses on research and development issues and also on optimization applications that can be related to real-life industrial design problems. The overall technical approach is based on integration of numerical optimization techniques, finite element methods, CAE and software engineering, and artificial intelligence/expert systems (AI/ES) concepts. The role of each of these engineering technologies in the development of a unified design methodology is illustrated. A software system DESIGN-OPT has been developed for both size and shape optimization of structural components subjected to static as well as dynamic loadings. By integrating this software with an automatic mesh generator, a geometric modeler and an attribute specification computer code, a software module SHAPE-OPT has been developed for shape optimization. Details of these software packages together with their applications to some 2- and 3-dimensional design problems are described.

Integrated design optimization research and development in an industrial environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kumar, V.; German, Marjorie D.; Lee, S.-J.

1989-01-01

An overview is given of a design optimization project that is in progress at the GE Research and Development Center for the past few years. The objective of this project is to develop a methodology and a software system for design automation and optimization of structural/mechanical components and systems. The effort focuses on research and development issues and also on optimization applications that can be related to real-life industrial design problems. The overall technical approach is based on integration of numerical optimization techniques, finite element methods, CAE and software engineering, and artificial intelligence/expert systems (AI/ES) concepts. The role of each of these engineering technologies in the development of a unified design methodology is illustrated. A software system DESIGN-OPT has been developed for both size and shape optimization of structural components subjected to static as well as dynamic loadings. By integrating this software with an automatic mesh generator, a geometric modeler and an attribute specification computer code, a software module SHAPE-OPT has been developed for shape optimization. Details of these software packages together with their applications to some 2- and 3-dimensional design problems are described.

High-precision measurements of cementless acetabular components using model-based RSA: an experimental study.

PubMed

Baad-Hansen, Thomas; Kold, Søren; Kaptein, Bart L; Søballe, Kjeld

2007-08-01

In RSA, tantalum markers attached to metal-backed acetabular cups are often difficult to detect on stereo radiographs due to the high density of the metal shell. This results in occlusion of the prosthesis markers and may lead to inconclusive migration results. Within the last few years, new software systems have been developed to solve this problem. We compared the precision of 3 RSA systems in migration analysis of the acetabular component. A hemispherical and a non-hemispherical acetabular component were mounted in a phantom. Both acetabular components underwent migration analyses with 3 different RSA systems: conventional RSA using tantalum markers, an RSA system using a hemispherical cup algorithm, and a novel model-based RSA system. We found narrow confidence intervals, indicating high precision of the conventional marker system and model-based RSA with regard to migration and rotation. The confidence intervals of conventional RSA and model-based RSA were narrower than those of the hemispherical cup algorithm-based system regarding cup migration and rotation. The model-based RSA software combines the precision of the conventional RSA software with the convenience of the hemispherical cup algorithm-based system. Based on our findings, we believe that these new tools offer an improvement in the measurement of acetabular component migration.

EMMA: a new paradigm in configurable software

DOE PAGES

Nogiec, J. M.; Trombly-Freytag, K.

2017-11-23

EMMA is a framework designed to create a family of configurable software systems, with emphasis on extensibility and flexibility. It is based on a loosely coupled, event driven architecture. The EMMA framework has been built upon the premise of composing software systems from independent components. It opens up opportunities for reuse of components and their functionality and composing them together in many different ways. As a result, it provides the developer of test and measurement applications with a lightweight alternative to microservices, while sharing their various advantages, including composability, loose coupling, encapsulation, and reuse.

EMMA: A New Paradigm in Configurable Software

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nogiec, J. M.; Trombly-Freytag, K.

EMMA is a framework designed to create a family of configurable software systems, with emphasis on extensibility and flexibility. It is based on a loosely coupled, event driven architecture. The EMMA framework has been built upon the premise of composing software systems from independent components. It opens up opportunities for reuse of components and their functionality and composing them together in many different ways. It provides the developer of test and measurement applications with a lightweight alternative to microservices, while sharing their various advantages, including composability, loose coupling, encapsulation, and reuse.

EMMA: a new paradigm in configurable software

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nogiec, J. M.; Trombly-Freytag, K.

EMMA is a framework designed to create a family of configurable software systems, with emphasis on extensibility and flexibility. It is based on a loosely coupled, event driven architecture. The EMMA framework has been built upon the premise of composing software systems from independent components. It opens up opportunities for reuse of components and their functionality and composing them together in many different ways. As a result, it provides the developer of test and measurement applications with a lightweight alternative to microservices, while sharing their various advantages, including composability, loose coupling, encapsulation, and reuse.

EMMA: a new paradigm in configurable software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nogiec, J. M.; Trombly-Freytag, K.

2017-10-01

EMMA is a framework designed to create a family of configurable software systems, with emphasis on extensibility and flexibility. It is based on a loosely coupled, event driven architecture. The EMMA framework has been built upon the premise of composing software systems from independent components. It opens up opportunities for reuse of components and their functionality and composing them together in many different ways. It provides the developer of test and measurement applications with a lightweight alternative to microservices, while sharing their various advantages, including composability, loose coupling, encapsulation, and reuse.

Development of software for computing forming information using a component based approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ko, Kwang Hee; Park, Jiing Seo; Kim, Jung; Kim, Young Bum; Shin, Jong Gye

2009-12-01

In shipbuilding industry, the manufacturing technology> has advanced at an unprecedented pace for the last decade. As a result, many automatic systems for cutting, welding, etc. have been developed and employed in the manufacturing process and accordingly the productivity has been increased drastically. Despite such improvement in the manufacturing technology', however, development of an automatic system for fabricating a curved hull plate remains at the beginning stage since hardware and software for the automation of the curved hull fabrication process should be developed differently depending on the dimensions of plates, forming methods and manufacturing processes of each shipyard. To deal with this problem, it is necessary> to create a "plug-in ''framework, which can adopt various kinds of hardware and software to construct a full automatic fabrication system. In this paper, a frame-work for automatic fabrication of curved hull plates is proposed, which consists of four components and related software. In particular the software module for computing fabrication information is developed by using the ooCBD development methodology; which can interface with other hardware and software with minimum effort. Examples of the proposed framework applied to medium and large shipyards are presented.

ICW eHealth Framework.

PubMed

Klein, Karsten; Wolff, Astrid C; Ziebold, Oliver; Liebscher, Thomas

2008-01-01

The ICW eHealth Framework (eHF) is a powerful infrastructure and platform for the development of service-oriented solutions in the health care business. It is the culmination of many years of experience of ICW in the development and use of in-house health care solutions and represents the foundation of ICW product developments based on the Java Enterprise Edition (Java EE). The ICW eHealth Framework has been leveraged to allow development by external partners - enabling adopters a straightforward integration into ICW solutions. The ICW eHealth Framework consists of reusable software components, development tools, architectural guidelines and conventions defining a full software-development and product lifecycle. From the perspective of a partner, the framework provides services and infrastructure capabilities for integrating applications within an eHF-based solution. This article introduces the ICW eHealth Framework's basic architectural concepts and technologies. It provides an overview of its module and component model, describes the development platform that supports the complete software development lifecycle of health care applications and outlines technological aspects, mainly focusing on application development frameworks and open standards.

Instrument control software development process for the multi-star AO system ARGOS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kulas, M.; Barl, L.; Borelli, J. L.; Gässler, W.; Rabien, S.

2012-09-01

The ARGOS project (Advanced Rayleigh guided Ground layer adaptive Optics System) will upgrade the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) with an AO System consisting of six Rayleigh laser guide stars. This adaptive optics system integrates several control loops and many different components like lasers, calibration swing arms and slope computers that are dispersed throughout the telescope. The purpose of the instrument control software (ICS) is running this AO system and providing convenient client interfaces to the instruments and the control loops. The challenges for the ARGOS ICS are the development of a distributed and safety-critical software system with no defects in a short time, the creation of huge and complex software programs with a maintainable code base, the delivery of software components with the desired functionality and the support of geographically distributed project partners. To tackle these difficult tasks, the ARGOS software engineers reuse existing software like the novel middleware from LINC-NIRVANA, an instrument for the LBT, provide many tests at different functional levels like unit tests and regression tests, agree about code and architecture style and deliver software incrementally while closely collaborating with the project partners. Many ARGOS ICS components are already successfully in use in the laboratories for testing ARGOS control loops.

Software Reuse Within the Earth Science Community

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Marshall, James J.; Olding, Steve; Wolfe, Robert E.; Delnore, Victor E.

2006-01-01

Scientific missions in the Earth sciences frequently require cost-effective, highly reliable, and easy-to-use software, which can be a challenge for software developers to provide. The NASA Earth Science Enterprise (ESE) spends a significant amount of resources developing software components and other software development artifacts that may also be of value if reused in other projects requiring similar functionality. In general, software reuse is often defined as utilizing existing software artifacts. Software reuse can improve productivity and quality while decreasing the cost of software development, as documented by case studies in the literature. Since large software systems are often the results of the integration of many smaller and sometimes reusable components, ensuring reusability of such software components becomes a necessity. Indeed, designing software components with reusability as a requirement can increase the software reuse potential within a community such as the NASA ESE community. The NASA Earth Science Data Systems (ESDS) Software Reuse Working Group is chartered to oversee the development of a process that will maximize the reuse potential of existing software components while recommending strategies for maximizing the reusability potential of yet-to-be-designed components. As part of this work, two surveys of the Earth science community were conducted. The first was performed in 2004 and distributed among government employees and contractors. A follow-up survey was performed in 2005 and distributed among a wider community, to include members of industry and academia. The surveys were designed to collect information on subjects such as the current software reuse practices of Earth science software developers, why they choose to reuse software, and what perceived barriers prevent them from reusing software. In this paper, we compare the results of these surveys, summarize the observed trends, and discuss the findings. The results are very similar, with the second, larger survey confirming the basic results of the first, smaller survey. The results suggest that reuse of ESE software can drive down the cost and time of system development, increase flexibility and responsiveness of these systems to new technologies and requirements, and increase effective and accountable community participation.

Measuring the impact of computer resource quality on the software development process and product

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcgarry, Frank; Valett, Jon; Hall, Dana

1985-01-01

The availability and quality of computer resources during the software development process was speculated to have measurable, significant impact on the efficiency of the development process and the quality of the resulting product. Environment components such as the types of tools, machine responsiveness, and quantity of direct access storage may play a major role in the effort to produce the product and in its subsequent quality as measured by factors such as reliability and ease of maintenance. During the past six years, the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center has conducted experiments with software projects in an attempt to better understand the impact of software development methodologies, environments, and general technologies on the software process and product. Data was extracted and examined from nearly 50 software development projects. All were related to support of satellite flight dynamics ground-based computations. The relationship between computer resources and the software development process and product as exemplified by the subject NASA data was examined. Based upon the results, a number of computer resource-related implications are provided.

Generalized Support Software: Domain Analysis and Implementation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stark, Mike; Seidewitz, Ed

1995-01-01

For the past five years, the Flight Dynamics Division (FDD) at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center has been carrying out a detailed domain analysis effort and is now beginning to implement Generalized Support Software (GSS) based on this analysis. GSS is part of the larger Flight Dynamics Distributed System (FDDS), and is designed to run under the FDDS User Interface / Executive (UIX). The FDD is transitioning from a mainframe based environment to systems running on engineering workstations. The GSS will be a library of highly reusable components that may be configured within the standard FDDS architecture to quickly produce low-cost satellite ground support systems. The estimates for the first release is that this library will contain approximately 200,000 lines of code. The main driver for developing generalized software is development cost and schedule improvement. The goal is to ultimately have at least 80 percent of all software required for a spacecraft mission (within the domain supported by the GSS) to be configured from the generalized components.

Engine structures analysis software: Component Specific Modeling (COSMO)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McKnight, R. L.; Maffeo, R. J.; Schwartz, S.

1994-08-01

A component specific modeling software program has been developed for propulsion systems. This expert program is capable of formulating the component geometry as finite element meshes for structural analysis which, in the future, can be spun off as NURB geometry for manufacturing. COSMO currently has geometry recipes for combustors, turbine blades, vanes, and disks. Component geometry recipes for nozzles, inlets, frames, shafts, and ducts are being added. COSMO uses component recipes that work through neutral files with the Technology Benefit Estimator (T/BEST) program which provides the necessary base parameters and loadings. This report contains the users manual for combustors, turbine blades, vanes, and disks.

Engine Structures Analysis Software: Component Specific Modeling (COSMO)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcknight, R. L.; Maffeo, R. J.; Schwartz, S.

1994-01-01

A component specific modeling software program has been developed for propulsion systems. This expert program is capable of formulating the component geometry as finite element meshes for structural analysis which, in the future, can be spun off as NURB geometry for manufacturing. COSMO currently has geometry recipes for combustors, turbine blades, vanes, and disks. Component geometry recipes for nozzles, inlets, frames, shafts, and ducts are being added. COSMO uses component recipes that work through neutral files with the Technology Benefit Estimator (T/BEST) program which provides the necessary base parameters and loadings. This report contains the users manual for combustors, turbine blades, vanes, and disks.

Simple solution to the medical instrumentation software problem

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Leif, Robert C.; Leif, Suzanne B.; Leif, Stephanie H.; Bingue, E.

1995-04-01

Medical devices now include a substantial software component, which is both difficult and expensive to produce and maintain. Medical software must be developed according to `Good Manufacturing Practices', GMP. Good Manufacturing Practices as specified by the FDA and ISO requires the definition and compliance to a software processes which ensures quality products by specifying a detailed method of software construction. The software process should be based on accepted standards. US Department of Defense software standards and technology can both facilitate the development and improve the quality of medical systems. We describe the advantages of employing Mil-Std-498, Software Development and Documentation, and the Ada programming language. Ada provides the very broad range of functionalities, from embedded real-time to management information systems required by many medical devices. It also includes advanced facilities for object oriented programming and software engineering.

Microterminal/Microfiche System for Computer-Based Instruction: Hardware and Software Development.

DTIC Science & Technology

1980-10-01

Circuit Description and Schematic of Adaptor Module 57 Appendix C Circuit Description The schematics for circuitry used in the microfiche viewer and the...composed of four major components and associated interfaces. The major components are (a) mirroterminal. (Is) microfiche reader. (0) memory module , and (d...sensing of the position of the platen containing the microfiche so that frame locations can be verified by the microterminal software. The memory module is

Users guide for STHARVEST: software to estimate the cost of harvesting small timber.

Treesearch

Roger D. Fight; Xiaoshan Zhang; Bruce R. Hartsough

2003-01-01

The STHARVEST computer application is Windows-based, public-domain software used to estimate costs for harvesting small-diameter stands or the small-diameter component of a mixed-sized stand. The equipment production rates were developed from existing studies. Equipment operating cost rates were based on November 1998 prices for new equipment and wage rates for the...

Modeling and managing risk early in software development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Briand, Lionel C.; Thomas, William M.; Hetmanski, Christopher J.

1993-01-01

In order to improve the quality of the software development process, we need to be able to build empirical multivariate models based on data collectable early in the software process. These models need to be both useful for prediction and easy to interpret, so that remedial actions may be taken in order to control and optimize the development process. We present an automated modeling technique which can be used as an alternative to regression techniques. We show how it can be used to facilitate the identification and aid the interpretation of the significant trends which characterize 'high risk' components in several Ada systems. Finally, we evaluate the effectiveness of our technique based on a comparison with logistic regression based models.

Agile Development of Various Computational Power Adaptive Web-Based Mobile-Learning Software Using Mobile Cloud Computing

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zadahmad, Manouchehr; Yousefzadehfard, Parisa

2016-01-01

Mobile Cloud Computing (MCC) aims to improve all mobile applications such as m-learning systems. This study presents an innovative method to use web technology and software engineering's best practices to provide m-learning functionalities hosted in a MCC-learning system as service. Components hosted by MCC are used to empower developers to create…

The Development of Point Doppler Velocimeter Data Acquisition and Processing Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cavone, Angelo A.

2008-01-01

In order to develop efficient and quiet aircraft and validate Computational Fluid Dynamic predications, aerodynamic researchers require flow parameter measurements to characterize flow fields about wind tunnel models and jet flows. A one-component Point Doppler Velocimeter (pDv), a non-intrusive, laser-based instrument, was constructed using a design/develop/test/validate/deploy approach. A primary component of the instrument is software required for system control/management and data collection/reduction. This software along with evaluation algorithms, advanced pDv from a laboratory curiosity to a production level instrument. Simultaneous pDv and pitot probe velocity measurements obtained at the centerline of a flow exiting a two-inch jet, matched within 0.4%. Flow turbulence spectra obtained with pDv and a hot-wire detected the primary and secondary harmonics with equal dynamic range produced by the fan driving the flow. Novel,hardware and software methods were developed, tested and incorporated into the system to eliminate and/or minimize error sources and improve system reliability.

USING THE ECLPSS SOFTWARE ENVIRONMENT TO BUILD A SPATIALLY EXPLICIT COMPONENT-BASED MODEL OF OZONE EFFECTS ON FOREST ECOSYSTEMS. (R827958)

EPA Science Inventory

We have developed a modeling framework to support grid-based simulation of ecosystems at multiple spatial scales, the Ecological Component Library for Parallel Spatial Simulation (ECLPSS). ECLPSS helps ecologists to build robust spatially explicit simulations of ...

Framework Programmable Platform for the Advanced Software Development Workstation: Preliminary system design document

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mayer, Richard J.; Blinn, Thomas M.; Mayer, Paula S. D.; Ackley, Keith A.; Crump, John W., IV; Henderson, Richard; Futrell, Michael T.

1991-01-01

The Framework Programmable Software Development Platform (FPP) is a project aimed at combining effective tool and data integration mechanisms with a model of the software development process in an intelligent integrated software environment. Guided by the model, this system development framework will take advantage of an integrated operating environment to automate effectively the management of the software development process so that costly mistakes during the development phase can be eliminated. The focus here is on the design of components that make up the FPP. These components serve as supporting systems for the Integration Mechanism and the Framework Processor and provide the 'glue' that ties the FPP together. Also discussed are the components that allow the platform to operate in a distributed, heterogeneous environment and to manage the development and evolution of software system artifacts.

Reliability Analysis and Optimal Release Problem Considering Maintenance Time of Software Components for an Embedded OSS Porting Phase

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tamura, Yoshinobu; Yamada, Shigeru

OSS (open source software) systems which serve as key components of critical infrastructures in our social life are still ever-expanding now. Especially, embedded OSS systems have been gaining a lot of attention in the embedded system area, i.e., Android, BusyBox, TRON, etc. However, the poor handling of quality problem and customer support prohibit the progress of embedded OSS. Also, it is difficult for developers to assess the reliability and portability of embedded OSS on a single-board computer. In this paper, we propose a method of software reliability assessment based on flexible hazard rates for the embedded OSS. Also, we analyze actual data of software failure-occurrence time-intervals to show numerical examples of software reliability assessment for the embedded OSS. Moreover, we compare the proposed hazard rate model for the embedded OSS with the typical conventional hazard rate models by using the comparison criteria of goodness-of-fit. Furthermore, we discuss the optimal software release problem for the porting-phase based on the total expected software maintenance cost.

Peridigm summary report : lessons learned in development with agile components.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Salinger, Andrew Gerhard; Mitchell, John Anthony; Littlewood, David John

2011-09-01

This report details efforts to deploy Agile Components for rapid development of a peridynamics code, Peridigm. The goal of Agile Components is to enable the efficient development of production-quality software by providing a well-defined, unifying interface to a powerful set of component-based software. Specifically, Agile Components facilitate interoperability among packages within the Trilinos Project, including data management, time integration, uncertainty quantification, and optimization. Development of the Peridigm code served as a testbed for Agile Components and resulted in a number of recommendations for future development. Agile Components successfully enabled rapid integration of Trilinos packages into Peridigm. A cost of thismore » approach, however, was a set of restrictions on Peridigm's architecture which impacted the ability to track history-dependent material data, dynamically modify the model discretization, and interject user-defined routines into the time integration algorithm. These restrictions resulted in modifications to the Agile Components approach, as implemented in Peridigm, and in a set of recommendations for future Agile Components development. Specific recommendations include improved handling of material states, a more flexible flow control model, and improved documentation. A demonstration mini-application, SimpleODE, was developed at the onset of this project and is offered as a potential supplement to Agile Components documentation.« less

Probabilistic, Decision-theoretic Disease Surveillance and Control

PubMed Central

Wagner, Michael; Tsui, Fuchiang; Cooper, Gregory; Espino, Jeremy U.; Harkema, Hendrik; Levander, John; Villamarin, Ricardo; Voorhees, Ronald; Millett, Nicholas; Keane, Christopher; Dey, Anind; Razdan, Manik; Hu, Yang; Tsai, Ming; Brown, Shawn; Lee, Bruce Y.; Gallagher, Anthony; Potter, Margaret

2011-01-01

The Pittsburgh Center of Excellence in Public Health Informatics has developed a probabilistic, decision-theoretic system for disease surveillance and control for use in Allegheny County, PA and later in Tarrant County, TX. This paper describes the software components of the system and its knowledge bases. The paper uses influenza surveillance to illustrate how the software components transform data collected by the healthcare system into population level analyses and decision analyses of potential outbreak-control measures. PMID:23569617

Development of high performance scientific components for interoperability of computing packages

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gulabani, Teena Pratap

2008-01-01

Three major high performance quantum chemistry computational packages, NWChem, GAMESS and MPQC have been developed by different research efforts following different design patterns. The goal is to achieve interoperability among these packages by overcoming the challenges caused by the different communication patterns and software design of each of these packages. A chemistry algorithm is hard to develop as well as being a time consuming process; integration of large quantum chemistry packages will allow resource sharing and thus avoid reinvention of the wheel. Creating connections between these incompatible packages is the major motivation of the proposed work. This interoperability is achievedmore » by bringing the benefits of Component Based Software Engineering through a plug-and-play component framework called Common Component Architecture (CCA). In this thesis, I present a strategy and process used for interfacing two widely used and important computational chemistry methodologies: Quantum Mechanics and Molecular Mechanics. To show the feasibility of the proposed approach the Tuning and Analysis Utility (TAU) has been coupled with NWChem code and its CCA components. Results show that the overhead is negligible when compared to the ease and potential of organizing and coping with large-scale software applications.« less

Development of a web application for water resources based on open source software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delipetrev, Blagoj; Jonoski, Andreja; Solomatine, Dimitri P.

2014-01-01

This article presents research and development of a prototype web application for water resources using latest advancements in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), open source software and web GIS. The web application has three web services for: (1) managing, presenting and storing of geospatial data, (2) support of water resources modeling and (3) water resources optimization. The web application is developed using several programming languages (PhP, Ajax, JavaScript, Java), libraries (OpenLayers, JQuery) and open source software components (GeoServer, PostgreSQL, PostGIS). The presented web application has several main advantages: it is available all the time, it is accessible from everywhere, it creates a real time multi-user collaboration platform, the programing languages code and components are interoperable and designed to work in a distributed computer environment, it is flexible for adding additional components and services and, it is scalable depending on the workload. The application was successfully tested on a case study with concurrent multi-users access.

JTAG-based remote configuration of FPGAs over optical fibers

DOE PAGES

Deng, B.; Xu, H.; Liu, C.; ...

2015-01-28

In this study, a remote FPGA-configuration method based on JTAG extension over optical fibers is presented. The method takes advantage of commercial components and ready-to-use software such as iMPACT and does not require any hardware or software development. The method combines the advantages of the slow remote JTAG configuration and the fast local flash memory configuration. The method has been verified successfully and used in the Demonstrator of Liquid-Argon Trigger Digitization Board (LTDB) for the ATLAS liquid argon calorimeter Phase-I trigger upgrade. All components on the FPGA side are verified to meet the radiation tolerance requirements.

The development and technology transfer of software engineering technology at NASA. Johnson Space Center

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pitman, C. L.; Erb, D. M.; Izygon, M. E.; Fridge, E. M., III; Roush, G. B.; Braley, D. M.; Savely, R. T.

1992-01-01

The United State's big space projects of the next decades, such as Space Station and the Human Exploration Initiative, will need the development of many millions of lines of mission critical software. NASA-Johnson (JSC) is identifying and developing some of the Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) technology that NASA will need to build these future software systems. The goal is to improve the quality and the productivity of large software development projects. New trends are outlined in CASE technology and how the Software Technology Branch (STB) at JSC is endeavoring to provide some of these CASE solutions for NASA is described. Key software technology components include knowledge-based systems, software reusability, user interface technology, reengineering environments, management systems for the software development process, software cost models, repository technology, and open, integrated CASE environment frameworks. The paper presents the status and long-term expectations for CASE products. The STB's Reengineering Application Project (REAP), Advanced Software Development Workstation (ASDW) project, and software development cost model (COSTMODL) project are then discussed. Some of the general difficulties of technology transfer are introduced, and a process developed by STB for CASE technology insertion is described.

A formal MIM specification and tools for the common exchange of MIM diagrams: an XML-Based format, an API, and a validation method

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background The Molecular Interaction Map (MIM) notation offers a standard set of symbols and rules on their usage for the depiction of cellular signaling network diagrams. Such diagrams are essential for disseminating biological information in a concise manner. A lack of software tools for the notation restricts wider usage of the notation. Development of software is facilitated by a more detailed specification regarding software requirements than has previously existed for the MIM notation. Results A formal implementation of the MIM notation was developed based on a core set of previously defined glyphs. This implementation provides a detailed specification of the properties of the elements of the MIM notation. Building upon this specification, a machine-readable format is provided as a standardized mechanism for the storage and exchange of MIM diagrams. This new format is accompanied by a Java-based application programming interface to help software developers to integrate MIM support into software projects. A validation mechanism is also provided to determine whether MIM datasets are in accordance with syntax rules provided by the new specification. Conclusions The work presented here provides key foundational components to promote software development for the MIM notation. These components will speed up the development of interoperable tools supporting the MIM notation and will aid in the translation of data stored in MIM diagrams to other standardized formats. Several projects utilizing this implementation of the notation are outlined herein. The MIM specification is available as an additional file to this publication. Source code, libraries, documentation, and examples are available at http://discover.nci.nih.gov/mim. PMID:21586134

A formal MIM specification and tools for the common exchange of MIM diagrams: an XML-Based format, an API, and a validation method.

PubMed

Luna, Augustin; Karac, Evrim I; Sunshine, Margot; Chang, Lucas; Nussinov, Ruth; Aladjem, Mirit I; Kohn, Kurt W

2011-05-17

The Molecular Interaction Map (MIM) notation offers a standard set of symbols and rules on their usage for the depiction of cellular signaling network diagrams. Such diagrams are essential for disseminating biological information in a concise manner. A lack of software tools for the notation restricts wider usage of the notation. Development of software is facilitated by a more detailed specification regarding software requirements than has previously existed for the MIM notation. A formal implementation of the MIM notation was developed based on a core set of previously defined glyphs. This implementation provides a detailed specification of the properties of the elements of the MIM notation. Building upon this specification, a machine-readable format is provided as a standardized mechanism for the storage and exchange of MIM diagrams. This new format is accompanied by a Java-based application programming interface to help software developers to integrate MIM support into software projects. A validation mechanism is also provided to determine whether MIM datasets are in accordance with syntax rules provided by the new specification. The work presented here provides key foundational components to promote software development for the MIM notation. These components will speed up the development of interoperable tools supporting the MIM notation and will aid in the translation of data stored in MIM diagrams to other standardized formats. Several projects utilizing this implementation of the notation are outlined herein. The MIM specification is available as an additional file to this publication. Source code, libraries, documentation, and examples are available at http://discover.nci.nih.gov/mim.

Investigation of environmental change pattern in Japan: A study on change detection of land cover in Tokyo districts using multi-dates LANDSAT CCT

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Maruyasu, T.; Murai, S. (Principal Investigator)

1976-01-01

The author has identified the following significant results. The software program, which enables the geographically corrected LANDSAT digital data base, was developed. The data base could provide land use planners with land cover information and the environmental change pattern. Land cover was evaluated by the color representation for ratio of three primary components, water vegetation, and nonorganic matter. Software was also developed for the change detection within multidates LANDSAT MSS data.

Enhancing requirements engineering for patient registry software systems with evidence-based components.

PubMed

Lindoerfer, Doris; Mansmann, Ulrich

2017-07-01

Patient registries are instrumental for medical research. Often their structures are complex and their implementations use composite software systems to meet the wide spectrum of challenges. Commercial and open-source systems are available for registry implementation, but many research groups develop their own systems. Methodological approaches in the selection of software as well as the construction of proprietary systems are needed. We propose an evidence-based checklist, summarizing essential items for patient registry software systems (CIPROS), to accelerate the requirements engineering process. Requirements engineering activities for software systems follow traditional software requirements elicitation methods, general software requirements specification (SRS) templates, and standards. We performed a multistep procedure to develop a specific evidence-based CIPROS checklist: (1) A systematic literature review to build a comprehensive collection of technical concepts, (2) a qualitative content analysis to define a catalogue of relevant criteria, and (3) a checklist to construct a minimal appraisal standard. CIPROS is based on 64 publications and covers twelve sections with a total of 72 items. CIPROS also defines software requirements. Comparing CIPROS with traditional software requirements elicitation methods, SRS templates and standards show a broad consensus but differences in issues regarding registry-specific aspects. Using an evidence-based approach to requirements engineering for registry software adds aspects to the traditional methods and accelerates the software engineering process for registry software. The method we used to construct CIPROS serves as a potential template for creating evidence-based checklists in other fields. The CIPROS list supports developers in assessing requirements for existing systems and formulating requirements for their own systems, while strengthening the reporting of patient registry software system descriptions. It may be a first step to create standards for patient registry software system assessments. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The Impact of Software Culture on the Management of Community Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Collins, J. A.; Pulsifer, P. L.; Sheffield, E.; Lewis, S.; Oldenburg, J.

2013-12-01

The Exchange for Local Observations and Knowledge of the Arctic (ELOKA), a program hosted at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), supports the collection, curation, and distribution of Local and Traditional Knowledge (LTK) data, as well as some quantitative data products. Investigations involving LTK data often involve community participation, and therefore require flexible and robust user interfaces to support a reliable process of data collection and management. Often, investigators focused on LTK and community-based monitoring choose to use ELOKA's data services based on our ability to provide rapid proof-of-concepts and economical delivery of a usable product. To satisfy these two overarching criteria, ELOKA is experimenting with modifications to its software development culture both in terms of how the software applications are developed as well as the kind of software applications (or components) being developed. Over the past several years, NSIDC has shifted its software development culture from one of assigning individual scientific programmers to support particular principal investigators or projects, to an Agile Software Methodology implementation using Scrum practices. ELOKA has participated in this process by working with other product owners to schedule and prioritize development work which is then implemented by a team of application developers. Scrum, along with practices such as Test Driven Development (TDD) and paired programming, improves the quality of the software product delivered to the user community. To meet the need for rapid prototyping and to maximize product development and support with limited developer input, our software development efforts are now focused on creating a platform of application modules that can be quickly customized to suit the needs of a variety of LTK projects. This approach is in contrast to the strategy of delivering custom applications for individual projects. To date, we have integrated components of the Nunaliit Atlas framework (a Java/JavaScript client-server web-based application) with an existing Ruby on Rails application. This approach requires transitioning individual applications to expose a service layer, thus allowing interapplication communication via RESTful services. In this presentation we will report on our experiences using Agile Scrum practices, our efforts to move from custom solutions to a platform of customizable modules, and the impact of each on our ability to support researchers and Arctic residents in the domain of community-based observations and knowledge.

Web accessibility and open source software.

PubMed

Obrenović, Zeljko

2009-07-01

A Web browser provides a uniform user interface to different types of information. Making this interface universally accessible and more interactive is a long-term goal still far from being achieved. Universally accessible browsers require novel interaction modalities and additional functionalities, for which existing browsers tend to provide only partial solutions. Although functionality for Web accessibility can be found as open source and free software components, their reuse and integration is complex because they were developed in diverse implementation environments, following standards and conventions incompatible with the Web. To address these problems, we have started several activities that aim at exploiting the potential of open-source software for Web accessibility. The first of these activities is the development of Adaptable Multi-Interface COmmunicator (AMICO):WEB, an infrastructure that facilitates efficient reuse and integration of open source software components into the Web environment. The main contribution of AMICO:WEB is in enabling the syntactic and semantic interoperability between Web extension mechanisms and a variety of integration mechanisms used by open source and free software components. Its design is based on our experiences in solving practical problems where we have used open source components to improve accessibility of rich media Web applications. The second of our activities involves improving education, where we have used our platform to teach students how to build advanced accessibility solutions from diverse open-source software. We are also partially involved in the recently started Eclipse projects called Accessibility Tools Framework (ACTF), the aim of which is development of extensible infrastructure, upon which developers can build a variety of utilities that help to evaluate and enhance the accessibility of applications and content for people with disabilities. In this article we briefly report on these activities.

Implementing reusable software components for SNOMED CT diagram and expression concept representations.

PubMed

Bánfai, Balázs; Porció, Roland; Kovács, Tibor

2014-01-01

SNOMED CT is a vital component in the future of semantic interoperability in healthcare as it provides the meaning to EHRs via its semantically rich, controlled terminology. Communicating the concepts of this terminology to both humans and machines is crucial therefore formal guidelines for diagram and expression representations have been developed by the curators of SNOMED CT. This paper presents a novel, model-based approach to implementing these guidelines that allows simultaneous editing of a concept via both diagram and expression editors. The implemented extensible software component can be embedded both both desktop and web applications.

ControlShell - A real-time software framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schneider, Stanley A.; Ullman, Marc A.; Chen, Vincent W.

1991-01-01

ControlShell is designed to enable modular design and impplementation of real-time software. It is an object-oriented tool-set for real-time software system programming. It provides a series of execution and data interchange mechansims that form a framework for building real-time applications. These mechanisms allow a component-based approach to real-time software generation and mangement. By defining a set of interface specifications for intermodule interaction, ControlShell provides a common platform that is the basis for real-time code development and exchange.

Abstracted Workow Framework with a Structure from Motion Application

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rossi, Adam J.

In scientific and engineering disciplines, from academia to industry, there is an increasing need for the development of custom software to perform experiments, construct systems, and develop products. The natural mindset initially is to shortcut and bypass all overhead and process rigor in order to obtain an immediate result for the problem at hand, with the misconception that the software will simply be thrown away at the end. In a majority of the cases, it turns out the software persists for many years, and likely ends up in production systems for which it was not initially intended. In the current study, a framework that can be used in both industry and academic applications mitigates underlying problems associated with developing scientific and engineering software. This results in software that is much more maintainable, documented, and usable by others, specifically allowing new users to extend capabilities of components already implemented in the framework. There is a multi-disciplinary need in the fields of imaging science, computer science, and software engineering for a unified implementation model, which motivates the development of an abstracted software framework. Structure from motion (SfM) has been identified as one use case where the abstracted workflow framework can improve research efficiencies and eliminate implementation redundancies in scientific fields. The SfM process begins by obtaining 2D images of a scene from different perspectives. Features from the images are extracted and correspondences are established. This provides a sufficient amount of information to initialize the problem for fully automated processing. Transformations are established between views, and 3D points are established via triangulation algorithms. The parameters for the camera models for all views / images are solved through bundle adjustment, establishing a highly consistent point cloud. The initial sparse point cloud and camera matrices are used to generate a dense point cloud through patch based techniques or densification algorithms such as Semi-Global Matching (SGM). The point cloud can be visualized or exploited by both humans and automated techniques. In some cases the point cloud is "draped" with original imagery in order to enhance the 3D model for a human viewer. The SfM workflow can be implemented in the abstracted framework, making it easily leverageable and extensible by multiple users. Like many processes in scientific and engineering domains, the workflow described for SfM is complex and requires many disparate components to form a functional system, often utilizing algorithms implemented by many users in different languages / environments and without knowledge of how the component fits into the larger system. In practice, this generally leads to issues interfacing the components, building the software for desired platforms, understanding its concept of operations, and how it can be manipulated in order to fit the desired function for a particular application. In addition, other scientists and engineers instinctively wish to analyze the performance of the system, establish new algorithms, optimize existing processes, and establish new functionality based on current research. This requires a framework whereby new components can be easily plugged in without affecting the current implemented functionality. The need for a universal programming environment establishes the motivation for the development of the abstracted workflow framework. This software implementation, named Catena, provides base classes from which new components must derive in order to operate within the framework. The derivation mandates requirements be satisfied in order to provide a complete implementation. Additionally, the developer must provide documentation of the component in terms of its overall function and inputs. The interface input and output values corresponding to the component must be defined in terms of their respective data types, and the implementation uses mechanisms within the framework to retrieve and send the values. This process requires the developer to componentize their algorithm rather than implement it monolithically. Although the requirements of the developer are slightly greater, the benefits realized from using Catena far outweigh the overhead, and results in extensible software. This thesis provides a basis for the abstracted workflow framework concept and the Catena software implementation. The benefits are also illustrated using a detailed examination of the SfM process as an example application.

Documenting Models for Interoperability and Reusability ...

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

Many modeling frameworks compartmentalize science via individual models that link sets of small components to create larger modeling workflows. Developing integrated watershed models increasingly requires coupling multidisciplinary, independent models, as well as collaboration between scientific communities, since component-based modeling can integrate models from different disciplines. Integrated Environmental Modeling (IEM) systems focus on transferring information between components by capturing a conceptual site model; establishing local metadata standards for input/output of models and databases; managing data flow between models and throughout the system; facilitating quality control of data exchanges (e.g., checking units, unit conversions, transfers between software languages); warning and error handling; and coordinating sensitivity/uncertainty analyses. Although many computational software systems facilitate communication between, and execution of, components, there are no common approaches, protocols, or standards for turn-key linkages between software systems and models, especially if modifying components is not the intent. Using a standard ontology, this paper reviews how models can be described for discovery, understanding, evaluation, access, and implementation to facilitate interoperability and reusability. In the proceedings of the International Environmental Modelling and Software Society (iEMSs), 8th International Congress on Environmental Mod

77 FR 32996 - Certain Handheld Electronic Computing Devices, Related Software, and Components Thereof...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-06-04

... INTERNATIONAL TRADE COMMISSION [Investigation No. 337-TA-769] Certain Handheld Electronic Computing Devices, Related Software, and Components Thereof; Termination of the Investigation Based on... electronic computing devices, related software, and components thereof by reason of infringement of certain...

EON: a component-based approach to automation of protocol-directed therapy.

PubMed Central

Musen, M A; Tu, S W; Das, A K; Shahar, Y

1996-01-01

Provision of automated support for planning protocol-directed therapy requires a computer program to take as input clinical data stored in an electronic patient-record system and to generate as output recommendations for therapeutic interventions and laboratory testing that are defined by applicable protocols. This paper presents a synthesis of research carried out at Stanford University to model the therapy-planning task and to demonstrate a component-based architecture for building protocol-based decision-support systems. We have constructed general-purpose software components that (1) interpret abstract protocol specifications to construct appropriate patient-specific treatment plans; (2) infer from time-stamped patient data higher-level, interval-based, abstract concepts; (3) perform time-oriented queries on a time-oriented patient database; and (4) allow acquisition and maintenance of protocol knowledge in a manner that facilitates efficient processing both by humans and by computers. We have implemented these components in a computer system known as EON. Each of the components has been developed, evaluated, and reported independently. We have evaluated the integration of the components as a composite architecture by implementing T-HELPER, a computer-based patient-record system that uses EON to offer advice regarding the management of patients who are following clinical trial protocols for AIDS or HIV infection. A test of the reuse of the software components in a different clinical domain demonstrated rapid development of a prototype application to support protocol-based care of patients who have breast cancer. PMID:8930854

Python as a federation tool for GENESIS 3.0.

PubMed

Cornelis, Hugo; Rodriguez, Armando L; Coop, Allan D; Bower, James M

2012-01-01

The GENESIS simulation platform was one of the first broad-scale modeling systems in computational biology to encourage modelers to develop and share model features and components. Supported by a large developer community, it participated in innovative simulator technologies such as benchmarking, parallelization, and declarative model specification and was the first neural simulator to define bindings for the Python scripting language. An important feature of the latest version of GENESIS is that it decomposes into self-contained software components complying with the Computational Biology Initiative federated software architecture. This architecture allows separate scripting bindings to be defined for different necessary components of the simulator, e.g., the mathematical solvers and graphical user interface. Python is a scripting language that provides rich sets of freely available open source libraries. With clean dynamic object-oriented designs, they produce highly readable code and are widely employed in specialized areas of software component integration. We employ a simplified wrapper and interface generator to examine an application programming interface and make it available to a given scripting language. This allows independent software components to be 'glued' together and connected to external libraries and applications from user-defined Python or Perl scripts. We illustrate our approach with three examples of Python scripting. (1) Generate and run a simple single-compartment model neuron connected to a stand-alone mathematical solver. (2) Interface a mathematical solver with GENESIS 3.0 to explore a neuron morphology from either an interactive command-line or graphical user interface. (3) Apply scripting bindings to connect the GENESIS 3.0 simulator to external graphical libraries and an open source three dimensional content creation suite that supports visualization of models based on electron microscopy and their conversion to computational models. Employed in this way, the stand-alone software components of the GENESIS 3.0 simulator provide a framework for progressive federated software development in computational neuroscience.

Python as a Federation Tool for GENESIS 3.0

PubMed Central

Cornelis, Hugo; Rodriguez, Armando L.; Coop, Allan D.; Bower, James M.

2012-01-01

The GENESIS simulation platform was one of the first broad-scale modeling systems in computational biology to encourage modelers to develop and share model features and components. Supported by a large developer community, it participated in innovative simulator technologies such as benchmarking, parallelization, and declarative model specification and was the first neural simulator to define bindings for the Python scripting language. An important feature of the latest version of GENESIS is that it decomposes into self-contained software components complying with the Computational Biology Initiative federated software architecture. This architecture allows separate scripting bindings to be defined for different necessary components of the simulator, e.g., the mathematical solvers and graphical user interface. Python is a scripting language that provides rich sets of freely available open source libraries. With clean dynamic object-oriented designs, they produce highly readable code and are widely employed in specialized areas of software component integration. We employ a simplified wrapper and interface generator to examine an application programming interface and make it available to a given scripting language. This allows independent software components to be ‘glued’ together and connected to external libraries and applications from user-defined Python or Perl scripts. We illustrate our approach with three examples of Python scripting. (1) Generate and run a simple single-compartment model neuron connected to a stand-alone mathematical solver. (2) Interface a mathematical solver with GENESIS 3.0 to explore a neuron morphology from either an interactive command-line or graphical user interface. (3) Apply scripting bindings to connect the GENESIS 3.0 simulator to external graphical libraries and an open source three dimensional content creation suite that supports visualization of models based on electron microscopy and their conversion to computational models. Employed in this way, the stand-alone software components of the GENESIS 3.0 simulator provide a framework for progressive federated software development in computational neuroscience. PMID:22276101

On-Board Software Payload Platform over RTEMS and LEON3FT Processing Units

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Martins, Rodolfo; Ribeiro, Pedro; Furano, Gianluca; Costa Pinto, Joao; Habinc, Sandi

2013-08-01

Under ESA and Inmarsat ARTES 8 Alphabus/Alphasat specific programme a technology demonstration payload (TDP) was developed. The payload called TDP8 is an Environment Effects Facility to monitor the GEO radiation environment and its effects on electronic components and sensors. This paper will discuss the on-board software payload platform approach developed since then and based on the TDP8 validation activities.

Transportable Payload Operations Control Center reusable software: Building blocks for quality ground data systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mahmot, Ron; Koslosky, John T.; Beach, Edward; Schwarz, Barbara

1994-01-01

The Mission Operations Division (MOD) at Goddard Space Flight Center builds Mission Operations Centers which are used by Flight Operations Teams to monitor and control satellites. Reducing system life cycle costs through software reuse has always been a priority of the MOD. The MOD's Transportable Payload Operations Control Center development team established an extensive library of 14 subsystems with over 100,000 delivered source instructions of reusable, generic software components. Nine TPOCC-based control centers to date support 11 satellites and achieved an average software reuse level of more than 75 percent. This paper shares experiences of how the TPOCC building blocks were developed and how building block developer's, mission development teams, and users are all part of the process.

High performance VLSI telemetry data systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chesney, J.; Speciale, N.; Horner, W.; Sabia, S.

1990-01-01

NASA's deployment of major space complexes such as Space Station Freedom (SSF) and the Earth Observing System (EOS) will demand increased functionality and performance from ground based telemetry acquisition systems well above current system capabilities. Adaptation of space telemetry data transport and processing standards such as those specified by the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS) standards and those required for commercial ground distribution of telemetry data, will drive these functional and performance requirements. In addition, budget limitations will force the requirement for higher modularity, flexibility, and interchangeability at lower cost in new ground telemetry data system elements. At NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), the design and development of generic ground telemetry data system elements, over the last five years, has resulted in significant solutions to these problems. This solution, referred to as the functional components approach includes both hardware and software components ready for end user application. The hardware functional components consist of modern data flow architectures utilizing Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASIC's) developed specifically to support NASA's telemetry data systems needs and designed to meet a range of data rate requirements up to 300 Mbps. Real-time operating system software components support both embedded local software intelligence, and overall system control, status, processing, and interface requirements. These components, hardware and software, form the superstructure upon which project specific elements are added to complete a telemetry ground data system installation. This paper describes the functional components approach, some specific component examples, and a project example of the evolution from VLSI component, to basic board level functional component, to integrated telemetry data system.

The Chandra X-ray Center data system: supporting the mission of the Chandra X-ray Observatory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Evans, Janet D.; Cresitello-Dittmar, Mark; Doe, Stephen; Evans, Ian; Fabbiano, Giuseppina; Germain, Gregg; Glotfelty, Kenny; Hall, Diane; Plummer, David; Zografou, Panagoula

2006-06-01

The Chandra X-ray Center Data System provides end-to-end scientific software support for Chandra X-ray Observatory mission operations. The data system includes the following components: (1) observers' science proposal planning tools; (2) science mission planning tools; (3) science data processing, monitoring, and trending pipelines and tools; and (4) data archive and database management. A subset of the science data processing component is ported to multiple platforms and distributed to end-users as a portable data analysis package. Web-based user tools are also available for data archive search and retrieval. We describe the overall architecture of the data system and its component pieces, and consider the design choices and their impacts on maintainability. We discuss the many challenges involved in maintaining a large, mission-critical software system with limited resources. These challenges include managing continually changing software requirements and ensuring the integrity of the data system and resulting data products while being highly responsive to the needs of the project. We describe our use of COTS and OTS software at the subsystem and component levels, our methods for managing multiple release builds, and adapting a large code base to new hardware and software platforms. We review our experiences during the life of the mission so-far, and our approaches for keeping a small, but highly talented, development team engaged during the maintenance phase of a mission.

A Component-based Programming Model for Composite, Distributed Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eidson, Thomas M.; Bushnell, Dennis M. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The nature of scientific programming is evolving to larger, composite applications that are composed of smaller element applications. These composite applications are more frequently being targeted for distributed, heterogeneous networks of computers. They are most likely programmed by a group of developers. Software component technology and computational frameworks are being proposed and developed to meet the programming requirements of these new applications. Historically, programming systems have had a hard time being accepted by the scientific programming community. In this paper, a programming model is outlined that attempts to organize the software component concepts and fundamental programming entities into programming abstractions that will be better understood by the application developers. The programming model is designed to support computational frameworks that manage many of the tedious programming details, but also that allow sufficient programmer control to design an accurate, high-performance application.

Architecture for Survivable System Processing (ASSP)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wood, Richard J.

1991-11-01

The Architecture for Survivable System Processing (ASSP) Program is a multi-phase effort to implement Department of Defense (DOD) and commercially developed high-tech hardware, software, and architectures for reliable space avionics and ground based systems. System configuration options provide processing capabilities to address Time Dependent Processing (TDP), Object Dependent Processing (ODP), and Mission Dependent Processing (MDP) requirements through Open System Architecture (OSA) alternatives that allow for the enhancement, incorporation, and capitalization of a broad range of development assets. High technology developments in hardware, software, and networking models, address technology challenges of long processor life times, fault tolerance, reliability, throughput, memories, radiation hardening, size, weight, power (SWAP) and security. Hardware and software design, development, and implementation focus on the interconnectivity/interoperability of an open system architecture and is being developed to apply new technology into practical OSA components. To insure for widely acceptable architecture capable of interfacing with various commercial and military components, this program provides for regular interactions with standardization working groups (e.g.) the International Standards Organization (ISO), American National Standards Institute (ANSI), Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), and Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). Selection of a viable open architecture is based on the widely accepted standards that implement the ISO/OSI Reference Model.

Architecture for Survivable System Processing (ASSP)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wood, Richard J.

1991-01-01

The Architecture for Survivable System Processing (ASSP) Program is a multi-phase effort to implement Department of Defense (DOD) and commercially developed high-tech hardware, software, and architectures for reliable space avionics and ground based systems. System configuration options provide processing capabilities to address Time Dependent Processing (TDP), Object Dependent Processing (ODP), and Mission Dependent Processing (MDP) requirements through Open System Architecture (OSA) alternatives that allow for the enhancement, incorporation, and capitalization of a broad range of development assets. High technology developments in hardware, software, and networking models, address technology challenges of long processor life times, fault tolerance, reliability, throughput, memories, radiation hardening, size, weight, power (SWAP) and security. Hardware and software design, development, and implementation focus on the interconnectivity/interoperability of an open system architecture and is being developed to apply new technology into practical OSA components. To insure for widely acceptable architecture capable of interfacing with various commercial and military components, this program provides for regular interactions with standardization working groups (e.g.) the International Standards Organization (ISO), American National Standards Institute (ANSI), Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), and Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). Selection of a viable open architecture is based on the widely accepted standards that implement the ISO/OSI Reference Model.

GIS-Based Noise Simulation Open Source Software: N-GNOIS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vijay, Ritesh; Sharma, A.; Kumar, M.; Shende, V.; Chakrabarti, T.; Gupta, Rajesh

2015-12-01

Geographical information system (GIS)-based noise simulation software (N-GNOIS) has been developed to simulate the noise scenario due to point and mobile sources considering the impact of geographical features and meteorological parameters. These have been addressed in the software through attenuation modules of atmosphere, vegetation and barrier. N-GNOIS is a user friendly, platform-independent and open geospatial consortia (OGC) compliant software. It has been developed using open source technology (QGIS) and open source language (Python). N-GNOIS has unique features like cumulative impact of point and mobile sources, building structure and honking due to traffic. Honking is the most common phenomenon in developing countries and is frequently observed on any type of roads. N-GNOIS also helps in designing physical barrier and vegetation cover to check the propagation of noise and acts as a decision making tool for planning and management of noise component in environmental impact assessment (EIA) studies.

Neural network-based retrieval from software reuse repositories

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eichmann, David A.; Srinivas, Kankanahalli

1992-01-01

A significant hurdle confronts the software reuser attempting to select candidate components from a software repository - discriminating between those components without resorting to inspection of the implementation(s). We outline an approach to this problem based upon neural networks which avoids requiring the repository administrators to define a conceptual closeness graph for the classification vocabulary.

Priority of VHS Development Based in Potential Area using Principal Component Analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Meirawan, D.; Ana, A.; Saripudin, S.

2018-02-01

The current condition of VHS is still inadequate in quality, quantity and relevance. The purpose of this research is to analyse the development of VHS based on the development of regional potential by using principal component analysis (PCA) in Bandung, Indonesia. This study used descriptive qualitative data analysis using the principle of secondary data reduction component. The method used is Principal Component Analysis (PCA) analysis with Minitab Statistics Software tool. The results of this study indicate the value of the lowest requirement is a priority of the construction of development VHS with a program of majors in accordance with the development of regional potential. Based on the PCA score found that the main priority in the development of VHS in Bandung is in Saguling, which has the lowest PCA value of 416.92 in area 1, Cihampelas with the lowest PCA value in region 2 and Padalarang with the lowest PCA value.

NEXUS - Resilient Intelligent Middleware

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kaveh, N.; Hercock, R. Ghanea

Service-oriented computing, a composition of distributed-object computing, component-based, and Web-based concepts, is becoming the widespread choice for developing dynamic heterogeneous software assets available as services across a network. One of the major strengths of service-oriented technologies is the high abstraction layer and large granularity level at which software assets are viewed compared to traditional object-oriented technologies. Collaboration through encapsulated and separately defined service interfaces creates a service-oriented environment, whereby multiple services can be linked together through their interfaces to compose a functional system. This approach enables better integration of legacy and non-legacy services, via wrapper interfaces, and allows for service composition at a more abstract level especially in cases such as vertical market stacks. The heterogeneous nature of service-oriented technologies and the granularity of their software components makes them a suitable computing model in the pervasive domain.

Development of an Ada package library

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Burton, Bruce; Broido, Michael

1986-01-01

A usable prototype Ada package library was developed and is currently being evaluated for use in large software development efforts. The library system is comprised of an Ada-oriented design language used to facilitate the collection of reuse information, a relational data base to store reuse information, a set of reusable Ada components and tools, and a set of guidelines governing the system's use. The prototyping exercise is discussed and the lessons learned from it have led to the definition of a comprehensive tool set to facilitate software reuse.

CARDS: A blueprint and environment for domain-specific software reuse

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wallnau, Kurt C.; Solderitsch, Anne Costa; Smotherman, Catherine

1992-01-01

CARDS (Central Archive for Reusable Defense Software) exploits advances in domain analysis and domain modeling to identify, specify, develop, archive, retrieve, understand, and reuse domain-specific software components. An important element of CARDS is to provide visibility into the domain model artifacts produced by, and services provided by, commercial computer-aided software engineering (CASE) technology. The use of commercial CASE technology is important to provide rich, robust support for the varied roles involved in a reuse process. We refer to this kind of use of knowledge representation systems as supporting 'knowledge-based integration.'

Development of land based radar polarimeter processor system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kronke, C. W.; Blanchard, A. J.

1983-01-01

The processing subsystem of a land based radar polarimeter was designed and constructed. This subsystem is labeled the remote data acquisition and distribution system (RDADS). The radar polarimeter, an experimental remote sensor, incorporates the RDADS to control all operations of the sensor. The RDADS uses industrial standard components including an 8-bit microprocessor based single board computer, analog input/output boards, a dynamic random access memory board, and power supplis. A high-speed digital electronics board was specially designed and constructed to control range-gating for the radar. A complete system of software programs was developed to operate the RDADS. The software uses a powerful real time, multi-tasking, executive package as an operating system. The hardware and software used in the RDADS are detailed. Future system improvements are recommended.

Development and integration of a LabVIEW-based modular architecture for automated execution of electrochemical catalyst testing.

PubMed

Topalov, Angel A; Katsounaros, Ioannis; Meier, Josef C; Klemm, Sebastian O; Mayrhofer, Karl J J

2011-11-01

This paper describes a system for performing electrochemical catalyst testing where all hardware components are controlled simultaneously using a single LabVIEW-based software application. The software that we developed can be operated in both manual mode for exploratory investigations and automatic mode for routine measurements, by using predefined execution procedures. The latter enables the execution of high-throughput or combinatorial investigations, which decrease substantially the time and cost for catalyst testing. The software was constructed using a modular architecture which simplifies the modification or extension of the system, depending on future needs. The system was tested by performing stability tests of commercial fuel cell electrocatalysts, and the advantages of the developed system are discussed. © 2011 American Institute of Physics

TERMTrial--terminology-based documentation systems for cooperative clinical trials.

PubMed

Merzweiler, A; Weber, R; Garde, S; Haux, R; Knaup-Gregori, P

2005-04-01

Within cooperative groups of multi-center clinical trials a standardized documentation is a prerequisite for communication and sharing of data. Standardizing documentation systems means standardizing the underlying terminology. The management and consistent application of terminology systems is a difficult and fault-prone task, which should be supported by appropriate software tools. Today, documentation systems for clinical trials are often implemented as so-called Remote-Data-Entry-Systems (RDE-systems). Although there are many commercial systems, which support the development of RDE-systems there is none offering a comprehensive terminological support. Therefore, we developed the software system TERMTrial which consists of a component for the definition and management of terminology systems for cooperative groups of clinical trials and two components for the terminology-based automatic generation of trial databases and terminology-based interactive design of electronic case report forms (eCRFs). TERMTrial combines the advantages of remote data entry with a comprehensive terminological control.

Center for Center for Technology for Advanced Scientific Component Software (TASCS)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kostadin, Damevski

A resounding success of the Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) program is that high-performance computational science is now universally recognized as a critical aspect of scientific discovery [71], complementing both theoretical and experimental research. As scientific communities prepare to exploit unprecedented computing capabilities of emerging leadership-class machines for multi-model simulations at the extreme scale [72], it is more important than ever to address the technical and social challenges of geographically distributed teams that combine expertise in domain science, applied mathematics, and computer science to build robust and flexible codes that can incorporate changes over time. The Center for Technologymore » for Advanced Scientific Component Software (TASCS)1 tackles these these issues by exploiting component-based software development to facilitate collaborative high-performance scientific computing.« less

The ALMA software architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schwarz, Joseph; Farris, Allen; Sommer, Heiko

2004-09-01

The software for the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) is being developed by many institutes on two continents. The software itself will function in a distributed environment, from the 0.5-14 kmbaselines that separate antennas to the larger distances that separate the array site at the Llano de Chajnantor in Chile from the operations and user support facilities in Chile, North America and Europe. Distributed development demands 1) interfaces that allow separated groups to work with minimal dependence on their counterparts at other locations; and 2) a common architecture to minimize duplication and ensure that developers can always perform similar tasks in a similar way. The Container/Component model provides a blueprint for the separation of functional from technical concerns: application developers concentrate on implementing functionality in Components, which depend on Containers to provide them with services such as access to remote resources, transparent serialization of entity objects to XML, logging, error handling and security. Early system integrations have verified that this architecture is sound and that developers can successfully exploit its features. The Containers and their services are provided by a system-orienteddevelopment team as part of the ALMA Common Software (ACS), middleware that is based on CORBA.

Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL) Data Base Maintenance System (DBAM) user's guide and system description

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lo, P. S.; Card, D.

1983-01-01

The Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL) Data Base Maintenance System (DBAM) is explained. The various software facilities of the SEL, DBAM operating procedures, and DBAM system information are described. The relationships among DBAM components (baseline diagrams), component descriptions, overlay descriptions, indirect command file listings, file definitions, and sample data collection forms are provided.

Digital video timing analyzer for the evaluation of PC-based real-time simulation systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jones, Shawn R.; Crosby, Jay L.; Terry, John E., Jr.

2009-05-01

Due to the rapid acceleration in technology and the drop in costs, the use of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) PC-based hardware and software components for digital and hardware-in-the-loop (HWIL) simulations has increased. However, the increase in PC-based components creates new challenges for HWIL test facilities such as cost-effective hardware and software selection, system configuration and integration, performance testing, and simulation verification/validation. This paper will discuss how the Digital Video Timing Analyzer (DiViTA) installed in the Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center (AMRDEC) provides quantitative characterization data for PC-based real-time scene generation systems. An overview of the DiViTA is provided followed by details on measurement techniques, applications, and real-world examples of system benefits.

ENCOMPASS: A SAGA based environment for the compositon of programs and specifications, appendix A

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Terwilliger, Robert B.; Campbell, Roy H.

1985-01-01

ENCOMPASS is an example integrated software engineering environment being constructed by the SAGA project. ENCOMPASS supports the specification, design, construction and maintenance of efficient, validated, and verified programs in a modular programming language. The life cycle paradigm, schema of software configurations, and hierarchical library structure used by ENCOMPASS is presented. In ENCOMPASS, the software life cycle is viewed as a sequence of developments, each of which reuses components from the previous ones. Each development proceeds through the phases planning, requirements definition, validation, design, implementation, and system integration. The components in a software system are modeled as entities which have relationships between them. An entity may have different versions and different views of the same project are allowed. The simple entities supported by ENCOMPASS may be combined into modules which may be collected into projects. ENCOMPASS supports multiple programmers and projects using a hierarchical library system containing a workspace for each programmer; a project library for each project, and a global library common to all projects.

Video sensor architecture for surveillance applications.

PubMed

Sánchez, Jordi; Benet, Ginés; Simó, José E

2012-01-01

This paper introduces a flexible hardware and software architecture for a smart video sensor. This sensor has been applied in a video surveillance application where some of these video sensors are deployed, constituting the sensory nodes of a distributed surveillance system. In this system, a video sensor node processes images locally in order to extract objects of interest, and classify them. The sensor node reports the processing results to other nodes in the cloud (a user or higher level software) in the form of an XML description. The hardware architecture of each sensor node has been developed using two DSP processors and an FPGA that controls, in a flexible way, the interconnection among processors and the image data flow. The developed node software is based on pluggable components and runs on a provided execution run-time. Some basic and application-specific software components have been developed, in particular: acquisition, segmentation, labeling, tracking, classification and feature extraction. Preliminary results demonstrate that the system can achieve up to 7.5 frames per second in the worst case, and the true positive rates in the classification of objects are better than 80%.

Video Sensor Architecture for Surveillance Applications

PubMed Central

Sánchez, Jordi; Benet, Ginés; Simó, José E.

2012-01-01

This paper introduces a flexible hardware and software architecture for a smart video sensor. This sensor has been applied in a video surveillance application where some of these video sensors are deployed, constituting the sensory nodes of a distributed surveillance system. In this system, a video sensor node processes images locally in order to extract objects of interest, and classify them. The sensor node reports the processing results to other nodes in the cloud (a user or higher level software) in the form of an XML description. The hardware architecture of each sensor node has been developed using two DSP processors and an FPGA that controls, in a flexible way, the interconnection among processors and the image data flow. The developed node software is based on pluggable components and runs on a provided execution run-time. Some basic and application-specific software components have been developed, in particular: acquisition, segmentation, labeling, tracking, classification and feature extraction. Preliminary results demonstrate that the system can achieve up to 7.5 frames per second in the worst case, and the true positive rates in the classification of objects are better than 80%. PMID:22438723

Engineering intelligent tutoring systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Warren, Kimberly C.; Goodman, Bradley A.

1993-01-01

We have defined an object-oriented software architecture for Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS's) to facilitate the rapid development, testing, and fielding of ITS's. This software architecture partitions the functionality of the ITS into a collection of software components with well-defined interfaces and execution concept. The architecture was designed to isolate advanced technology components, partition domain dependencies, take advantage of the increased availability of commercial software packages, and reduce the risks involved in acquiring ITS's. A key component of the architecture, the Executive, is a publish and subscribe message handling component that coordinates all communication between ITS components.

Design and Testing of Space Telemetry SCA Waveform

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mortensen, Dale J.; Handler, Louis M.; Quinn, Todd M.

2006-01-01

A Software Communications Architecture (SCA) Waveform for space telemetry is being developed at the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC). The space telemetry waveform is implemented in a laboratory testbed consisting of general purpose processors, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), analog-to-digital converters (ADCs), and digital-to-analog converters (DACs). The radio hardware is integrated with an SCA Core Framework and other software development tools. The waveform design is described from both the bottom-up signal processing and top-down software component perspectives. Simulations and model-based design techniques used for signal processing subsystems are presented. Testing with legacy hardware-based modems verifies proper design implementation and dynamic waveform operations. The waveform development is part of an effort by NASA to define an open architecture for space based reconfigurable transceivers. Use of the SCA as a reference has increased understanding of software defined radio architectures. However, since space requirements put a premium on size, mass, and power, the SCA may be impractical for today s space ready technology. Specific requirements for an SCA waveform and other lessons learned from this development are discussed.

JMS Proxy and C/C++ Client SDK

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wolgast, Paul; Pechkam, Paul

2007-01-01

JMS Proxy and C/C++ Client SDK (JMS signifies "Java messaging service" and "SDK" signifies "software development kit") is a software package for developing interfaces that enable legacy programs (here denoted "clients") written in the C and C++ languages to communicate with each other via a JMS broker. This package consists of two main components: the JMS proxy server component and the client C library SDK component. The JMS proxy server component implements a native Java process that receives and responds to requests from clients. This component can run on any computer that supports Java and a JMS client. The client C library SDK component is used to develop a JMS client program running in each affected C or C++ environment, without need for running a Java virtual machine in the affected computer. A C client program developed by use of this SDK has most of the quality-of-service characteristics of standard Java-based client programs, including the following: Durable subscriptions; Asynchronous message receipt; Such standard JMS message qualities as "TimeToLive," "Message Properties," and "DeliveryMode" (as the quoted terms are defined in previously published JMS documentation); and Automatic reconnection of a JMS proxy to a restarted JMS broker.

Generating Cultures for Mathematical Microworld Development in a Multi-Organizational Context.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kynigos, Chronis

2002-01-01

Discusses methodological issues of mathematical microworld development integrated with generating innovation in school settings. Includes experiences in developing a component architecture for educational software based on Logo as a scripting language and discusses problems of collaboration between organizations and people of differing expertise…

Data collection and analysis software development for rotor dynamics testing in spin laboratory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Abdul-Aziz, Ali; Arble, Daniel; Woike, Mark

2017-04-01

Gas turbine engine components undergo high rotational loading another complex environmental conditions. Such operating environment leads these components to experience damages and cracks that can cause catastrophic failure during flights. There are traditional crack detections and health monitoring methodologies currently being used which rely on periodic routine maintenances, nondestructive inspections that often times involve engine and components dis-assemblies. These methods do not also offer adequate information about the faults, especially, if these faults at subsurface or not clearly evident. At NASA Glenn research center, the rotor dynamics laboratory is presently involved in developing newer techniques that are highly dependent on sensor technology to enable health monitoring and prediction of damage and cracks in rotor disks. These approaches are noninvasive and relatively economical. Spin tests are performed using a subscale test article mimicking turbine rotor disk undergoing rotational load. Non-contact instruments such as capacitive and microwave sensors are used to measure the blade tip gap displacement and blade vibrations characteristics in an attempt develop a physics based model to assess/predict the faults in the rotor disk. Data collection is a major component in this experimental-analytical procedure and as a result, an upgrade to an older version of the data acquisition software which is based on LabVIEW program has been implemented to support efficiently running tests and analyze the results. Outcomes obtained from the tests data and related experimental and analytical rotor dynamics modeling including key features of the updated software are presented and discussed.

An Object Model for a Rocket Engine Numerical Simulator

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mitra, D.; Bhalla, P. N.; Pratap, V.; Reddy, P.

1998-01-01

Rocket Engine Numerical Simulator (RENS) is a packet of software which numerically simulates the behavior of a rocket engine. Different parameters of the components of an engine is the input to these programs. Depending on these given parameters the programs output the behaviors of those components. These behavioral values are then used to guide the design of or to diagnose a model of a rocket engine "built" by a composition of these programs simulating different components of the engine system. In order to use this software package effectively one needs to have a flexible model of a rocket engine. These programs simulating different components then should be plugged into this modular representation. Our project is to develop an object based model of such an engine system. We are following an iterative and incremental approach in developing the model, as is the standard practice in the area of object oriented design and analysis of softwares. This process involves three stages: object modeling to represent the components and sub-components of a rocket engine, dynamic modeling to capture the temporal and behavioral aspects of the system, and functional modeling to represent the transformational aspects. This article reports on the first phase of our activity under a grant (RENS) from the NASA Lewis Research center. We have utilized Rambaugh's object modeling technique and the tool UML for this purpose. The classes of a rocket engine propulsion system are developed and some of them are presented in this report. The next step, developing a dynamic model for RENS, is also touched upon here. In this paper we will also discuss the advantages of using object-based modeling for developing this type of an integrated simulator over other tools like an expert systems shell or a procedural language, e.g., FORTRAN. Attempts have been made in the past to use such techniques.

Software design for automated assembly of truss structures

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Herstrom, Catherine L.; Grantham, Carolyn; Allen, Cheryl L.; Doggett, William R.; Will, Ralph W.

1992-01-01

Concern over the limited intravehicular activity time has increased the interest in performing in-space assembly and construction operations with automated robotic systems. A technique being considered at LaRC is a supervised-autonomy approach, which can be monitored by an Earth-based supervisor that intervenes only when the automated system encounters a problem. A test-bed to support evaluation of the hardware and software requirements for supervised-autonomy assembly methods was developed. This report describes the design of the software system necessary to support the assembly process. The software is hierarchical and supports both automated assembly operations and supervisor error-recovery procedures, including the capability to pause and reverse any operation. The software design serves as a model for the development of software for more sophisticated automated systems and as a test-bed for evaluation of new concepts and hardware components.

Component-specific modeling. [jet engine hot section components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcknight, R. L.; Maffeo, R. J.; Tipton, M. T.; Weber, G.

1992-01-01

Accomplishments are described for a 3 year program to develop methodology for component-specific modeling of aircraft hot section components (turbine blades, turbine vanes, and burner liners). These accomplishments include: (1) engine thermodynamic and mission models, (2) geometry model generators, (3) remeshing, (4) specialty three-dimensional inelastic structural analysis, (5) computationally efficient solvers, (6) adaptive solution strategies, (7) engine performance parameters/component response variables decomposition and synthesis, (8) integrated software architecture and development, and (9) validation cases for software developed.

Designing Tracking Software for Image-Guided Surgery Applications: IGSTK Experience

PubMed Central

Enquobahrie, Andinet; Gobbi, David; Turek, Matt; Cheng, Patrick; Yaniv, Ziv; Lindseth, Frank; Cleary, Kevin

2009-01-01

Objective Many image-guided surgery applications require tracking devices as part of their core functionality. The Image-Guided Surgery Toolkit (IGSTK) was designed and developed to interface tracking devices with software applications incorporating medical images. Methods IGSTK was designed as an open source C++ library that provides the basic components needed for fast prototyping and development of image-guided surgery applications. This library follows a component-based architecture with several components designed for specific sets of image-guided surgery functions. At the core of the toolkit is the tracker component that handles communication between a control computer and navigation device to gather pose measurements of surgical instruments present in the surgical scene. The representations of the tracked instruments are superimposed on anatomical images to provide visual feedback to the clinician during surgical procedures. Results The initial version of the IGSTK toolkit has been released in the public domain and several trackers are supported. The toolkit and related information are available at www.igstk.org. Conclusion With the increased popularity of minimally invasive procedures in health care, several tracking devices have been developed for medical applications. Designing and implementing high-quality and safe software to handle these different types of trackers in a common framework is a challenging task. It requires establishing key software design principles that emphasize abstraction, extensibility, reusability, fault-tolerance, and portability. IGSTK is an open source library that satisfies these needs for the image-guided surgery community. PMID:20037671

Software framework for automatic learning of telescope operation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rodríguez, Jose A.; Molgó, Jordi; Guerra, Dailos

2016-07-01

The "Gran Telescopio de Canarias" (GTC) is an optical-infrared 10-meter segmented mirror telescope at the ORM observatory in Canary Islands (Spain). The GTC Control System (GCS) is a distributed object and component oriented system based on RT-CORBA and it is responsible for the operation of the telescope, including its instrumentation. The current development state of GCS is mature and fully operational. On the one hand telescope users as PI's implement the sequences of observing modes of future scientific instruments that will be installed in the telescope and operators, in turn, design their own sequences for maintenance. On the other hand engineers develop new components that provide new functionality required by the system. This great work effort is possible to minimize so that costs are reduced, especially if one considers that software maintenance is the most expensive phase of the software life cycle. Could we design a system that allows the progressive assimilation of sequences of operation and maintenance of the telescope, through an automatic self-programming system, so that it can evolve from one Component oriented organization to a Service oriented organization? One possible way to achieve this is to use mechanisms of learning and knowledge consolidation to reduce to the minimum expression the effort to transform the specifications of the different telescope users to the operational deployments. This article proposes a framework for solving this problem based on the combination of the following tools: data mining, self-Adaptive software, code generation, refactoring based on metrics, Hierarchical Agglomerative Clustering and Service Oriented Architectures.

ATLAS tile calorimeter cesium calibration control and analysis software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Solovyanov, O.; Solodkov, A.; Starchenko, E.; Karyukhin, A.; Isaev, A.; Shalanda, N.

2008-07-01

An online control system to calibrate and monitor ATLAS Barrel hadronic calorimeter (TileCal) with a movable radioactive source, driven by liquid flow, is described. To read out and control the system an online software has been developed, using ATLAS TDAQ components like DVS (Diagnostic and Verification System) to verify the hardware before running, IS (Information Server) for data and status exchange between networked computers, and other components like DDC (DCS to DAQ Connection), to connect to PVSS-based slow control systems of Tile Calorimeter, high voltage and low voltage. A system of scripting facilities, based on Python language, is used to handle all the calibration and monitoring processes from hardware perspective to final data storage, including various abnormal situations. A QT based graphical user interface to display the status of the calibration system during the cesium source scan is described. The software for analysis of the detector response, using online data, is discussed. Performance of the system and first experience from the ATLAS pit are presented.

Towards early software reliability prediction for computer forensic tools (case study).

PubMed

Abu Talib, Manar

2016-01-01

Versatility, flexibility and robustness are essential requirements for software forensic tools. Researchers and practitioners need to put more effort into assessing this type of tool. A Markov model is a robust means for analyzing and anticipating the functioning of an advanced component based system. It is used, for instance, to analyze the reliability of the state machines of real time reactive systems. This research extends the architecture-based software reliability prediction model for computer forensic tools, which is based on Markov chains and COSMIC-FFP. Basically, every part of the computer forensic tool is linked to a discrete time Markov chain. If this can be done, then a probabilistic analysis by Markov chains can be performed to analyze the reliability of the components and of the whole tool. The purposes of the proposed reliability assessment method are to evaluate the tool's reliability in the early phases of its development, to improve the reliability assessment process for large computer forensic tools over time, and to compare alternative tool designs. The reliability analysis can assist designers in choosing the most reliable topology for the components, which can maximize the reliability of the tool and meet the expected reliability level specified by the end-user. The approach of assessing component-based tool reliability in the COSMIC-FFP context is illustrated with the Forensic Toolkit Imager case study.

Agile software development in an earned value world: a survival guide

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kantor, Jeffrey; Long, Kevin; Becla, Jacek; Economou, Frossie; Gelman, Margaret; Juric, Mario; Lambert, Ron; Krughoff, Simon; Swinbank, John D.; Wu, Xiuqin

2016-08-01

Agile methodologies are current best practice in software development. They are favored for, among other reasons, preventing premature optimization by taking a somewhat short-term focus, and allowing frequent replans/reprioritizations of upcoming development work based on recent results and current backlog. At the same time, funding agencies prescribe earned value management accounting for large projects which, these days, inevitably include substantial software components. Earned Value approaches emphasize a more comprehensive and typically longer-range plan, and tend to characterize frequent replans and reprioritizations as indicative of problems. Here we describe the planning, execution and reporting framework used by the LSST Data Management team, that navigates these opposite tensions.

Models for Deploying Open Source and Commercial Software to Support Earth Science Data Processing and Distribution

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yetman, G.; Downs, R. R.

2011-12-01

Software deployment is needed to process and distribute scientific data throughout the data lifecycle. Developing software in-house can take software development teams away from other software development projects and can require efforts to maintain the software over time. Adopting and reusing software and system modules that have been previously developed by others can reduce in-house software development and maintenance costs and can contribute to the quality of the system being developed. A variety of models are available for reusing and deploying software and systems that have been developed by others. These deployment models include open source software, vendor-supported open source software, commercial software, and combinations of these approaches. Deployment in Earth science data processing and distribution has demonstrated the advantages and drawbacks of each model. Deploying open source software offers advantages for developing and maintaining scientific data processing systems and applications. By joining an open source community that is developing a particular system module or application, a scientific data processing team can contribute to aspects of the software development without having to commit to developing the software alone. Communities of interested developers can share the work while focusing on activities that utilize in-house expertise and addresses internal requirements. Maintenance is also shared by members of the community. Deploying vendor-supported open source software offers similar advantages to open source software. However, by procuring the services of a vendor, the in-house team can rely on the vendor to provide, install, and maintain the software over time. Vendor-supported open source software may be ideal for teams that recognize the value of an open source software component or application and would like to contribute to the effort, but do not have the time or expertise to contribute extensively. Vendor-supported software may also have the additional benefits of guaranteed up-time, bug fixes, and vendor-added enhancements. Deploying commercial software can be advantageous for obtaining system or software components offered by a vendor that meet in-house requirements. The vendor can be contracted to provide installation, support and maintenance services as needed. Combining these options offers a menu of choices, enabling selection of system components or software modules that meet the evolving requirements encountered throughout the scientific data lifecycle.

An investigation of modelling and design for software service applications.

PubMed

Anjum, Maria; Budgen, David

2017-01-01

Software services offer the opportunity to use a component-based approach for the design of applications. However, this needs a deeper understanding of how to develop service-based applications in a systematic manner, and of the set of properties that need to be included in the 'design model'. We have used a realistic application to explore systematically how service-based designs can be created and described. We first identified the key properties of an SOA (service oriented architecture) and then undertook a single-case case study to explore its use in the development of a design for a large-scale application in energy engineering, modelling this with existing notations wherever possible. We evaluated the resulting design model using two walkthroughs with both domain and application experts. We were able to successfully develop a design model around the ten properties identified, and to describe it by adapting existing design notations. A component-based approach to designing such systems does appear to be feasible. However, it needs the assistance of a more integrated set of notations for describing the resulting design model.

An investigation of modelling and design for software service applications

PubMed Central

2017-01-01

Software services offer the opportunity to use a component-based approach for the design of applications. However, this needs a deeper understanding of how to develop service-based applications in a systematic manner, and of the set of properties that need to be included in the ‘design model’. We have used a realistic application to explore systematically how service-based designs can be created and described. We first identified the key properties of an SOA (service oriented architecture) and then undertook a single-case case study to explore its use in the development of a design for a large-scale application in energy engineering, modelling this with existing notations wherever possible. We evaluated the resulting design model using two walkthroughs with both domain and application experts. We were able to successfully develop a design model around the ten properties identified, and to describe it by adapting existing design notations. A component-based approach to designing such systems does appear to be feasible. However, it needs the assistance of a more integrated set of notations for describing the resulting design model. PMID:28489905

Onyx-Advanced Aeropropulsion Simulation Framework Created

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reed, John A.

2001-01-01

The Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) project at the NASA Glenn Research Center is developing a new software environment for analyzing and designing aircraft engines and, eventually, space transportation systems. Its purpose is to dramatically reduce the time, effort, and expense necessary to design and test jet engines by creating sophisticated computer simulations of an aerospace object or system (refs. 1 and 2). Through a university grant as part of that effort, researchers at the University of Toledo have developed Onyx, an extensible Java-based (Sun Micro-systems, Inc.), objectoriented simulation framework, to investigate how advanced software design techniques can be successfully applied to aeropropulsion system simulation (refs. 3 and 4). The design of Onyx's architecture enables users to customize and extend the framework to add new functionality or adapt simulation behavior as required. It exploits object-oriented technologies, such as design patterns, domain frameworks, and software components, to develop a modular system in which users can dynamically replace components with others having different functionality.

The Ensemble Canon

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

MIittman, David S

2011-01-01

Ensemble is an open architecture for the development, integration, and deployment of mission operations software. Fundamentally, it is an adaptation of the Eclipse Rich Client Platform (RCP), a widespread, stable, and supported framework for component-based application development. By capitalizing on the maturity and availability of the Eclipse RCP, Ensemble offers a low-risk, politically neutral path towards a tighter integration of operations tools. The Ensemble project is a highly successful, ongoing collaboration among NASA Centers. Since 2004, the Ensemble project has supported the development of mission operations software for NASA's Exploration Systems, Science, and Space Operations Directorates.

Programs for Testing an SSME-Monitoring System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lang, Andre; Cecil, Jimmie; Heusinger, Ralph; Freestone, Kathleen; Blue, Lisa; Wilkerson, DeLisa; McMahon, Leigh Anne; Hall, Richard B.; Varnavas, Kosta; Smith, Keary;

Automated Software Development Workstation (ASDW)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fridge, Ernie

1990-01-01

Software development is a serious bottleneck in the construction of complex automated systems. An increase of the reuse of software designs and components has been viewed as a way to relieve this bottleneck. One approach to achieving software reusability is through the development and use of software parts composition systems. A software parts composition system is a software development environment comprised of a parts description language for modeling parts and their interfaces, a catalog of existing parts, a composition editor that aids a user in the specification of a new application from existing parts, and a code generator that takes a specification and generates an implementation of a new application in a target language. The Automated Software Development Workstation (ASDW) is an expert system shell that provides the capabilities required to develop and manipulate these software parts composition systems. The ASDW is now in Beta testing at the Johnson Space Center. Future work centers on responding to user feedback for capability and usability enhancement, expanding the scope of the software lifecycle that is covered, and in providing solutions to handling very large libraries of reusable components.

C-Based Design Methodology and Topological Change for an Indian Agricultural Tractor Component

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Matta, Anil Kumar; Raju, D. Ranga; Suman, K. N. S.; Kranthi, A. S.

2018-06-01

The failure of tractor components and their replacement has now become very common in India because of re-cycling, re-sale, and duplication. To over come the problem of failure we propose a design methodology for topological change co-simulating with software's. In the proposed Design methodology, the designer checks Paxial, Pcr, Pfailue, τ by hand calculations, from which refined topological changes of R.S.Arm are formed. We explained several techniques employed in the component for reduction, removal of rib material to change center of gravity and centroid point by using system C for mixed level simulation and faster topological changes. The design process in system C can be compiled and executed with software, TURBO C7. The modified component is developed in proE and analyzed in ANSYS. The topologically changed component with slot 120 × 4.75 × 32.5 mm at the center showed greater effectiveness than the original component.

C-Based Design Methodology and Topological Change for an Indian Agricultural Tractor Component

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Matta, Anil Kumar; Raju, D. Ranga; Suman, K. N. S.; Kranthi, A. S.

2018-02-01

The failure of tractor components and their replacement has now become very common in India because of re-cycling, re-sale, and duplication. To over come the problem of failure we propose a design methodology for topological change co-simulating with software's. In the proposed Design methodology, the designer checks Paxial, Pcr, Pfailue, τ by hand calculations, from which refined topological changes of R.S.Arm are formed. We explained several techniques employed in the component for reduction, removal of rib material to change center of gravity and centroid point by using system C for mixed level simulation and faster topological changes. The design process in system C can be compiled and executed with software, TURBO C7. The modified component is developed in proE and analyzed in ANSYS. The topologically changed component with slot 120 × 4.75 × 32.5 mm at the center showed greater effectiveness than the original component.

Cementitious Barriers Partnership FY2013 End-Year Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Flach, G. P.; Langton, C. A.; Burns, H. H.

2013-11-01

In FY2013, the Cementitious Barriers Partnership (CBP) demonstrated continued tangible progress toward fulfilling the objective of developing a set of software tools to improve understanding and prediction of the long-term structural, hydraulic and chemical performance of cementitious barriers used in nuclear applications. In November 2012, the CBP released “Version 1.0” of the CBP Software Toolbox, a suite of software for simulating reactive transport in cementitious materials and important degradation phenomena. In addition, the CBP completed development of new software for the “Version 2.0” Toolbox to be released in early FY2014 and demonstrated use of the Version 1.0 Toolbox on DOEmore » applications. The current primary software components in both Versions 1.0 and 2.0 are LeachXS/ORCHESTRA, STADIUM, and a GoldSim interface for probabilistic analysis of selected degradation scenarios. The CBP Software Toolbox Version 1.0 supports analysis of external sulfate attack (including damage mechanics), carbonation, and primary constituent leaching. Version 2.0 includes the additional analysis of chloride attack and dual regime flow and contaminant migration in fractured and non-fractured cementitious material. The LeachXS component embodies an extensive material property measurements database along with chemical speciation and reactive mass transport simulation cases with emphasis on leaching of major, trace and radionuclide constituents from cementitious materials used in DOE facilities, such as Saltstone (Savannah River) and Cast Stone (Hanford), tank closure grouts, and barrier concretes. STADIUM focuses on the physical and structural service life of materials and components based on chemical speciation and reactive mass transport of major cement constituents and aggressive species (e.g., chloride, sulfate, etc.). THAMES is a planned future CBP Toolbox component focused on simulation of the microstructure of cementitious materials and calculation of resultant hydraulic and constituent mass transfer parameters needed in modeling. Two CBP software demonstrations were conducted in FY2013, one to support the Saltstone Disposal Facility (SDF) at SRS and the other on a representative Hanford high-level waste tank. The CBP Toolbox demonstration on the SDF provided analysis on the most probable degradation mechanisms to the cementitious vault enclosure caused by sulfate and carbonation ingress. This analysis was documented and resulted in the issuance of a SDF Performance Assessment Special Analysis by Liquid Waste Operations this fiscal year. The two new software tools supporting chloride attack and dual-regime flow will provide additional degradation tools to better evaluate performance of DOE and commercial cementitious barriers. The CBP SRNL experimental program produced two patent applications and field data that will be used in the development and calibration of CBP software tools being developed in FY2014. The CBP software and simulation tools varies from other efforts in that all the tools are based upon specific and relevant experimental research of cementitious materials utilized in DOE applications. The CBP FY2013 program involved continuing research to improve and enhance the simulation tools as well as developing new tools that model other key degradation phenomena not addressed in Version 1.0. Also efforts to continue to verify the various simulation tools through laboratory experiments and analysis of field specimens are ongoing and will continue into FY2014 to quantify and reduce the uncertainty associated with performance assessments. This end-year report summarizes FY2013 software development efforts and the various experimental programs that are providing data for calibration and validation of the CBP developed software.« less

A component-based problem list subsystem for the HOLON testbed. Health Object Library Online.

PubMed Central

Law, V.; Goldberg, H. S.; Jones, P.; Safran, C.

1998-01-01

One of the deliverables of the HOLON (Health Object Library Online) project is the specification of a reference architecture for clinical information systems that facilitates the development of a variety of discrete, reusable software components. One of the challenges facing the HOLON consortium is determining what kinds of components can be made available in a library for developers of clinical information systems. To further explore the use of component architectures in the development of reusable clinical subsystems, we have incorporated ongoing work in the development of enterprise terminology services into a Problem List subsystem for the HOLON testbed. We have successfully implemented a set of components using CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture) and Java distributed object technologies that provide a functional problem list application and UMLS-based "Problem Picker." Through this development, we have overcome a variety of obstacles characteristic of rapidly emerging technologies, and have identified architectural issues necessary to scale these components for use and reuse within an enterprise clinical information system. PMID:9929252

A component-based problem list subsystem for the HOLON testbed. Health Object Library Online.

PubMed

Law, V; Goldberg, H S; Jones, P; Safran, C

1998-01-01

One of the deliverables of the HOLON (Health Object Library Online) project is the specification of a reference architecture for clinical information systems that facilitates the development of a variety of discrete, reusable software components. One of the challenges facing the HOLON consortium is determining what kinds of components can be made available in a library for developers of clinical information systems. To further explore the use of component architectures in the development of reusable clinical subsystems, we have incorporated ongoing work in the development of enterprise terminology services into a Problem List subsystem for the HOLON testbed. We have successfully implemented a set of components using CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture) and Java distributed object technologies that provide a functional problem list application and UMLS-based "Problem Picker." Through this development, we have overcome a variety of obstacles characteristic of rapidly emerging technologies, and have identified architectural issues necessary to scale these components for use and reuse within an enterprise clinical information system.

Construction of integrated case environments.

PubMed

Losavio, Francisca; Matteo, Alfredo; Pérez, María

2003-01-01

The main goal of Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE) technology is to improve the entire software system development process. The CASE approach is not merely a technology; it involves a fundamental change in the process of software development. The tendency of the CASE approach, technically speaking, is the integration of tools that assist in the application of specific methods. In this sense, the environment architecture, which includes the platform and the system's hardware and software, constitutes the base of the CASE environment. The problem of tools integration has been proposed for two decades. Current integration efforts emphasize the interoperability of tools, especially in distributed environments. In this work we use the Brown approach. The environment resulting from the application of this model is called a federative environment, focusing on the fact that this architecture pays special attention to the connections among the components of the environment. This approach is now being used in component-based design. This paper describes a concrete experience in civil engineering and architecture fields, for the construction of an integrated CASE environment. A generic architectural framework based on an intermediary architectural pattern is applied to achieve the integration of the different tools. This intermediary represents the control perspective of the PAC (Presentation-Abstraction-Control) style, which has been implemented as a Mediator pattern and it has been used in the interactive systems domain. In addition, a process is given to construct the integrated CASE.

Ground-Based Correction of Remote-Sensing Spectral Imagery

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alder-Golden, Steven M.; Rochford, Peter; Matthew, Michael; Berk, Alexander

2007-01-01

Software has been developed for an improved method of correcting for the atmospheric optical effects (primarily, effects of aerosols and water vapor) in spectral images of the surface of the Earth acquired by airborne and spaceborne remote-sensing instruments. In this method, the variables needed for the corrections are extracted from the readings of a radiometer located on the ground in the vicinity of the scene of interest. The software includes algorithms that analyze measurement data acquired from a shadow-band radiometer. These algorithms are based on a prior radiation transport software model, called MODTRAN, that has been developed through several versions up to what are now known as MODTRAN4 and MODTRAN5 . These components have been integrated with a user-friendly Interactive Data Language (IDL) front end and an advanced version of MODTRAN4. Software tools for handling general data formats, performing a Langley-type calibration, and generating an output file of retrieved atmospheric parameters for use in another atmospheric-correction computer program known as FLAASH have also been incorporated into the present soft-ware. Concomitantly with the soft-ware described thus far, there has been developed a version of FLAASH that utilizes the retrieved atmospheric parameters to process spectral image data.

Tethys: A Platform for Water Resources Modeling and Decision Support Apps

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Swain, N. R.; Christensen, S. D.; Jones, N.; Nelson, E. J.

2014-12-01

Cloud-based applications or apps are a promising medium through which water resources models and data can be conveyed in a user-friendly environment—making them more accessible to decision-makers and stakeholders. In the context of this work, a water resources web app is a web application that exposes limited modeling functionality for a scenario exploration activity in a structured workflow (e.g.: land use change runoff analysis, snowmelt runoff prediction, and flood potential analysis). The technical expertise required to develop water resources web apps can be a barrier to many potential developers of water resources apps. One challenge that developers face is in providing spatial storage, analysis, and visualization for the spatial data that is inherent to water resources models. The software projects that provide this functionality are non-standard to web development and there are a large number of free and open source software (FOSS) projects to choose from. In addition, it is often required to synthesize several software projects to provide all of the needed functionality. Another challenge for the developer will be orchestrating the use of several software components. Consequently, the initial software development investment required to deploy an effective water resources cloud-based application can be substantial. The Tethys Platform has been developed to lower the technical barrier and minimize the initial development investment that prohibits many scientists and engineers from making use of the web app medium. Tethys synthesizes several software projects including PostGIS for spatial storage, 52°North WPS for spatial analysis, GeoServer for spatial publishing, Google Earth™, Google Maps™ and OpenLayers for spatial visualization, and Highcharts for plotting tabular data. The software selection came after a literature review of software projects being used to create existing earth sciences web apps. All of the software is linked via a Python-powered software development kit (SDK). Tethys developers use the SDK to build their apps and incorporate the needed functionality from the software suite. The presentation will include several apps that have been developed using Tethys to demonstrate its capabilities. Based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 1135483.

Implications of Responsive Space on the Flight Software Architecture

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wilmot, Jonathan

2006-01-01

The Responsive Space initiative has several implications for flight software that need to be addressed not only within the run-time element, but the development infrastructure and software life-cycle process elements as well. The runtime element must at a minimum support Plug & Play, while the development and process elements need to incorporate methods to quickly generate the needed documentation, code, tests, and all of the artifacts required of flight quality software. Very rapid response times go even further, and imply little or no new software development, requiring instead, using only predeveloped and certified software modules that can be integrated and tested through automated methods. These elements have typically been addressed individually with significant benefits, but it is when they are combined that they can have the greatest impact to Responsive Space. The Flight Software Branch at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center has been developing the runtime, infrastructure and process elements needed for rapid integration with the Core Flight software System (CFS) architecture. The CFS architecture consists of three main components; the core Flight Executive (cFE), the component catalog, and the Integrated Development Environment (DE). This paper will discuss the design of the components, how they facilitate rapid integration, and lessons learned as the architecture is utilized for an upcoming spacecraft.

Component-specific modeling

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcknight, R. L.

1985-01-01

Accomplishments are described for the second year effort of a 3-year program to develop methodology for component specific modeling of aircraft engine hot section components (turbine blades, turbine vanes, and burner liners). These accomplishments include: (1) engine thermodynamic and mission models; (2) geometry model generators; (3) remeshing; (4) specialty 3-D inelastic stuctural analysis; (5) computationally efficient solvers, (6) adaptive solution strategies; (7) engine performance parameters/component response variables decomposition and synthesis; (8) integrated software architecture and development, and (9) validation cases for software developed.

Reconfigurable Transceiver and Software-Defined Radio Architecture and Technology Evaluated for NASA Space Communications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reinhart, Richard C.; Kacpura, Thomas J.

2004-01-01

The NASA Glenn Research Center is investigating the development and suitability of a software-based open-architecture for space-based reconfigurable transceivers (RTs) and software-defined radios (SDRs). The main objectives of this project are to enable advanced operations and reduce mission costs. SDRs are becoming more common because of the capabilities of reconfigurable digital signal processing technologies such as field programmable gate arrays and digital signal processors, which place radio functions in firmware and software that were traditionally performed with analog hardware components. Features of interest of this communications architecture include nonproprietary open standards and application programming interfaces to enable software reuse and portability, independent hardware and software development, and hardware and software functional separation. The goals for RT and SDR technologies for NASA space missions include prelaunch and on-orbit frequency and waveform reconfigurability and programmability, high data rate capability, and overall communications and processing flexibility. These operational advances over current state-of-art transceivers will be provided to reduce the power, mass, and cost of RTs and SDRs for space communications. The open architecture for NASA communications will support existing (legacy) communications needs and capabilities while providing a path to more capable, advanced waveform development and mission concepts (e.g., ad hoc constellations with self-healing networks and high-rate science data return). A study was completed to assess the state of the art in RT architectures, implementations, and technologies. In-house researchers conducted literature searches and analysis, interviewed Government and industry contacts, and solicited information and white papers from industry on space-qualifiable RTs and SDRs and their associated technologies for space-based NASA applications. The white papers were evaluated, compiled, and used to assess RT and SDR system architectures and core technology elements to determine an appropriate investment strategy to advance these technologies to meet future mission needs. The use of these radios in the space environment represents a challenge because of the space radiation suitability of the components, which drastically reduces the processing capability. The radios available for space are considered to be RTs (as opposed to SDRs), which are digitally programmable radios with selectable changes from an architecture combining analog and digital components. The limited flexibility of this design contrasts against the desire to have a power-efficient solution and open architecture.

A model for the electronic support of practice-based research networks.

PubMed

Peterson, Kevin A; Delaney, Brendan C; Arvanitis, Theodoros N; Taweel, Adel; Sandberg, Elisabeth A; Speedie, Stuart; Richard Hobbs, F D

2012-01-01

The principal goal of the electronic Primary Care Research Network (ePCRN) is to enable the development of an electronic infrastructure to support clinical research activities in primary care practice-based research networks (PBRNs). We describe the model that the ePCRN developed to enhance the growth and to expand the reach of PBRN research. Use cases and activity diagrams were developed from interviews with key informants from 11 PBRNs from the United States and United Kingdom. Discrete functions were identified and aggregated into logical components. Interaction diagrams were created, and an overall composite diagram was constructed describing the proposed software behavior. Software for each component was written and aggregated, and the resulting prototype application was pilot tested for feasibility. A practical model was then created by separating application activities into distinct software packages based on existing PBRN business rules, hardware requirements, network requirements, and security concerns. We present an information architecture that provides for essential interactions, activities, data flows, and structural elements necessary for providing support for PBRN translational research activities. The model describes research information exchange between investigators and clusters of independent data sites supported by a contracted research director. The model was designed to support recruitment for clinical trials, collection of aggregated anonymous data, and retrieval of identifiable data from previously consented patients across hundreds of practices. The proposed model advances our understanding of the fundamental roles and activities of PBRNs and defines the information exchange commonly used by PBRNs to successfully engage community health care clinicians in translational research activities. By describing the network architecture in a language familiar to that used by software developers, the model provides an important foundation for the development of electronic support for essential PBRN research activities.

Develop a Model Component

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ensey, Tyler S.

2013-01-01

During my internship at NASA, I was a model developer for Ground Support Equipment (GSE). The purpose of a model developer is to develop and unit test model component libraries (fluid, electrical, gas, etc.). The models are designed to simulate software for GSE (Ground Special Power, Crew Access Arm, Cryo, Fire and Leak Detection System, Environmental Control System (ECS), etc. .) before they are implemented into hardware. These models support verifying local control and remote software for End-Item Software Under Test (SUT). The model simulates the physical behavior (function, state, limits and 110) of each end-item and it's dependencies as defined in the Subsystem Interface Table, Software Requirements & Design Specification (SRDS), Ground Integrated Schematic (GIS), and System Mechanical Schematic.(SMS). The software of each specific model component is simulated through MATLAB's Simulink program. The intensiv model development life cycle is a.s follows: Identify source documents; identify model scope; update schedule; preliminary design review; develop model requirements; update model.. scope; update schedule; detailed design review; create/modify library component; implement library components reference; implement subsystem components; develop a test script; run the test script; develop users guide; send model out for peer review; the model is sent out for verifictionlvalidation; if there is empirical data, a validation data package is generated; if there is not empirical data, a verification package is generated; the test results are then reviewed; and finally, the user. requests accreditation, and a statement of accreditation is prepared. Once each component model is reviewed and approved, they are intertwined together into one integrated model. This integrated model is then tested itself, through a test script and autotest, so that it can be concluded that all models work conjointly, for a single purpose. The component I was assigned, specifically, was a fluid component, a discrete pressure switch. The switch takes a fluid pressure input, and if the pressure is greater than a designated cutoff pressure, the switch would stop fluid flow.

77 FR 75659 - Certain Video Analytics Software, Systems, Components Thereof, and Products Containing Same...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-12-21

... INTERNATIONAL TRADE COMMISSION [Investigation No. 337-TA-852] Certain Video Analytics Software..., 2012, based on a complaint filed by ObjectVideo, Inc. (``ObjectVideo'') of Reston, Virginia. 77 FR... United States after importation of certain video analytics software systems, components thereof, and...

A microkernel design for component-based parallel numerical software systems.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Balay, S.

1999-01-13

What is the minimal software infrastructure and what type of conventions are needed to simplify development of sophisticated parallel numerical application codes using a variety of software components that are not necessarily available as source code? We propose an opaque object-based model where the objects are dynamically loadable from the file system or network. The microkernel required to manage such a system needs to include, at most: (1) a few basic services, namely--a mechanism for loading objects at run time via dynamic link libraries, and consistent schemes for error handling and memory management; and (2) selected methods that all objectsmore » share, to deal with object life (destruction, reference counting, relationships), and object observation (viewing, profiling, tracing). We are experimenting with these ideas in the context of extensible numerical software within the ALICE (Advanced Large-scale Integrated Computational Environment) project, where we are building the microkernel to manage the interoperability among various tools for large-scale scientific simulations. This paper presents some preliminary observations and conclusions from our work with microkernel design.« less

EVA: Collaborative Distributed Learning Environment Based in Agents.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sheremetov, Leonid; Tellez, Rolando Quintero

In this paper, a Web-based learning environment developed within the project called Virtual Learning Spaces (EVA, in Spanish) is presented. The environment is composed of knowledge, collaboration, consulting, experimentation, and personal spaces as a collection of agents and conventional software components working over the knowledge domains. All…

EVA: An Interactive Web-Based Collaborative Learning Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sheremetov, Leonid; Arenas, Adolfo Guzman

2002-01-01

In this paper, a Web-based learning environment developed within the project called Virtual Learning Spaces (EVA, in Spanish) is described. The environment is composed of knowledge, collaboration, consulting and experimentation spaces as a collection of agents and conventional software components working over the knowledge domains. All user…

A New Approach to Developing Interactive Software Modules Through Graduate Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sanders, Nathan E.; Faesi, Chris; Goodman, Alyssa A.

2014-06-01

Educational technology has attained significant importance as a mechanism for supporting experiential learning of science concepts. However, the growth of this mechanism is limited by the significant time and technical expertise needed to develop such products, particularly in specialized fields of science. We sought to test whether interactive, educational, online software modules can be developed effectively by students as a curriculum component of an advanced science course. We discuss a set of 15 such modules developed by Harvard University graduate students to demonstrate various concepts related to astronomy and physics. Their successful development of these modules demonstrates that online software tools for education and outreach on specialized topics can be produced while simultaneously fulfilling project-based learning objectives. We describe a set of technologies suitable for module development and present in detail four examples of modules developed by the students. We offer recommendations for incorporating educational software development within a graduate curriculum and conclude by discussing the relevance of this novel approach to new online learning environments like edX.

A Multi-mission Event-Driven Component-Based System for Support of Flight Software Development, ATLO, and Operations first used by the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Project

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dehghani, Navid; Tankenson, Michael

2006-01-01

This viewgraph presentation reviews the architectural description of the Mission Data Processing and Control System (MPCS). MPCS is an event-driven, multi-mission ground data processing components providing uplink, downlink, and data management capabilities which will support the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) project as its first target mission. MPCS is designed with these factors (1) Enabling plug and play architecture (2) MPCS has strong inheritance from GDS components that have been developed for other Flight Projects (MER, MRO, DAWN, MSAP), and are currently being used in operations and ATLO, and (3) MPCS components are Java-based, platform independent, and are designed to consume and produce XML-formatted data

Design of Instrument Control Software for Solar Vector Magnetograph at Udaipur Solar Observatory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gosain, Sanjay; Venkatakrishnan, P.; Venugopalan, K.

2004-04-01

A magnetograph is an instrument which makes measurement of solar magnetic field by measuring Zeeman induced polarization in solar spectral lines. In a typical filter based magnetograph there are three main modules namely, polarimeter, narrow-band spectrometer (filter), and imager(CCD camera). For a successful operation of magnetograph it is essential that these modules work in synchronization with each other. Here, we describe the design of instrument control system implemented for the Solar Vector Magnetograph under development at Udaipur Solar Observatory. The control software is written in Visual Basic and exploits the Component Object Model (COM) components for a fast and flexible application development. The user can interact with the instrument modules through a Graphical User Interface (GUI) and can program the sequence of magnetograph operations. The integration of Interactive Data Language (IDL) ActiveX components in the interface provides a powerful tool for online visualization, analysis and processing of images.

LabVIEW control software for scanning micro-beam X-ray fluorescence spectrometer.

PubMed

Wrobel, Pawel; Czyzycki, Mateusz; Furman, Leszek; Kolasinski, Krzysztof; Lankosz, Marek; Mrenca, Alina; Samek, Lucyna; Wegrzynek, Dariusz

2012-05-15

Confocal micro-beam X-ray fluorescence microscope was constructed. The system was assembled from commercially available components - a low power X-ray tube source, polycapillary X-ray optics and silicon drift detector - controlled by an in-house developed LabVIEW software. A video camera coupled to optical microscope was utilized to display the area excited by X-ray beam. The camera image calibration and scan area definition software were also based entirely on LabVIEW code. Presently, the main area of application of the newly constructed spectrometer is 2-dimensional mapping of element distribution in environmental, biological and geological samples with micrometer spatial resolution. The hardware and the developed software can already handle volumetric 3-D confocal scans. In this work, a front panel graphical user interface as well as communication protocols between hardware components were described. Two applications of the spectrometer, to homogeneity testing of titanium layers and to imaging of various types of grains in air particulate matter collected on membrane filters, were presented. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Development of online NIR urine analyzing system based on AOTF

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wan, Feng; Sun, Zhendong; Li, Xiaoxia

2006-09-01

In this paper, some key techniques on development of on-line MR urine analyzing system based on AOTF (Acousto - Optics Tunable Filter) are introduced. Problems about designing the optical system including collimation of incident light and working distance (the shortest distance for separating incident light and diffracted light) are analyzed and researched. DDS (Direct Digital Synthesizer) controlled by microprocessor is used to realize the wavelength scan. The experiment results show that this MR urine analyzing system based on. AOTF has 10000 - 4000cm -1 wavelength range and O.3ms wavelength transfer rate. Compare with the conventional Fourier Transform NIP. spectrophotometer for analyzing multi-components in urine, this system features low cost, small volume and on-line measurement function. Unscrambler software (multivariate statistical software by CAMO Inc. Norway) is selected as the software for processing the data. This system can realize on line quantitative analysis of protein, urea and creatinine in urine.

Clinical software development for the Web: lessons learned from the BOADICEA project

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

Background In the past 20 years, society has witnessed the following landmark scientific advances: (i) the sequencing of the human genome, (ii) the distribution of software by the open source movement, and (iii) the invention of the World Wide Web. Together, these advances have provided a new impetus for clinical software development: developers now translate the products of human genomic research into clinical software tools; they use open-source programs to build them; and they use the Web to deliver them. Whilst this open-source component-based approach has undoubtedly made clinical software development easier, clinical software projects are still hampered by problems that traditionally accompany the software process. This study describes the development of the BOADICEA Web Application, a computer program used by clinical geneticists to assess risks to patients with a family history of breast and ovarian cancer. The key challenge of the BOADICEA Web Application project was to deliver a program that was safe, secure and easy for healthcare professionals to use. We focus on the software process, problems faced, and lessons learned. Our key objectives are: (i) to highlight key clinical software development issues; (ii) to demonstrate how software engineering tools and techniques can facilitate clinical software development for the benefit of individuals who lack software engineering expertise; and (iii) to provide a clinical software development case report that can be used as a basis for discussion at the start of future projects. Results We developed the BOADICEA Web Application using an evolutionary software process. Our approach to Web implementation was conservative and we used conventional software engineering tools and techniques. The principal software development activities were: requirements, design, implementation, testing, documentation and maintenance. The BOADICEA Web Application has now been widely adopted by clinical geneticists and researchers. BOADICEA Web Application version 1 was released for general use in November 2007. By May 2010, we had > 1200 registered users based in the UK, USA, Canada, South America, Europe, Africa, Middle East, SE Asia, Australia and New Zealand. Conclusions We found that an evolutionary software process was effective when we developed the BOADICEA Web Application. The key clinical software development issues identified during the BOADICEA Web Application project were: software reliability, Web security, clinical data protection and user feedback. PMID:22490389

Clinical software development for the Web: lessons learned from the BOADICEA project.

PubMed

Cunningham, Alex P; Antoniou, Antonis C; Easton, Douglas F

2012-04-10

In the past 20 years, society has witnessed the following landmark scientific advances: (i) the sequencing of the human genome, (ii) the distribution of software by the open source movement, and (iii) the invention of the World Wide Web. Together, these advances have provided a new impetus for clinical software development: developers now translate the products of human genomic research into clinical software tools; they use open-source programs to build them; and they use the Web to deliver them. Whilst this open-source component-based approach has undoubtedly made clinical software development easier, clinical software projects are still hampered by problems that traditionally accompany the software process. This study describes the development of the BOADICEA Web Application, a computer program used by clinical geneticists to assess risks to patients with a family history of breast and ovarian cancer. The key challenge of the BOADICEA Web Application project was to deliver a program that was safe, secure and easy for healthcare professionals to use. We focus on the software process, problems faced, and lessons learned. Our key objectives are: (i) to highlight key clinical software development issues; (ii) to demonstrate how software engineering tools and techniques can facilitate clinical software development for the benefit of individuals who lack software engineering expertise; and (iii) to provide a clinical software development case report that can be used as a basis for discussion at the start of future projects. We developed the BOADICEA Web Application using an evolutionary software process. Our approach to Web implementation was conservative and we used conventional software engineering tools and techniques. The principal software development activities were: requirements, design, implementation, testing, documentation and maintenance. The BOADICEA Web Application has now been widely adopted by clinical geneticists and researchers. BOADICEA Web Application version 1 was released for general use in November 2007. By May 2010, we had > 1200 registered users based in the UK, USA, Canada, South America, Europe, Africa, Middle East, SE Asia, Australia and New Zealand. We found that an evolutionary software process was effective when we developed the BOADICEA Web Application. The key clinical software development issues identified during the BOADICEA Web Application project were: software reliability, Web security, clinical data protection and user feedback.

Effective Software Engineering Leadership for Development Programs

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cagle West, Marsha

2010-01-01

Software is a critical component of systems ranging from simple consumer appliances to complex health, nuclear, and flight control systems. The development of quality, reliable, and effective software solutions requires the incorporation of effective software engineering processes and leadership. Processes, approaches, and methodologies for…

The Development of a Field Services Network for a Satellite-Based Educational Telecommunications Experiment. Satellite Technology Demonstration, Technical Report No. 0333.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Anderson, Frank; And Others

The Satellite Technology Demonstration (STD) of the Federation of Rocky Mountain States (FRMS) employed a technical delivery system to merge effectively hardware and software, products and services. It also needed a nontechnical component to insure product and service acceptance. Accordingly, the STD's Utilization Component was responsible for…

Experiences integrating autonomous components and legacy systems into tsunami early warning systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reißland, S.; Herrnkind, S.; Guenther, M.; Babeyko, A.; Comoglu, M.; Hammitzsch, M.

2012-04-01

Fostered by and embedded in the general development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) the evolution of Tsunami Early Warning Systems (TEWS) shows a significant development from seismic-centred to multi-sensor system architectures using additional sensors, e.g. sea level stations for the detection of tsunami waves and GPS stations for the detection of ground displacements. Furthermore, the design and implementation of a robust and scalable service infrastructure supporting the integration and utilisation of existing resources serving near real-time data not only includes sensors but also other components and systems offering services such as the delivery of feasible simulations used for forecasting in an imminent tsunami threat. In the context of the development of the German Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System (GITEWS) and the project Distant Early Warning System (DEWS) a service platform for both sensor integration and warning dissemination has been newly developed and demonstrated. In particular, standards of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) and the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) have been successfully incorporated. In the project Collaborative, Complex, and Critical Decision-Support in Evolving Crises (TRIDEC) new developments are used to extend the existing platform to realise a component-based technology framework for building distributed TEWS. This talk will describe experiences made in GITEWS, DEWS and TRIDEC while integrating legacy stand-alone systems and newly developed special-purpose software components into TEWS using different software adapters and communication strategies to make the systems work together in a corporate infrastructure. The talk will also cover task management and data conversion between the different systems. Practical approaches and software solutions for the integration of sensors, e.g. providing seismic and sea level data, and utilisation of special-purpose components, such as simulation systems, in TEWS will be presented.

Tools for Administration of a UNIX-Based Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

LeClaire, Stephen; Farrar, Edward

2004-01-01

Several computer programs have been developed to enable efficient administration of a large, heterogeneous, UNIX-based computing and communication network that includes a variety of computers connected to a variety of subnetworks. One program provides secure software tools for administrators to create, modify, lock, and delete accounts of specific users. This program also provides tools for users to change their UNIX passwords and log-in shells. These tools check for errors. Another program comprises a client and a server component that, together, provide a secure mechanism to create, modify, and query quota levels on a network file system (NFS) mounted by use of the VERITAS File SystemJ software. The client software resides on an internal secure computer with a secure Web interface; one can gain access to the client software from any authorized computer capable of running web-browser software. The server software resides on a UNIX computer configured with the VERITAS software system. Directories where VERITAS quotas are applied are NFS-mounted. Another program is a Web-based, client/server Internet Protocol (IP) address tool that facilitates maintenance lookup of information about IP addresses for a network of computers.

Applying Reflective Middleware Techniques to Optimize a QoS-enabled CORBA Component Model Implementation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wang, Nanbor; Parameswaran, Kirthika; Kircher, Michael; Schmidt, Douglas

2003-01-01

Although existing CORBA specifications, such as Real-time CORBA and CORBA Messaging, address many end-to-end quality-of service (QoS) properties, they do not define strategies for configuring these properties into applications flexibly, transparently, and adaptively. Therefore, application developers must make these configuration decisions manually and explicitly, which is tedious, error-prone, and open sub-optimal. Although the recently adopted CORBA Component Model (CCM) does define a standard configuration framework for packaging and deploying software components, conventional CCM implementations focus on functionality rather than adaptive quality-of-service, which makes them unsuitable for next-generation applications with demanding QoS requirements. This paper presents three contributions to the study of middleware for QoS-enabled component-based applications. It outlines rejective middleware techniques designed to adaptively (1) select optimal communication mechanisms, (2) manage QoS properties of CORBA components in their contain- ers, and (3) (re)con$gure selected component executors dynamically. Based on our ongoing research on CORBA and the CCM, we believe the application of rejective techniques to component middleware will provide a dynamically adaptive and (re)configurable framework for COTS software that is well-suited for the QoS demands of next-generation applications.

Applying Reflective Middleware Techniques to Optimize a QoS-enabled CORBA Component Model Implementation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wang, Nanbor; Kircher, Michael; Schmidt, Douglas C.

2000-01-01

Although existing CORBA specifications, such as Real-time CORBA and CORBA Messaging, address many end-to-end quality-of-service (QoS) properties, they do not define strategies for configuring these properties into applications flexibly, transparently, and adaptively. Therefore, application developers must make these configuration decisions manually and explicitly, which is tedious, error-prone, and often sub-optimal. Although the recently adopted CORBA Component Model (CCM) does define a standard configuration frame-work for packaging and deploying software components, conventional CCM implementations focus on functionality rather than adaptive quality-of service, which makes them unsuitable for next-generation applications with demanding QoS requirements. This paper presents three contributions to the study of middleware for QoS-enabled component-based applications. It outlines reflective middleware techniques designed to adaptively: (1) select optimal communication mechanisms, (2) man- age QoS properties of CORBA components in their containers, and (3) (re)configure selected component executors dynamically. Based on our ongoing research on CORBA and the CCM, we believe the application of reflective techniques to component middleware will provide a dynamically adaptive and (re)configurable framework for COTS software that is well-suited for the QoS demands of next-generation applications.

Award-Winning CARES/Life Ceramics Durability Evaluation Software Is Making Advanced Technology Accessible

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1997-01-01

Products made from advanced ceramics show great promise for revolutionizing aerospace and terrestrial propulsion and power generation. However, ceramic components are difficult to design because brittle materials in general have widely varying strength values. The CARES/Life software developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center eases this by providing a tool that uses probabilistic reliability analysis techniques to optimize the design and manufacture of brittle material components. CARES/Life is an integrated package that predicts the probability of a monolithic ceramic component's failure as a function of its time in service. It couples commercial finite element programs--which resolve a component's temperature and stress distribution - with reliability evaluation and fracture mechanics routines for modeling strength - limiting defects. These routines are based on calculations of the probabilistic nature of the brittle material's strength.

C-Language Integrated Production System, Version 5.1

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Riley, Gary; Donnell, Brian; Ly, Huyen-Anh VU; Culbert, Chris; Savely, Robert T.; Mccoy, Daniel J.; Giarratano, Joseph

1992-01-01

CLIPS 5.1 provides cohesive software tool for handling wide variety of knowledge with support for three different programming paradigms: rule-based, object-oriented, and procedural. Rule-based programming provides representation of knowledge by use of heuristics. Object-oriented programming enables modeling of complex systems as modular components. Procedural programming enables CLIPS to represent knowledge in ways similar to those allowed in such languages as C, Pascal, Ada, and LISP. Working with CLIPS 5.1, one can develop expert-system software by use of rule-based programming only, object-oriented programming only, procedural programming only, or combinations of the three.

Development of new vibration energy flow analysis software and its applications to vehicle systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, D.-J.; Hong, S.-Y.; Park, Y.-H.

2005-09-01

The Energy flow analysis (EFA) offers very promising results in predicting the noise and vibration responses of system structures in medium-to-high frequency ranges. We have developed the Energy flow finite element method (EFFEM) based software, EFADSC++ R4, for the vibration analysis. The software can analyze the system structures composed of beam, plate, spring-damper, rigid body elements and many other components developed, and has many useful functions in analysis. For convenient use of the software, the main functions of the whole software are modularized into translator, model-converter, and solver. The translator module makes it possible to use finite element (FE) model for the vibration analysis. The model-converter module changes FE model into energy flow finite element (EFFE) model, and generates joint elements to cover the vibrational attenuation in the complex structures composed of various elements and can solve the joint element equations by using the wave tra! nsmission approach very quickly. The solver module supports the various direct and iterative solvers for multi-DOF structures. The predictions of vibration for real vehicles by using the developed software were performed successfully.

A flexible continuous-variable QKD system using off-the-shelf components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Comandar, Lucian C.; Brunner, Hans H.; Bettelli, Stefano; Fung, Fred; Karinou, Fotini; Hillerkuss, David; Mikroulis, Spiros; Wang, Dawei; Kuschnerov, Maxim; Xie, Changsong; Poppe, Andreas; Peev, Momtchil

2017-10-01

We present the development of a robust and versatile CV-QKD architecture based on commercially available optical and electronic components. The system uses a pilot tone for phase synchronization with a local oscillator, as well as local feedback loops to mitigate frequency and polarization drifts. Transmit and receive-side digital signal processing is performed fully in software, allowing for rapid protocol reconfiguration. The quantum link is complemented with a software stack for secure-key processing, key storage and encrypted communication. All these features allow for the system to be at the same time a prototype for a future commercial product and a research platform.

Space-Based Reconfigurable Software Defined Radio Test Bed Aboard International Space Station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reinhart, Richard C.; Lux, James P.

2014-01-01

The National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA) recently launched a new software defined radio research test bed to the International Space Station. The test bed, sponsored by the Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) Office within NASA is referred to as the SCaN Testbed. The SCaN Testbed is a highly capable communications system, composed of three software defined radios, integrated into a flight system, and mounted to the truss of the International Space Station. Software defined radios offer the future promise of in-flight reconfigurability, autonomy, and eventually cognitive operation. The adoption of software defined radios offers space missions a new way to develop and operate space transceivers for communications and navigation. Reconfigurable or software defined radios with communications and navigation functions implemented in software or VHDL (Very High Speed Hardware Description Language) provide the capability to change the functionality of the radio during development or after launch. The ability to change the operating characteristics of a radio through software once deployed to space offers the flexibility to adapt to new science opportunities, recover from anomalies within the science payload or communication system, and potentially reduce development cost and risk by adapting generic space platforms to meet specific mission requirements. The software defined radios on the SCaN Testbed are each compliant to NASA's Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) Architecture. The STRS Architecture is an open, non-proprietary architecture that defines interfaces for the connections between radio components. It provides an operating environment to abstract the communication waveform application from the underlying platform specific hardware such as digital-to-analog converters, analog-to-digital converters, oscillators, RF attenuators, automatic gain control circuits, FPGAs, general-purpose processors, etc. and the interconnections among different radio components.

Terra Harvest software architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Humeniuk, Dave; Klawon, Kevin

2012-06-01

Under the Terra Harvest Program, the DIA has the objective of developing a universal Controller for the Unattended Ground Sensor (UGS) community. The mission is to define, implement, and thoroughly document an open architecture that universally supports UGS missions, integrating disparate systems, peripherals, etc. The Controller's inherent interoperability with numerous systems enables the integration of both legacy and future UGS System (UGSS) components, while the design's open architecture supports rapid third-party development to ensure operational readiness. The successful accomplishment of these objectives by the program's Phase 3b contractors is demonstrated via integration of the companies' respective plug-'n'-play contributions that include controllers, various peripherals, such as sensors, cameras, etc., and their associated software drivers. In order to independently validate the Terra Harvest architecture, L-3 Nova Engineering, along with its partner, the University of Dayton Research Institute, is developing the Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE), a Java Virtual Machine (JVM) running on an embedded Linux Operating System. The Use Cases on which the software is developed support the full range of UGS operational scenarios such as remote sensor triggering, image capture, and data exfiltration. The Team is additionally developing an ARM microprocessor-based evaluation platform that is both energy-efficient and operationally flexible. The paper describes the overall THOSE architecture, as well as the design decisions for some of the key software components. Development process for THOSE is discussed as well.

Loading, electromyograph, and motion during exercise

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Figueroa, Fernando

1993-01-01

A system is being developed to gather kineto-dynamic data for a study to determine the load vectors applied to bone during exercise on equipment similar to that used in space. This information will quantify bone loading for exercise countermeasures development. Decreased muscle loading and external loading of bone during weightlessness results in cancellous bone loss of 1 percent per month in the lower extremities and 2 percent per month in the calcaneous. It is hypothesized that loading bone appropriately during exercise may prevent the bone loss. The system consists of an ergometer instrumented to provide position of the pedal (foot), pedaling forces on the foot (on the sagittal plane), and force on the seat. Accelerometers attached to the limbs will provide acceleration. These data will be used as input to an analytical model of the limb to determine forces on the bones and on groups of muscles. EMG signals from activity in the muscles will also be used in conjunction with the equations of mechanics of motion to be able to discern forces exerted by specific muscles. The tasks to be carried out include: design of various mechanical components to mount transducers, specification of mechanical components, specification of position transducers, development of a scheme to control the data acquisition instruments (TEAC recorder and optical encoder board), development of a dynamic model of the limbs in motion, and development of an overall scheme for data collection analysis and presentation. At the present time, all the hardware components of the system are operational, except for a computer board to gather position data from the pedals and crank. This board, however, may be put to use by anyone with background in computer based instrumentation. The software components are not all done. Software to transfer data recorded from the EMG measurements is operational, software to drive the optical encoder card is mostly done. The equations to model the kinematics and dynamics of motion of the limbs have been developed, but they have not yet been implemented in software. Aside from the development of the hardware and software components of the system, the methodology to use accelerometers and encoders and the formulation of the appropriate equations are an important contribution to the area of biomechanics, particularly in space applications.

VIDANA: Data Management System for Nano Satellites

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Montenegro, Sergio; Walter, Thomas; Dilger, Erik

2013-08-01

A Vidana data management system is a network of software and hardware components. This implies a software network, a hardware network and a smooth connection between both of them. Our strategy is based on our innovative middleware. A reliable interconnection network (SW & HW) which can interconnect many unreliable redundant components such as sensors, actuators, communication devices, computers, and storage elements,... and software components! Component failures are detected, the affected device is disabled and its function is taken over by a redundant component. Our middleware doesn't connect only software, but also devices and software together. Software and hardware communicate with each other without having to distinguish which functions are in software and which are implemented in hardware. Components may be turned on and off at any time, and the whole system will autonomously adapt to its new configuration in order to continue fulfilling its task. In VIDANA we aim dynamic adaptability (run tine), static adaptability (tailoring), and unified HW/SW communication protocols. For many of these aspects we use "learn from the nature" where we can find astonishing reference implementations.

Software Productivity of Field Experiments Using the Mobile Agents Open Architecture with Workflow Interoperability

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clancey, William J.; Lowry, Michael R.; Nado, Robert Allen; Sierhuis, Maarten

2011-01-01

We analyzed a series of ten systematically developed surface exploration systems that integrated a variety of hardware and software components. Design, development, and testing data suggest that incremental buildup of an exploration system for long-duration capabilities is facilitated by an open architecture with appropriate-level APIs, specifically designed to facilitate integration of new components. This improves software productivity by reducing changes required for reconfiguring an existing system.

Component Verification and Certification in NASA Missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Giannakopoulou, Dimitra; Penix, John; Norvig, Peter (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

Software development for NASA missions is a particularly challenging task. Missions are extremely ambitious scientifically, have very strict time frames, and must be accomplished with a maximum degree of reliability. Verification technologies must therefore be pushed far beyond their current capabilities. Moreover, reuse and adaptation of software architectures and components must be incorporated in software development within and across missions. This paper discusses NASA applications that we are currently investigating from these perspectives.

Pybus -- A Python Software Bus

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lavrijsen, Wim T.L.P.

2004-10-14

A software bus, just like its hardware equivalent, allows for the discovery, installation, configuration, loading, unloading, and run-time replacement of software components, as well as channeling of inter-component communication. Python, a popular open-source programming language, encourages a modular design on software written in it, but it offers little or no component functionality. However, the language and its interpreter provide sufficient hooks to implement a thin, integral layer of component support. This functionality can be presented to the developer in the form of a module, making it very easy to use. This paper describes a Pythonmodule, PyBus, with which the conceptmore » of a ''software bus'' can be realized in Python. It demonstrates, within the context of the ATLAS software framework Athena, how PyBus can be used for the installation and (run-time) configuration of software, not necessarily Python modules, from a Python application in a way that is transparent to the end-user.« less

ODU-CAUSE: Computer Based Learning Lab.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sachon, Michael W.; Copeland, Gary E.

This paper describes the Computer Based Learning Lab (CBLL) at Old Dominion University (ODU) as a component of the ODU-Comprehensive Assistance to Undergraduate Science Education (CAUSE) Project. Emphasis is directed to the structure and management of the facility and to the software under development by the staff. Serving the ODU-CAUSE User Group…

Steamer II: Steamer prototype component inventory and user interface commands. Technical report, 1988-1989

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dickieson, J.L.; Thode, W.F.; Newbury, K.

1988-12-01

Over the last several years, Navy Personnel Research and Development has produced a prototype simulation of a 1200-psi steam plant. This simulation, called Steamer, is installed on an expensive Symbolics minicomputer at the Surface Warfare Officers School, Pacific Coronado, California. The fundamental research goal of the Steamer prototype system was to evaluate the potential of, what was then, new artificial intelligence (AI) hardware and software technology for supporting the construction of computer-based training systems using graphic representations of complex, dynamic systems. The area of propulsion engineering was chosen for a number of reasons. This document describes the Steamer prototype systemmore » components and user interface commands and establishes a starting point for designing, developing, and implementing Steamer II. Careful examination of the actual program code produced an inventory that describes the hardware, system software, application software, and documentation for the Steamer prototype system. Exercising all menu options systematically produced an inventory of all Steamer prototype user interface commands.« less

Development and use of mathematical models and software frameworks for integrated analysis of agricultural systems and associated water use impacts

USGS Publications Warehouse

Fowler, K. R.; Jenkins, E.W.; Parno, M.; Chrispell, J.C.; Colón, A. I.; Hanson, Randall T.

2016-01-01

The development of appropriate water management strategies requires, in part, a methodology for quantifying and evaluating the impact of water policy decisions on regional stakeholders. In this work, we describe the framework we are developing to enhance the body of resources available to policy makers, farmers, and other community members in their e orts to understand, quantify, and assess the often competing objectives water consumers have with respect to usage. The foundation for the framework is the construction of a simulation-based optimization software tool using two existing software packages. In particular, we couple a robust optimization software suite (DAKOTA) with the USGS MF-OWHM water management simulation tool to provide a flexible software environment that will enable the evaluation of one or multiple (possibly competing) user-defined (or stakeholder) objectives. We introduce the individual software components and outline the communication strategy we defined for the coupled development. We present numerical results for case studies related to crop portfolio management with several defined objectives. The objectives are not optimally satisfied for any single user class, demonstrating the capability of the software tool to aid in the evaluation of a variety of competing interests.

Workflow-Based Software Development Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Izygon, Michel E.

2013-01-01

The Software Developer's Assistant (SDA) helps software teams more efficiently and accurately conduct or execute software processes associated with NASA mission-critical software. SDA is a process enactment platform that guides software teams through project-specific standards, processes, and procedures. Software projects are decomposed into all of their required process steps or tasks, and each task is assigned to project personnel. SDA orchestrates the performance of work required to complete all process tasks in the correct sequence. The software then notifies team members when they may begin work on their assigned tasks and provides the tools, instructions, reference materials, and supportive artifacts that allow users to compliantly perform the work. A combination of technology components captures and enacts any software process use to support the software lifecycle. It creates an adaptive workflow environment that can be modified as needed. SDA achieves software process automation through a Business Process Management (BPM) approach to managing the software lifecycle for mission-critical projects. It contains five main parts: TieFlow (workflow engine), Business Rules (rules to alter process flow), Common Repository (storage for project artifacts, versions, history, schedules, etc.), SOA (interface to allow internal, GFE, or COTS tools integration), and the Web Portal Interface (collaborative web environment

Reconfigurable, Cognitive Software-Defined Radio

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bhat, Arvind

2015-01-01

Software-defined radio (SDR) technology allows radios to be reconfigured to perform different communication functions without using multiple radios to accomplish each task. Intelligent Automation, Inc., has developed SDR platforms that switch adaptively between different operation modes. The innovation works by modifying both transmit waveforms and receiver signal processing tasks. In Phase I of the project, the company developed SDR cognitive capabilities, including adaptive modulation and coding (AMC), automatic modulation recognition (AMR), and spectrum sensing. In Phase II, these capabilities were integrated into SDR platforms. The reconfigurable transceiver design employs high-speed field-programmable gate arrays, enabling multimode operation and scalable architecture. Designs are based on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components and are modular in nature, making it easier to upgrade individual components rather than redesigning the entire SDR platform as technology advances.

Analyzing and Predicting Effort Associated with Finding and Fixing Software Faults

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hamill, Maggie; Goseva-Popstojanova, Katerina

2016-01-01

Context: Software developers spend a significant amount of time fixing faults. However, not many papers have addressed the actual effort needed to fix software faults. Objective: The objective of this paper is twofold: (1) analysis of the effort needed to fix software faults and how it was affected by several factors and (2) prediction of the level of fix implementation effort based on the information provided in software change requests. Method: The work is based on data related to 1200 failures, extracted from the change tracking system of a large NASA mission. The analysis includes descriptive and inferential statistics. Predictions are made using three supervised machine learning algorithms and three sampling techniques aimed at addressing the imbalanced data problem. Results: Our results show that (1) 83% of the total fix implementation effort was associated with only 20% of failures. (2) Both safety critical failures and post-release failures required three times more effort to fix compared to non-critical and pre-release counterparts, respectively. (3) Failures with fixes spread across multiple components or across multiple types of software artifacts required more effort. The spread across artifacts was more costly than spread across components. (4) Surprisingly, some types of faults associated with later life-cycle activities did not require significant effort. (5) The level of fix implementation effort was predicted with 73% overall accuracy using the original, imbalanced data. Using oversampling techniques improved the overall accuracy up to 77%. More importantly, oversampling significantly improved the prediction of the high level effort, from 31% to around 85%. Conclusions: This paper shows the importance of tying software failures to changes made to fix all associated faults, in one or more software components and/or in one or more software artifacts, and the benefit of studying how the spread of faults and other factors affect the fix implementation effort.

Development strategies for the satellite flight software on-board Meteosat Third Generation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tipaldi, Massimo; Legendre, Cedric; Koopmann, Olliver; Ferraguto, Massimo; Wenker, Ralf; D'Angelo, Gianni

2018-04-01

Nowadays, satellites are becoming increasingly software dependent. Satellite Flight Software (FSW), that is to say, the application software running on the satellite main On-Board Computer (OBC), plays a relevant role in implementing complex space mission requirements. In this paper, we examine relevant technical approaches and programmatic strategies adopted for the development of the Meteosat Third Generation Satellite (MTG) FSW. To begin with, we present its layered model-based architecture, and the means for ensuring a robust and reliable interaction among the FSW components. Then, we focus on the selection of an effective software development life cycle model. In particular, by combining plan-driven and agile approaches, we can fulfill the need of having preliminary SW versions. They can be used for the elicitation of complex system-level requirements as well as for the initial satellite integration and testing activities. Another important aspect can be identified in the testing activities. Indeed, very demanding quality requirements have to be fulfilled in satellite SW applications. This manuscript proposes a test automation framework, which uses an XML-based test procedure language independent of the underlying test environment. Finally, a short overview of the MTG FSW sizing and timing budgets concludes the paper.

A Role-Playing Game for a Software Engineering Lab: Developing a Product Line

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zuppiroli, Sara; Ciancarini, Paolo; Gabbrielli, Maurizio

2012-01-01

Software product line development refers to software engineering practices and techniques for creating families of similar software systems from a basic set of reusable components, called shared assets. Teaching how to deal with software product lines in a university lab course is a challenging task, because there are several practical issues that…

Cobalt: A GPU-based correlator and beamformer for LOFAR

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Broekema, P. Chris; Mol, J. Jan David; Nijboer, R.; van Amesfoort, A. S.; Brentjens, M. A.; Loose, G. Marcel; Klijn, W. F. A.; Romein, J. W.

2018-04-01

For low-frequency radio astronomy, software correlation and beamforming on general purpose hardware is a viable alternative to custom designed hardware. LOFAR, a new-generation radio telescope centered in the Netherlands with international stations in Germany, France, Ireland, Poland, Sweden and the UK, has successfully used software real-time processors based on IBM Blue Gene technology since 2004. Since then, developments in technology have allowed us to build a system based on commercial off-the-shelf components that combines the same capabilities with lower operational cost. In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of a GPU-based correlator and beamformer with the same capabilities as the Blue Gene based systems. We focus on the design approach taken, and show the challenges faced in selecting an appropriate system. The design, implementation and verification of the software system show the value of a modern test-driven development approach. Operational experience, based on three years of operations, demonstrates that a general purpose system is a good alternative to the previous supercomputer-based system or custom-designed hardware.

Software architecture of INO340 telescope control system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ravanmehr, Reza; Khosroshahi, Habib

2016-08-01

The software architecture plays an important role in distributed control system of astronomical projects because many subsystems and components must work together in a consistent and reliable way. We have utilized a customized architecture design approach based on "4+1 view model" in order to design INOCS software architecture. In this paper, after reviewing the top level INOCS architecture, we present the software architecture model of INOCS inspired by "4+1 model", for this purpose we provide logical, process, development, physical, and scenario views of our architecture using different UML diagrams and other illustrative visual charts. Each view presents INOCS software architecture from a different perspective. We finish the paper by science data operation of INO340 and the concluding remarks.

Development and application of a time-history analysis for rotorcraft dynamics based on a component approach

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sopher, R.; Hallock, D. W.

1985-01-01

A time history analysis for rotorcraft dynamics based on dynamical substructures, and nonstructural mathematical and aerodynamic components is described. The analysis is applied to predict helicopter ground resonance and response to rotor damage. Other applications illustrate the stability and steady vibratory response of stopped and gimballed rotors, representative of new technology. Desirable attributes expected from modern codes are realized, although the analysis does not employ a complete set of techniques identified for advanced software. The analysis is able to handle a comprehensive set of steady state and stability problems with a small library of components.

A Prototype for the Support of Integrated Software Process Development and Improvement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Porrawatpreyakorn, Nalinpat; Quirchmayr, Gerald; Chutimaskul, Wichian

An efficient software development process is one of key success factors for quality software. Not only can the appropriate establishment but also the continuous improvement of integrated project management and of the software development process result in efficiency. This paper hence proposes a software process maintenance framework which consists of two core components: an integrated PMBOK-Scrum model describing how to establish a comprehensive set of project management and software engineering processes and a software development maturity model advocating software process improvement. Besides, a prototype tool to support the framework is introduced.

Provision of Training for the IT Industry: The ELEVATE Project

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Paraskakis, Iraklis; Konstantinidis, Andreas; Bouras, Thanassis; Perakis, Kostas; Pantelopoulos, Stelios; Hatziapostolou, Thanos

This paper will present ELEVATE that aims to deliver an innovative training, educational and certification environment integrating the application software to be taught with the training procedure. ELEVATE aspires to address the training needs of software development SMEs and the solution proposed is based on three basic notions: to provide competence training that is tailored to the needs of the individual trainee, to allow the trainee to carry out authentic activities as well as problem based learning that draws from real life scenarios and finally to allow for the assessment and certification of the skills and competences acquired. In order to achieve the desired results the ELEVATE architecture utilises an Interactive Interoperability Layer, an Intelligent Personalization Trainer as well as the Training, Evaluation & Certification component. As an end product, the ELEVATE project The ELEVATE pedagogical model is based on blended learning, the e-Training component (an intelligent system that provides tailored training) and Learning 2.0.

Design of a component-based integrated environmental modeling framework

EPA Science Inventory

Integrated environmental modeling (IEM) includes interdependent science-based components (e.g., models, databases, viewers, assessment protocols) that comprise an appropriate software modeling system. The science-based components are responsible for consuming and producing inform...

Software packager user's guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Callahan, John R.

1995-01-01

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.

The software architecture of climate models: a graphical comparison of CMIP5 and EMICAR5 configurations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alexander, K.; Easterbrook, S. M.

2015-01-01

We analyse the source code of eight coupled climate models, selected from those that participated in the CMIP5 (Taylor et al., 2012) or EMICAR5 (Eby et al., 2013; Zickfeld et al., 2013) intercomparison projects. For each model, we sort the preprocessed code into components and subcomponents based on dependency structure. We then create software architecture diagrams which show the relative sizes of these components/subcomponents and the flow of data between them. The diagrams also illustrate several major classes of climate model design; the distribution of complexity between components, which depends on historical development paths as well as the conscious goals of each institution; and the sharing of components between different modelling groups. These diagrams offer insights into the similarities and differences between models, and have the potential to be useful tools for communication between scientists, scientific institutions, and the public.

The software architecture of climate models: a graphical comparison of CMIP5 and EMICAR5 configurations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alexander, K.; Easterbrook, S. M.

2015-04-01

We analyze the source code of eight coupled climate models, selected from those that participated in the CMIP5 (Taylor et al., 2012) or EMICAR5 (Eby et al., 2013; Zickfeld et al., 2013) intercomparison projects. For each model, we sort the preprocessed code into components and subcomponents based on dependency structure. We then create software architecture diagrams that show the relative sizes of these components/subcomponents and the flow of data between them. The diagrams also illustrate several major classes of climate model design; the distribution of complexity between components, which depends on historical development paths as well as the conscious goals of each institution; and the sharing of components between different modeling groups. These diagrams offer insights into the similarities and differences in structure between climate models, and have the potential to be useful tools for communication between scientists, scientific institutions, and the public.

Some design constraints required for the assembly of software components: The incorporation of atomic abstract types into generically structured abstract types

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnson, Charles S.

1986-01-01

It is nearly axiomatic, that to take the greatest advantage of the useful features available in a development system, and to avoid the negative interactions of those features, requires the exercise of a design methodology which constrains their use. A major design support feature of the Ada language is abstraction: for data, functions processes, resources, and system elements in general. Atomic abstract types can be created in packages defining those private types and all of the overloaded operators, functions, and hidden data required for their use in an application. Generically structured abstract types can be created in generic packages defining those structured private types, as buildups from the user-defined data types which are input as parameters. A study is made of the design constraints required for software incorporating either atomic or generically structured abstract types, if the integration of software components based on them is to be subsequently performed. The impact of these techniques on the reusability of software and the creation of project-specific software support environments is also discussed.

Modeling a distributed environment for a petroleum reservoir engineering application with software product line

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

de Faria Scheidt, Rafael; Vilain, Patrícia; Dantas, M. A. R.

2014-10-01

Petroleum reservoir engineering is a complex and interesting field that requires large amount of computational facilities to achieve successful results. Usually, software environments for this field are developed without taking care out of possible interactions and extensibilities required by reservoir engineers. In this paper, we present a research work which it is characterized by the design and implementation based on a software product line model for a real distributed reservoir engineering environment. Experimental results indicate successfully the utilization of this approach for the design of distributed software architecture. In addition, all components from the proposal provided greater visibility of the organization and processes for the reservoir engineers.

Building Safer Systems With SpecTRM

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2003-01-01

System safety, an integral component in software development, often poses a challenge to engineers designing computer-based systems. While the relaxed constraints on software design allow for increased power and flexibility, this flexibility introduces more possibilities for error. As a result, system engineers must identify the design constraints necessary to maintain safety and ensure that the system and software design enforces them. Safeware Engineering Corporation, of Seattle, Washington, provides the information, tools, and techniques to accomplish this task with its Specification Tools and Requirements Methodology (SpecTRM). NASA assisted in developing this engineering toolset by awarding the company several Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contracts with Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center. The technology benefits NASA through its applications for Space Station rendezvous and docking. SpecTRM aids system and software engineers in developing specifications for large, complex safety critical systems. The product enables engineers to find errors early in development so that they can be fixed with the lowest cost and impact on the system design. SpecTRM traces both the requirements and design rationale (including safety constraints) throughout the system design and documentation, allowing engineers to build required system properties into the design from the beginning, rather than emphasizing assessment at the end of the development process when changes are limited and costly.System safety, an integral component in software development, often poses a challenge to engineers designing computer-based systems. While the relaxed constraints on software design allow for increased power and flexibility, this flexibility introduces more possibilities for error. As a result, system engineers must identify the design constraints necessary to maintain safety and ensure that the system and software design enforces them. Safeware Engineering Corporation, of Seattle, Washington, provides the information, tools, and techniques to accomplish this task with its Specification Tools and Requirements Methodology (SpecTRM). NASA assisted in developing this engineering toolset by awarding the company several Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contracts with Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center. The technology benefits NASA through its applications for Space Station rendezvous and docking. SpecTRM aids system and software engineers in developing specifications for large, complex safety critical systems. The product enables engineers to find errors early in development so that they can be fixed with the lowest cost and impact on the system design. SpecTRM traces both the requirements and design rationale (including safety constraints) throughout the system design and documentation, allowing engineers to build required system properties into the design from the beginning, rather than emphasizing assessment at the end of the development process when changes are limited and costly.

Educational Software--New Guidelines for Development.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gold, Patricia Cohen

1984-01-01

Discusses standards developed by the Educational Computer Service of the National Education Association that incorporate technical, educational, and documentation components to guide authors in the development of quality educational software. (Author/MBR)

Development of RT-components for the M-3 Strawberry Harvesting Robot

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yamashita, Tomoki; Tanaka, Motomasa; Yamamoto, Satoshi; Hayashi, Shigehiko; Saito, Sadafumi; Sugano, Shigeki

We are now developing the strawberry harvest robot called “M-3” prototype robot system under the 4th urgent project of MAFF. In order to develop the control software of the M-3 robot more efficiently, we innovated the RT-middleware “OpenRTM-aist” software platform. In this system, we developed 9 kind of RT-Components (RTC): Robot task sequence player RTC, Proxy RTC for image processing software, DC motor controller RTC, Arm kinematics RTC, and so on. In this paper, we discuss advantages of RT-middleware developing system and problems about operating the RTC-configured robotic system by end-users.

Measuring software development characteristics in the local environment. [considering project requirements for spacecraft control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Basili, V. R.; Zelkowitz, M. V.

1978-01-01

In a brief evaluation of software-related considerations, it is found that suitable approaches for software development depend to a large degree on the characteristics of the particular project involved. An analysis is conducted of development problems in an environment in which ground support software is produced for spacecraft control. The amount of work involved is in the range from 6 to 10 man-years. Attention is given to a general project summary, a programmer/analyst survey, a component summary, a component status report, a resource summary, a change report, a computer program run analysis, aspects of data collection on a smaller scale, progress forecasting, problems of overhead, and error analysis.

Advanced software integration: The case for ITV facilities

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Garman, John R.

1990-01-01

The array of technologies and methodologies involved in the development and integration of avionics software has moved almost as rapidly as computer technology itself. Future avionics systems involve major advances and risks in the following areas: (1) Complexity; (2) Connectivity; (3) Security; (4) Duration; and (5) Software engineering. From an architectural standpoint, the systems will be much more distributed, involve session-based user interfaces, and have the layered architectures typified in the layers of abstraction concepts popular in networking. Typified in the NASA Space Station Freedom will be the highly distributed nature of software development itself. Systems composed of independent components developed in parallel must be bound by rigid standards and interfaces, the clean requirements and specifications. Avionics software provides a challenge in that it can not be flight tested until the first time it literally flies. It is the binding of requirements for such an integration environment into the advances and risks of future avionics systems that form the basis of the presented concept and the basic Integration, Test, and Verification concept within the development and integration life cycle of Space Station Mission and Avionics systems.

Realtime, Object-oriented Reduction of Parkes Multibeam Data using AIPS++

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barnes, D. G.

An overview of the Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF) Parkes Multibeam Software is presented. The new thirteen-beam Parkes {21 cm} Multibeam Receiver is being used for the neutral hydrogen (Hi) Parkes All Sky Survey (HIPASS). This survey will search the entire southern sky for Hi in the redshift range {$-1200$ km s$^{-1}$} to {$+12600$ km s$^{-1}$}; with a limiting column density of {$N_Hi \\simeq 5 \\times 1017$ cm$^{-2}$}. Observations for the survey began in late February, 1997, and will continue through to the year 2000. A complete reduction package for the HIPASS survey has been developed, based on the AIPS++ library. The major software component is realtime, and uses advanced inter-process communication coupled to a graphical user interface, provided by AIPS++, to apply bandpass removal, flux calibration, velocity frame conversion and spectral smoothing to 26 spectra of 1024 channels each, every five seconds. AIPS++ connections have been added to ATNF-developed visualization software to provide on-line visual monitoring of the data quality. The non-realtime component of the software is responsible for gridding the spectra into position-velocity cubes; typically 200000 spectra are gridded into an $8^\\circ \\times 8^\\circ$ cube.

WIFIP: a web-based user interface for automated synchrotron beamlines.

PubMed

Sallaz-Damaz, Yoann; Ferrer, Jean Luc

2017-09-01

The beamline control software, through the associated graphical user interface (GUI), is the user access point to the experiment, interacting with synchrotron beamline components and providing automated routines. FIP, the French beamline for the Investigation of Proteins, is a highly automatized macromolecular crystallography (MX) beamline at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility. On such a beamline, a significant number of users choose to control their experiment remotely. This is often performed with a limited bandwidth and from a large choice of computers and operating systems. Furthermore, this has to be possible in a rapidly evolving experimental environment, where new developments have to be easily integrated. To face these challenges, a light, platform-independent, control software and associated GUI are required. Here, WIFIP, a web-based user interface developed at FIP, is described. Further than being the present FIP control interface, WIFIP is also a proof of concept for future MX control software.

Model-Based Engineering for Supply Chain Risk Management

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-09-30

Privacy, 2009 [19] Julien Delange Wheel Brake System Example using AADL; Feiler, Peter; Hansson, Jörgen; de Niz, Dionisio; & Wrage, Lutz. System ...University Software Engineering Institute Abstract—Expanded use of commercial components has increased the complexity of system assurance...verification. Model- based engineering (MBE) offers a means to design, develop, analyze, and maintain a complex system architecture. Architecture Analysis

Mobile Agents Applications.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Martins, Rosane Maria; Chaves, Magali Ribeiro; Pirmez, Luci; Rust da Costa Carmo, Luiz Fernando

2001-01-01

Discussion of the need to filter and retrieval relevant information from the Internet focuses on the use of mobile agents, specific software components which are based on distributed artificial intelligence and integrated systems. Surveys agent technology and discusses the agent building package used to develop two applications using IBM's Aglet…

DA+ data acquisition and analysis software at the Swiss Light Source macromolecular crystallography beamlines.

PubMed

Wojdyla, Justyna Aleksandra; Kaminski, Jakub W; Panepucci, Ezequiel; Ebner, Simon; Wang, Xiaoqiang; Gabadinho, Jose; Wang, Meitian

2018-01-01

Data acquisition software is an essential component of modern macromolecular crystallography (MX) beamlines, enabling efficient use of beam time at synchrotron facilities. Developed at the Paul Scherrer Institute, the DA+ data acquisition software is implemented at all three Swiss Light Source (SLS) MX beamlines. DA+ consists of distributed services and components written in Python and Java, which communicate via messaging and streaming technologies. The major components of DA+ are the user interface, acquisition engine, online processing and database. Immediate data quality feedback is achieved with distributed automatic data analysis routines. The software architecture enables exploration of the full potential of the latest instrumentation at the SLS MX beamlines, such as the SmarGon goniometer and the EIGER X 16M detector, and development of new data collection methods.

Framework Programmable Platform for the advanced software development workstation: Framework processor design document

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mayer, Richard J.; Blinn, Thomas M.; Mayer, Paula S. D.; Ackley, Keith A.; Crump, Wes; Sanders, Les

1991-01-01

The design of the Framework Processor (FP) component of the Framework Programmable Software Development Platform (FFP) is described. The FFP is a project aimed at combining effective tool and data integration mechanisms with a model of the software development process in an intelligent integrated software development environment. Guided by the model, this Framework Processor will take advantage of an integrated operating environment to provide automated support for the management and control of the software development process so that costly mistakes during the development phase can be eliminated.

Business logic for geoprocessing of distributed geodata

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kiehle, Christian

2006-12-01

This paper describes the development of a business-logic component for the geoprocessing of distributed geodata. The business logic acts as a mediator between the data and the user, therefore playing a central role in any spatial information system. The component is used in service-oriented architectures to foster the reuse of existing geodata inventories. Based on a geoscientific case study of groundwater vulnerability assessment and mapping, the demands for such architectures are identified with special regard to software engineering tasks. Methods are derived from the field of applied Geosciences (Hydrogeology), Geoinformatics, and Software Engineering. In addition to the development of a business logic component, a forthcoming Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) specification is introduced: the OGC Web Processing Service (WPS) specification. A sample application is introduced to demonstrate the potential of WPS for future information systems. The sample application Geoservice Groundwater Vulnerability is described in detail to provide insight into the business logic component, and demonstrate how information can be generated out of distributed geodata. This has the potential to significantly accelerate the assessment and mapping of groundwater vulnerability. The presented concept is easily transferable to other geoscientific use cases dealing with distributed data inventories. Potential application fields include web-based geoinformation systems operating on distributed data (e.g. environmental planning systems, cadastral information systems, and others).

Support for life-cycle product reuse in NASA's SSE

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shotton, Charles

1989-01-01

The Software Support Environment (SSE) is a software factory for the production of Space Station Freedom Program operational software. The SSE is to be centrally developed and maintained and used to configure software production facilities in the field. The PRC product TTCQF provides for an automated qualification process and analysis of existing code that can be used for software reuse. The interrogation subsystem permits user queries of the reusable data and components which have been identified by an analyzer and qualified with associated metrics. The concept includes reuse of non-code life-cycle components such as requirements and designs. Possible types of reusable life-cycle components include templates, generics, and as-is items. Qualification of reusable elements requires analysis (separation of candidate components into primitives), qualification (evaluation of primitives for reusability according to reusability criteria) and loading (placing qualified elements into appropriate libraries). There can be different qualifications for different installations, methodologies, applications and components. Identifying reusable software and related components is labor-intensive and is best carried out as an integrated function of an SSE.

Computer software.

PubMed

Rosenthal, L E

1986-10-01

Software is the component in a computer system that permits the hardware to perform the various functions that a computer system is capable of doing. The history of software and its development can be traced to the early nineteenth century. All computer systems are designed to utilize the "stored program concept" as first developed by Charles Babbage in the 1850s. The concept was lost until the mid-1940s, when modern computers made their appearance. Today, because of the complex and myriad tasks that a computer system can perform, there has been a differentiation of types of software. There is software designed to perform specific business applications. There is software that controls the overall operation of a computer system. And there is software that is designed to carry out specialized tasks. Regardless of types, software is the most critical component of any computer system. Without it, all one has is a collection of circuits, transistors, and silicone chips.

Method for distributed object communications based on dynamically acquired and assembled software components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sundermier, Amy (Inventor)

2002-01-01

A method for acquiring and assembling software components at execution time into a client program, where the components may be acquired from remote networked servers is disclosed. The acquired components are assembled according to knowledge represented within one or more acquired mediating components. A mediating component implements knowledge of an object model. A mediating component uses its implemented object model knowledge, acquired component class information and polymorphism to assemble components into an interacting program at execution time. The interactions or abstract relationships between components in the object model may be implemented by the mediating component as direct invocations or indirect events or software bus exchanges. The acquired components may establish communications with remote servers. The acquired components may also present a user interface representing data to be exchanged with the remote servers. The mediating components may be assembled into layers, allowing arbitrarily complex programs to be constructed at execution time.

Medical device software: defining key terms.

PubMed

Pashkov, Vitalii; Gutorova, Nataliya; Harkusha, Andrii

one of the areas of significant growth in medical devices has been the role of software - as an integral component of a medical device, as a standalone device and more recently as applications on mobile devices. The risk related to a malfunction of the standalone software used within healthcare is in itself not a criterion for its qualification or not as a medical device. It is therefore, necessary to clarify some criteria for the qualification of stand-alone software as medical devices Materials and methods: Ukrainian, European Union, United States of America legislation, Guidelines developed by European Commission and Food and Drug Administration's, recommendations represented by international voluntary group and scientific works. This article is based on dialectical, comparative, analytic, synthetic and comprehensive research methods. the legal regulation of software which is used for medical purpose in Ukraine limited to one definition. In European Union and United States of America were developed and applying special guidelines that help developers, manufactures and end users to difference software on types standing on medical purpose criteria. Software becomes more and more incorporated into medical devices. Developers and manufacturers may not have initially appreciated potential risks to patients and users such situation could have dangerous results for patients or users. It is necessary to develop and adopt the legislation that will intend to define the criteria for the qualification of medical device software and the application of the classification criteria to such software, provide some illustrative examples and step by step recommendations to qualify software as medical device.

A Multi-mission Event-Driven Component-Based System for Support of Flight Software Development, ATLO, and Operations first used by the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Project

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dehghani, Navid; Tankenson, Michael

2006-01-01

This paper details an architectural description of the Mission Data Processing and Control System (MPCS), an event-driven, multi-mission ground data processing components providing uplink, downlink, and data management capabilities which will support the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) project as its first target mission. MPCS is developed based on a set of small reusable components, implemented in Java, each designed with a specific function and well-defined interfaces. An industry standard messaging bus is used to transfer information among system components. Components generate standard messages which are used to capture system information, as well as triggers to support the event-driven architecture of the system. Event-driven systems are highly desirable for processing high-rate telemetry (science and engineering) data, and for supporting automation for many mission operations processes.

Software Fault Tolerance: A Tutorial

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Torres-Pomales, Wilfredo

2000-01-01

Because of our present inability to produce error-free software, software fault tolerance is and will continue to be an important consideration in software systems. The root cause of software design errors is the complexity of the systems. Compounding the problems in building correct software is the difficulty in assessing the correctness of software for highly complex systems. After a brief overview of the software development processes, we note how hard-to-detect design faults are likely to be introduced during development and how software faults tend to be state-dependent and activated by particular input sequences. Although component reliability is an important quality measure for system level analysis, software reliability is hard to characterize and the use of post-verification reliability estimates remains a controversial issue. For some applications software safety is more important than reliability, and fault tolerance techniques used in those applications are aimed at preventing catastrophes. Single version software fault tolerance techniques discussed include system structuring and closure, atomic actions, inline fault detection, exception handling, and others. Multiversion techniques are based on the assumption that software built differently should fail differently and thus, if one of the redundant versions fails, it is expected that at least one of the other versions will provide an acceptable output. Recovery blocks, N-version programming, and other multiversion techniques are reviewed.

Classification of voting algorithms for N-version software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tsarev, R. Yu; Durmuş, M. S.; Üstoglu, I.; Morozov, V. A.

2018-05-01

A voting algorithm in N-version software is a crucial component that evaluates the execution of each of the N versions and determines the correct result. Obviously, the result of the voting algorithm determines the outcome of the N-version software in general. Thus, the choice of the voting algorithm is a vital issue. A lot of voting algorithms were already developed and they may be selected for implementation based on the specifics of the analysis of input data. However, the voting algorithms applied in N-version software are not classified. This article presents an overview of classic and recent voting algorithms used in N-version software and the authors' classification of the voting algorithms. Moreover, the steps of the voting algorithms are presented and the distinctive features of the voting algorithms in Nversion software are defined.

Impeller leakage flow modeling for mechanical vibration control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Palazzolo, Alan B.

1996-01-01

HPOTP and HPFTP vibration test results have exhibited transient and steady characteristics which may be due to impeller leakage path (ILP) related forces. For example, an axial shift in the rotor could suddenly change the ILP clearances and lengths yielding dynamic coefficient and subsequent vibration changes. ILP models are more complicated than conventional-single component-annular seal models due to their radial flow component (coriolis and centrifugal acceleration), complex geometry (axial/radial clearance coupling), internal boundary (transition) flow conditions between mechanical components along the ILP and longer length, requiring moment as well as force coefficients. Flow coupling between mechanical components results from mass and energy conservation applied at their interfaces. Typical components along the ILP include an inlet seal, curved shroud, and an exit seal, which may be a stepped labyrinth type. Von Pragenau (MSFC) has modeled labyrinth seals as a series of plain annular seals for leakage and dynamic coefficient prediction. These multi-tooth components increase the total number of 'flow coupled' components in the ILP. Childs developed an analysis for an ILP consisting of a single, constant clearance shroud with an exit seal represented by a lumped flow-loss coefficient. This same geometry was later extended to include compressible flow. The objective of the current work is to: supply ILP leakage-force impedance-dynamic coefficient modeling software to MSFC engineers, base on incompressible/compressible bulk flow theory; design the software to model a generic geometry ILP described by a series of components lying along an arbitrarily directed path; validate the software by comparison to available test data, CFD and bulk models; and develop a hybrid CFD-bulk flow model of an ILP to improve modeling accuracy within practical run time constraints.

Object-oriented approach for gas turbine engine simulation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Curlett, Brian P.; Felder, James L.

1995-01-01

An object-oriented gas turbine engine simulation program was developed. This program is a prototype for a more complete, commercial grade engine performance program now being proposed as part of the Numerical Propulsion System Simulator (NPSS). This report discusses architectural issues of this complex software system and the lessons learned from developing the prototype code. The prototype code is a fully functional, general purpose engine simulation program, however, only the component models necessary to model a transient compressor test rig have been written. The production system will be capable of steady state and transient modeling of almost any turbine engine configuration. Chief among the architectural considerations for this code was the framework in which the various software modules will interact. These modules include the equation solver, simulation code, data model, event handler, and user interface. Also documented in this report is the component based design of the simulation module and the inter-component communication paradigm. Object class hierarchies for some of the code modules are given.

Using C to build a satellite scheduling expert system: Examples from the Explorer Platform planning system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mclean, David R.; Tuchman, Alan; Potter, William J.

1991-01-01

A C-based artificial intelligence (AI) development effort which is based on a software tools approach is discussed with emphasis on reusability and maintainability of code. The discussion starts with simple examples of how list processing can easily be implemented in C and then proceeds to the implementations of frames and objects which use dynamic memory allocation. The implementation of procedures which use depth first search, constraint propagation, context switching, and blackboard-like simulation environment are described. Techniques for managing the complexity of C-based AI software are noted, especially the object-oriented techniques of data encapsulation and incremental development. Finally, all these concepts are put together by describing the components of planning software called the Planning And Resource Reasoning (PARR) Shell. This shell was successfully utilized for scheduling services of the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System for the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite since May of 1987 and will be used for operations scheduling of the Explorer Platform in Nov. of 1991.

What Not To Do: Anti-patterns for Developing Scientific Workflow Software Components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Futrelle, J.; Maffei, A. R.; Sosik, H. M.; Gallager, S. M.; York, A.

2013-12-01

Scientific workflows promise to enable efficient scaling-up of researcher code to handle large datasets and workloads, as well as documentation of scientific processing via standardized provenance records, etc. Workflow systems and related frameworks for coordinating the execution of otherwise separate components are limited, however, in their ability to overcome software engineering design problems commonly encountered in pre-existing components, such as scripts developed externally by scientists in their laboratories. In practice, this often means that components must be rewritten or replaced in a time-consuming, expensive process. In the course of an extensive workflow development project involving large-scale oceanographic image processing, we have begun to identify and codify 'anti-patterns'--problematic design characteristics of software--that make components fit poorly into complex automated workflows. We have gone on to develop and document low-effort solutions and best practices that efficiently address the anti-patterns we have identified. The issues, solutions, and best practices can be used to evaluate and improve existing code, as well as guiding the development of new components. For example, we have identified a common anti-pattern we call 'batch-itis' in which a script fails and then cannot perform more work, even if that work is not precluded by the failure. The solution we have identified--removing unnecessary looping over independent units of work--is often easier to code than the anti-pattern, as it eliminates the need for complex control flow logic in the component. Other anti-patterns we have identified are similarly easy to identify and often easy to fix. We have drawn upon experience working with three science teams at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, each of which has designed novel imaging instruments and associated image analysis code. By developing use cases and prototypes within these teams, we have undertaken formal evaluations of software components developed by programmers with widely varying levels of expertise, and have been able to discover and characterize a number of anti-patterns. Our evaluation methodology and testbed have also enabled us to assess the efficacy of strategies to address these anti-patterns according to scientifically relevant metrics, such as ability of algorithms to perform faster than the rate of data acquisition and the accuracy of workflow component output relative to ground truth. The set of anti-patterns and solutions we have identified augments of the body of more well-known software engineering anti-patterns by addressing additional concerns that obtain when a software component has to function as part of a workflow assembled out of independently-developed codebases. Our experience shows that identifying and resolving these anti-patterns reduces development time and improves performance without reducing component reusability.

CEMENTITIOUS BARRIERS PARTNERSHIP FY13 MID-YEAR REPORT

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Burns, H.; Flach, G.; Langton, C.

2013-05-01

In FY2013, the Cementitious Barriers Partnership (CBP) is continuing in its effort to develop and enhance software tools demonstrating tangible progress toward fulfilling the objective of developing a set of tools to improve understanding and prediction of the long-term structural, hydraulic and chemical performance of cementitious barriers used in nuclear applications. In FY2012, the CBP released the initial inhouse “Beta-version” of the CBP Software Toolbox, a suite of software for simulating reactive transport in cementitious materials and important degradation phenomena. The current primary software components are LeachXS/ORCHESTRA, STADIUM, and a GoldSim interface for probabilistic analysis of selected degradation scenarios. THAMESmore » is a planned future CBP Toolbox component (FY13/14) focused on simulation of the microstructure of cementitious materials and calculation of resultant hydraulic and constituent mass transfer parameters needed in modeling. This past November, the CBP Software Toolbox Version 1.0 was released that supports analysis of external sulfate attack (including damage mechanics), carbonation, and primary constituent leaching. The LeachXS component embodies an extensive material property measurements database along with chemical speciation and reactive mass transport simulation cases with emphasis on leaching of major, trace and radionuclide constituents from cementitious materials used in DOE facilities, such as Saltstone (Savannah River) and Cast Stone (Hanford), tank closure grouts, and barrier concretes. STADIUM focuses on the physical and structural service life of materials and components based on chemical speciation and reactive mass transport of major cement constituents and aggressive species (e.g., chloride, sulfate, etc.). The CBP issued numerous reports and other documentation that accompanied the “Version 1.0” release including a CBP Software Toolbox User Guide and Installation Guide. These documents, as well as, the presentations from the CBP Software Toolbox Demonstration and User Workshop, which are briefly described below, can be accessed from the CBP webpage at http://cementbarriers.org/. The website was recently modified to describe the CBP Software Toolbox and includes an interest form for application to use the software. The CBP FY13 program is continuing research to improve and enhance the simulation tools as well as develop new tools that model other key degradation phenomena not addressed in Version 1.0. Also efforts to continue to verify the various simulation tools thru laboratory experiments and analysis of field specimens are ongoing to quantify and reduce the uncertainty associated with performance assessments are ongoing. This mid-year report also includes both a summary on the FY13 software accomplishments in addition to the release of Version 1.0 of the CBP Software Toolbox and the various experimental programs that are providing data for calibration and validation of the CBP developed software. The focus this year for experimental studies was to measure transport in cementitious material by utilization of a leaching method and reduction capacity of saltstone field samples. Results are being used to calibrate and validate the updated carbonation model.« less

An Architecture to Enable Autonomous Control of Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

May, Ryan D.; Dever, Timothy P.; Soeder, James F.; George, Patrick J.; Morris, Paul H.; Colombano, Silvano P.; Frank, Jeremy D.; Schwabacher, Mark A.; Wang, Liu; LawLer, Dennis

2014-01-01

Autonomy is required for manned spacecraft missions distant enough that light-time communication delays make ground-based mission control infeasible. Presently, ground controllers develop a complete schedule of power modes for all spacecraft components based on a large number of factors. The proposed architecture is an early attempt to formalize and automate this process using on-vehicle computation resources. In order to demonstrate this architecture, an autonomous electrical power system controller and vehicle Mission Manager are constructed. These two components are designed to work together in order to plan upcoming load use as well as respond to unanticipated deviations from the plan. The communication protocol was developed using "paper" simulations prior to formally encoding the messages and developing software to implement the required functionality. These software routines exchange data via TCP/IP sockets with the Mission Manager operating at NASA Ames Research Center and the autonomous power controller running at NASA Glenn Research Center. The interconnected systems are tested and shown to be effective at planning the operation of a simulated quasi-steady state spacecraft power system and responding to unexpected disturbances.

Model-based reasoning for power system management using KATE and the SSM/PMAD

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Morris, Robert A.; Gonzalez, Avelino J.; Carreira, Daniel J.; Mckenzie, F. D.; Gann, Brian

1993-01-01

The overall goal of this research effort has been the development of a software system which automates tasks related to monitoring and controlling electrical power distribution in spacecraft electrical power systems. The resulting software system is called the Intelligent Power Controller (IPC). The specific tasks performed by the IPC include continuous monitoring of the flow of power from a source to a set of loads, fast detection of anomalous behavior indicating a fault to one of the components of the distribution systems, generation of diagnosis (explanation) of anomalous behavior, isolation of faulty object from remainder of system, and maintenance of flow of power to critical loads and systems (e.g. life-support) despite fault conditions being present (recovery). The IPC system has evolved out of KATE (Knowledge-based Autonomous Test Engineer), developed at NASA-KSC. KATE consists of a set of software tools for developing and applying structure and behavior models to monitoring, diagnostic, and control applications.

A federated design for a neurobiological simulation engine: the CBI federated software architecture.

PubMed

Cornelis, Hugo; Coop, Allan D; Bower, James M

2012-01-01

Simulator interoperability and extensibility has become a growing requirement in computational biology. To address this, we have developed a federated software architecture. It is federated by its union of independent disparate systems under a single cohesive view, provides interoperability through its capability to communicate, execute programs, or transfer data among different independent applications, and supports extensibility by enabling simulator expansion or enhancement without the need for major changes to system infrastructure. Historically, simulator interoperability has relied on development of declarative markup languages such as the neuron modeling language NeuroML, while simulator extension typically occurred through modification of existing functionality. The software architecture we describe here allows for both these approaches. However, it is designed to support alternative paradigms of interoperability and extensibility through the provision of logical relationships and defined application programming interfaces. They allow any appropriately configured component or software application to be incorporated into a simulator. The architecture defines independent functional modules that run stand-alone. They are arranged in logical layers that naturally correspond to the occurrence of high-level data (biological concepts) versus low-level data (numerical values) and distinguish data from control functions. The modular nature of the architecture and its independence from a given technology facilitates communication about similar concepts and functions for both users and developers. It provides several advantages for multiple independent contributions to software development. Importantly, these include: (1) Reduction in complexity of individual simulator components when compared to the complexity of a complete simulator, (2) Documentation of individual components in terms of their inputs and outputs, (3) Easy removal or replacement of unnecessary or obsoleted components, (4) Stand-alone testing of components, and (5) Clear delineation of the development scope of new components.

A Federated Design for a Neurobiological Simulation Engine: The CBI Federated Software Architecture

PubMed Central

Cornelis, Hugo; Coop, Allan D.; Bower, James M.

2012-01-01

Simulator interoperability and extensibility has become a growing requirement in computational biology. To address this, we have developed a federated software architecture. It is federated by its union of independent disparate systems under a single cohesive view, provides interoperability through its capability to communicate, execute programs, or transfer data among different independent applications, and supports extensibility by enabling simulator expansion or enhancement without the need for major changes to system infrastructure. Historically, simulator interoperability has relied on development of declarative markup languages such as the neuron modeling language NeuroML, while simulator extension typically occurred through modification of existing functionality. The software architecture we describe here allows for both these approaches. However, it is designed to support alternative paradigms of interoperability and extensibility through the provision of logical relationships and defined application programming interfaces. They allow any appropriately configured component or software application to be incorporated into a simulator. The architecture defines independent functional modules that run stand-alone. They are arranged in logical layers that naturally correspond to the occurrence of high-level data (biological concepts) versus low-level data (numerical values) and distinguish data from control functions. The modular nature of the architecture and its independence from a given technology facilitates communication about similar concepts and functions for both users and developers. It provides several advantages for multiple independent contributions to software development. Importantly, these include: (1) Reduction in complexity of individual simulator components when compared to the complexity of a complete simulator, (2) Documentation of individual components in terms of their inputs and outputs, (3) Easy removal or replacement of unnecessary or obsoleted components, (4) Stand-alone testing of components, and (5) Clear delineation of the development scope of new components. PMID:22242154

New technologies for supporting real-time on-board software development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kerridge, D.

1995-03-01

The next generation of on-board data management systems will be significantly more complex than current designs, and will be required to perform more complex and demanding tasks in software. Improved hardware technology, in the form of the MA31750 radiation hard processor, is one key component in addressing the needs of future embedded systems. However, to complement these hardware advances, improved support for the design and implementation of real-time data management software is now needed. This will help to control the cost and risk assoicated with developing data management software development as it becomes an increasingly significant element within embedded systems. One particular problem with developing embedded software is managing the non-functional requirements in a systematic way. This paper identifies how Logica has exploited recent developments in hard real-time theory to address this problem through the use of new hard real-time analysis and design methods which can be supported by specialized tools. The first stage in transferring this technology from the research domain to industrial application has already been completed. The MA37150 Hard Real-Time Embedded Software Support Environment (HESSE) is a loosely integrated set of hardware and software tools which directly support the process of hard real-time analysis for software targeting the MA31750 processor. With further development, this HESSE promises to provide embedded system developers with software tools which can reduce the risks associated with developing complex hard real-time software. Supported in this way by more sophisticated software methods and tools, it is foreseen that MA31750 based embedded systems can meet the processing needs for the next generation of on-board data management systems.

MEDIC: medical embedded device for individualized care.

PubMed

Wu, Winston H; Bui, Alex A T; Batalin, Maxim A; Au, Lawrence K; Binney, Jonathan D; Kaiser, William J

2008-02-01

Presented work highlights the development and initial validation of a medical embedded device for individualized care (MEDIC), which is based on a novel software architecture, enabling sensor management and disease prediction capabilities, and commercially available microelectronic components, sensors and conventional personal digital assistant (PDA) (or a cell phone). In this paper, we present a general architecture for a wearable sensor system that can be customized to an individual patient's needs. This architecture is based on embedded artificial intelligence that permits autonomous operation, sensor management and inference, and may be applied to a general purpose wearable medical diagnostics. A prototype of the system has been developed based on a standard PDA and wireless sensor nodes equipped with commercially available Bluetooth radio components, permitting real-time streaming of high-bandwidth data from various physiological and contextual sensors. We also present the results of abnormal gait diagnosis using the complete system from our evaluation, and illustrate how the wearable system and its operation can be remotely configured and managed by either enterprise systems or medical personnel at centralized locations. By using commercially available hardware components and software architecture presented in this paper, the MEDIC system can be rapidly configured, providing medical researchers with broadband sensor data from remote patients and platform access to best adapt operation for diagnostic operation objectives.

Using Modern Methodologies with Maintenance Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Streiffert, Barbara A.; Francis, Laurie K.; Smith, Benjamin D.

2014-01-01

Jet Propulsion Laboratory uses multi-mission software produced by the Mission Planning and Sequencing (MPS) team to process, simulate, translate, and package the commands that are sent to a spacecraft. MPS works under the auspices of the Multi-Mission Ground Systems and Services (MGSS). This software consists of nineteen applications that are in maintenance. The MPS software is classified as either class B (mission critical) or class C (mission important). The scheduling of tasks is difficult because mission needs must be addressed prior to performing any other tasks and those needs often spring up unexpectedly. Keeping track of the tasks that everyone is working on is also difficult because each person is working on a different software component. Recently the group adopted the Scrum methodology for planning and scheduling tasks. Scrum is one of the newer methodologies typically used in agile development. In the Scrum development environment, teams pick their tasks that are to be completed within a sprint based on priority. The team specifies the sprint length usually a month or less. Scrum is typically used for new development of one application. In the Scrum methodology there is a scrum master who is a facilitator who tries to make sure that everything moves smoothly, a product owner who represents the user(s) of the software and the team. MPS is not the traditional environment for the Scrum methodology. MPS has many software applications in maintenance, team members who are working on disparate applications, many users, and is interruptible based on mission needs, issues and requirements. In order to use scrum, the methodology needed adaptation to MPS. Scrum was chosen because it is adaptable. This paper is about the development of the process for using scrum, a new development methodology, with a team that works on disparate interruptible tasks on multiple software applications.

Guidelines for testing and release procedures

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Molari, R.; Conway, M.

1984-01-01

Guidelines and procedures are recommended for the testing and release of the types of computer software efforts commonly performed at NASA/Ames Research Center. All recommendations are based on the premise that testing and release activities must be specifically selected for the environment, size, and purpose of each individual software project. Guidelines are presented for building a Test Plan and using formal Test Plan and Test Care Inspections on it. Frequent references are made to NASA/Ames Guidelines for Software Inspections. Guidelines are presented for selecting an Overall Test Approach and for each of the four main phases of testing: (1) Unit Testing of Components, (2) Integration Testing of Components, (3) System Integration Testing, and (4) Acceptance Testing. Tools used for testing are listed, including those available from operating systems used at Ames, specialized tools which can be developed, unit test drivers, stub module generators, and the use of format test reporting schemes.

SandiaMRCR

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

2012-01-05

SandiaMCR was developed to identify pure components and their concentrations from spectral data. This software efficiently implements the multivariate calibration regression alternating least squares (MCR-ALS), principal component analysis (PCA), and singular value decomposition (SVD). Version 3.37 also includes the PARAFAC-ALS Tucker-1 (for trilinear analysis) algorithms. The alternating least squares methods can be used to determine the composition without or with incomplete prior information on the constituents and their concentrations. It allows the specification of numerous preprocessing, initialization and data selection and compression options for the efficient processing of large data sets. The software includes numerous options including the definition ofmore » equality and non-negativety constraints to realistically restrict the solution set, various normalization or weighting options based on the statistics of the data, several initialization choices and data compression. The software has been designed to provide a practicing spectroscopist the tools required to routinely analysis data in a reasonable time and without requiring expert intervention.« less

Application of Design Patterns in Refactoring Software Design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Baggs. Rjpda; Shaykhian, Gholam Ali

2007-01-01

Refactoring software design is a method of changing software design while explicitly preserving its unique design functionalities. Presented approach is to utilize design patterns as the basis for refactoring software design. Comparison of a design solution will be made through C++ programming language examples to exploit this approach. Developing reusable component will be discussed, the paper presents that the construction of such components can diminish the added burden of both refactoring and the use of design patterns.

Apply Design Patterns to Refactor Software Design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Baggs, Rhoda; Shaykhian, Gholam Ali

2007-01-01

Refactoring software design is a method of changing software design while explicitly preserving its unique design functionalities. Presented approach is to utilize design patterns as the basis for refactoring software design. Comparison of a design solution will be made through C++ programming language examples to exploit this approach. Developing reusable component will be discussed, the paper presents that the construction of such components can diminish the added burden of both refactoring and the use of design patterns.

Space Physics Data Facility Web Services

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Candey, Robert M.; Harris, Bernard T.; Chimiak, Reine A.

2005-01-01

The Space Physics Data Facility (SPDF) Web services provides a distributed programming interface to a portion of the SPDF software. (A general description of Web services is available at http://www.w3.org/ and in many current software-engineering texts and articles focused on distributed programming.) The SPDF Web services distributed programming interface enables additional collaboration and integration of the SPDF software system with other software systems, in furtherance of the SPDF mission to lead collaborative efforts in the collection and utilization of space physics data and mathematical models. This programming interface conforms to all applicable Web services specifications of the World Wide Web Consortium. The interface is specified by a Web Services Description Language (WSDL) file. The SPDF Web services software consists of the following components: 1) A server program for implementation of the Web services; and 2) A software developer s kit that consists of a WSDL file, a less formal description of the interface, a Java class library (which further eases development of Java-based client software), and Java source code for an example client program that illustrates the use of the interface.

Towards easing the configuration and new team member accommodation for open source software based portals

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fu, L.; West, P.; Zednik, S.; Fox, P. A.

2013-12-01

For simple portals such as vocabulary based services, which contain small amounts of data and require only hyper-textual representation, it is often an overkill to adopt the whole software stack of database, middleware and front end, or to use a general Web development framework as the starting point of development. Directly combining open source software is a much more favorable approach. However, our experience with the Coastal and Marine Spatial Planning Vocabulary (CMSPV) service portal shows that there are still issues such as system configuration and accommodating a new team member that need to be handled carefully. In this contribution, we share our experience in the context of the CMSPV portal, and focus on the tools and mechanisms we've developed to ease the configuration job and the incorporation process of new project members. We discuss the configuration issues that arise when we don't have complete control over how the software in use is configured and need to follow existing configuration styles that may not be well documented, especially when multiple pieces of such software need to work together as a combined system. As for the CMSPV portal, it is built on two pieces of open source software that are still under rapid development: a Fuseki data server and Epimorphics Linked Data API (ELDA) front end. Both lack mature documentation and tutorials. We developed comparison and labeling tools to ease the problem of system configuration. Another problem that slowed down the project is that project members came and went during the development process, so new members needed to start with a partially configured system and incomplete documentation left by old members. We developed documentation/tutorial maintenance mechanisms based on our comparison and labeling tools to make it easier for the new members to be incorporated into the project. These tools and mechanisms also provided benefit to other projects that reused the software components from the CMSPV system.

Cementitious Barriers Partnership (CBP): Training and Release of CBP Toolbox Software, Version 1.0 - 13480

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brown, K.G.; Kosson, D.S.; Garrabrants, A.C.

2013-07-01

The Cementitious Barriers Partnership (CBP) Project is a multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional collaboration supported by the Office of Tank Waste Management within the Office of Environmental Management of U.S. Department of Energy (US DOE). The CBP program has developed a set of integrated tools (based on state-of-the-art models and leaching test methods) that improve understanding and predictions of the long-term hydraulic and chemical performance of cementitious barriers used in nuclear applications. Tools selected for and developed under this program are intended to evaluate and predict the behavior of cementitious barriers used in near-surface engineered waste disposal systems for periods of performance upmore » to or longer than 100 years for operating facilities and longer than 1,000 years for waste management purposes. CBP software tools were made available to selected DOE Office of Environmental Management and field site users for training and evaluation based on a set of important degradation scenarios, including sulfate ingress/attack and carbonation of cementitious materials. The tools were presented at two-day training workshops held at U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Savannah River, and Hanford included LeachXS{sup TM}/ORCHESTRA, STADIUM{sup R}, and a CBP-developed GoldSim Dashboard interface. Collectively, these components form the CBP Software Toolbox. The new U.S. Environmental Protection Agency leaching test methods based on the Leaching Environmental Assessment Framework (LEAF) were also presented. The CBP Dashboard uses a custom Dynamic-link library developed by CBP to couple to the LeachXS{sup TM}/ORCHESTRA and STADIUM{sup R} codes to simulate reactive transport and degradation in cementitious materials for selected performance assessment scenarios. The first day of the workshop introduced participants to the software components via presentation materials, and the second day included hands-on tutorial exercises followed by discussions of enhancements desired by participants. Tools were revised based on feedback obtained during the workshops held from April through June 2012. The resulting improved CBP Software Toolbox, including evaluation versions of and LeachXS{sup TM}/ORCHESTRA and STADIUM{sup R} has been made available to workshop and selected other participants for further assessment. Inquiries about future workshops and requests for access to the Toolbox software can be made via the CBP web site [1]. (authors)« less

Test Driven Development of a Parameterized Ice Sheet Component

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Clune, T.

2011-12-01

Test driven development (TDD) is a software development methodology that offers many advantages over traditional approaches including reduced development and maintenance costs, improved reliability, and superior design quality. Although TDD is widely accepted in many software communities, the suitability to scientific software is largely undemonstrated and warrants a degree of skepticism. Indeed, numerical algorithms pose several challenges to unit testing in general, and TDD in particular. Among these challenges are the need to have simple, non-redundant closed-form expressions to compare against the results obtained from the implementation as well as realistic error estimates. The necessity for serial and parallel performance raises additional concerns for many scientific applicaitons. In previous work I demonstrated that TDD performed well for the development of a relatively simple numerical model that simulates the growth of snowflakes, but the results were anecdotal and of limited relevance to far more complex software components typical of climate models. This investigation has now been extended by successfully applying TDD to the implementation of a substantial portion of a new parameterized ice sheet component within a full climate model. After a brief introduction to TDD, I will present techniques that address some of the obstacles encountered with numerical algorithms. I will conclude with some quantitative and qualitative comparisons against climate components developed in a more traditional manner.

Lifecycle Prognostics Architecture for Selected High-Cost Active Components

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

N. Lybeck; B. Pham; M. Tawfik

There are an extensive body of knowledge and some commercial products available for calculating prognostics, remaining useful life, and damage index parameters. The application of these technologies within the nuclear power community is still in its infancy. Online monitoring and condition-based maintenance is seeing increasing acceptance and deployment, and these activities provide the technological bases for expanding to add predictive/prognostics capabilities. In looking to deploy prognostics there are three key aspects of systems that are presented and discussed: (1) component/system/structure selection, (2) prognostic algorithms, and (3) prognostics architectures. Criteria are presented for component selection: feasibility, failure probability, consequences of failure,more » and benefits of the prognostics and health management (PHM) system. The basis and methods commonly used for prognostics algorithms are reviewed and summarized. Criteria for evaluating PHM architectures are presented: open, modular architecture; platform independence; graphical user interface for system development and/or results viewing; web enabled tools; scalability; and standards compatibility. Thirteen software products were identified and discussed in the context of being potentially useful for deployment in a PHM program applied to systems in a nuclear power plant (NPP). These products were evaluated by using information available from company websites, product brochures, fact sheets, scholarly publications, and direct communication with vendors. The thirteen products were classified into four groups of software: (1) research tools, (2) PHM system development tools, (3) deployable architectures, and (4) peripheral tools. Eight software tools fell into the deployable architectures category. Of those eight, only two employ all six modules of a full PHM system. Five systems did not offer prognostic estimates, and one system employed the full health monitoring suite but lacked operations and maintenance support. Each product is briefly described in Appendix A. Selection of the most appropriate software package for a particular application will depend on the chosen component, system, or structure. Ongoing research will determine the most appropriate choices for a successful demonstration of PHM systems in aging NPPs.« less

Framework for End-User Programming of Cross-Smart Space Applications

PubMed Central

Palviainen, Marko; Kuusijärvi, Jarkko; Ovaska, Eila

2012-01-01

Cross-smart space applications are specific types of software services that enable users to share information, monitor the physical and logical surroundings and control it in a way that is meaningful for the user's situation. For developing cross-smart space applications, this paper makes two main contributions: it introduces (i) a component design and scripting method for end-user programming of cross-smart space applications and (ii) a backend framework of components that interwork to support the brunt of the RDFScript translation, and the use and execution of ontology models. Before end-user programming activities, the software professionals must develop easy-to-apply Driver components for the APIs of existing software systems. Thereafter, end-users are able to create applications from the commands of the Driver components with the help of the provided toolset. The paper also introduces the reference implementation of the framework, tools for the Driver component development and end-user programming of cross-smart space applications and the first evaluation results on their application. PMID:23202169

Multiphysics Application Coupling Toolkit

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Campbell, Michael T.

2013-12-02

This particular consortium implementation of the software integration infrastructure will, in large part, refactor portions of the Rocstar multiphysics infrastructure. Development of this infrastructure originated at the University of Illinois DOE ASCI Center for Simulation of Advanced Rockets (CSAR) to support the center's massively parallel multiphysics simulation application, Rocstar, and has continued at IllinoisRocstar, a small company formed near the end of the University-based program. IllinoisRocstar is now licensing these new developments as free, open source, in hopes to help improve their own and others' access to infrastructure which can be readily utilized in developing coupled or composite software systems;more » with particular attention to more rapid production and utilization of multiphysics applications in the HPC environment. There are two major pieces to the consortium implementation, the Application Component Toolkit (ACT), and the Multiphysics Application Coupling Toolkit (MPACT). The current development focus is the ACT, which is (will be) the substrate for MPACT. The ACT itself is built up from the components described in the technical approach. In particular, the ACT has the following major components: 1.The Component Object Manager (COM): The COM package provides encapsulation of user applications, and their data. COM also provides the inter-component function call mechanism. 2.The System Integration Manager (SIM): The SIM package provides constructs and mechanisms for orchestrating composite systems of multiply integrated pieces.« less

Computational Simulations and the Scientific Method

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kleb, Bil; Wood, Bill

2005-01-01

As scientific simulation software becomes more complicated, the scientific-software implementor's need for component tests from new model developers becomes more crucial. The community's ability to follow the basic premise of the Scientific Method requires independently repeatable experiments, and model innovators are in the best position to create these test fixtures. Scientific software developers also need to quickly judge the value of the new model, i.e., its cost-to-benefit ratio in terms of gains provided by the new model and implementation risks such as cost, time, and quality. This paper asks two questions. The first is whether other scientific software developers would find published component tests useful, and the second is whether model innovators think publishing test fixtures is a feasible approach.

Architecture of a framework for providing information services for public transport.

PubMed

García, Carmelo R; Pérez, Ricardo; Lorenzo, Alvaro; Quesada-Arencibia, Alexis; Alayón, Francisco; Padrón, Gabino

2012-01-01

This paper presents OnRoute, a framework for developing and running ubiquitous software that provides information services to passengers of public transportation, including payment systems and on-route guidance services. To achieve a high level of interoperability, accessibility and context awareness, OnRoute uses the ubiquitous computing paradigm. To guarantee the quality of the software produced, the reliable software principles used in critical contexts, such as automotive systems, are also considered by the framework. The main components of its architecture (run-time, system services, software components and development discipline) and how they are deployed in the transportation network (stations and vehicles) are described in this paper. Finally, to illustrate the use of OnRoute, the development of a guidance service for travellers is explained.

SimVascular: An Open Source Pipeline for Cardiovascular Simulation.

PubMed

Updegrove, Adam; Wilson, Nathan M; Merkow, Jameson; Lan, Hongzhi; Marsden, Alison L; Shadden, Shawn C

2017-03-01

Patient-specific cardiovascular simulation has become a paradigm in cardiovascular research and is emerging as a powerful tool in basic, translational and clinical research. In this paper we discuss the recent development of a fully open-source SimVascular software package, which provides a complete pipeline from medical image data segmentation to patient-specific blood flow simulation and analysis. This package serves as a research tool for cardiovascular modeling and simulation, and has contributed to numerous advances in personalized medicine, surgical planning and medical device design. The SimVascular software has recently been refactored and expanded to enhance functionality, usability, efficiency and accuracy of image-based patient-specific modeling tools. Moreover, SimVascular previously required several licensed components that hindered new user adoption and code management and our recent developments have replaced these commercial components to create a fully open source pipeline. These developments foster advances in cardiovascular modeling research, increased collaboration, standardization of methods, and a growing developer community.

DA+ data acquisition and analysis software at the Swiss Light Source macromolecular crystallography beamlines

PubMed Central

Wojdyla, Justyna Aleksandra; Kaminski, Jakub W.; Ebner, Simon; Wang, Xiaoqiang; Gabadinho, Jose; Wang, Meitian

2018-01-01

Data acquisition software is an essential component of modern macromolecular crystallography (MX) beamlines, enabling efficient use of beam time at synchrotron facilities. Developed at the Paul Scherrer Institute, the DA+ data acquisition software is implemented at all three Swiss Light Source (SLS) MX beamlines. DA+ consists of distributed services and components written in Python and Java, which communicate via messaging and streaming technologies. The major components of DA+ are the user interface, acquisition engine, online processing and database. Immediate data quality feedback is achieved with distributed automatic data analysis routines. The software architecture enables exploration of the full potential of the latest instrumentation at the SLS MX beamlines, such as the SmarGon goniometer and the EIGER X 16M detector, and development of new data collection methods. PMID:29271779

AdaNET Dynamic Software Inventory (DSI) prototype component acquisition plan

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hanley, Lionel

1989-01-01

A component acquisition plan contains the information needed to evaluate, select, and acquire software and hardware components necessary for successful completion of the AdaNET Dynamic Software Inventory (DSI) Management System Prototype. This plan will evolve and be applicable to all phases of the DSI prototype development. Resources, budgets, schedules, and organizations related to component acquisition activities are provided. A purpose and description of a software or hardware component which is to be acquired are presented. Since this is a plan for acquisition of all components, this section is not applicable. The procurement activities and events conducted by the acquirer are described and who is responsible is identified, where the activity will be performed, and when the activities will occur for each planned procurement. Acquisition requirements describe the specific requirements and standards to be followed during component acquisition. The activities which will take place during component acquisition are described. A list of abbreviations and acronyms, and a glossary are contained.

Predicting Software Suitability Using a Bayesian Belief Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Beaver, Justin M.; Schiavone, Guy A.; Berrios, Joseph S.

2005-01-01

The ability to reliably predict the end quality of software under development presents a significant advantage for a development team. It provides an opportunity to address high risk components earlier in the development life cycle, when their impact is minimized. This research proposes a model that captures the evolution of the quality of a software product, and provides reliable forecasts of the end quality of the software being developed in terms of product suitability. Development team skill, software process maturity, and software problem complexity are hypothesized as driving factors of software product quality. The cause-effect relationships between these factors and the elements of software suitability are modeled using Bayesian Belief Networks, a machine learning method. This research presents a Bayesian Network for software quality, and the techniques used to quantify the factors that influence and represent software quality. The developed model is found to be effective in predicting the end product quality of small-scale software development efforts.

High Resolution X-Ray Micro-CT of Ultra-Thin Wall Space Components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Roth, Don J.; Rauser, R. W.; Bowman, Randy R.; Bonacuse, Peter; Martin, Richard E.; Locci, I. E.; Kelley, M.

2012-01-01

A high resolution micro-CT system has been assembled and is being used to provide optimal characterization for ultra-thin wall space components. The Glenn Research Center NDE Sciences Team, using this CT system, has assumed the role of inspection vendor for the Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) project at NASA. This article will discuss many aspects of the development of the CT scanning for this type of component, including CT system overview; inspection requirements; process development, software utilized and developed to visualize, process, and analyze results; calibration sample development; results on actual samples; correlation with optical/SEM characterization; CT modeling; and development of automatic flaw recognition software. Keywords: Nondestructive Evaluation, NDE, Computed Tomography, Imaging, X-ray, Metallic Components, Thin Wall Inspection

The software for automatic creation of the formal grammars used by speech recognition, computer vision, editable text conversion systems, and some new functions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kardava, Irakli; Tadyszak, Krzysztof; Gulua, Nana; Jurga, Stefan

2017-02-01

For more flexibility of environmental perception by artificial intelligence it is needed to exist the supporting software modules, which will be able to automate the creation of specific language syntax and to make a further analysis for relevant decisions based on semantic functions. According of our proposed approach, of which implementation it is possible to create the couples of formal rules of given sentences (in case of natural languages) or statements (in case of special languages) by helping of computer vision, speech recognition or editable text conversion system for further automatic improvement. In other words, we have developed an approach, by which it can be achieved to significantly improve the training process automation of artificial intelligence, which as a result will give us a higher level of self-developing skills independently from us (from users). At the base of our approach we have developed a software demo version, which includes the algorithm and software code for the entire above mentioned component's implementation (computer vision, speech recognition and editable text conversion system). The program has the ability to work in a multi - stream mode and simultaneously create a syntax based on receiving information from several sources.

Are Integrated Portfolio Systems the Answer? An Evaluation of a Web-Based Portfolio System to Improve Preservice Teachers' Reflective Thinking Skills

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Oner, Diler; Adadan, Emine

2016-01-01

This study investigated the effectiveness of an integrated web-based portfolio system, namely the BOUNCE System, which primarily focuses on improving preservice teachers' reflective thinking skills. BOUNCE©, the software component of the system, was designed and developed to support a teaching practice model including a cycle of activities to be…

Image retrieval and processing system version 2.0 development work

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Slavney, Susan H.; Guinness, Edward A.

1991-01-01

The Image Retrieval and Processing System (IRPS) is a software package developed at Washington University and used by the NASA Regional Planetary Image Facilities (RPIF's). The IRPS combines data base management and image processing components to allow the user to examine catalogs of image data, locate the data of interest, and perform radiometric and geometric calibration of the data in preparation for analysis. Version 1.0 of IRPS was completed in Aug. 1989 and was installed at several IRPS's. Other RPIF's use remote logins via NASA Science Internet to access IRPS at Washington University. Work was begun on designing and population a catalog of Magellan image products that will be part of IRPS Version 2.0, planned for release by the end of calendar year 1991. With this catalog, a user will be able to search by orbit and by location for Magellan Basic Image Data Records (BIDR's), Mosaicked Image Data Records (MIDR's), and Altimetry-Radiometry Composite Data Records (ARCDR's). The catalog will include the Magellan CD-ROM volume, director, and file name for each data product. The image processing component of IRPS is based on the Planetary Image Cartography Software (PICS) developed by the U.S. Geological Survey, Flagstaff, Arizona. To augment PICS capabilities, a set of image processing programs were developed that are compatible with PICS-format images. This software includes general-purpose functions that PICS does not have, analysis and utility programs for specific data sets, and programs from other sources that were modified to work with PICS images. Some of the software will be integrated into the Version 2.0 release of IRPS. A table is presented that lists the programs with a brief functional description of each.

Developing the E-Scape Software System

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Derrick, Karim

2012-01-01

Most innovations have contextual pre-cursors that prompt new ways of thinking and in their turn help to give form to the new reality. This was the case with the e-scape software development process. The origins of the system existed in software components and ideas that we had developed through previous projects, but the ultimate direction we took…

Open architectures for formal reasoning and deductive technologies for software development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mccarthy, John; Manna, Zohar; Mason, Ian; Pnueli, Amir; Talcott, Carolyn; Waldinger, Richard

1994-01-01

The objective of this project is to develop an open architecture for formal reasoning systems. One goal is to provide a framework with a clear semantic basis for specification and instantiation of generic components; construction of complex systems by interconnecting components; and for making incremental improvements and tailoring to specific applications. Another goal is to develop methods for specifying component interfaces and interactions to facilitate use of existing and newly built systems as 'off the shelf' components, thus helping bridge the gap between producers and consumers of reasoning systems. In this report we summarize results in several areas: our data base of reasoning systems; a theory of binding structures; a theory of components of open systems; a framework for specifying components of open reasoning system; and an analysis of the integration of rewriting and linear arithmetic modules in Boyer-Moore using the above framework.

Model-based software for simulating ultrasonic pulse/echo inspections of metal components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chiou, Chien-Ping; Margetan, Frank J.; Taylor, Jared L.; McKillip, Matthew; Engle, Brady J.; Roberts, Ronald A.; Barnard, Daniel J.

2017-02-01

Under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation's Industry/University Cooperative Research Center at Iowa State University, an effort was initiated in 2015 to repackage existing research-grade software into user friendly tools for the rapid estimation of signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) for ultrasonic inspections of metals. The software combines: (1) a Python-based graphical user interface for specifying an inspection scenario and displaying results; and (2) a Fortran-based engine for computing defect signals and backscattered grain noise characteristics. The later makes use the Thompson-Gray Model for the response from an internal defect and the Independent Scatterer Model for backscattered grain noise. This paper provides an overview of the ongoing modeling effort with emphasis on recent developments. These include: treatment of angle-beam inspections, implementation of distance-amplitude corrections, changes in the generation of "invented" calibration signals, efforts to simulate ultrasonic C-scans; and experimental testing of model predictions. The simulation software can now treat both normal and oblique-incidence immersion inspections of curved metal components having equiaxed microstructures in which the grain size varies with depth. Both longitudinal and shear-wave inspections are treated. The model transducer can either be planar, spherically-focused, or bi-cylindrically-focused. A calibration (or reference) signal is required and is used to deduce the measurement system efficiency function. This can be "invented" by the software using center frequency and bandwidth information specified by the user, or, alternatively, a measured calibration signal can be used. Defect types include flat-bottomed-hole reference reflectors, and spherical pores and inclusions. Simulation outputs include estimated defect signal amplitudes, root-mean-squared grain noise amplitudes, and S/N as functions of the depth of the defect within the metal component. At any particular depth, the user can view a simulated A-scan displaying the superimposed defect and grain-noise waveforms. The realistic grain noise signals used in the A-scans are generated from a set of measured "universal" noise signals whose strengths and spectral characteristics are altered to match predicted noise characteristics for the simulation at hand. We present simulation examples demonstrating recent developments, and discuss plans to improve simulator capabilities.

An adaptive software defined radio design based on a standard space telecommunication radio system API

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xiong, Wenhao; Tian, Xin; Chen, Genshe; Pham, Khanh; Blasch, Erik

2017-05-01

Software defined radio (SDR) has become a popular tool for the implementation and testing for communications performance. The advantage of the SDR approach includes: a re-configurable design, adaptive response to changing conditions, efficient development, and highly versatile implementation. In order to understand the benefits of SDR, the space telecommunication radio system (STRS) was proposed by NASA Glenn research center (GRC) along with the standard application program interface (API) structure. Each component of the system uses a well-defined API to communicate with other components. The benefit of standard API is to relax the platform limitation of each component for addition options. For example, the waveform generating process can support a field programmable gate array (FPGA), personal computer (PC), or an embedded system. As long as the API defines the requirements, the generated waveform selection will work with the complete system. In this paper, we demonstrate the design and development of adaptive SDR following the STRS and standard API protocol. We introduce step by step the SDR testbed system including the controlling graphic user interface (GUI), database, GNU radio hardware control, and universal software radio peripheral (USRP) tranceiving front end. In addition, a performance evaluation in shown on the effectiveness of the SDR approach for space telecommunication.

Real time software for a heat recovery steam generator control system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Valdes, R.; Delgadillo, M.A.; Chavez, R.

1995-12-31

This paper is addressed to the development and successful implementation of a real time software for the Heat Recovery Steam Generator (HRSG) control system of a Combined Cycle Power Plant. The real time software for the HRSG control system physically resides in a Control and Acquisition System (SAC) which is a component of a distributed control system (DCS). The SAC is a programmable controller. The DCS installed at the Gomez Palacio power plant in Mexico accomplishes the functions of logic, analog and supervisory control. The DCS is based on microprocessors and the architecture consists of workstations operating as a Man-Machinemore » Interface (MMI), linked to SAC controllers by means of a communication system. The HRSG real time software is composed of an operating system, drivers, dedicated computer program and application computer programs. The operating system used for the development of this software was the MultiTasking Operating System (MTOS). The application software developed at IIE for the HRSG control system basically consisted of a set of digital algorithms for the regulation of the main process variables at the HRSG. By using the multitasking feature of MTOS, the algorithms are executed pseudo concurrently. In this way, the applications programs continuously use the resources of the operating system to perform their functions through a uniform service interface. The application software of the HRSG consist of three tasks, each of them has dedicated responsibilities. The drivers were developed for the handling of hardware resources of the SAC controller which in turn allows the signals acquisition and data communication with a MMI. The dedicated programs were developed for hardware diagnostics, task initializations, access to the data base and fault tolerance. The application software and the dedicated software for the HRSG control system was developed using C programming language due to compactness, portability and efficiency.« less

OpenROCS: a software tool to control robotic observatories

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Colomé, Josep; Sanz, Josep; Vilardell, Francesc; Ribas, Ignasi; Gil, Pere

2012-09-01

We present the Open Robotic Observatory Control System (OpenROCS), an open source software platform developed for the robotic control of telescopes. It acts as a software infrastructure that executes all the necessary processes to implement responses to the system events that appear in the routine and non-routine operations associated to data-flow and housekeeping control. The OpenROCS software design and implementation provides a high flexibility to be adapted to different observatory configurations and event-action specifications. It is based on an abstract model that is independent of the specific hardware or software and is highly configurable. Interfaces to the system components are defined in a simple manner to achieve this goal. We give a detailed description of the version 2.0 of this software, based on a modular architecture developed in PHP and XML configuration files, and using standard communication protocols to interface with applications for hardware monitoring and control, environment monitoring, scheduling of tasks, image processing and data quality control. We provide two examples of how it is used as the core element of the control system in two robotic observatories: the Joan Oró Telescope at the Montsec Astronomical Observatory (Catalonia, Spain) and the SuperWASP Qatar Telescope at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (Canary Islands, Spain).

Using Selection Pressure as an Asset to Develop Reusable, Adaptable Software Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Berrick, Stephen; Lynnes, Christopher

2007-01-01

The Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) at NASA has over the years developed and honed several reusable architectural components for supporting large-scale data centers with a large customer base. These include a processing system (S4PM) and an archive system (S4PA) based upon a workflow engine called the Simple Scalable Script based Science Processor (S4P) and an online data visualization and analysis system (Giovanni). These subsystems are currently reused internally in a variety of combinations to implement customized data management on behalf of instrument science teams and other science investigators. Some of these subsystems (S4P and S4PM) have also been reused by other data centers for operational science processing. Our experience has been that development and utilization of robust interoperable and reusable software systems can actually flourish in environments defined by heterogeneous commodity hardware systems the emphasis on value-added customer service and the continual goal for achieving higher cost efficiencies. The repeated internal reuse that is fostered by such an environment encourages and even forces changes to the software that make it more reusable and adaptable. Allowing and even encouraging such selective pressures to software development has been a key factor In the success of S4P and S4PM which are now available to the open source community under the NASA Open source Agreement

Web-based spatial analysis with the ILWIS open source GIS software and satellite images from GEONETCast

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lemmens, R.; Maathuis, B.; Mannaerts, C.; Foerster, T.; Schaeffer, B.; Wytzisk, A.

2009-12-01

This paper involves easy accessible integrated web-based analysis of satellite images with a plug-in based open source software. The paper is targeted to both users and developers of geospatial software. Guided by a use case scenario, we describe the ILWIS software and its toolbox to access satellite images through the GEONETCast broadcasting system. The last two decades have shown a major shift from stand-alone software systems to networked ones, often client/server applications using distributed geo-(web-)services. This allows organisations to combine without much effort their own data with remotely available data and processing functionality. Key to this integrated spatial data analysis is a low-cost access to data from within a user-friendly and flexible software. Web-based open source software solutions are more often a powerful option for developing countries. The Integrated Land and Water Information System (ILWIS) is a PC-based GIS & Remote Sensing software, comprising a complete package of image processing, spatial analysis and digital mapping and was developed as commercial software from the early nineties onwards. Recent project efforts have migrated ILWIS into a modular, plug-in-based open source software, and provide web-service support for OGC-based web mapping and processing. The core objective of the ILWIS Open source project is to provide a maintainable framework for researchers and software developers to implement training components, scientific toolboxes and (web-) services. The latest plug-ins have been developed for multi-criteria decision making, water resources analysis and spatial statistics analysis. The development of this framework is done since 2007 in the context of 52°North, which is an open initiative that advances the development of cutting edge open source geospatial software, using the GPL license. GEONETCast, as part of the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), puts essential environmental data at the fingertips of users around the globe. This user-friendly and low-cost information dissemination provides global information as a basis for decision-making in a number of critical areas, including public health, energy, agriculture, weather, water, climate, natural disasters and ecosystems. GEONETCast makes available satellite images via Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) technology. An OGC WMS interface and plug-ins which convert GEONETCast data streams allow an ILWIS user to integrate various distributed data sources with data locally stored on his machine. Our paper describes a use case in which ILWIS is used with GEONETCast satellite imagery for decision making processes in Ghana. We also explain how the ILWIS software can be extended with additional functionality by means of building plug-ins and unfold our plans to implement other OGC standards, such as WCS and WPS in the same context. Especially, the latter one can be seen as a major step forward in terms of moving well-proven desktop based processing functionality to the web. This enables the embedding of ILWIS functionality in Spatial Data Infrastructures or even the execution in scalable and on-demand cloud computing environments.

The Architecture Based Design Method

DTIC Science & Technology

2000-01-01

implementation of components of different types. The software templates include a description of how components interact with shared services and also include citizenship responsibilities for components.

Materials integrity in microsystems: a framework for a petascale predictive-science-based multiscale modeling and simulation system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

To, Albert C.; Liu, Wing Kam; Olson, Gregory B.; Belytschko, Ted; Chen, Wei; Shephard, Mark S.; Chung, Yip-Wah; Ghanem, Roger; Voorhees, Peter W.; Seidman, David N.; Wolverton, Chris; Chen, J. S.; Moran, Brian; Freeman, Arthur J.; Tian, Rong; Luo, Xiaojuan; Lautenschlager, Eric; Challoner, A. Dorian

2008-09-01

Microsystems have become an integral part of our lives and can be found in homeland security, medical science, aerospace applications and beyond. Many critical microsystem applications are in harsh environments, in which long-term reliability needs to be guaranteed and repair is not feasible. For example, gyroscope microsystems on satellites need to function for over 20 years under severe radiation, thermal cycling, and shock loading. Hence a predictive-science-based, verified and validated computational models and algorithms to predict the performance and materials integrity of microsystems in these situations is needed. Confidence in these predictions is improved by quantifying uncertainties and approximation errors. With no full system testing and limited sub-system testings, petascale computing is certainly necessary to span both time and space scales and to reduce the uncertainty in the prediction of long-term reliability. This paper presents the necessary steps to develop predictive-science-based multiscale modeling and simulation system. The development of this system will be focused on the prediction of the long-term performance of a gyroscope microsystem. The environmental effects to be considered include radiation, thermo-mechanical cycling and shock. Since there will be many material performance issues, attention is restricted to creep resulting from thermal aging and radiation-enhanced mass diffusion, material instability due to radiation and thermo-mechanical cycling and damage and fracture due to shock. To meet these challenges, we aim to develop an integrated multiscale software analysis system that spans the length scales from the atomistic scale to the scale of the device. The proposed software system will include molecular mechanics, phase field evolution, micromechanics and continuum mechanics software, and the state-of-the-art model identification strategies where atomistic properties are calibrated by quantum calculations. We aim to predict the long-term (in excess of 20 years) integrity of the resonator, electrode base, multilayer metallic bonding pads, and vacuum seals in a prescribed mission. Although multiscale simulations are efficient in the sense that they focus the most computationally intensive models and methods on only the portions of the space time domain needed, the execution of the multiscale simulations associated with evaluating materials and device integrity for aerospace microsystems will require the application of petascale computing. A component-based software strategy will be used in the development of our massively parallel multiscale simulation system. This approach will allow us to take full advantage of existing single scale modeling components. An extensive, pervasive thrust in the software system development is verification, validation, and uncertainty quantification (UQ). Each component and the integrated software system need to be carefully verified. An UQ methodology that determines the quality of predictive information available from experimental measurements and packages the information in a form suitable for UQ at various scales needs to be developed. Experiments to validate the model at the nanoscale, microscale, and macroscale are proposed. The development of a petascale predictive-science-based multiscale modeling and simulation system will advance the field of predictive multiscale science so that it can be used to reliably analyze problems of unprecedented complexity, where limited testing resources can be adequately replaced by petascale computational power, advanced verification, validation, and UQ methodologies.

SAGA: A project to automate the management of software production systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Campbell, R. H.; Badger, W.; Beckman, C. S.; Beshers, G.; Hammerslag, D.; Kimball, J.; Kirslis, P. A.; Render, H.; Richards, P.; Terwilliger, R.

1984-01-01

The project to automate the management of software production systems is described. The SAGA system is a software environment that is designed to support most of the software development activities that occur in a software lifecycle. The system can be configured to support specific software development applications using given programming languages, tools, and methodologies. Meta-tools are provided to ease configuration. Several major components of the SAGA system are completed to prototype form. The construction methods are described.

Proposal for a New ’Rights in Software’ Clause for Software Acquisitions by the Department of Defense.

DTIC Science & Technology

1986-09-01

point here Is that the capital cost of design and development (including the cost of software tools and/or CAD/CAM programs which aided in the development...and capitalization , software Is in many ways more Ike a hardware component than it is Ike the tech- nical documentation which supports the hardware...Invoked, the owner of intelectual property rights in software may attach appropriate copyright notices to software delivered under this contract. 2.2.2

Astronaut Office Scheduling System Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brown, Estevancio

2010-01-01

AOSS is a highly efficient scheduling application that uses various tools to schedule astronauts weekly appointment information. This program represents an integration of many technologies into a single application to facilitate schedule sharing and management. It is a Windows-based application developed in Visual Basic. Because the NASA standard office automation load environment is Microsoft-based, Visual Basic provides AO SS developers with the ability to interact with Windows collaboration components by accessing objects models from applications like Outlook and Excel. This also gives developers the ability to create newly customizable components that perform specialized tasks pertaining to scheduling reporting inside the application. With this capability, AOSS can perform various asynchronous tasks, such as gathering/ sending/ managing astronauts schedule information directly to their Outlook calendars at any time.

Ground System Architectures Workshop GMSEC SERVICES SUITE (GSS): an Agile Development Story

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ly, Vuong

2017-01-01

The GMSEC (Goddard Mission Services Evolution Center) Services Suite (GSS) is a collection of tools and software services along with a robust customizable web-based portal that enables the user to capture, monitor, report, and analyze system-wide GMSEC data. Given our plug-and-play architecture and the needs for rapid system development, we opted to follow the Scrum Agile Methodology for software development. Being one of the first few projects to implement the Agile methodology at NASA GSFC, in this presentation we will present our approaches, tools, successes, and challenges in implementing this methodology. The GMSEC architecture provides a scalable, extensible ground and flight system for existing and future missions. GMSEC comes with a robust Application Programming Interface (GMSEC API) and a core set of Java-based GMSEC components that facilitate the development of a GMSEC-based ground system. Over the past few years, we have seen an upbeat in the number of customers who are moving from a native desktop application environment to a web based environment particularly for data monitoring and analysis. We also see a need to provide separation of the business logic from the GUI display for our Java-based components and also to consolidate all the GUI displays into one interface. This combination of separation and consolidation brings immediate value to a GMSEC-based ground system through increased ease of data access via a uniform interface, built-in security measures, centralized configuration management, and ease of feature extensibility.

Advanced software development workstation project: Engineering scripting language. Graphical editor

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1992-01-01

Software development is widely considered to be a bottleneck in the development of complex systems, both in terms of development and in terms of maintenance of deployed systems. Cost of software development and maintenance can also be very high. One approach to reducing costs and relieving this bottleneck is increasing the reuse of software designs and software components. A method for achieving such reuse is a software parts composition system. Such a system consists of a language for modeling software parts and their interfaces, a catalog of existing parts, an editor for combining parts, and a code generator that takes a specification and generates code for that application in the target language. The Advanced Software Development Workstation is intended to be an expert system shell designed to provide the capabilities of a software part composition system.

Citizen Observatories: A Standards Based Architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Simonis, Ingo

2015-04-01

A number of large-scale research projects are currently under way exploring the various components of citizen observatories, e.g. CITI-SENSE (http://www.citi-sense.eu), Citclops (http://citclops.eu), COBWEB (http://cobwebproject.eu), OMNISCIENTIS (http://www.omniscientis.eu), and WeSenseIt (http://www.wesenseit.eu). Common to all projects is the motivation to develop a platform enabling effective participation by citizens in environmental projects, while considering important aspects such as security, privacy, long-term storage and availability, accessibility of raw and processed data and its proper integration into catalogues and international exchange and collaboration systems such as GEOSS or INSPIRE. This paper describes the software architecture implemented for setting up crowdsourcing campaigns using standardized components, interfaces, security features, and distribution capabilities. It illustrates the Citizen Observatory Toolkit, a software suite that allows defining crowdsourcing campaigns, to invite registered and unregistered participants to participate in crowdsourcing campaigns, and to analyze, process, and visualize raw and quality enhanced crowd sourcing data and derived products. The Citizen Observatory Toolkit is not a single software product. Instead, it is a framework of components that are built using internationally adopted standards wherever possible (e.g. OGC standards from Sensor Web Enablement, GeoPackage, and Web Mapping and Processing Services, as well as security and metadata/cataloguing standards), defines profiles of those standards where necessary (e.g. SWE O&M profile, SensorML profile), and implements design decisions based on the motivation to maximize interoperability and reusability of all components. The toolkit contains tools to set up, manage and maintain crowdsourcing campaigns, allows building on-demand apps optimized for the specific sampling focus, supports offline and online sampling modes using modern cell phones with built-in sensing technologies, automates the upload of the raw data, and handles conflation services to match quality requirements and analysis challenges. The strict implementation of all components using internationally adopted standards ensures maximal interoperability and reusability of all components. The Citizen Observatory Toolkit is currently developed as part of the COBWEB research project. COBWEB is partially funded by the European Programme FP7/2007-2013 under grant agreement n° 308513; part of the topic ENV.2012.6.5-1 "Developing community based environmental monitoring and information systems using innovative and novel earth observation applications.

Architecture of a Framework for Providing Information Services for Public Transport

PubMed Central

García, Carmelo R.; Pérez, Ricardo; Lorenzo, Álvaro; Quesada-Arencibia, Alexis; Alayón, Francisco; Padrón, Gabino

2012-01-01

This paper presents OnRoute, a framework for developing and running ubiquitous software that provides information services to passengers of public transportation, including payment systems and on-route guidance services. To achieve a high level of interoperability, accessibility and context awareness, OnRoute uses the ubiquitous computing paradigm. To guarantee the quality of the software produced, the reliable software principles used in critical contexts, such as automotive systems, are also considered by the framework. The main components of its architecture (run-time, system services, software components and development discipline) and how they are deployed in the transportation network (stations and vehicles) are described in this paper. Finally, to illustrate the use of OnRoute, the development of a guidance service for travellers is explained. PMID:22778585

Mercury: An Example of Effective Software Reuse for Metadata Management, Data Discovery and Access

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Devarakonda, Ranjeet; Palanisamy, Giri; Green, James; Wilson, Bruce E.

2008-12-01

Mercury is a federated metadata harvesting, data discovery and access tool based on both open source packages and custom developed software. Though originally developed for NASA, the Mercury development consortium now includes funding from NASA, USGS, and DOE. Mercury supports the reuse of metadata by enabling searching across a range of metadata specification and standards including XML, Z39.50, FGDC, Dublin-Core, Darwin-Core, EML, and ISO-19115. Mercury provides a single portal to information contained in distributed data management systems. It collects metadata and key data from contributing project servers distributed around the world and builds a centralized index. The Mercury search interfaces then allow the users to perform simple, fielded, spatial and temporal searches across these metadata sources. One of the major goals of the recent redesign of Mercury was to improve the software reusability across the 12 projects which currently fund the continuing development of Mercury. These projects span a range of land, atmosphere, and ocean ecological communities and have a number of common needs for metadata searches, but they also have a number of needs specific to one or a few projects. To balance these common and project-specific needs, Mercury's architecture has three major reusable components; a harvester engine, an indexing system and a user interface component. The harvester engine is responsible for harvesting metadata records from various distributed servers around the USA and around the world. The harvester software was packaged in such a way that all the Mercury projects will use the same harvester scripts but each project will be driven by a set of project specific configuration files. The harvested files are structured metadata records that are indexed against the search library API consistently, so that it can render various search capabilities such as simple, fielded, spatial and temporal. This backend component is supported by a very flexible, easy to use Graphical User Interface which is driven by cascading style sheets, which make it even simpler for reusable design implementation. The new Mercury system is based on a Service Oriented Architecture and effectively reuses components for various services such as Thesaurus Service, Gazetteer Web Service and UDDI Directory Services. The software also provides various search services including: RSS, Geo-RSS, OpenSearch, Web Services and Portlets, integrated shopping cart to order datasets from various data centers (ORNL DAAC, NSIDC) and integrated visualization tools. Other features include: Filtering and dynamic sorting of search results, book- markable search results, save, retrieve, and modify search criteria.

Mercury: An Example of Effective Software Reuse for Metadata Management, Data Discovery and Access

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Devarakonda, Ranjeet

2008-01-01

Mercury is a federated metadata harvesting, data discovery and access tool based on both open source packages and custom developed software. Though originally developed for NASA, the Mercury development consortium now includes funding from NASA, USGS, and DOE. Mercury supports the reuse of metadata by enabling searching across a range of metadata specification and standards including XML, Z39.50, FGDC, Dublin-Core, Darwin-Core, EML, and ISO-19115. Mercury provides a single portal to information contained in distributed data management systems. It collects metadata and key data from contributing project servers distributed around the world and builds a centralized index. The Mercury search interfacesmore » then allow the users to perform simple, fielded, spatial and temporal searches across these metadata sources. One of the major goals of the recent redesign of Mercury was to improve the software reusability across the 12 projects which currently fund the continuing development of Mercury. These projects span a range of land, atmosphere, and ocean ecological communities and have a number of common needs for metadata searches, but they also have a number of needs specific to one or a few projects. To balance these common and project-specific needs, Mercury's architecture has three major reusable components; a harvester engine, an indexing system and a user interface component. The harvester engine is responsible for harvesting metadata records from various distributed servers around the USA and around the world. The harvester software was packaged in such a way that all the Mercury projects will use the same harvester scripts but each project will be driven by a set of project specific configuration files. The harvested files are structured metadata records that are indexed against the search library API consistently, so that it can render various search capabilities such as simple, fielded, spatial and temporal. This backend component is supported by a very flexible, easy to use Graphical User Interface which is driven by cascading style sheets, which make it even simpler for reusable design implementation. The new Mercury system is based on a Service Oriented Architecture and effectively reuses components for various services such as Thesaurus Service, Gazetteer Web Service and UDDI Directory Services. The software also provides various search services including: RSS, Geo-RSS, OpenSearch, Web Services and Portlets, integrated shopping cart to order datasets from various data centers (ORNL DAAC, NSIDC) and integrated visualization tools. Other features include: Filtering and dynamic sorting of search results, book- markable search results, save, retrieve, and modify search criteria.« less

Modular Certification

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rushby, John; Miner, Paul S. (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

Airplanes are certified as a whole: there is no established basis for separately certifying some components, particularly software-intensive ones, independently of their specific application in a given airplane. The absence of separate certification inhibits the development of modular components that could be largely "precertified" and used in several different contexts within a single airplane, or across many different airplanes. In this report, we examine the issues in modular certification of software components and propose an approach based on assume-guarantee reasoning. We extend the method from verification to certification by considering behavior in the presence of failures. This exposes the need for partitioning, and separation of assumptions and guarantees into normal and abnormal cases. We then identify three classes of property that must be verified within this framework: safe function, true guarantees, and controlled failure. We identify a particular assume-guarantee proof rule (due to McMillan) that is appropriate to the applications considered, and formally verify its soundness in PVS.

Software Health Management: A Short Review of Challenges and Existing Techniques

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pipatsrisawat, Knot; Darwiche, Adnan; Mengshoel, Ole J.; Schumann, Johann

2009-01-01

Modern spacecraft (as well as most other complex mechanisms like aircraft, automobiles, and chemical plants) rely more and more on software, to a point where software failures have caused severe accidents and loss of missions. Software failures during a manned mission can cause loss of life, so there are severe requirements to make the software as safe and reliable as possible. Typically, verification and validation (V&V) has the task of making sure that all software errors are found before the software is deployed and that it always conforms to the requirements. Experience, however, shows that this gold standard of error-free software cannot be reached in practice. Even if the software alone is free of glitches, its interoperation with the hardware (e.g., with sensors or actuators) can cause problems. Unexpected operational conditions or changes in the environment may ultimately cause a software system to fail. Is there a way to surmount this problem? In most modern aircraft and many automobiles, hardware such as central electrical, mechanical, and hydraulic components are monitored by IVHM (Integrated Vehicle Health Management) systems. These systems can recognize, isolate, and identify faults and failures, both those that already occurred as well as imminent ones. With the help of diagnostics and prognostics, appropriate mitigation strategies can be selected (replacement or repair, switch to redundant systems, etc.). In this short paper, we discuss some challenges and promising techniques for software health management (SWHM). In particular, we identify unique challenges for preventing software failure in systems which involve both software and hardware components. We then present our classifications of techniques related to SWHM. These classifications are performed based on dimensions of interest to both developers and users of the techniques, and hopefully provide a map for dealing with software faults and failures.

The Development of Design Tools for Fault Tolerant Quantum Dot Cellular Automata Based Logic

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Armstrong, Curtis D.; Humphreys, William M.

2003-01-01

We are developing software to explore the fault tolerance of quantum dot cellular automata gate architectures in the presence of manufacturing variations and device defects. The Topology Optimization Methodology using Applied Statistics (TOMAS) framework extends the capabilities of the A Quantum Interconnected Network Array Simulator (AQUINAS) by adding front-end and back-end software and creating an environment that integrates all of these components. The front-end tools establish all simulation parameters, configure the simulation system, automate the Monte Carlo generation of simulation files, and execute the simulation of these files. The back-end tools perform automated data parsing, statistical analysis and report generation.

Calyx{trademark} EA implementation at AECB

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

NONE

1997-12-31

This report describes a project to examine the applicability of a knowledge-based decision support software for environmental assessment (Calyx) to assist the Atomic Energy Control Board in environmental screenings, assessment, management, and database searches. The report begins with background on the Calyx software and then reviews activities with regard to modification of the Calyx knowledge base for application to the nuclear sector. This is followed by lists of standard activities handled by the software and activities specific to the Board; the hierarchy of environmental components developed for the Board; details of impact rules that describe the conditions under which environmentalmore » impacts will occur (the bulk of the report); information on mitigation and monitoring rules and on instance data; and considerations for future work on implementing Calyx at the Board. Appendices include an introduction to expert systems and an overview of the Calyx knowledge base structure.« less

Updates to the NASA Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) Architecture

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kacpura, Thomas J.; Handler, Louis M.; Briones, Janette; Hall, Charles S.

2008-01-01

This paper describes an update of the Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) open architecture for NASA space based radios. The STRS architecture has been defined as a framework for the design, development, operation and upgrade of space based software defined radios, where processing resources are constrained. The architecture has been updated based upon reviews by NASA missions, radio providers, and component vendors. The STRS Standard prescribes the architectural relationship between the software elements used in software execution and defines the Application Programmer Interface (API) between the operating environment and the waveform application. Modeling tools have been adopted to present the architecture. The paper will present a description of the updated API, configuration files, and constraints. Minimum compliance is discussed for early implementations. The paper then closes with a summary of the changes made and discussion of the relevant alignment with the Object Management Group (OMG) SWRadio specification, and enhancements to the specialized signal processing abstraction.

Software Intensive Systems Data Quality and Estimation Research in Support of Future Defense Cost Analysis

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-03-13

Legacy Maintenance and Brownfield Development 6.6.6 Agile and Kanban Development 6.6.7 Putting It All Together at the Large-Project or Enterprise Level...NDI)-intensive systems Ultrahigh software system assurance; Legacy maintenance and brownfield development; and Agile and kanban development. This...be furnished by NDI components or may need to be developed for special systems. Legacy Maintenance and Brownfield Development Fewer and fewer software

A Plug and Play GNC Architecture Using FPGA Components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

KrishnaKumar, K.; Kaneshige, J.; Waterman, R.; Pires, C.; Ippoloito, C.

2005-01-01

The goal of Plug and Play, or PnP, is to allow hardware and software components to work together automatically, without requiring manual setup procedures. As a result, new or replacement hardware can be plugged into a system and automatically configured with the appropriate resource assignments. However, in many cases it may not be practical or even feasible to physically replace hardware components. One method for handling these types of situations is through the incorporation of reconfigurable hardware such as Field Programmable Gate Arrays, or FPGAs. This paper describes a phased approach to developing a Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC) architecture that expands on the traditional concepts of PnP, in order to accommodate hardware reconfiguration without requiring detailed knowledge of the hardware. This is achieved by establishing a functional based interface that defines how the hardware will operate, and allow the hardware to reconfigure itself. The resulting system combines the flexibility of manipulating software components with the speed and efficiency of hardware.

The SoRReL papers: Recent publications of the Software Reuse Repository Lab

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eichmann, David A. (Editor)

1992-01-01

The entire publication is presented of some of the papers recently published by the SoRReL. Some typical titles are as follows: Design of a Lattice-Based Faceted Classification System; A Hybrid Approach to Software Reuse Repository Retrieval; Selecting Reusable Components Using Algebraic Specifications; Neural Network-Based Retrieval from Reuse Repositories; and A Neural Net-Based Approach to Software Metrics.

Using component technology to facilitate external software reuse in ground-based planning systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chase, A.

2003-01-01

APGEN (Activity Plan GENerator - 314), a multi-mission planning tool, must interface with external software to vest serve its users. AP-GEN's original method for incorporating external software, the User-Defined library mechanism, has been very successful in allowing APGEN users access to external software functionality.

Why Free Software Matters for Literacy Educators.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brunelle, Michael D.; Bruce, Bertram C.

2002-01-01

Notes that understanding what "free software" means and its implications for access and use of new technologies is an important component of the new literacies. Concludes that if free speech and free press are essential to the development of a general literacy, then free software can promote the development of computer literacy. (SG)

SAGA: A project to automate the management of software production systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Campbell, Roy H.; Beckman, Carol S.; Benzinger, Leonora; Beshers, George; Hammerslag, David; Kimball, John; Kirslis, Peter A.; Render, Hal; Richards, Paul; Terwilliger, Robert

1985-01-01

The SAGA system is a software environment that is designed to support most of the software development activities that occur in a software lifecycle. The system can be configured to support specific software development applications using given programming languages, tools, and methodologies. Meta-tools are provided to ease configuration. The SAGA system consists of a small number of software components that are adapted by the meta-tools into specific tools for use in the software development application. The modules are design so that the meta-tools can construct an environment which is both integrated and flexible. The SAGA project is documented in several papers which are presented.

The Software Management Environment (SME)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Valett, Jon D.; Decker, William; Buell, John

1988-01-01

The Software Management Environment (SME) is a research effort designed to utilize the past experiences and results of the Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL) and to incorporate this knowledge into a tool for managing projects. SME provides the software development manager with the ability to observe, compare, predict, analyze, and control key software development parameters such as effort, reliability, and resource utilization. The major components of the SME, the architecture of the system, and examples of the functionality of the tool are discussed.

A software tool for advanced MRgFUS prostate therapy planning and follow up

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

van Straaten, Dörte; Hoogenboom, Martijn; van Amerongen, Martinus J.; Weiler, Florian; Issawi, Jumana Al; Günther, Matthias; Fütterer, Jurgen; Jenne, Jürgen W.

2017-03-01

US guided HIFU/FUS ablation for the therapy of prostate cancer is a clinical established method, while MR guided HIFU/FUS applications for prostate recently started clinical evaluation. Even if MRI examination is an excellent diagnostic tool for prostate cancer, it is a time consuming procedure and not practicable within an MRgFUS therapy session. The aim of our ongoing work is to develop software to support therapy planning and post-therapy follow-up for MRgFUS on localized prostate cancer, based on multi-parametric MR protocols. The clinical workflow of diagnosis, therapy and follow-up of MR guided FUS on prostate cancer was deeply analyzed. Based on this, the image processing workflow was designed and all necessary components, e.g. GUI, viewer, registration tools etc. were defined and implemented. The software bases on MeVisLab with several implemented C++ modules for the image processing tasks. The developed software, called LTC (Local Therapy Control) will register and visualize automatically all images (T1w, T2w, DWI etc.) and ADC or perfusion maps gained from the diagnostic MRI session. This maximum of diagnostic information helps to segment all necessary ROIs, e.g. the tumor, for therapy planning. Final therapy planning will be performed based on these segmentation data in the following MRgFUS therapy session. In addition, the developed software should help to evaluate the therapy success, by synchronization and display of pre-therapeutic, therapy and follow-up image data including the therapy plan and thermal dose information. In this ongoing project, the first stand-alone prototype was completed and will be clinically evaluated.

Selecting reusable components using algebraic specifications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eichmann, David A.

1992-01-01

A significant hurdle confronts the software reuser attempting to select candidate components from a software repository - discriminating between those components without resorting to inspection of the implementation(s). We outline a mixed classification/axiomatic approach to this problem based upon our lattice-based faceted classification technique and Guttag and Horning's algebraic specification techniques. This approach selects candidates by natural language-derived classification, by their interfaces, using signatures, and by their behavior, using axioms. We briefly outline our problem domain and related work. Lattice-based faceted classifications are described; the reader is referred to surveys of the extensive literature for algebraic specification techniques. Behavioral support for reuse queries is presented, followed by the conclusions.

System Risk Balancing Profiles: Software Component

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kelly, John C.; Sigal, Burton C.; Gindorf, Tom

2000-01-01

The Software QA / V&V guide will be reviewed and updated based on feedback from NASA organizations and others with a vested interest in this area. Hardware, EEE Parts, Reliability, and Systems Safety are a sample of the future guides that will be developed. Cost Estimates, Lessons Learned, Probability of Failure and PACTS (Prevention, Avoidance, Control or Test) are needed to provide a more complete risk management strategy. This approach to risk management is designed to help balance the resources and program content for risk reduction for NASA's changing environment.

Development of a Dynamically Configurable,Object-Oriented Framework for Distributed, Multi-modal Computational Aerospace Systems Simulation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Afjeh, Abdollah A.; Reed, John A.

2003-01-01

This research is aimed at developing a neiv and advanced simulation framework that will significantly improve the overall efficiency of aerospace systems design and development. This objective will be accomplished through an innovative integration of object-oriented and Web-based technologies ivith both new and proven simulation methodologies. The basic approach involves Ihree major areas of research: Aerospace system and component representation using a hierarchical object-oriented component model which enables the use of multimodels and enforces component interoperability. Collaborative software environment that streamlines the process of developing, sharing and integrating aerospace design and analysis models. . Development of a distributed infrastructure which enables Web-based exchange of models to simplify the collaborative design process, and to support computationally intensive aerospace design and analysis processes. Research for the first year dealt with the design of the basic architecture and supporting infrastructure, an initial implementation of that design, and a demonstration of its application to an example aircraft engine system simulation.

Software development environments: Status and trends

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Duffel, Larry E.

1988-01-01

Currently software engineers are the essential integrating factors tying several components together. The components consist of process, methods, computers, tools, support environments, and software engineers. The engineers today empower the tools versus the tools empowering the engineers. Some of the issues in software engineering are quality, managing the software engineering process, and productivity. A strategy to accomplish this is to promote the evolution of software engineering from an ad hoc, labor intensive activity to a managed, technology supported discipline. This strategy may be implemented by putting the process under management control, adopting appropriate methods, inserting the technology that provides automated support for the process and methods, collecting automated tools into an integrated environment and educating the personnel.

Knowledge-Based Parallel Performance Technology for Scientific Application Competitiveness Final Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Malony, Allen D; Shende, Sameer

The primary goal of the University of Oregon's DOE "œcompetitiveness" project was to create performance technology that embodies and supports knowledge of performance data, analysis, and diagnosis in parallel performance problem solving. The target of our development activities was the TAU Performance System and the technology accomplishments reported in this and prior reports have all been incorporated in the TAU open software distribution. In addition, the project has been committed to maintaining strong interactions with the DOE SciDAC Performance Engineering Research Institute (PERI) and Center for Technology for Advanced Scientific Component Software (TASCS). This collaboration has proved valuable for translationmore » of our knowledge-based performance techniques to parallel application development and performance engineering practice. Our outreach has also extended to the DOE Advanced CompuTational Software (ACTS) collection and project. Throughout the project we have participated in the PERI and TASCS meetings, as well as the ACTS annual workshops.« less

Intelligent tutoring systems for systems engineering methodologies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Meyer, Richard J.; Toland, Joel; Decker, Louis

1991-01-01

The general goal is to provide the technology required to build systems that can provide intelligent tutoring in IDEF (Integrated Computer Aided Manufacturing Definition Method) modeling. The following subject areas are covered: intelligent tutoring systems for systems analysis methodologies; IDEF tutor architecture and components; developing cognitive skills for IDEF modeling; experimental software; and PC based prototype.

CRAX/Cassandra Reliability Analysis Software

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robinson, D.

1999-02-10

Over the past few years Sandia National Laboratories has been moving toward an increased dependence on model- or physics-based analyses as a means to assess the impact of long-term storage on the nuclear weapons stockpile. These deterministic models have also been used to evaluate replacements for aging systems, often involving commercial off-the-shelf components (COTS). In addition, the models have been used to assess the performance of replacement components manufactured via unique, small-lot production runs. In either case, the limited amount of available test data dictates that the only logical course of action to characterize the reliability of these components ismore » to specifically consider the uncertainties in material properties, operating environment etc. within the physics-based (deterministic) model. This not only provides the ability to statistically characterize the expected performance of the component or system, but also provides direction regarding the benefits of additional testing on specific components within the system. An effort was therefore initiated to evaluate the capabilities of existing probabilistic methods and, if required, to develop new analysis methods to support the inclusion of uncertainty in the classical design tools used by analysts and design engineers at Sandia. The primary result of this effort is the CMX (Cassandra Exoskeleton) reliability analysis software.« less

Development of a software safety process and a case study of its use

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Knight, John C.

1993-01-01

The goal of this research is to continue the development of a comprehensive approach to software safety and to evaluate the approach with a case study. The case study is a major part of the project, and it involves the analysis of a specific safety-critical system from the medical equipment domain. The particular application being used was selected because of the availability of a suitable candidate system. We consider the results to be generally applicable and in no way particularly limited by the domain. The research is concentrating on issues raised by the specification and verification phases of the software lifecycle since they are central to our previously-developed rigorous definitions of software safety. The theoretical research is based on our framework of definitions for software safety. In the area of specification, the main topics being investigated are the development of techniques for building system fault trees that correctly incorporate software issues and the development of rigorous techniques for the preparation of software safety specifications. The research results are documented. Another area of theoretical investigation is the development of verification methods tailored to the characteristics of safety requirements. Verification of the correct implementation of the safety specification is central to the goal of establishing safe software. The empirical component of this research is focusing on a case study in order to provide detailed characterizations of the issues as they appear in practice, and to provide a testbed for the evaluation of various existing and new theoretical results, tools, and techniques. The Magnetic Stereotaxis System is summarized.

RT 6 - Software Intensive Systems Data Quality and Estimation Research in Support of Future Defense Cost Analysis

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-03-13

Brownfield Development 6.6.6 Agile and Kanban Development 6.6.7 Putting It All Together at the Large-Project or Enterprise Level 6.7 References 7...Ultrahigh software system assurance; Legacy maintenance and brownfield development; and Agile and kanban development. This chapter summarizes each...components or may need to be developed for special systems. Legacy Maintenance and Brownfield Development Fewer and fewer software-intensive systems have

The Design of Fault Tolerant Quantum Dot Cellular Automata Based Logic

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Armstrong, C. Duane; Humphreys, William M.; Fijany, Amir

2002-01-01

As transistor geometries are reduced, quantum effects begin to dominate device performance. At some point, transistors cease to have the properties that make them useful computational components. New computing elements must be developed in order to keep pace with Moore s Law. Quantum dot cellular automata (QCA) represent an alternative paradigm to transistor-based logic. QCA architectures that are robust to manufacturing tolerances and defects must be developed. We are developing software that allows the exploration of fault tolerant QCA gate architectures by automating the specification, simulation, analysis and documentation processes.

MisTec - A software application for supporting space exploration scenario options and technology development analysis and planning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Horsham, Gary A. P.

1992-01-01

This structure and composition of a new, emerging software application, which models and analyzes space exploration scenario options for feasibility based on technology development projections is presented. The software application consists of four main components: a scenario generator for designing and inputting scenario options and constraints; a processor which performs algorithmic coupling and options analyses of mission activity requirements and technology capabilities; a results display which graphically and textually shows coupling and options analysis results; and a data/knowledge base which contains information on a variety of mission activities and (power and propulsion) technology system capabilities. The general long-range study process used by NASA to support recent studies is briefly introduced to provide the primary basis for comparison for discussing the potential advantages to be gained from developing and applying this kind of application. A hypothetical example of a scenario option to facilitate the best conceptual understanding of what the application is, how it works, or the operating methodology, and when it might be applied is presented.

MisTec: A software application for supporting space exploration scenario options and technology development analysis and planning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Horsham, Gary A. P.

1991-01-01

The structure and composition of a new, emerging software application, which models and analyzes space exploration scenario options for feasibility based on technology development projections is presented. The software application consists of four main components: a scenario generator for designing and inputting scenario options and constraints; a processor which performs algorithmic coupling and options analyses of mission activity requirements and technology capabilities; a results display which graphically and textually shows coupling and options analysis results; and a data/knowledge base which contains information on a variety of mission activities and (power and propulsion) technology system capabilities. The general long-range study process used by NASA to support recent studies is briefly introduced to provide the primary basis for comparison for discussing the potential advantages to be gained from developing and applying this king of application. A hypothetical example of a scenario option to facilitate the best conceptual understanding of what the application is, how it works, or the operating methodology, and when it might be applied is presented.

XML-based scripting of multimodality image presentations in multidisciplinary clinical conferences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ratib, Osman M.; Allada, Vivekanand; Dahlbom, Magdalena; Marcus, Phillip; Fine, Ian; Lapstra, Lorelle

2002-05-01

We developed a multi-modality image presentation software for display and analysis of images and related data from different imaging modalities. The software is part of a cardiac image review and presentation platform that supports integration of digital images and data from digital and analog media such as videotapes, analog x-ray films and 35 mm cine films. The software supports standard DICOM image files as well as AVI and PDF data formats. The system is integrated in a digital conferencing room that includes projections of digital and analog sources, remote videoconferencing capabilities, and an electronic whiteboard. The goal of this pilot project is to: 1) develop a new paradigm for image and data management for presentation in a clinically meaningful sequence adapted to case-specific scenarios, 2) design and implement a multi-modality review and conferencing workstation using component technology and customizable 'plug-in' architecture to support complex review and diagnostic tasks applicable to all cardiac imaging modalities and 3) develop an XML-based scripting model of image and data presentation for clinical review and decision making during routine clinical tasks and multidisciplinary clinical conferences.

Muscle Strength Endurance Testing Development Based Photo Transistor with Motion Sensor Ultrasonic

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rusdiana, A.

2017-03-01

The endurance of upper-body muscles is one of the most important physical fitness components. As technology develops, the process of test and assessment is now getting digital; for instance, there are a sensor stuck to the shoe (Foot Pod, Polar, and Sunto), Global Positioning System (GPS) and Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS), radar, photo finish, kinematic analysis, and photocells. Those devices aim to analyze the performances and fitness of athletes particularly the endurance of arm, chest, and shoulder muscles. In relation to that, this study attempt to create a software and a hardware for pull-ups through phototransistor with ultrasonic motion sensor. Components needed to develop this device consist of microcontroller MCS-51, photo transistor, light emitting diode, buzzer, ultrasonic sensor, and infrared sensor. The infrared sensor is put under the buffer while the ultrasonic sensor is stuck on the upper pole. The components are integrated with an LED or a laptop made using Visual Basic 12 software. The results show that pull-ups test using digital device (mean; 9.4 rep) is lower than using manual calculation (mean; 11.3 rep). This is due to the fact that digital test requires the test-takers to do pull-ups perfectly.

Monkey search algorithm for ECE components partitioning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kuliev, Elmar; Kureichik, Vladimir; Kureichik, Vladimir, Jr.

2018-05-01

The paper considers one of the important design problems – a partitioning of electronic computer equipment (ECE) components (blocks). It belongs to the NP-hard class of problems and has a combinatorial and logic nature. In the paper, a partitioning problem formulation can be found as a partition of graph into parts. To solve the given problem, the authors suggest using a bioinspired approach based on a monkey search algorithm. Based on the developed software, computational experiments were carried out that show the algorithm efficiency, as well as its recommended settings for obtaining more effective solutions in comparison with a genetic algorithm.

Access Control of Web and Java Based Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tso, Kam S.; Pajevski, Michael J.; Johnson, Bryan

2011-01-01

Cyber security has gained national and international attention as a result of near continuous headlines from financial institutions, retail stores, government offices and universities reporting compromised systems and stolen data. Concerns continue to rise as threats of service interruption, and spreading of viruses become ever more prevalent and serious. Controlling access to application layer resources is a critical component in a layered security solution that includes encryption, firewalls, virtual private networks, antivirus, and intrusion detection. In this paper we discuss the development of an application-level access control solution, based on an open-source access manager augmented with custom software components, to provide protection to both Web-based and Java-based client and server applications.

Adjustable Autonomy Testbed

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Malin, Jane T.; Schrenkenghost, Debra K.

2001-01-01

The Adjustable Autonomy Testbed (AAT) is a simulation-based testbed located in the Intelligent Systems Laboratory in the Automation, Robotics and Simulation Division at NASA Johnson Space Center. The purpose of the testbed is to support evaluation and validation of prototypes of adjustable autonomous agent software for control and fault management for complex systems. The AA T project has developed prototype adjustable autonomous agent software and human interfaces for cooperative fault management. This software builds on current autonomous agent technology by altering the architecture, components and interfaces for effective teamwork between autonomous systems and human experts. Autonomous agents include a planner, flexible executive, low level control and deductive model-based fault isolation. Adjustable autonomy is intended to increase the flexibility and effectiveness of fault management with an autonomous system. The test domain for this work is control of advanced life support systems for habitats for planetary exploration. The CONFIG hybrid discrete event simulation environment provides flexible and dynamically reconfigurable models of the behavior of components and fluids in the life support systems. Both discrete event and continuous (discrete time) simulation are supported, and flows and pressures are computed globally. This provides fast dynamic simulations of interacting hardware systems in closed loops that can be reconfigured during operations scenarios, producing complex cascading effects of operations and failures. Current object-oriented model libraries support modeling of fluid systems, and models have been developed of physico-chemical and biological subsystems for processing advanced life support gases. In FY01, water recovery system models will be developed.

The caCORE Software Development Kit: streamlining construction of interoperable biomedical information services.

PubMed

Phillips, Joshua; Chilukuri, Ram; Fragoso, Gilberto; Warzel, Denise; Covitz, Peter A

2006-01-06

Robust, programmatically accessible biomedical information services that syntactically and semantically interoperate with other resources are challenging to construct. Such systems require the adoption of common information models, data representations and terminology standards as well as documented application programming interfaces (APIs). The National Cancer Institute (NCI) developed the cancer common ontologic representation environment (caCORE) to provide the infrastructure necessary to achieve interoperability across the systems it develops or sponsors. The caCORE Software Development Kit (SDK) was designed to provide developers both within and outside the NCI with the tools needed to construct such interoperable software systems. The caCORE SDK requires a Unified Modeling Language (UML) tool to begin the development workflow with the construction of a domain information model in the form of a UML Class Diagram. Models are annotated with concepts and definitions from a description logic terminology source using the Semantic Connector component. The annotated model is registered in the Cancer Data Standards Repository (caDSR) using the UML Loader component. System software is automatically generated using the Codegen component, which produces middleware that runs on an application server. The caCORE SDK was initially tested and validated using a seven-class UML model, and has been used to generate the caCORE production system, which includes models with dozens of classes. The deployed system supports access through object-oriented APIs with consistent syntax for retrieval of any type of data object across all classes in the original UML model. The caCORE SDK is currently being used by several development teams, including by participants in the cancer biomedical informatics grid (caBIG) program, to create compatible data services. caBIG compatibility standards are based upon caCORE resources, and thus the caCORE SDK has emerged as a key enabling technology for caBIG. The caCORE SDK substantially lowers the barrier to implementing systems that are syntactically and semantically interoperable by providing workflow and automation tools that standardize and expedite modeling, development, and deployment. It has gained acceptance among developers in the caBIG program, and is expected to provide a common mechanism for creating data service nodes on the data grid that is under development.

Estimating multilevel logistic regression models when the number of clusters is low: a comparison of different statistical software procedures.

PubMed

Austin, Peter C

2010-04-22

Multilevel logistic regression models are increasingly being used to analyze clustered data in medical, public health, epidemiological, and educational research. Procedures for estimating the parameters of such models are available in many statistical software packages. There is currently little evidence on the minimum number of clusters necessary to reliably fit multilevel regression models. We conducted a Monte Carlo study to compare the performance of different statistical software procedures for estimating multilevel logistic regression models when the number of clusters was low. We examined procedures available in BUGS, HLM, R, SAS, and Stata. We found that there were qualitative differences in the performance of different software procedures for estimating multilevel logistic models when the number of clusters was low. Among the likelihood-based procedures, estimation methods based on adaptive Gauss-Hermite approximations to the likelihood (glmer in R and xtlogit in Stata) or adaptive Gaussian quadrature (Proc NLMIXED in SAS) tended to have superior performance for estimating variance components when the number of clusters was small, compared to software procedures based on penalized quasi-likelihood. However, only Bayesian estimation with BUGS allowed for accurate estimation of variance components when there were fewer than 10 clusters. For all statistical software procedures, estimation of variance components tended to be poor when there were only five subjects per cluster, regardless of the number of clusters.

DEPEND - A design environment for prediction and evaluation of system dependability

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Goswami, Kumar K.; Iyer, Ravishankar K.

1990-01-01

The development of DEPEND, an integrated simulation environment for the design and dependability analysis of fault-tolerant systems, is described. DEPEND models both hardware and software components at a functional level, and allows automatic failure injection to assess system performance and reliability. It relieves the user of the work needed to inject failures, maintain statistics, and output reports. The automatic failure injection scheme is geared toward evaluating a system under high stress (workload) conditions. The failures that are injected can affect both hardware and software components. To illustrate the capability of the simulator, a distributed system which employs a prediction-based, dynamic load-balancing heuristic is evaluated. Experiments were conducted to determine the impact of failures on system performance and to identify the failures to which the system is especially susceptible.

ControlShell: A real-time software framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schneider, Stanley A.; Chen, Vincent W.; Pardo-Castellote, Gerardo

1994-01-01

The ControlShell system is a programming environment that enables the development and implementation of complex real-time software. It includes many building tools for complex systems, such as a graphical finite state machine (FSM) tool to provide strategic control. ControlShell has a component-based design, providing interface definitions and mechanisms for building real-time code modules along with providing basic data management. Some of the system-building tools incorporated in ControlShell are a graphical data flow editor, a component data requirement editor, and a state-machine editor. It also includes a distributed data flow package, an execution configuration manager, a matrix package, and an object database and dynamic binding facility. This paper presents an overview of ControlShell's architecture and examines the functions of several of its tools.

Agent-based models of cellular systems.

PubMed

Cannata, Nicola; Corradini, Flavio; Merelli, Emanuela; Tesei, Luca

2013-01-01

Software agents are particularly suitable for engineering models and simulations of cellular systems. In a very natural and intuitive manner, individual software components are therein delegated to reproduce "in silico" the behavior of individual components of alive systems at a given level of resolution. Individuals' actions and interactions among individuals allow complex collective behavior to emerge. In this chapter we first introduce the readers to software agents and multi-agent systems, reviewing the evolution of agent-based modeling of biomolecular systems in the last decade. We then describe the main tools, platforms, and methodologies available for programming societies of agents, possibly profiting also of toolkits that do not require advanced programming skills.

Integrated Software Health Management for Aircraft GN and C

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schumann, Johann; Mengshoel, Ole

2011-01-01

Modern aircraft rely heavily on dependable operation of many safety-critical software components. Despite careful design, verification and validation (V&V), on-board software can fail with disastrous consequences if it encounters problematic software/hardware interaction or must operate in an unexpected environment. We are using a Bayesian approach to monitor the software and its behavior during operation and provide up-to-date information about the health of the software and its components. The powerful reasoning mechanism provided by our model-based Bayesian approach makes reliable diagnosis of the root causes possible and minimizes the number of false alarms. Compilation of the Bayesian model into compact arithmetic circuits makes SWHM feasible even on platforms with limited CPU power. We show initial results of SWHM on a small simulator of an embedded aircraft software system, where software and sensor faults can be injected.

Increasing quality and managing complexity in neuroinformatics software development with continuous integration.

PubMed

Zaytsev, Yury V; Morrison, Abigail

2012-01-01

High quality neuroscience research requires accurate, reliable and well maintained neuroinformatics applications. As software projects become larger, offering more functionality and developing a denser web of interdependence between their component parts, we need more sophisticated methods to manage their complexity. If complexity is allowed to get out of hand, either the quality of the software or the speed of development suffer, and in many cases both. To address this issue, here we develop a scalable, low-cost and open source solution for continuous integration (CI), a technique which ensures the quality of changes to the code base during the development procedure, rather than relying on a pre-release integration phase. We demonstrate that a CI-based workflow, due to rapid feedback about code integration problems and tracking of code health measures, enabled substantial increases in productivity for a major neuroinformatics project and additional benefits for three further projects. Beyond the scope of the current study, we identify multiple areas in which CI can be employed to further increase the quality of neuroinformatics projects by improving development practices and incorporating appropriate development tools. Finally, we discuss what measures can be taken to lower the barrier for developers of neuroinformatics applications to adopt this useful technique.

Increasing quality and managing complexity in neuroinformatics software development with continuous integration

PubMed Central

Zaytsev, Yury V.; Morrison, Abigail

2013-01-01

High quality neuroscience research requires accurate, reliable and well maintained neuroinformatics applications. As software projects become larger, offering more functionality and developing a denser web of interdependence between their component parts, we need more sophisticated methods to manage their complexity. If complexity is allowed to get out of hand, either the quality of the software or the speed of development suffer, and in many cases both. To address this issue, here we develop a scalable, low-cost and open source solution for continuous integration (CI), a technique which ensures the quality of changes to the code base during the development procedure, rather than relying on a pre-release integration phase. We demonstrate that a CI-based workflow, due to rapid feedback about code integration problems and tracking of code health measures, enabled substantial increases in productivity for a major neuroinformatics project and additional benefits for three further projects. Beyond the scope of the current study, we identify multiple areas in which CI can be employed to further increase the quality of neuroinformatics projects by improving development practices and incorporating appropriate development tools. Finally, we discuss what measures can be taken to lower the barrier for developers of neuroinformatics applications to adopt this useful technique. PMID:23316158

A theoretical basis for the analysis of redundant software subject to coincident errors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eckhardt, D. E., Jr.; Lee, L. D.

1985-01-01

Fundamental to the development of redundant software techniques fault-tolerant software, is an understanding of the impact of multiple-joint occurrences of coincident errors. A theoretical basis for the study of redundant software is developed which provides a probabilistic framework for empirically evaluating the effectiveness of the general (N-Version) strategy when component versions are subject to coincident errors, and permits an analytical study of the effects of these errors. The basic assumptions of the model are: (1) independently designed software components are chosen in a random sample; and (2) in the user environment, the system is required to execute on a stationary input series. The intensity of coincident errors, has a central role in the model. This function describes the propensity to introduce design faults in such a way that software components fail together when executing in the user environment. The model is used to give conditions under which an N-Version system is a better strategy for reducing system failure probability than relying on a single version of software. A condition which limits the effectiveness of a fault-tolerant strategy is studied, and it is posted whether system failure probability varies monotonically with increasing N or whether an optimal choice of N exists.

Certified Binaries for Software Components

DTIC Science & Technology

2007-09-01

is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense. The Software Engineering Institute is a federally funded research and development center sponsored...by the U.S. Department of Defense. Copyright 2007 Carnegie Mellon University. NO WARRANTY THIS CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY AND SOFTWARE ENGINEERING

caGrid 1.0: a Grid enterprise architecture for cancer research.

PubMed

Oster, Scott; Langella, Stephen; Hastings, Shannon; Ervin, David; Madduri, Ravi; Kurc, Tahsin; Siebenlist, Frank; Covitz, Peter; Shanbhag, Krishnakant; Foster, Ian; Saltz, Joel

2007-10-11

caGrid is the core Grid architecture of the NCI-sponsored cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIG) program. The current release, caGrid version 1.0, is developed as the production Grid software infrastructure of caBIG. Based on feedback from adopters of the previous version (caGrid 0.5), it has been significantly enhanced with new features and improvements to existing components. This paper presents an overview of caGrid 1.0, its main components, and enhancements over caGrid 0.5.

Software-engineering challenges of building and deploying reusable problem solvers.

PubMed

O'Connor, Martin J; Nyulas, Csongor; Tu, Samson; Buckeridge, David L; Okhmatovskaia, Anna; Musen, Mark A

2009-11-01

Problem solving methods (PSMs) are software components that represent and encode reusable algorithms. They can be combined with representations of domain knowledge to produce intelligent application systems. A goal of research on PSMs is to provide principled methods and tools for composing and reusing algorithms in knowledge-based systems. The ultimate objective is to produce libraries of methods that can be easily adapted for use in these systems. Despite the intuitive appeal of PSMs as conceptual building blocks, in practice, these goals are largely unmet. There are no widely available tools for building applications using PSMs and no public libraries of PSMs available for reuse. This paper analyzes some of the reasons for the lack of widespread adoptions of PSM techniques and illustrate our analysis by describing our experiences developing a complex, high-throughput software system based on PSM principles. We conclude that many fundamental principles in PSM research are useful for building knowledge-based systems. In particular, the task-method decomposition process, which provides a means for structuring knowledge-based tasks, is a powerful abstraction for building systems of analytic methods. However, despite the power of PSMs in the conceptual modeling of knowledge-based systems, software engineering challenges have been seriously underestimated. The complexity of integrating control knowledge modeled by developers using PSMs with the domain knowledge that they model using ontologies creates a barrier to widespread use of PSM-based systems. Nevertheless, the surge of recent interest in ontologies has led to the production of comprehensive domain ontologies and of robust ontology-authoring tools. These developments present new opportunities to leverage the PSM approach.

Software-engineering challenges of building and deploying reusable problem solvers

PubMed Central

O’CONNOR, MARTIN J.; NYULAS, CSONGOR; TU, SAMSON; BUCKERIDGE, DAVID L.; OKHMATOVSKAIA, ANNA; MUSEN, MARK A.

2012-01-01

Problem solving methods (PSMs) are software components that represent and encode reusable algorithms. They can be combined with representations of domain knowledge to produce intelligent application systems. A goal of research on PSMs is to provide principled methods and tools for composing and reusing algorithms in knowledge-based systems. The ultimate objective is to produce libraries of methods that can be easily adapted for use in these systems. Despite the intuitive appeal of PSMs as conceptual building blocks, in practice, these goals are largely unmet. There are no widely available tools for building applications using PSMs and no public libraries of PSMs available for reuse. This paper analyzes some of the reasons for the lack of widespread adoptions of PSM techniques and illustrate our analysis by describing our experiences developing a complex, high-throughput software system based on PSM principles. We conclude that many fundamental principles in PSM research are useful for building knowledge-based systems. In particular, the task–method decomposition process, which provides a means for structuring knowledge-based tasks, is a powerful abstraction for building systems of analytic methods. However, despite the power of PSMs in the conceptual modeling of knowledge-based systems, software engineering challenges have been seriously underestimated. The complexity of integrating control knowledge modeled by developers using PSMs with the domain knowledge that they model using ontologies creates a barrier to widespread use of PSM-based systems. Nevertheless, the surge of recent interest in ontologies has led to the production of comprehensive domain ontologies and of robust ontology-authoring tools. These developments present new opportunities to leverage the PSM approach. PMID:23565031

The Knowledge-Based Software Assistant: Beyond CASE

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Carozzoni, Joseph A.

1993-01-01

This paper will outline the similarities and differences between two paradigms of software development. Both support the whole software life cycle and provide automation for most of the software development process, but have different approaches. The CASE approach is based on a set of tools linked by a central data repository. This tool-based approach is data driven and views software development as a series of sequential steps, each resulting in a product. The Knowledge-Based Software Assistant (KBSA) approach, a radical departure from existing software development practices, is knowledge driven and centers around a formalized software development process. KBSA views software development as an incremental, iterative, and evolutionary process with development occurring at the specification level.

GFam: a platform for automatic annotation of gene families.

PubMed

Sasidharan, Rajkumar; Nepusz, Tamás; Swarbreck, David; Huala, Eva; Paccanaro, Alberto

2012-10-01

We have developed GFam, a platform for automatic annotation of gene/protein families. GFam provides a framework for genome initiatives and model organism resources to build domain-based families, derive meaningful functional labels and offers a seamless approach to propagate functional annotation across periodic genome updates. GFam is a hybrid approach that uses a greedy algorithm to chain component domains from InterPro annotation provided by its 12 member resources followed by a sequence-based connected component analysis of un-annotated sequence regions to derive consensus domain architecture for each sequence and subsequently generate families based on common architectures. Our integrated approach increases sequence coverage by 7.2 percentage points and residue coverage by 14.6 percentage points higher than the coverage relative to the best single-constituent database within InterPro for the proteome of Arabidopsis. The true power of GFam lies in maximizing annotation provided by the different InterPro data sources that offer resource-specific coverage for different regions of a sequence. GFam's capability to capture higher sequence and residue coverage can be useful for genome annotation, comparative genomics and functional studies. GFam is a general-purpose software and can be used for any collection of protein sequences. The software is open source and can be obtained from http://www.paccanarolab.org/software/gfam/.

Maximum Entropy Discrimination Poisson Regression for Software Reliability Modeling.

PubMed

Chatzis, Sotirios P; Andreou, Andreas S

2015-11-01

Reliably predicting software defects is one of the most significant tasks in software engineering. Two of the major components of modern software reliability modeling approaches are: 1) extraction of salient features for software system representation, based on appropriately designed software metrics and 2) development of intricate regression models for count data, to allow effective software reliability data modeling and prediction. Surprisingly, research in the latter frontier of count data regression modeling has been rather limited. More specifically, a lack of simple and efficient algorithms for posterior computation has made the Bayesian approaches appear unattractive, and thus underdeveloped in the context of software reliability modeling. In this paper, we try to address these issues by introducing a novel Bayesian regression model for count data, based on the concept of max-margin data modeling, effected in the context of a fully Bayesian model treatment with simple and efficient posterior distribution updates. Our novel approach yields a more discriminative learning technique, making more effective use of our training data during model inference. In addition, it allows of better handling uncertainty in the modeled data, which can be a significant problem when the training data are limited. We derive elegant inference algorithms for our model under the mean-field paradigm and exhibit its effectiveness using the publicly available benchmark data sets.

g-PRIME: A Free, Windows Based Data Acquisition and Event Analysis Software Package for Physiology in Classrooms and Research Labs.

PubMed

Lott, Gus K; Johnson, Bruce R; Bonow, Robert H; Land, Bruce R; Hoy, Ronald R

2009-01-01

We present g-PRIME, a software based tool for physiology data acquisition, analysis, and stimulus generation in education and research. This software was developed in an undergraduate neurophysiology course and strongly influenced by instructor and student feedback. g-PRIME is a free, stand-alone, windows application coded and "compiled" in Matlab (does not require a Matlab license). g-PRIME supports many data acquisition interfaces from the PC sound card to expensive high throughput calibrated equipment. The program is designed as a software oscilloscope with standard trigger modes, multi-channel visualization controls, and data logging features. Extensive analysis options allow real time and offline filtering of signals, multi-parameter threshold-and-window based event detection, and two-dimensional display of a variety of parameters including event time, energy density, maximum FFT frequency component, max/min amplitudes, and inter-event rate and intervals. The software also correlates detected events with another simultaneously acquired source (event triggered average) in real time or offline. g-PRIME supports parameter histogram production and a variety of elegant publication quality graphics outputs. A major goal of this software is to merge powerful engineering acquisition and analysis tools with a biological approach to studies of nervous system function.

Model-Based Trade Space Exploration for Near-Earth Space Missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cohen, Ronald H.; Boncyk, Wayne; Brutocao, James; Beveridge, Iain

2005-01-01

We developed a capability for model-based trade space exploration to be used in the conceptual design of Earth-orbiting space missions. We have created a set of reusable software components to model various subsystems and aspects of space missions. Several example mission models were created to test the tools and process. This technique and toolset has demonstrated itself to be valuable for space mission architectural design.

Mathematical modeling and computer simulation of isoelectric focusing with electrochemically defined ampholytes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Palusinski, O. A.; Allgyer, T. T.; Mosher, R. A.; Bier, M.; Saville, D. A.

1981-01-01

A mathematical model of isoelectric focusing at the steady state has been developed for an M-component system of electrochemically defined ampholytes. The model is formulated from fundamental principles describing the components' chemical equilibria, mass transfer resulting from diffusion and electromigration, and electroneutrality. The model consists of ordinary differential equations coupled with a system of algebraic equations. The model is implemented on a digital computer using FORTRAN-based simulation software. Computer simulation data are presented for several two-component systems showing the effects of varying the isoelectric points and dissociation constants of the constituents.

Software Framework for Development of Web-GIS Systems for Analysis of Georeferenced Geophysical Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Okladnikov, I.; Gordov, E. P.; Titov, A. G.

2011-12-01

Georeferenced datasets (meteorological databases, modeling and reanalysis results, remote sensing products, etc.) are currently actively used in numerous applications including modeling, interpretation and forecast of climatic and ecosystem changes for various spatial and temporal scales. Due to inherent heterogeneity of environmental datasets as well as their size which might constitute up to tens terabytes for a single dataset at present studies in the area of climate and environmental change require a special software support. A dedicated software framework for rapid development of providing such support information-computational systems based on Web-GIS technologies has been created. The software framework consists of 3 basic parts: computational kernel developed using ITTVIS Interactive Data Language (IDL), a set of PHP-controllers run within specialized web portal, and JavaScript class library for development of typical components of web mapping application graphical user interface (GUI) based on AJAX technology. Computational kernel comprise of number of modules for datasets access, mathematical and statistical data analysis and visualization of results. Specialized web-portal consists of web-server Apache, complying OGC standards Geoserver software which is used as a base for presenting cartographical information over the Web, and a set of PHP-controllers implementing web-mapping application logic and governing computational kernel. JavaScript library aiming at graphical user interface development is based on GeoExt library combining ExtJS Framework and OpenLayers software. Based on the software framework an information-computational system for complex analysis of large georeferenced data archives was developed. Structured environmental datasets available for processing now include two editions of NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis, JMA/CRIEPI JRA-25 Reanalysis, ECMWF ERA-40 Reanalysis, ECMWF ERA Interim Reanalysis, MRI/JMA APHRODITE's Water Resources Project Reanalysis, meteorological observational data for the territory of the former USSR for the 20th century, and others. Current version of the system is already involved into a scientific research process. Particularly, recently the system was successfully used for analysis of Siberia climate changes and its impact in the region. The software framework presented allows rapid development of Web-GIS systems for geophysical data analysis thus providing specialists involved into multidisciplinary research projects with reliable and practical instruments for complex analysis of climate and ecosystems changes on global and regional scales. This work is partially supported by RFBR grants #10-07-00547, #11-05-01190, and SB RAS projects 4.31.1.5, 4.31.2.7, 4, 8, 9, 50 and 66.

Estimating Software Effort Hours for Major Defense Acquisition Programs

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wallshein, Corinne C.

2010-01-01

Software Cost Estimation (SCE) uses labor hours or effort required to conceptualize, develop, integrate, test, field, or maintain program components. Department of Defense (DoD) SCE can use initial software data parameters to project effort hours for large, software-intensive programs for contractors reporting the top levels of process maturity,…

Using Selection Pressure as an Asset to Develop Reusable, Adaptable Software Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Berrick, S. W.; Lynnes, C.

2007-12-01

The Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) at NASA has over the years developed and honed a number of reusable architectural components for supporting large-scale data centers with a large customer base. These include a processing system (S4PM) and an archive system (S4PA) based upon a workflow engine called the Simple, Scalable, Script-based Science Processor (S4P); an online data visualization and analysis system (Giovanni); and the radically simple and fast data search tool, Mirador. These subsystems are currently reused internally in a variety of combinations to implement customized data management on behalf of instrument science teams and other science investigators. Some of these subsystems (S4P and S4PM) have also been reused by other data centers for operational science processing. Our experience has been that development and utilization of robust, interoperable, and reusable software systems can actually flourish in environments defined by heterogeneous commodity hardware systems, the emphasis on value-added customer service, and continual cost reduction pressures. The repeated internal reuse that is fostered by such an environment encourages and even forces changes to the software that make it more reusable and adaptable. Allowing and even encouraging such selective pressures to software development has been a key factor in the success of S4P and S4PM, which are now available to the open source community under the NASA Open Source Agreement.

Fuzzy/Neural Software Estimates Costs of Rocket-Engine Tests

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Douglas, Freddie; Bourgeois, Edit Kaminsky

2005-01-01

The Highly Accurate Cost Estimating Model (HACEM) is a software system for estimating the costs of testing rocket engines and components at Stennis Space Center. HACEM is built on a foundation of adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference systems (ANFIS) a hybrid software concept that combines the adaptive capabilities of neural networks with the ease of development and additional benefits of fuzzy-logic-based systems. In ANFIS, fuzzy inference systems are trained by use of neural networks. HACEM includes selectable subsystems that utilize various numbers and types of inputs, various numbers of fuzzy membership functions, and various input-preprocessing techniques. The inputs to HACEM are parameters of specific tests or series of tests. These parameters include test type (component or engine test), number and duration of tests, and thrust level(s) (in the case of engine tests). The ANFIS in HACEM are trained by use of sets of these parameters, along with costs of past tests. Thereafter, the user feeds HACEM a simple input text file that contains the parameters of a planned test or series of tests, the user selects the desired HACEM subsystem, and the subsystem processes the parameters into an estimate of cost(s).

Automation and hypermedia technology applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jupin, Joseph H.; Ng, Edward W.; James, Mark L.

1993-01-01

This paper represents a progress report on HyLite (Hypermedia Library technology): a research and development activity to produce a versatile system as part of NASA's technology thrusts in automation, information sciences, and communications. HyLite can be used as a system or tool to facilitate the creation and maintenance of large distributed electronic libraries. The contents of such a library may be software components, hardware parts or designs, scientific data sets or databases, configuration management information, etc. Proliferation of computer use has made the diversity and quantity of information too large for any single user to sort, process, and utilize effectively. In response to this information deluge, we have created HyLite to enable the user to process relevant information into a more efficient organization for presentation, retrieval, and readability. To accomplish this end, we have incorporated various AI techniques into the HyLite hypermedia engine to facilitate parameters and properties of the system. The proposed techniques include intelligent searching tools for the libraries, intelligent retrievals, and navigational assistance based on user histories. HyLite itself is based on an earlier project, the Encyclopedia of Software Components (ESC) which used hypermedia to facilitate and encourage software reuse.

Sensor Open System Architecture (SOSA) evolution for collaborative standards development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Collier, Charles Patrick; Lipkin, Ilya; Davidson, Steven A.; Baldwin, Rusty; Orlovsky, Michael C.; Ibrahim, Tim

2017-04-01

The Sensor Open System Architecture (SOSA) is a C4ISR-focused technical and economic collaborative effort between the Air Force, Navy, Army, the Department of Defense (DoD), Industry, and other Governmental agencies to develop (and incorporate) a technical Open Systems Architecture standard in order to maximize C4ISR sub-system, system, and platform affordability, re-configurability, and hardware/software/firmware re-use. The SOSA effort will effectively create an operational and technical framework for the integration of disparate payloads into C4ISR systems; with a focus on the development of a modular decomposition (defining functions and behaviors) and associated key interfaces (physical and logical) for common multi-purpose architecture for radar, EO/IR, SIGINT, EW, and Communications. SOSA addresses hardware, software, and mechanical/electrical interfaces. The modular decomposition will produce a set of re-useable components, interfaces, and sub-systems that engender reusable capabilities. This, in effect, creates a realistic and affordable ecosystem enabling mission effectiveness through systematic re-use of all available re-composed hardware, software, and electrical/mechanical base components and interfaces. To this end, SOSA will leverage existing standards as much as possible and evolve the SOSA architecture through modification, reuse, and enhancements to achieve C4ISR goals. This paper will present accomplishments over the first year of SOSA initiative.

Control System Architectures, Technologies and Concepts for Near Term and Future Human Exploration of Space

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Boulanger, Richard; Overland, David

2004-01-01

Technologies that facilitate the design and control of complex, hybrid, and resource-constrained systems are examined. This paper focuses on design methodologies, and system architectures, not on specific control methods that may be applied to life support subsystems. Honeywell and Boeing have estimated that 60-80Y0 of the effort in developing complex control systems is software development, and only 20-40% is control system development. It has also been shown that large software projects have failure rates of as high as 50-65%. Concepts discussed include the Unified Modeling Language (UML) and design patterns with the goal of creating a self-improving, self-documenting system design process. Successful architectures for control must not only facilitate hardware to software integration, but must also reconcile continuously changing software with much less frequently changing hardware. These architectures rely on software modules or components to facilitate change. Architecting such systems for change leverages the interfaces between these modules or components.

45 CFR 307.5 - Mandatory computerized support enforcement systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... hardware, operational system software, and electronic linkages with the separate components of an... plans to use and how they will interface with the base system; (3) Provide documentation that the... and for operating costs including hardware, operational software and applications software of a...

45 CFR 307.5 - Mandatory computerized support enforcement systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... hardware, operational system software, and electronic linkages with the separate components of an... plans to use and how they will interface with the base system; (3) Provide documentation that the... and for operating costs including hardware, operational software and applications software of a...

45 CFR 307.5 - Mandatory computerized support enforcement systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... hardware, operational system software, and electronic linkages with the separate components of an... plans to use and how they will interface with the base system; (3) Provide documentation that the... and for operating costs including hardware, operational software and applications software of a...

An Open Source Tool to Test Interoperability

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bermudez, L. E.

2012-12-01

Scientists interact with information at various levels from gathering of the raw observed data to accessing portrayed processed quality control data. Geoinformatics tools help scientist on the acquisition, storage, processing, dissemination and presentation of geospatial information. Most of the interactions occur in a distributed environment between software components that take the role of either client or server. The communication between components includes protocols, encodings of messages and managing of errors. Testing of these communication components is important to guarantee proper implementation of standards. The communication between clients and servers can be adhoc or follow standards. By following standards interoperability between components increase while reducing the time of developing new software. The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), not only coordinates the development of standards but also, within the Compliance Testing Program (CITE), provides a testing infrastructure to test clients and servers. The OGC Web-based Test Engine Facility, based on TEAM Engine, allows developers to test Web services and clients for correct implementation of OGC standards. TEAM Engine is a JAVA open source facility, available at Sourceforge that can be run via command line, deployed in a web servlet container or integrated in developer's environment via MAVEN. The TEAM Engine uses the Compliance Test Language (CTL) and TestNG to test HTTP requests, SOAP services and XML instances against Schemas and Schematron based assertions of any type of web service, not only OGC services. For example, the OGC Web Feature Service (WFS) 1.0.0 test has more than 400 test assertions. Some of these assertions includes conformance of HTTP responses, conformance of GML-encoded data; proper values for elements and attributes in the XML; and, correct error responses. This presentation will provide an overview of TEAM Engine, introduction of how to test via the OGC Testing web site and description of performing local tests. It will also provide information about how to participate in the open source code development of TEAM Engine.

RESEARCH AND DESIGN ABOUT VERSATILE 3D-CAD ENGINE FOR CONSTRUCTION

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tanaka, Shigenori; Kubota, Satoshi; Kitagawa, Etsuji; Monobe, Kantaro; Nakamura, Kenji

In the construction field of Japan, it is an important subject to build the environment where 3D-CAD data is used for CALS/EC, information construction, and an improvement in productivity. However, in the construction field, 3D-CAD software does not exist under the present circumstances. Then, in order to support development of domestic 3D-CAD software, it is required to develop a 3D-CAD engine. In this research, in order to familiarize the 3D-CAD software at low cost and quickly and build the environment where the 3D-CAD software is utilizable, investigation for designing a 3D-CAD engine is proposed. The target for investigation are the use scene of 3D-CAD, the seeds which accompany 3D-CAD, a standardization trend, existing products, IT component engineering. Based on results of the investigation, the functional requirements for the 3D-CAD engine for the construction field were concluded.

MORTICIA, a statistical analysis software package for determining optical surveillance system effectiveness.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ramkilowan, A.; Griffith, D. J.

2017-10-01

Surveillance modelling in terms of the standard Detect, Recognise and Identify (DRI) thresholds remains a key requirement for determining the effectiveness of surveillance sensors. With readily available computational resources it has become feasible to perform statistically representative evaluations of the effectiveness of these sensors. A new capability for performing this Monte-Carlo type analysis is demonstrated in the MORTICIA (Monte- Carlo Optical Rendering for Theatre Investigations of Capability under the Influence of the Atmosphere) software package developed at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). This first generation, python-based open-source integrated software package, currently in the alpha stage of development aims to provide all the functionality required to perform statistical investigations of the effectiveness of optical surveillance systems in specific or generic deployment theatres. This includes modelling of the mathematical and physical processes that govern amongst other components of a surveillance system; a sensor's detector and optical components, a target and its background as well as the intervening atmospheric influences. In this paper we discuss integral aspects of the bespoke framework that are critical to the longevity of all subsequent modelling efforts. Additionally, some preliminary results are presented.

An overview of the mathematical and statistical analysis component of RICIS

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hallum, Cecil R.

1987-01-01

Mathematical and statistical analysis components of RICIS (Research Institute for Computing and Information Systems) can be used in the following problem areas: (1) quantification and measurement of software reliability; (2) assessment of changes in software reliability over time (reliability growth); (3) analysis of software-failure data; and (4) decision logic for whether to continue or stop testing software. Other areas of interest to NASA/JSC where mathematical and statistical analysis can be successfully employed include: math modeling of physical systems, simulation, statistical data reduction, evaluation methods, optimization, algorithm development, and mathematical methods in signal processing.

An Assessment of Integrated Health Management (IHM) Frameworks

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

N. Lybeck; M. Tawfik; L. Bond

In order to meet the ever increasing demand for energy, the United States nuclear industry is turning to life extension of existing nuclear power plants (NPPs). Economically ensuring the safe, secure, and reliable operation of aging nuclear power plants presents many challenges. The 2009 Light Water Reactor Sustainability Workshop identified online monitoring of active and structural components as essential to the better understanding and management of the challenges posed by aging nuclear power plants. Additionally, there is increasing adoption of condition-based maintenance (CBM) for active components in NPPs. These techniques provide a foundation upon which a variety of advanced onlinemore » surveillance, diagnostic, and prognostic techniques can be deployed to continuously monitor and assess the health of NPP systems and components. The next step in the development of advanced online monitoring is to move beyond CBM to estimating the remaining useful life of active components using prognostic tools. Deployment of prognostic health management (PHM) on the scale of a NPP requires the use of an integrated health management (IHM) framework - a software product (or suite of products) used to manage the necessary elements needed for a complete implementation of online monitoring and prognostics. This paper provides a thoughtful look at the desirable functions and features of IHM architectures. A full PHM system involves several modules, including data acquisition, system modeling, fault detection, fault diagnostics, system prognostics, and advisory generation (operations and maintenance planning). The standards applicable to PHM applications are indentified and summarized. A list of evaluation criteria for PHM software products, developed to ensure scalability of the toolset to an environment with the complexity of a NPP, is presented. Fourteen commercially available PHM software products are identified and classified into four groups: research tools, PHM system development tools, deployable architectures, and peripheral tools.« less

The ALMA common software: dispatch from the trenches

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schwarz, J.; Sommer, H.; Jeram, B.; Sekoranja, M.; Chiozzi, G.; Grimstrup, A.; Caproni, A.; Paredes, C.; Allaert, E.; Harrington, S.; Turolla, S.; Cirami, R.

2008-07-01

The ALMA Common Software (ACS) provides both an application framework and CORBA-based middleware for the distributed software system of the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. Building upon open-source tools such as the JacORB, TAO and OmniORB ORBs, ACS supports the development of component-based software in any of three languages: Java, C++ and Python. Now in its seventh major release, ACS has matured, both in its feature set as well as in its reliability and performance. However, it is only recently that the ALMA observatory's hardware and application software has reached a level at which it can exploit and challenge the infrastructure that ACS provides. In particular, the availability of an Antenna Test Facility(ATF) at the site of the Very Large Array in New Mexico has enabled us to exercise and test the still evolving end-to-end ALMA software under realistic conditions. The major focus of ACS, consequently, has shifted from the development of new features to consideration of how best to use those that already exist. Configuration details which could be neglected for the purpose of running unit tests or skeletal end-to-end simulations have turned out to be sensitive levers for achieving satisfactory performance in a real-world environment. Surprising behavior in some open-source tools has required us to choose between patching code that we did not write or addressing its deficiencies by implementing workarounds in our own software. We will discuss these and other aspects of our recent experience at the ATF and in simulation.

Autonomous Cryogenic Load Operations: Knowledge-Based Autonomous Test Engineer

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schrading, J. Nicolas

2013-01-01

The Knowledge-Based Autonomous Test Engineer (KATE) program has a long history at KSC. Now a part of the Autonomous Cryogenic Load Operations (ACLO) mission, this software system has been sporadically developed over the past 20 years. Originally designed to provide health and status monitoring for a simple water-based fluid system, it was proven to be a capable autonomous test engineer for determining sources of failure in the system. As part of a new goal to provide this same anomaly-detection capability for a complicated cryogenic fluid system, software engineers, physicists, interns and KATE experts are working to upgrade the software capabilities and graphical user interface. Much progress was made during this effort to improve KATE. A display of the entire cryogenic system's graph, with nodes for components and edges for their connections, was added to the KATE software. A searching functionality was added to the new graph display, so that users could easily center their screen on specific components. The GUI was also modified so that it displayed information relevant to the new project goals. In addition, work began on adding new pneumatic and electronic subsystems into the KATE knowledge base, so that it could provide health and status monitoring for those systems. Finally, many fixes for bugs, memory leaks, and memory errors were implemented and the system was moved into a state in which it could be presented to stakeholders. Overall, the KATE system was improved and necessary additional features were added so that a presentation of the program and its functionality in the next few months would be a success.

Propulsion Diagnostic Method Evaluation Strategy (ProDiMES) User's Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Simon, Donald L.

2010-01-01

This report is a User's Guide for the Propulsion Diagnostic Method Evaluation Strategy (ProDiMES). ProDiMES is a standard benchmarking problem and a set of evaluation metrics to enable the comparison of candidate aircraft engine gas path diagnostic methods. This Matlab (The Mathworks, Inc.) based software tool enables users to independently develop and evaluate diagnostic methods. Additionally, a set of blind test case data is also distributed as part of the software. This will enable the side-by-side comparison of diagnostic approaches developed by multiple users. The Users Guide describes the various components of ProDiMES, and provides instructions for the installation and operation of the tool.

Genoviz Software Development Kit: Java tool kit for building genomics visualization applications.

PubMed

Helt, Gregg A; Nicol, John W; Erwin, Ed; Blossom, Eric; Blanchard, Steven G; Chervitz, Stephen A; Harmon, Cyrus; Loraine, Ann E

2009-08-25

Visualization software can expose previously undiscovered patterns in genomic data and advance biological science. The Genoviz Software Development Kit (SDK) is an open source, Java-based framework designed for rapid assembly of visualization software applications for genomics. The Genoviz SDK framework provides a mechanism for incorporating adaptive, dynamic zooming into applications, a desirable feature of genome viewers. Visualization capabilities of the Genoviz SDK include automated layout of features along genetic or genomic axes; support for user interactions with graphical elements (Glyphs) in a map; a variety of Glyph sub-classes that promote experimentation with new ways of representing data in graphical formats; and support for adaptive, semantic zooming, whereby objects change their appearance depending on zoom level and zooming rate adapts to the current scale. Freely available demonstration and production quality applications, including the Integrated Genome Browser, illustrate Genoviz SDK capabilities. Separation between graphics components and genomic data models makes it easy for developers to add visualization capability to pre-existing applications or build new applications using third-party data models. Source code, documentation, sample applications, and tutorials are available at http://genoviz.sourceforge.net/.

artdaq: DAQ software development made simple

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Biery, Kurt; Flumerfelt, Eric; Freeman, John; Ketchum, Wesley; Lukhanin, Gennadiy; Rechenmacher, Ron

2017-10-01

For a few years now, the artdaq data acquisition software toolkit has provided numerous experiments with ready-to-use components which allow for rapid development and deployment of DAQ systems. Developed within the Fermilab Scientific Computing Division, artdaq provides data transfer, event building, run control, and event analysis functionality. This latter feature includes built-in support for the art event analysis framework, allowing experiments to run art modules for real-time filtering, compression, disk writing and online monitoring. As art, also developed at Fermilab, is also used for offline analysis, a major advantage of artdaq is that it allows developers to easily switch between developing online and offline software. artdaq continues to be improved. Support for an alternate mode of running whereby data from some subdetector components are only streamed if requested has been added; this option will reduce unnecessary DAQ throughput. Real-time reporting of DAQ metrics has been implemented, along with the flexibility to choose the format through which experiments receive the reports; these formats include the Ganglia, Graphite and syslog software packages, along with flat ASCII files. Additionally, work has been performed investigating more flexible modes of online monitoring, including the capability to run multiple online monitoring processes on different hosts, each running its own set of art modules. Finally, a web-based GUI interface through which users can configure details of their DAQ system has been implemented, increasing the ease of use of the system. Already successfully deployed on the LArlAT, DarkSide-50, DUNE 35ton and Mu2e experiments, artdaq will be employed for SBND and is a strong candidate for use on ICARUS and protoDUNE. With each experiment comes new ideas for how artdaq can be made more flexible and powerful. The above improvements will be described, along with potential ideas for the future.

Developing interpretable models with optimized set reduction for identifying high risk software components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Briand, Lionel C.; Basili, Victor R.; Hetmanski, Christopher J.

1993-01-01

Applying equal testing and verification effort to all parts of a software system is not very efficient, especially when resources are limited and scheduling is tight. Therefore, one needs to be able to differentiate low/high fault frequency components so that testing/verification effort can be concentrated where needed. Such a strategy is expected to detect more faults and thus improve the resulting reliability of the overall system. This paper presents the Optimized Set Reduction approach for constructing such models, intended to fulfill specific software engineering needs. Our approach to classification is to measure the software system and build multivariate stochastic models for predicting high risk system components. We present experimental results obtained by classifying Ada components into two classes: is or is not likely to generate faults during system and acceptance test. Also, we evaluate the accuracy of the model and the insights it provides into the error making process.

Robotics On-Board Trainer (ROBoT)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnson, Genevieve; Alexander, Greg

2013-01-01

ROBoT is an on-orbit version of the ground-based Dynamics Skills Trainer (DST) that astronauts use for training on a frequent basis. This software consists of two primary software groups. The first series of components is responsible for displaying the graphical scenes. The remaining components are responsible for simulating the Mobile Servicing System (MSS), the Japanese Experiment Module Remote Manipulator System (JEMRMS), and the H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) Free Flyer Robotics Operations. The MSS simulation software includes: Robotic Workstation (RWS) simulation, a simulation of the Space Station Remote Manipulator System (SSRMS), a simulation of the ISS Command and Control System (CCS), and a portion of the Portable Computer System (PCS) software necessary for MSS operations. These components all run under the CentOS4.5 Linux operating system. The JEMRMS simulation software includes real-time, HIL, dynamics, manipulator multi-body dynamics, and a moving object contact model with Tricks discrete time scheduling. The JEMRMS DST will be used as a functional proficiency and skills trainer for flight crews. The HTV Free Flyer Robotics Operations simulation software adds a functional simulation of HTV vehicle controllers, sensors, and data to the MSS simulation software. These components are intended to support HTV ISS visiting vehicle analysis and training. The scene generation software will use DOUG (Dynamic On-orbit Ubiquitous Graphics) to render the graphical scenes. DOUG runs on a laptop running the CentOS4.5 Linux operating system. DOUG is an Open GL-based 3D computer graphics rendering package. It uses pre-built three-dimensional models of on-orbit ISS and space shuttle systems elements, and provides realtime views of various station and shuttle configurations.

Air Force Research Laboratory Technology Milestones 2007

DTIC Science & Technology

2007-01-01

Propulsion Fuel Pumps and Fuel Systems Liquid Rockets and Combustion Gas Generators Micropropulsion Gears Monopropellants High-Cycle Fatigue and Its... Systems Electric Propulsion Engine Health Monitoring Systems High-Energy-Density Matter Exhaust Nozzles Injectors and Spray Measurements Fans Laser...of software models to drive development of component-based systems and lightweight domain-specific specification and verification technology. Highly

A theoretical basis for the analysis of multiversion software subject to coincident errors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eckhardt, D. E., Jr.; Lee, L. D.

1985-01-01

Fundamental to the development of redundant software techniques (known as fault-tolerant software) is an understanding of the impact of multiple joint occurrences of errors, referred to here as coincident errors. A theoretical basis for the study of redundant software is developed which: (1) provides a probabilistic framework for empirically evaluating the effectiveness of a general multiversion strategy when component versions are subject to coincident errors, and (2) permits an analytical study of the effects of these errors. An intensity function, called the intensity of coincident errors, has a central role in this analysis. This function describes the propensity of programmers to introduce design faults in such a way that software components fail together when executing in the application environment. A condition under which a multiversion system is a better strategy than relying on a single version is given.

From Research to Operations: Integrating Components of an Advanced Diagnostic System with an Aspect-Oriented Framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fletcher, Daryl P.; Alena, Richard L.; Akkawi, Faisal; Duncavage, Daniel P.

2004-01-01

This paper presents some of the challenges associated with bringing software projects from the research world into an operationa1 environment. While the core functional components of research-oriented software applications can have great utility in an operational setting, these applications often lack aspects important in an operational environment such as logging and security. Furthermore, these stand-alone applications, sometimes developed in isolation from one another, can produce data products useful to other applications in a software ecosystem.

Automatic calibration and signal switching system for the particle beam fusion research data acquisition facility

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Boyer, W.B.

1979-09-01

This report describes both the hardware and software components of an automatic calibration and signal system (Autocal) for the data acquisition system for the Sandia particle beam fusion research accelerators Hydra, Proto I, and Proto II. The Autocal hardware consists of off-the-shelf commercial equipment. The various hardware components, special modifications and overall system configuration are described. Special software has been developed to support the Autocal hardware. Software operation and maintenance are described.

The Five 'R's' for Developing Trusted Software Frameworks to increase confidence in, and maximise reuse of, Open Source Software.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fraser, Ryan; Gross, Lutz; Wyborn, Lesley; Evans, Ben; Klump, Jens

2015-04-01

Recent investments in HPC, cloud and Petascale data stores, have dramatically increased the scale and resolution that earth science challenges can now be tackled. These new infrastructures are highly parallelised and to fully utilise them and access the large volumes of earth science data now available, a new approach to software stack engineering needs to be developed. The size, complexity and cost of the new infrastructures mean any software deployed has to be reliable, trusted and reusable. Increasingly software is available via open source repositories, but these usually only enable code to be discovered and downloaded. As a user it is hard for a scientist to judge the suitability and quality of individual codes: rarely is there information on how and where codes can be run, what the critical dependencies are, and in particular, on the version requirements and licensing of the underlying software stack. A trusted software framework is proposed to enable reliable software to be discovered, accessed and then deployed on multiple hardware environments. More specifically, this framework will enable those who generate the software, and those who fund the development of software, to gain credit for the effort, IP, time and dollars spent, and facilitate quantification of the impact of individual codes. For scientific users, the framework delivers reviewed and benchmarked scientific software with mechanisms to reproduce results. The trusted framework will have five separate, but connected components: Register, Review, Reference, Run, and Repeat. 1) The Register component will facilitate discovery of relevant software from multiple open source code repositories. The registration process of the code should include information about licensing, hardware environments it can be run on, define appropriate validation (testing) procedures and list the critical dependencies. 2) The Review component is targeting on the verification of the software typically against a set of benchmark cases. This will be achieved by linking the code in the software framework to peer review forums such as Mozilla Science or appropriate Journals (e.g. Geoscientific Model Development Journal) to assist users to know which codes to trust. 3) Referencing will be accomplished by linking the Software Framework to groups such as Figshare or ImpactStory that help disseminate and measure the impact of scientific research, including program code. 4) The Run component will draw on information supplied in the registration process, benchmark cases described in the review and relevant information to instantiate the scientific code on the selected environment. 5) The Repeat component will tap into existing Provenance Workflow engines that will automatically capture information that relate to a particular run of that software, including identification of all input and output artefacts, and all elements and transactions within that workflow. The proposed trusted software framework will enable users to rapidly discover and access reliable code, reduce the time to deploy it and greatly facilitate sharing, reuse and reinstallation of code. Properly designed it could enable an ability to scale out to massively parallel systems and be accessed nationally/ internationally for multiple use cases, including Supercomputer centres, cloud facilities, and local computers.

Semantic Entity-Component State Management Techniques to Enhance Software Quality for Multimodal VR-Systems.

PubMed

Fischbach, Martin; Wiebusch, Dennis; Latoschik, Marc Erich

2017-04-01

Modularity, modifiability, reusability, and API usability are important software qualities that determine the maintainability of software architectures. Virtual, Augmented, and Mixed Reality (VR, AR, MR) systems, modern computer games, as well as interactive human-robot systems often include various dedicated input-, output-, and processing subsystems. These subsystems collectively maintain a real-time simulation of a coherent application state. The resulting interdependencies between individual state representations, mutual state access, overall synchronization, and flow of control implies a conceptual close coupling whereas software quality asks for a decoupling to develop maintainable solutions. This article presents five semantics-based software techniques that address this contradiction: Semantic grounding, code from semantics, grounded actions, semantic queries, and decoupling by semantics. These techniques are applied to extend the well-established entity-component-system (ECS) pattern to overcome some of this pattern's deficits with respect to the implied state access. A walk-through of central implementation aspects of a multimodal (speech and gesture) VR-interface is used to highlight the techniques' benefits. This use-case is chosen as a prototypical example of complex architectures with multiple interacting subsystems found in many VR, AR and MR architectures. Finally, implementation hints are given, lessons learned regarding maintainability pointed-out, and performance implications discussed.

Mercury: Reusable software application for Metadata Management, Data Discovery and Access

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Devarakonda, Ranjeet; Palanisamy, Giri; Green, James; Wilson, Bruce E.

2009-12-01

Mercury is a federated metadata harvesting, data discovery and access tool based on both open source packages and custom developed software. It was originally developed for NASA, and the Mercury development consortium now includes funding from NASA, USGS, and DOE. Mercury is itself a reusable toolset for metadata, with current use in 12 different projects. Mercury also supports the reuse of metadata by enabling searching across a range of metadata specification and standards including XML, Z39.50, FGDC, Dublin-Core, Darwin-Core, EML, and ISO-19115. Mercury provides a single portal to information contained in distributed data management systems. It collects metadata and key data from contributing project servers distributed around the world and builds a centralized index. The Mercury search interfaces then allow the users to perform simple, fielded, spatial and temporal searches across these metadata sources. One of the major goals of the recent redesign of Mercury was to improve the software reusability across the projects which currently fund the continuing development of Mercury. These projects span a range of land, atmosphere, and ocean ecological communities and have a number of common needs for metadata searches, but they also have a number of needs specific to one or a few projects To balance these common and project-specific needs, Mercury’s architecture includes three major reusable components; a harvester engine, an indexing system and a user interface component. The harvester engine is responsible for harvesting metadata records from various distributed servers around the USA and around the world. The harvester software was packaged in such a way that all the Mercury projects will use the same harvester scripts but each project will be driven by a set of configuration files. The harvested files are then passed to the Indexing system, where each of the fields in these structured metadata records are indexed properly, so that the query engine can perform simple, keyword, spatial and temporal searches across these metadata sources. The search user interface software has two API categories; a common core API which is used by all the Mercury user interfaces for querying the index and a customized API for project specific user interfaces. For our work in producing a reusable, portable, robust, feature-rich application, Mercury received a 2008 NASA Earth Science Data Systems Software Reuse Working Group Peer-Recognition Software Reuse Award. The new Mercury system is based on a Service Oriented Architecture and effectively reuses components for various services such as Thesaurus Service, Gazetteer Web Service and UDDI Directory Services. The software also provides various search services including: RSS, Geo-RSS, OpenSearch, Web Services and Portlets, integrated shopping cart to order datasets from various data centers (ORNL DAAC, NSIDC) and integrated visualization tools. Other features include: Filtering and dynamic sorting of search results, book-markable search results, save, retrieve, and modify search criteria.

Managing EEE part standardisation and procurement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Serieys, C.; Bensoussan, A.; Petitmangin, A.; Rigaud, M.; Barbaresco, P.; Lyan, C.

2002-12-01

This paper presents the development activities in space components selection and procurement dealing with a new data base tool implemented at Alcatel Space using TransForm softwaa re configurator developed by Techform S.A. Based on TransForm, Access Ingenierie has devv eloped a software product named OLG@DOS which facilitate the part nomenclatures analyses for new equipment design and manufacturing in term of ACCESS data base implementation. Hi-Rel EEE part type technical, production and quality information are collected and compiled usingproduction data base issued from production tools implemented for equipment definition, description and production based on Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP II Control Open) and Parametric Design Manager (PDM Work Manager). The analysis of any new equipment nomenclature may be conducted through this means for standardisation purpose, cost containment program and management procurement activities as well as preparation of Component reviews as Part Approval Document and Declared Part List validation.

SEQ-REVIEW: A tool for reviewing and checking spacecraft sequences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maldague, Pierre F.; El-Boushi, Mekki; Starbird, Thomas J.; Zawacki, Steven J.

1994-11-01

A key component of JPL's strategy to make space missions faster, better and cheaper is the Advanced Multi-Mission Operations System (AMMOS), a ground software intensive system currently in use and in further development. AMMOS intends to eliminate the cost of re-engineering a ground system for each new JPL mission. This paper discusses SEQ-REVIEW, a component of AMMOS that was designed to facilitate and automate the task of reviewing and checking spacecraft sequences. SEQ-REVIEW is a smart browser for inspecting files created by other sequence generation tools in the AMMOS system. It can parse sequence-related files according to a computer-readable version of a 'Software Interface Specification' (SIS), which is a standard document for defining file formats. It lets users display one or several linked files and check simple constraints using a Basic-like 'Little Language'. SEQ-REVIEW represents the first application of the Quality Function Development (QFD) method to sequence software development at JPL. The paper will show how the requirements for SEQ-REVIEW were defined and converted into a design based on object-oriented principles. The process starts with interviews of potential users, a small but diverse group that spans multiple disciplines and 'cultures'. It continues with the development of QFD matrices that related product functions and characteristics to user-demanded qualities. These matrices are then turned into a formal Software Requirements Document (SRD). The process concludes with the design phase, in which the CRC (Class, Responsibility, Collaboration) approach was used to convert requirements into a blueprint for the final product.

SEQ-REVIEW: A tool for reviewing and checking spacecraft sequences

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Maldague, Pierre F.; El-Boushi, Mekki; Starbird, Thomas J.; Zawacki, Steven J.

1994-01-01

A key component of JPL's strategy to make space missions faster, better and cheaper is the Advanced Multi-Mission Operations System (AMMOS), a ground software intensive system currently in use and in further development. AMMOS intends to eliminate the cost of re-engineering a ground system for each new JPL mission. This paper discusses SEQ-REVIEW, a component of AMMOS that was designed to facilitate and automate the task of reviewing and checking spacecraft sequences. SEQ-REVIEW is a smart browser for inspecting files created by other sequence generation tools in the AMMOS system. It can parse sequence-related files according to a computer-readable version of a 'Software Interface Specification' (SIS), which is a standard document for defining file formats. It lets users display one or several linked files and check simple constraints using a Basic-like 'Little Language'. SEQ-REVIEW represents the first application of the Quality Function Development (QFD) method to sequence software development at JPL. The paper will show how the requirements for SEQ-REVIEW were defined and converted into a design based on object-oriented principles. The process starts with interviews of potential users, a small but diverse group that spans multiple disciplines and 'cultures'. It continues with the development of QFD matrices that related product functions and characteristics to user-demanded qualities. These matrices are then turned into a formal Software Requirements Document (SRD). The process concludes with the design phase, in which the CRC (Class, Responsibility, Collaboration) approach was used to convert requirements into a blueprint for the final product.

The KATE shell: An implementation of model-based control, monitor and diagnosis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cornell, Matthew

1987-01-01

The conventional control and monitor software currently used by the Space Center for Space Shuttle processing has many limitations such as high maintenance costs, limited diagnostic capabilities and simulation support. These limitations have caused the development of a knowledge based (or model based) shell to generically control and monitor electro-mechanical systems. The knowledge base describes the system's structure and function and is used by a software shell to do real time constraints checking, low level control of components, diagnosis of detected faults, sensor validation, automatic generation of schematic diagrams and automatic recovery from failures. This approach is more versatile and more powerful than the conventional hard coded approach and offers many advantages over it, although, for systems which require high speed reaction times or aren't well understood, knowledge based control and monitor systems may not be appropriate.

A Review of DIMPACK Version 1.0: Conditional Covariance-Based Test Dimensionality Analysis Package

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Deng, Nina; Han, Kyung T.; Hambleton, Ronald K.

2013-01-01

DIMPACK Version 1.0 for assessing test dimensionality based on a nonparametric conditional covariance approach is reviewed. This software was originally distributed by Assessment Systems Corporation and now can be freely accessed online. The software consists of Windows-based interfaces of three components: DIMTEST, DETECT, and CCPROX/HAC, which…

Simulation Control Graphical User Interface Logging Report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hewling, Karl B., Jr.

2012-01-01

One of the many tasks of my project was to revise the code of the Simulation Control Graphical User Interface (SIM GUI) to enable logging functionality to a file. I was also tasked with developing a script that directed the startup and initialization flow of the various LCS software components. This makes sure that a software component will not spin up until all the appropriate dependencies have been configured properly. Also I was able to assist hardware modelers in verifying the configuration of models after they have been upgraded to a new software version. I developed some code that analyzes the MDL files to determine if any error were generated due to the upgrade process. Another one of the projects assigned to me was supporting the End-to-End Hardware/Software Daily Tag-up meeting.

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

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Howard, S. D.

1990-01-01

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.

Design of a nickel-hydrogen battery simulator for the NASA EOS testbed

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gur, Zvi; Mang, Xuesi; Patil, Ashok R.; Sable, Dan M.; Cho, Bo H.; Lee, Fred C.

1992-01-01

The hardware and software design of a nickel-hydrogen (Ni-H2) battery simulator (BS) with application to the NASA Earth Observation System (EOS) satellite is presented. The battery simulator is developed as a part of a complete testbed for the EOS satellite power system. The battery simulator involves both hardware and software components. The hardware component includes the capability of sourcing and sinking current at a constant programmable voltage. The software component includes the capability of monitoring the battery's ampere-hours (Ah) and programming the battery voltage according to an empirical model of the nickel-hydrogen battery stored in a computer.

A component-based system for agricultural drought monitoring by remote sensing.

PubMed

Dong, Heng; Li, Jun; Yuan, Yanbin; You, Lin; Chen, Chao

2017-01-01

In recent decades, various kinds of remote sensing-based drought indexes have been proposed and widely used in the field of drought monitoring. However, the drought-related software and platform development lag behind the theoretical research. The current drought monitoring systems focus mainly on information management and publishing, and cannot implement professional drought monitoring or parameter inversion modelling, especially the models based on multi-dimensional feature space. In view of the above problems, this paper aims at fixing this gap with a component-based system named RSDMS to facilitate the application of drought monitoring by remote sensing. The system is designed and developed based on Component Object Model (COM) to ensure the flexibility and extendibility of modules. RSDMS realizes general image-related functions such as data management, image display, spatial reference management, image processing and analysis, and further provides drought monitoring and evaluation functions based on internal and external models. Finally, China's Ningxia region is selected as the study area to validate the performance of RSDMS. The experimental results show that RSDMS provide an efficient and scalable support to agricultural drought monitoring.

A component-based system for agricultural drought monitoring by remote sensing

PubMed Central

Yuan, Yanbin; You, Lin; Chen, Chao

2017-01-01

In recent decades, various kinds of remote sensing-based drought indexes have been proposed and widely used in the field of drought monitoring. However, the drought-related software and platform development lag behind the theoretical research. The current drought monitoring systems focus mainly on information management and publishing, and cannot implement professional drought monitoring or parameter inversion modelling, especially the models based on multi-dimensional feature space. In view of the above problems, this paper aims at fixing this gap with a component-based system named RSDMS to facilitate the application of drought monitoring by remote sensing. The system is designed and developed based on Component Object Model (COM) to ensure the flexibility and extendibility of modules. RSDMS realizes general image-related functions such as data management, image display, spatial reference management, image processing and analysis, and further provides drought monitoring and evaluation functions based on internal and external models. Finally, China’s Ningxia region is selected as the study area to validate the performance of RSDMS. The experimental results show that RSDMS provide an efficient and scalable support to agricultural drought monitoring. PMID:29236700

HiCAT Software Infrastructure: Safe hardware control with object oriented Python

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Moriarty, Christopher; Brooks, Keira; Soummer, Remi

2018-01-01

High contrast imaging for Complex Aperture Telescopes (HiCAT) is a testbed designed to demonstrate coronagraphy and wavefront control for segmented on-axis space telescopes such as envisioned for LUVOIR. To limit the air movements in the testbed room, software interfaces for several different hardware components were developed to completely automate operations. When developing software interfaces for many different pieces of hardware, unhandled errors are commonplace and can prevent the software from properly closing a hardware resource. Some fragile components (e.g. deformable mirrors) can be permanently damaged because of this. We present an object oriented Python-based infrastructure to safely automate hardware control and optical experiments. Specifically, conducting high-contrast imaging experiments while monitoring humidity and power status along with graceful shutdown processes even for unexpected errors. Python contains a construct called a “context manager” that allows you define code to run when a resource is opened or closed. Context managers ensure that a resource is properly closed, even when unhandled errors occur. Harnessing the context manager design, we also use Python’s multiprocessing library to monitor humidity and power status without interrupting the experiment. Upon detecting a safety problem, the master process sends an event to the child process that triggers the context managers to gracefully close any open resources. This infrastructure allows us to queue up several experiments and safely operate the testbed without a human in the loop.

Aquarius' Object-Oriented, Plug and Play Component-Based Flight Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Murray, Alexander; Shahabuddin, Mohammad

2013-01-01

The Aquarius mission involves a combined radiometer and radar instrument in low-Earth orbit, providing monthly global maps of Sea Surface Salinity. Operating successfully in orbit since June, 2011, the spacecraft bus was furnished by the Argentine space agency, Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE). The instrument, built jointly by NASA's Caltech/JPL and Goddard Space Flight Center, has been successfully producing expectation-exceeding data since it was powered on in August of 2011. In addition to the radiometer and scatterometer, the instrument contains an command & data-handling subsystem with a computer and flight software (FSW) that is responsible for managing the instrument, its operation, and its data. Aquarius' FSW is conceived and architected as a Component-based system, in which the running software consists of a set of Components, each playing a distinctive role in the subsystem, instantiated and connected together at runtime. Component architectures feature a well-defined set of interfaces between the Components, visible and analyzable at the architectural level (see [1]). As we will describe, this kind of an architecture offers significant advantages over more traditional FSW architectures, which often feature a monolithic runtime structure. Component-based software is enabled by Object-Oriented (OO) techniques and languages, the use of which again is not typical in space mission FSW. We will argue in this paper that the use of OO design methods and tools (especially the Unified Modeling Language), as well as the judicious usage of C++, are very well suited to FSW applications, and we will present Aquarius FSW, describing our methods, processes, and design, as a successful case in point.

Distributed Software for Observations in the Near Infrared

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gavryusev, V.; Baffa, C.; Giani, E.

We have developed an integrated system that performs astronomical observations in Near Infrared bands operating two-dimensional instruments at the Italian National Infrared Facility's \\htmllink{ARNICA}{http://helios.arcetri.astro.it:/home/idefix/Mosaic/ instr/arnica/arnica.html} and \\htmllink{LONGSP}{http://helios.arcetri.astro.it:/home/idefix/Mosaic/ instr/longsp/longsp.html}. This software consists of several communicating processes, generally executed across a network, as well as on a single computer. The user interface is organized as widget-based X11 client. The interprocess communication is provided by sockets and uses TCP/IP. The processes denoted for control of hardware (telescope and other instruments) should be executed currently on a PC dedicated for this task under DESQview/X, while all other components (user interface, tools for the data analysis, etc.) can also work under UNIX\\@. The hardware independent part of software is based on the Athena Widget Set and is compiled by GNU C to provide maximum portability.

Vision Based Localization in Urban Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

McHenry, Michael; Cheng, Yang; Matthies, Larry

2005-01-01

As part of DARPA's MARS2020 program, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory developed a vision-based system for localization in urban environments that requires neither GPS nor active sensors. System hardware consists of a pair of small FireWire cameras and a standard Pentium-based computer. The inputs to the software system consist of: 1) a crude grid-based map describing the positions of buildings, 2) an initial estimate of robot location and 3) the video streams produced by each camera. At each step during the traverse the system: captures new image data, finds image features hypothesized to lie on the outside of a building, computes the range to those features, determines an estimate of the robot's motion since the previous step and combines that data with the map to update a probabilistic representation of the robot's location. This probabilistic representation allows the system to simultaneously represent multiple possible locations, For our testing, we have derived the a priori map manually using non-orthorectified overhead imagery, although this process could be automated. The software system consists of two primary components. The first is the vision system which uses binocular stereo ranging together with a set of heuristics to identify features likely to be part of building exteriors and to compute an estimate of the robot's motion since the previous step. The resulting visual features and the associated range measurements are software component, a particle-filter based localization system. This system uses the map and the then fed to the second primary most recent results from the vision system to update the estimate of the robot's location. This report summarizes the design of both the hardware and software and will include the results of applying the system to the global localization of a robot over an approximately half-kilometer traverse across JPL'S Pasadena campus.

Software Engineering Program: Software Process Improvement Guidebook

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1996-01-01

The purpose of this document is to provide experience-based guidance in implementing a software process improvement program in any NASA software development or maintenance community. This guidebook details how to define, operate, and implement a working software process improvement program. It describes the concept of the software process improvement program and its basic organizational components. It then describes the structure, organization, and operation of the software process improvement program, illustrating all these concepts with specific NASA examples. The information presented in the document is derived from the experiences of several NASA software organizations, including the SEL, the SEAL, and the SORCE. Their experiences reflect many of the elements of software process improvement within NASA. This guidebook presents lessons learned in a form usable by anyone considering establishing a software process improvement program within his or her own environment. This guidebook attempts to balance general and detailed information. It provides material general enough to be usable by NASA organizations whose characteristics do not directly match those of the sources of the information and models presented herein. It also keeps the ideas sufficiently close to the sources of the practical experiences that have generated the models and information.

Gesture Based Control and EMG Decomposition

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wheeler, Kevin R.; Chang, Mindy H.; Knuth, Kevin H.

2005-01-01

This paper presents two probabilistic developments for use with Electromyograms (EMG). First described is a new-electric interface for virtual device control based on gesture recognition. The second development is a Bayesian method for decomposing EMG into individual motor unit action potentials. This more complex technique will then allow for higher resolution in separating muscle groups for gesture recognition. All examples presented rely upon sampling EMG data from a subject's forearm. The gesture based recognition uses pattern recognition software that has been trained to identify gestures from among a given set of gestures. The pattern recognition software consists of hidden Markov models which are used to recognize the gestures as they are being performed in real-time from moving averages of EMG. Two experiments were conducted to examine the feasibility of this interface technology. The first replicated a virtual joystick interface, and the second replicated a keyboard. Moving averages of EMG do not provide easy distinction between fine muscle groups. To better distinguish between different fine motor skill muscle groups we present a Bayesian algorithm to separate surface EMG into representative motor unit action potentials. The algorithm is based upon differential Variable Component Analysis (dVCA) [l], [2] which was originally developed for Electroencephalograms. The algorithm uses a simple forward model representing a mixture of motor unit action potentials as seen across multiple channels. The parameters of this model are iteratively optimized for each component. Results are presented on both synthetic and experimental EMG data. The synthetic case has additive white noise and is compared with known components. The experimental EMG data was obtained using a custom linear electrode array designed for this study.

Integration of genomic and medical data into a 3D atlas of human anatomy.

PubMed

Turinsky, Andrei L; Fanea, Elena; Trinh, Quang; Dong, Xiaoli; Stromer, Julie N; Shu, Xueling; Wat, Stephen; Hallgrímsson, Benedikt; Hill, Jonathan W; Edwards, Carol; Grosenick, Brenda; Yajima, Masumi; Sensen, Christoph W

2008-01-01

We have developed a framework for the visual integration and exploration of multi-scale biomedical data, which includes anatomical and molecular components. We have also created a Java-based software system that integrates molecular information, such as gene expression data, into a three-dimensional digital atlas of the male adult human anatomy. Our atlas is structured according to the Terminologia Anatomica. The underlying data-indexing mechanism uses open standards and semantic ontology-processing tools to establish the associations between heterogeneous data types. The software system makes an extensive use of virtual reality visualization.

Advantages of Brahms for Specifying and Implementing a Multiagent Human-Robotic Exploration System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clancey, William J.; Sierhuis, Maarten; Kaskiris, Charis; vanHoof, Ron

2003-01-01

We have developed a model-based, distributed architecture that integrates diverse components in a system designed for lunar and planetary surface operations: an astronaut's space suit, cameras, all-terrain vehicles, robotic assistant, crew in a local habitat, and mission support team. Software processes ('agents') implemented in the Brahms language, run on multiple, mobile platforms. These mobile agents interpret and transform available data to help people and robotic systems coordinate their actions to make operations more safe and efficient. The Brahms-based mobile agent architecture (MAA) uses a novel combination of agent types so the software agents may understand and facilitate communications between people and between system components. A state-of-the-art spoken dialogue interface is integrated with Brahms models, supporting a speech-driven field observation record and rover command system. An important aspect of the methodology involves first simulating the entire system in Brahms, then configuring the agents into a runtime system Thus, Brahms provides a language, engine, and system builder's toolkit for specifying and implementing multiagent systems.

Tele-rehabilitation using in-house wearable ankle rehabilitation robot.

PubMed

Jamwal, Prashant K; Hussain, Shahid; Mir-Nasiri, Nazim; Ghayesh, Mergen H; Xie, Sheng Q

2018-01-01

This article explores wide-ranging potential of the wearable ankle robot for in-house rehabilitation. The presented robot has been conceptualized following a brief analysis of the existing technologies, systems, and solutions for in-house physical ankle rehabilitation. Configuration design analysis and component selection for ankle robot have been discussed as part of the conceptual design. The complexities of human robot interaction are closely encountered while maneuvering a rehabilitation robot. We present a fuzzy logic-based controller to perform the required robot-assisted ankle rehabilitation treatment. Designs of visual haptic interfaces have also been discussed, which will make the treatment interesting, and the subject will be motivated to exert more and regain lost functions rapidly. The complex nature of web-based communication between user and remotely sitting physiotherapy staff has also been discussed. A high-level software architecture appended with robot ensures user-friendly operations. This software is made up of three important components: patient-related database, graphical user interface (GUI), and a library of exercises creating virtual reality-specifically developed for ankle rehabilitation.

Software development kit for a compact cryo-refrigerator

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gardiner, J.; Hamilton, J.; Lawton, J.; Knight, K.; Wilson, A.; Spagna, S.

2017-12-01

This paper introduces a Software Development Kit (SDK) that enables the creation of custom software applications that automate the control of a cryo-refrigerator (Quantum Design model GA-1) in third party instruments. A remote interface allows real time tracking and logging of critical system diagnostics such as pressures, temperatures, valve states and run modes. The helium compressor scroll capsule speed and Gifford-McMahon (G-M) cold head speed can be manually adjusted over a serial communication line via a CAN interface. This configuration optimizes cooling power, while reducing wear on moving components thus extending service life. Additionally, a proportional speed control mode allows for automated throttling of speeds based on temperature or pressure feedback from a 3rd party device. Warm up and cool down modes allow 1st and 2nd stage temperatures to be adjusted without the use of external heaters.

The Open AUC Project.

PubMed

Cölfen, Helmut; Laue, Thomas M; Wohlleben, Wendel; Schilling, Kristian; Karabudak, Engin; Langhorst, Bradley W; Brookes, Emre; Dubbs, Bruce; Zollars, Dan; Rocco, Mattia; Demeler, Borries

2010-02-01

Progress in analytical ultracentrifugation (AUC) has been hindered by obstructions to hardware innovation and by software incompatibility. In this paper, we announce and outline the Open AUC Project. The goals of the Open AUC Project are to stimulate AUC innovation by improving instrumentation, detectors, acquisition and analysis software, and collaborative tools. These improvements are needed for the next generation of AUC-based research. The Open AUC Project combines on-going work from several different groups. A new base instrument is described, one that is designed from the ground up to be an analytical ultracentrifuge. This machine offers an open architecture, hardware standards, and application programming interfaces for detector developers. All software will use the GNU Public License to assure that intellectual property is available in open source format. The Open AUC strategy facilitates collaborations, encourages sharing, and eliminates the chronic impediments that have plagued AUC innovation for the last 20 years. This ultracentrifuge will be equipped with multiple and interchangeable optical tracks so that state-of-the-art electronics and improved detectors will be available for a variety of optical systems. The instrument will be complemented by a new rotor, enhanced data acquisition and analysis software, as well as collaboration software. Described here are the instrument, the modular software components, and a standardized database that will encourage and ease integration of data analysis and interpretation software.

Fault Tree Analysis Application for Safety and Reliability

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wallace, Dolores R.

2003-01-01

Many commercial software tools exist for fault tree analysis (FTA), an accepted method for mitigating risk in systems. The method embedded in the tools identifies a root as use in system components, but when software is identified as a root cause, it does not build trees into the software component. No commercial software tools have been built specifically for development and analysis of software fault trees. Research indicates that the methods of FTA could be applied to software, but the method is not practical without automated tool support. With appropriate automated tool support, software fault tree analysis (SFTA) may be a practical technique for identifying the underlying cause of software faults that may lead to critical system failures. We strive to demonstrate that existing commercial tools for FTA can be adapted for use with SFTA, and that applied to a safety-critical system, SFTA can be used to identify serious potential problems long before integrator and system testing.

Arbitrary Shape Deformation in CFD Design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Landon, Mark; Perry, Ernest

2014-01-01

Sculptor(R) is a commercially available software tool, based on an Arbitrary Shape Design (ASD), which allows the user to perform shape optimization for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) design. The developed software tool provides important advances in the state-of-the-art of automatic CFD shape deformations and optimization software. CFD is an analysis tool that is used by engineering designers to help gain a greater understanding of the fluid flow phenomena involved in the components being designed. The next step in the engineering design process is to then modify, the design to improve the components' performance. This step has traditionally been performed manually via trial and error. Two major problems that have, in the past, hindered the development of an automated CFD shape optimization are (1) inadequate shape parameterization algorithms, and (2) inadequate algorithms for CFD grid modification. The ASD that has been developed as part of the Sculptor(R) software tool is a major advancement in solving these two issues. First, the ASD allows the CFD designer to freely create his own shape parameters, thereby eliminating the restriction of only being able to use the CAD model parameters. Then, the software performs a smooth volumetric deformation, which eliminates the extremely costly process of having to remesh the grid for every shape change (which is how this process had previously been achieved). Sculptor(R) can be used to optimize shapes for aerodynamic and structural design of spacecraft, aircraft, watercraft, ducts, and other objects that affect and are affected by flows of fluids and heat. Sculptor(R) makes it possible to perform, in real time, a design change that would manually take hours or days if remeshing were needed.

Voice and gesture-based 3D multimedia presentation tool

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fukutake, Hiromichi; Akazawa, Yoshiaki; Okada, Yoshihiro

2007-09-01

This paper proposes a 3D multimedia presentation tool that allows the user to manipulate intuitively only through the voice input and the gesture input without using a standard keyboard or a mouse device. The authors developed this system as a presentation tool to be used in a presentation room equipped a large screen like an exhibition room in a museum because, in such a presentation environment, it is better to use voice commands and the gesture pointing input rather than using a keyboard or a mouse device. This system was developed using IntelligentBox, which is a component-based 3D graphics software development system. IntelligentBox has already provided various types of 3D visible, reactive functional components called boxes, e.g., a voice input component and various multimedia handling components. IntelligentBox also provides a dynamic data linkage mechanism called slot-connection that allows the user to develop 3D graphics applications by combining already existing boxes through direct manipulations on a computer screen. Using IntelligentBox, the 3D multimedia presentation tool proposed in this paper was also developed as combined components only through direct manipulations on a computer screen. The authors have already proposed a 3D multimedia presentation tool using a stage metaphor and its voice input interface. This time, we extended the system to make it accept the user gesture input besides voice commands. This paper explains details of the proposed 3D multimedia presentation tool and especially describes its component-based voice and gesture input interfaces.

A Common DPU Platform for ESA JUICE Mission Instruments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aberg, Martin; Hellstrom, Daniel; Samuelsson, Arne; Torelli, Felice

2016-08-01

This paper describes the resulting hardware and software platform based on GR712RC [1] LEON3-FT that Cobham Gaisler developed in accordance with the common system requirements of the ten scientific instruments on-board the ESA JUICE spacecraft destined the Jupiter system [8].The radiation hardened DPU platform features EDAC protected boot, application memory and working memory of configurable sizes and SpaceWire, FPGA I/O-32/16/8, GPIO, UART and SPI I/O interfaces. The design has undergone PSA, Risk, WCA, Radiation analyses etc. to justify component and design choices resulting in a robust design that can be used in spacecrafts requiring a total dose up to 100krad(Si). The prototype board manufactured uses engineering models of the flight components to ensure that development is representative.Validated boot, standby and driver software accommodates the various DPU platform configurations. The boot performs low-level DPU initialization, standby handles OBC SpaceWire communication and finally the loading and executing of application images typically stored in the non-volatile application memory.

Collision of Physics and Software in the Monte Carlo Application Toolkit (MCATK)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sweezy, Jeremy Ed

2016-01-21

The topic is presented in a series of slides organized as follows: MCATK overview, development strategy, available algorithms, problem modeling (sources, geometry, data, tallies), parallelism, miscellaneous tools/features, example MCATK application, recent areas of research, and summary and future work. MCATK is a C++ component-based Monte Carlo neutron-gamma transport software library with continuous energy neutron and photon transport. Designed to build specialized applications and to provide new functionality in existing general-purpose Monte Carlo codes like MCNP, it reads ACE formatted nuclear data generated by NJOY. The motivation behind MCATK was to reduce costs. MCATK physics involves continuous energy neutron & gammamore » transport with multi-temperature treatment, static eigenvalue (k eff and α) algorithms, time-dependent algorithm, and fission chain algorithms. MCATK geometry includes mesh geometries and solid body geometries. MCATK provides verified, unit-test Monte Carlo components, flexibility in Monte Carlo application development, and numerous tools such as geometry and cross section plotters.« less

Existing Fortran interfaces to Trilinos in preparation for exascale ForTrilinos development

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Evans, Katherine J.; Young, Mitchell T.; Collins, Benjamin S.

This report summarizes the current state of Fortran interfaces to the Trilinos library within several key applications of the Exascale Computing Program (ECP), with the aim of informing developers about strategies to develop ForTrilinos, an exascale-ready, Fortran interface software package within Trilinos. The two software projects assessed within are the DOE Office of Science's Accelerated Climate Model for Energy (ACME) atmosphere component, CAM, and the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy's core-simulator portion of VERA, a nuclear reactor simulation code. Trilinos is an object-oriented, C++ based software project, and spans a collection of algorithms and other enabling technologies such as uncertaintymore » quantification and mesh generation. To date, Trilinos has enabled these codes to achieve large-scale simulation results, however the simulation needs of CAM and VERA-CS will approach exascale over the next five years. A Fortran interface to Trilinos that enables efficient use of programming models and more advanced algorithms is necessary. Where appropriate, the needs of the CAM and VERA-CS software to achieve their simulation goals are called out specifically. With this report, a design document and execution plan for ForTrilinos development can proceed.« less

Robonaut's Flexible Information Technology Infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Askew, Scott; Bluethmann, William; Alder, Ken; Ambrose, Robert

2003-01-01

Robonaut, NASA's humanoid robot, is designed to work as both an astronaut assistant and, in certain situations, an astronaut surrogate. This highly dexterous robot performs complex tasks under telepresence control that could previously only be carried out directly by humans. Currently with 47 degrees of freedom (DOF), Robonaut is a state-of-the-art human size telemanipulator system. while many of Robonaut's embedded components have been custom designed to meet packaging or environmental requirements, the primary computing systems used in Robonaut are currently commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) products which have some correlation to flight qualified computer systems. This loose coupling of information technology (IT) resources allows Robonaut to exploit cost effective solutions while floating the technology base to take advantage of the rapid pace of IT advances. These IT systems utilize a software development environment, which is both compatible with COTS hardware as well as flight proven computing systems, preserving the majority of software development for a flight system. The ability to use highly integrated and flexible COTS software development tools improves productivity while minimizing redesign for a space flight system. Further, the flexibility of Robonaut's software and communication architecture has allowed it to become a widely used distributed development testbed for integrating new capabilities and furthering experimental research.

Automatic discovery of the communication network topology for building a supercomputer model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sobolev, Sergey; Stefanov, Konstantin; Voevodin, Vadim

2016-10-01

The Research Computing Center of Lomonosov Moscow State University is developing the Octotron software suite for automatic monitoring and mitigation of emergency situations in supercomputers so as to maximize hardware reliability. The suite is based on a software model of the supercomputer. The model uses a graph to describe the computing system components and their interconnections. One of the most complex components of a supercomputer that needs to be included in the model is its communication network. This work describes the proposed approach for automatically discovering the Ethernet communication network topology in a supercomputer and its description in terms of the Octotron model. This suite automatically detects computing nodes and switches, collects information about them and identifies their interconnections. The application of this approach is demonstrated on the "Lomonosov" and "Lomonosov-2" supercomputers.

Butterfly valve in a virtual environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Talekar, Aniruddha; Patil, Saurabh; Thakre, Prashant; Rajkumar, E.

2017-11-01

Assembly of components is one of the processes involved in product design and development. The present paper deals with the assembly of a simple butterfly valve components in a virtual environment. The assembly has been carried out using virtual reality software by trial and error methods. The parts are modelled using parametric software (SolidWorks), meshed accordingly, and then called into virtual environment for assembly.

Reconfigurable vision system for real-time applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Torres-Huitzil, Cesar; Arias-Estrada, Miguel

2002-03-01

Recently, a growing community of researchers has used reconfigurable systems to solve computationally intensive problems. Reconfigurability provides optimized processors for systems on chip designs, and makes easy to import technology to a new system through reusable modules. The main objective of this work is the investigation of a reconfigurable computer system targeted for computer vision and real-time applications. The system is intended to circumvent the inherent computational load of most window-based computer vision algorithms. It aims to build a system for such tasks by providing an FPGA-based hardware architecture for task specific vision applications with enough processing power, using the minimum amount of hardware resources as possible, and a mechanism for building systems using this architecture. Regarding the software part of the system, a library of pre-designed and general-purpose modules that implement common window-based computer vision operations is being investigated. A common generic interface is established for these modules in order to define hardware/software components. These components can be interconnected to develop more complex applications, providing an efficient mechanism for transferring image and result data among modules. Some preliminary results are presented and discussed.

Brahms Mobile Agents: Architecture and Field Tests

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clancey, William J.; Sierhuis, Maarten; Kaskiris, Charis; vanHoof, Ron

2002-01-01

We have developed a model-based, distributed architecture that integrates diverse components in a system designed for lunar and planetary surface operations: an astronaut's space suit, cameras, rover/All-Terrain Vehicle (ATV), robotic assistant, other personnel in a local habitat, and a remote mission support team (with time delay). Software processes, called agents, implemented in the Brahms language, run on multiple, mobile platforms. These mobile agents interpret and transform available data to help people and robotic systems coordinate their actions to make operations more safe and efficient. The Brahms-based mobile agent architecture (MAA) uses a novel combination of agent types so the software agents may understand and facilitate communications between people and between system components. A state-of-the-art spoken dialogue interface is integrated with Brahms models, supporting a speech-driven field observation record and rover command system (e.g., return here later and bring this back to the habitat ). This combination of agents, rover, and model-based spoken dialogue interface constitutes a personal assistant. An important aspect of the methodology involves first simulating the entire system in Brahms, then configuring the agents into a run-time system.

Access Control of Web- and Java-Based Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tso, Kam S.; Pajevski, Michael J.

2013-01-01

Cybersecurity has become a great concern as threats of service interruption, unauthorized access, stealing and altering of information, and spreading of viruses have become more prevalent and serious. Application layer access control of applications is a critical component in the overall security solution that also includes encryption, firewalls, virtual private networks, antivirus, and intrusion detection. An access control solution, based on an open-source access manager augmented with custom software components, was developed to provide protection to both Web-based and Javabased client and server applications. The DISA Security Service (DISA-SS) provides common access control capabilities for AMMOS software applications through a set of application programming interfaces (APIs) and network- accessible security services for authentication, single sign-on, authorization checking, and authorization policy management. The OpenAM access management technology designed for Web applications can be extended to meet the needs of Java thick clients and stand alone servers that are commonly used in the JPL AMMOS environment. The DISA-SS reusable components have greatly reduced the effort for each AMMOS subsystem to develop its own access control strategy. The novelty of this work is that it leverages an open-source access management product that was designed for Webbased applications to provide access control for Java thick clients and Java standalone servers. Thick clients and standalone servers are still commonly used in businesses and government, especially for applications that require rich graphical user interfaces and high-performance visualization that cannot be met by thin clients running on Web browsers

Fusing Symbolic and Numerical Diagnostic Computations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

James, Mark

2007-01-01

X-2000 Anomaly Detection Language denotes a developmental computing language, and the software that establishes and utilizes the language, for fusing two diagnostic computer programs, one implementing a numerical analysis method, the other implementing a symbolic analysis method into a unified event-based decision analysis software system for realtime detection of events (e.g., failures) in a spacecraft, aircraft, or other complex engineering system. The numerical analysis method is performed by beacon-based exception analysis for multi-missions (BEAMs), which has been discussed in several previous NASA Tech Briefs articles. The symbolic analysis method is, more specifically, an artificial-intelligence method of the knowledge-based, inference engine type, and its implementation is exemplified by the Spacecraft Health Inference Engine (SHINE) software. The goal in developing the capability to fuse numerical and symbolic diagnostic components is to increase the depth of analysis beyond that previously attainable, thereby increasing the degree of confidence in the computed results. In practical terms, the sought improvement is to enable detection of all or most events, with no or few false alarms.

Computational model for fuel component supply into a combustion chamber of LRE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Teterev, A. V.; Mandrik, P. A.; Rudak, L. V.; Misyuchenko, N. I.

2017-12-01

A 2D-3D computational model for calculating a flow inside jet injectors that feed fuel components to a combustion chamber of a liquid rocket engine is described. The model is based on the gasdynamic calculation of compressible medium. Model software provides calculation of both one- and two-component injectors. Flow simulation in two-component injectors is realized using the scheme of separate supply of “gas-gas” or “gas-liquid” fuel components. An algorithm for converting a continuous liquid medium into a “cloud” of drops is described. Application areas of the developed model and the results of 2D simulation of injectors to obtain correction factors in the calculation formulas for fuel supply are discussed.

An integrated software suite for surface-based analyses of cerebral cortex.

PubMed

Van Essen, D C; Drury, H A; Dickson, J; Harwell, J; Hanlon, D; Anderson, C H

2001-01-01

The authors describe and illustrate an integrated trio of software programs for carrying out surface-based analyses of cerebral cortex. The first component of this trio, SureFit (Surface Reconstruction by Filtering and Intensity Transformations), is used primarily for cortical segmentation, volume visualization, surface generation, and the mapping of functional neuroimaging data onto surfaces. The second component, Caret (Computerized Anatomical Reconstruction and Editing Tool Kit), provides a wide range of surface visualization and analysis options as well as capabilities for surface flattening, surface-based deformation, and other surface manipulations. The third component, SuMS (Surface Management System), is a database and associated user interface for surface-related data. It provides for efficient insertion, searching, and extraction of surface and volume data from the database.

An integrated software suite for surface-based analyses of cerebral cortex

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Van Essen, D. C.; Drury, H. A.; Dickson, J.; Harwell, J.; Hanlon, D.; Anderson, C. H.

2001-01-01

The authors describe and illustrate an integrated trio of software programs for carrying out surface-based analyses of cerebral cortex. The first component of this trio, SureFit (Surface Reconstruction by Filtering and Intensity Transformations), is used primarily for cortical segmentation, volume visualization, surface generation, and the mapping of functional neuroimaging data onto surfaces. The second component, Caret (Computerized Anatomical Reconstruction and Editing Tool Kit), provides a wide range of surface visualization and analysis options as well as capabilities for surface flattening, surface-based deformation, and other surface manipulations. The third component, SuMS (Surface Management System), is a database and associated user interface for surface-related data. It provides for efficient insertion, searching, and extraction of surface and volume data from the database.

Improving the Accuracy of Software-Based Energy Analysis for Residential Buildings (Presentation)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Polly, B.

2011-09-01

This presentation describes the basic components of software-based energy analysis for residential buildings, explores the concepts of 'error' and 'accuracy' when analysis predictions are compared to measured data, and explains how NREL is working to continuously improve the accuracy of energy analysis methods.

Integrating model behavior, optimization, and sensitivity/uncertainty analysis: overview and application of the MOUSE software toolbox

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

This paper provides an overview of the Model Optimization, Uncertainty, and SEnsitivity Analysis (MOUSE) software application, an open-source, Java-based toolbox of visual and numerical analysis components for the evaluation of environmental models. MOUSE is based on the OPTAS model calibration syst...

Recent Survey and Application of the simSUNDT Software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Persson, G.; Wirdelius, H.

2010-02-01

The simSUNDT software is based on a previous developed program (SUNDT). The latest version has been customized in order to generate realistic synthetic data (including a grain noise model), compatible with a number of off-line analysis software. The software consists of a Windows®-based preprocessor and postprocessor together with a mathematical kernel (UTDefect), dealing with the actual mathematical modeling. The model employs various integral transforms and integral equation and enables simulations of the entire ultrasonic testing situation. The model is completely three-dimensional though the simulated component is two-dimensional, bounded by the scanning surface and a planar back surface as an option. It is of great importance that inspection methods that are applied are proper validated and that their capability of detection of cracks and defects are quantified. In order to achieve this, statistical methods such as Probability of Detection (POD) often are applied, with the ambition to estimate the detectability as a function of defect size. Despite the fact that the proposed procedure with the utilization of test pieces is very expensive, it also tends to introduce a number of possible misalignments between the actual NDT situation that is to be performed and the proposed experimental simulation. The presentation will describe the developed model that will enable simulation of a phased array NDT inspection and the ambition to use this simulation software to generate POD information. The paper also includes the most recent developments of the model including some initial experimental validation of the phased array probe model.

Integrated Online Software for Libraries: An Overview of Today's Best-Selling IOLS. Options from the U.S. Perspective.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cibbarelli, Pamela

1996-01-01

Profiles the top-selling IOLS (integrated online library systems) software for libraries based on sales figures reported in the 1996 "Library Journal" annual survey of the library automation marketplace. Highlights include microcomputer-based systems and minicomputer-based systems, system components, MARC formats, and market sectors.…

Comparison of Fiber Optic Strain Demodulation Implementations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Quach, Cuong C.; Vazquez, Sixto L.

2005-01-01

NASA Langley Research Center is developing instrumentation based upon principles of Optical Frequency-Domain Reflectometry (OFDR) for the provision of large-scale, dense distribution of strain sensors using fiber optics embedded with Bragg gratings. Fiber Optic Bragg Grating technology enables the distribution of thousands of sensors immune to moisture and electromagnetic interference with negligible weight penalty. At Langley, this technology provides a key component for research and development relevant to comprehensive aerospace vehicle structural health monitoring. A prototype system is under development that includes hardware and software necessary for the acquisition of data from an optical network and conversion of the data into strain measurements. This report documents the steps taken to verify the software that implements the algorithm for calculating the fiber strain. Brief descriptions of the strain measurement system and the test article are given. The scope of this report is the verification of software implementations as compared to a reference model. The algorithm will be detailed along with comparison results.

CrossTalk: The Journal of Defense Software Engineering. Volume 21, Number 1

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-01-01

project manage- ment and the individual components of the software life-cycle model ; it will be awarded for...software professionals that had been formally educated in software project manage- ment. The study indicated that our industry is lacking in program managers...soft- ware developments get bigger, more complicated, and more dependent on senior software pro- fessionals to get the project on the right path

Visualizing Java uncertainty

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Knight, Claire; Munro, Malcolm

2001-07-01

Distributed component based systems seem to be the immediate future for software development. The use of such techniques, object oriented languages, and the combination with ever more powerful higher-level frameworks has led to the rapid creation and deployment of such systems to cater for the demand of internet and service driven business systems. This diversity of solution through both components utilised and the physical/virtual locations of those components can provide powerful resolutions to the new demand. The problem lies in the comprehension and maintenance of such systems because they then have inherent uncertainty. The components combined at any given time for a solution may differ, the messages generated, sent, and/or received may differ, and the physical/virtual locations cannot be guaranteed. Trying to account for this uncertainty and to build in into analysis and comprehension tools is important for both development and maintenance activities.

Automated reuseable components system study results

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gilroy, Kathy

1989-01-01

The Automated Reusable Components System (ARCS) was developed under a Phase 1 Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) contract for the U.S. Army CECOM. The objectives of the ARCS program were: (1) to investigate issues associated with automated reuse of software components, identify alternative approaches, and select promising technologies, and (2) to develop tools that support component classification and retrieval. The approach followed was to research emerging techniques and experimental applications associated with reusable software libraries, to investigate the more mature information retrieval technologies for applicability, and to investigate the applicability of specialized technologies to improve the effectiveness of a reusable component library. Various classification schemes and retrieval techniques were identified and evaluated for potential application in an automated library system for reusable components. Strategies for library organization and management, component submittal and storage, and component search and retrieval were developed. A prototype ARCS was built to demonstrate the feasibility of automating the reuse process. The prototype was created using a subset of the classification and retrieval techniques that were investigated. The demonstration system was exercised and evaluated using reusable Ada components selected from the public domain. A requirements specification for a production-quality ARCS was also developed.

Modernization of the NASA IRTF Telescope Control System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pilger, Eric J.; Harwood, James V.; Onaka, Peter M.

1994-06-01

We describe the ongoing modernization of the NASA IR Telescope Facility Telescope Control System. A major mandate of this project is to keep the telescope available for observations throughout. Therefore, we have developed an incremental plan that will allow us to replace components of the software and hardware without shutting down the system. The current system, running under FORTH on a DEC LSI 11/23 minicomputer interfaced to a Bus and boards developed in house, will be replaced with a combination of a Sun SPARCstation running SunOS, a MicroSPARC based Single Board Computer running LynxOS, and various intelligent VME based peripheral cards. The software is based on a design philosophy originally developed by Pat Wallace for use on the Anglo Australian Telescope. This philosophy has gained wide acceptance, and is currently used in a number of observatories around the world. A key element of this philosophy is the division of the TCS into `Virtual' and `Real' parts. This will allow us to replace the higher level functions of the TCS with software running on the Sun, while still relying on the LSI 11/23 for performance of the lower level functions. Eventual transfer of lower level functions to the MicroSPARC system will then proceed incrementally through use of a Q-Bus to VME-Bus converter.

Bushland Evapotranspiration and Agricultural Remote Sensing System (BEARS) software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gowda, P. H.; Moorhead, J.; Brauer, D. K.

2017-12-01

Evapotranspiration (ET) is a major component of the hydrologic cycle. ET data are used for a variety of water management and research purposes such as irrigation scheduling, water and crop modeling, streamflow, water availability, and many more. Remote sensing products have been widely used to create spatially representative ET data sets which provide important information from field to regional scales. As UAV capabilities increase, remote sensing use is likely to also increase. For that purpose, scientists at the USDA-ARS research laboratory in Bushland, TX developed the Bushland Evapotranspiration and Agricultural Remote Sensing System (BEARS) software. The BEARS software is a Java based software that allows users to process remote sensing data to generate ET outputs using predefined models, or enter custom equations and models. The capability to define new equations and build new models expands the applicability of the BEARS software beyond ET mapping to any remote sensing application. The software also includes an image viewing tool that allows users to visualize outputs, as well as draw an area of interest using various shapes. This software is freely available from the USDA-ARS Conservation and Production Research Laboratory website.

An embedded system developed for hand held assay used in water monitoring

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Lin; Wang, Jianwei; Ramakrishna, Bharath; Hsueh, Mingkai; Liu, Jonathan; Wu, Qufei; Wu, Chao-Cheng; Cao, Mang; Chang, Chein-I.; Jensen, Janet L.; Jensen, James O.; Knapp, Harlan; Daniel, Robert; Yin, Ray

2005-11-01

The US Army Joint Service Agent Water Monitor (JSAWM) program is currently interested in an approach that can implement a hardware- designed device in ticket-based hand-held assay (currently being developed) used for chemical/biological agent detection. This paper presents a preliminary investigation of the proof of concept. Three components are envisioned to accomplish the task. One is the ticket development which has been undertaken by the ANP, Inc. Another component is the software development which has been carried out by the Remote Sensing Signal and Image Processing Laboratory (RSSIPL) at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). A third component is an embedded system development which can be used to drive the UMBC-developed software to analyze the ANP-developed HHA tickets on a small pocket-size device like a PDA. The main focus of this paper is to investigate the third component that is viable and is yet to be explored. In order to facilitate to prove the concept, a flatbed scanner is used to replace a ticket reader to serve as an input device. The Stargate processor board is used as the embedded System with Embedded Linux installed. It is connected to an input device such as scanner as well as output devices such as LCD display or laptop etc. It executes the C-Coded processing program developed for this embedded system and outputs its findings on a display device. The embedded system to be developed and investigated in this paper is the core of a future hardware device. Several issues arising in such an embedded system will be addressed. Finally, the proof-of-concept pilot embedded system will be demonstrated.

Real-Time 12-Lead High-Frequency QRS Electrocardiography for Enhanced Detection of Myocardial Ischemia and Coronary Artery Disease

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schlegel, Todd T.; Kulecz, Walter B.; DePalma, Jude L.; Feiveson, Alan H.; Wilson, John S.; Rahman, M. Atiar; Bungo, Michael W.

2004-01-01

Several studies have shown that diminution of the high-frequency (HF; 150-250 Hz) components present within the central portion of the QRS complex of an electrocardiogram (ECG) is a more sensitive indicator for the presence of myocardial ischemia than are changes in the ST segments of the conventional low-frequency ECG. However, until now, no device has been capable of displaying, in real time on a beat-to-beat basis, changes in these HF QRS ECG components in a continuously monitored patient. Although several software programs have been designed to acquire the HF components over the entire QRS interval, such programs have involved laborious off-line calculations and postprocessing, limiting their clinical utility. We describe a personal computer-based ECG software program developed recently at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) that acquires, analyzes, and displays HF QRS components in each of the 12 conventional ECG leads in real time. The system also updates these signals and their related derived parameters in real time on a beat-to-beat basis for any chosen monitoring period and simultaneously displays the diagnostic information from the conventional (low-frequency) 12-lead ECG. The real-time NASA HF QRS ECG software is being evaluated currently in multiple clinical settings in North America. We describe its potential usefulness in the diagnosis of myocardial ischemia and coronary artery disease.

An intelligent knowledge-based and customizable home care system framework with ubiquitous patient monitoring and alerting techniques.

PubMed

Chen, Yen-Lin; Chiang, Hsin-Han; Yu, Chao-Wei; Chiang, Chuan-Yen; Liu, Chuan-Ming; Wang, Jenq-Haur

2012-01-01

This study develops and integrates an efficient knowledge-based system and a component-based framework to design an intelligent and flexible home health care system. The proposed knowledge-based system integrates an efficient rule-based reasoning model and flexible knowledge rules for determining efficiently and rapidly the necessary physiological and medication treatment procedures based on software modules, video camera sensors, communication devices, and physiological sensor information. This knowledge-based system offers high flexibility for improving and extending the system further to meet the monitoring demands of new patient and caregiver health care by updating the knowledge rules in the inference mechanism. All of the proposed functional components in this study are reusable, configurable, and extensible for system developers. Based on the experimental results, the proposed intelligent homecare system demonstrates that it can accomplish the extensible, customizable, and configurable demands of the ubiquitous healthcare systems to meet the different demands of patients and caregivers under various rehabilitation and nursing conditions.

An Intelligent Knowledge-Based and Customizable Home Care System Framework with Ubiquitous Patient Monitoring and Alerting Techniques

PubMed Central

Chen, Yen-Lin; Chiang, Hsin-Han; Yu, Chao-Wei; Chiang, Chuan-Yen; Liu, Chuan-Ming; Wang, Jenq-Haur

2012-01-01

This study develops and integrates an efficient knowledge-based system and a component-based framework to design an intelligent and flexible home health care system. The proposed knowledge-based system integrates an efficient rule-based reasoning model and flexible knowledge rules for determining efficiently and rapidly the necessary physiological and medication treatment procedures based on software modules, video camera sensors, communication devices, and physiological sensor information. This knowledge-based system offers high flexibility for improving and extending the system further to meet the monitoring demands of new patient and caregiver health care by updating the knowledge rules in the inference mechanism. All of the proposed functional components in this study are reusable, configurable, and extensible for system developers. Based on the experimental results, the proposed intelligent homecare system demonstrates that it can accomplish the extensible, customizable, and configurable demands of the ubiquitous healthcare systems to meet the different demands of patients and caregivers under various rehabilitation and nursing conditions. PMID:23112650

Development of KSC program for investigating and generating field failure rates. Volume 1: Summary and overview

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bean, E. E.; Bloomquist, C. E.

1972-01-01

A summary of the KSC program for investigating the reliability aspects of the ground support activities is presented. An analysis of unsatisfactory condition reports (RC), and the generation of reliability assessment of components based on the URC are discussed along with the design considerations for attaining reliable real time hardware/software configurations.

Knowledge Based Cloud FE Simulation of Sheet Metal Forming Processes.

PubMed

Zhou, Du; Yuan, Xi; Gao, Haoxiang; Wang, Ailing; Liu, Jun; El Fakir, Omer; Politis, Denis J; Wang, Liliang; Lin, Jianguo

2016-12-13

The use of Finite Element (FE) simulation software to adequately predict the outcome of sheet metal forming processes is crucial to enhancing the efficiency and lowering the development time of such processes, whilst reducing costs involved in trial-and-error prototyping. Recent focus on the substitution of steel components with aluminum alloy alternatives in the automotive and aerospace sectors has increased the need to simulate the forming behavior of such alloys for ever more complex component geometries. However these alloys, and in particular their high strength variants, exhibit limited formability at room temperature, and high temperature manufacturing technologies have been developed to form them. Consequently, advanced constitutive models are required to reflect the associated temperature and strain rate effects. Simulating such behavior is computationally very expensive using conventional FE simulation techniques. This paper presents a novel Knowledge Based Cloud FE (KBC-FE) simulation technique that combines advanced material and friction models with conventional FE simulations in an efficient manner thus enhancing the capability of commercial simulation software packages. The application of these methods is demonstrated through two example case studies, namely: the prediction of a material's forming limit under hot stamping conditions, and the tool life prediction under multi-cycle loading conditions.

Knowledge Based Cloud FE Simulation of Sheet Metal Forming Processes

PubMed Central

Zhou, Du; Yuan, Xi; Gao, Haoxiang; Wang, Ailing; Liu, Jun; El Fakir, Omer; Politis, Denis J.; Wang, Liliang; Lin, Jianguo

2016-01-01

The use of Finite Element (FE) simulation software to adequately predict the outcome of sheet metal forming processes is crucial to enhancing the efficiency and lowering the development time of such processes, whilst reducing costs involved in trial-and-error prototyping. Recent focus on the substitution of steel components with aluminum alloy alternatives in the automotive and aerospace sectors has increased the need to simulate the forming behavior of such alloys for ever more complex component geometries. However these alloys, and in particular their high strength variants, exhibit limited formability at room temperature, and high temperature manufacturing technologies have been developed to form them. Consequently, advanced constitutive models are required to reflect the associated temperature and strain rate effects. Simulating such behavior is computationally very expensive using conventional FE simulation techniques. This paper presents a novel Knowledge Based Cloud FE (KBC-FE) simulation technique that combines advanced material and friction models with conventional FE simulations in an efficient manner thus enhancing the capability of commercial simulation software packages. The application of these methods is demonstrated through two example case studies, namely: the prediction of a material's forming limit under hot stamping conditions, and the tool life prediction under multi-cycle loading conditions. PMID:28060298

Cloud computing geospatial application for water resources based on free and open source software and open standards - a prototype

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delipetrev, Blagoj

2016-04-01

Presently, most of the existing software is desktop-based, designed to work on a single computer, which represents a major limitation in many ways, starting from limited computer processing, storage power, accessibility, availability, etc. The only feasible solution lies in the web and cloud. This abstract presents research and development of a cloud computing geospatial application for water resources based on free and open source software and open standards using hybrid deployment model of public - private cloud, running on two separate virtual machines (VMs). The first one (VM1) is running on Amazon web services (AWS) and the second one (VM2) is running on a Xen cloud platform. The presented cloud application is developed using free and open source software, open standards and prototype code. The cloud application presents a framework how to develop specialized cloud geospatial application that needs only a web browser to be used. This cloud application is the ultimate collaboration geospatial platform because multiple users across the globe with internet connection and browser can jointly model geospatial objects, enter attribute data and information, execute algorithms, and visualize results. The presented cloud application is: available all the time, accessible from everywhere, it is scalable, works in a distributed computer environment, it creates a real-time multiuser collaboration platform, the programing languages code and components are interoperable, and it is flexible in including additional components. The cloud geospatial application is implemented as a specialized water resources application with three web services for 1) data infrastructure (DI), 2) support for water resources modelling (WRM), 3) user management. The web services are running on two VMs that are communicating over the internet providing services to users. The application was tested on the Zletovica river basin case study with concurrent multiple users. The application is a state-of-the-art cloud geospatial collaboration platform. The presented solution is a prototype and can be used as a foundation for developing of any specialized cloud geospatial applications. Further research will be focused on distributing the cloud application on additional VMs, testing the scalability and availability of services.

From scenarios to domain models: processes and representations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Haddock, Gail; Harbison, Karan

1994-03-01

The domain specific software architectures (DSSA) community has defined a philosophy for the development of complex systems. This philosophy improves productivity and efficiency by increasing the user's role in the definition of requirements, increasing the systems engineer's role in the reuse of components, and decreasing the software engineer's role to the development of new components and component modifications only. The scenario-based engineering process (SEP), the first instantiation of the DSSA philosophy, has been adopted by the next generation controller project. It is also the chosen methodology of the trauma care information management system project, and the surrogate semi-autonomous vehicle project. SEP uses scenarios from the user to create domain models and define the system's requirements. Domain knowledge is obtained from a variety of sources including experts, documents, and videos. This knowledge is analyzed using three techniques: scenario analysis, task analysis, and object-oriented analysis. Scenario analysis results in formal representations of selected scenarios. Task analysis of the scenario representations results in descriptions of tasks necessary for object-oriented analysis and also subtasks necessary for functional system analysis. Object-oriented analysis of task descriptions produces domain models and system requirements. This paper examines the representations that support the DSSA philosophy, including reference requirements, reference architectures, and domain models. The processes used to create and use the representations are explained through use of the scenario-based engineering process. Selected examples are taken from the next generation controller project.

Pi-EEWS: a low cost prototype for on-site earthquake early warning system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pazos, Antonio; Vera, Angel; Morgado, Arturo; Rioja, Carlos; Davila, Jose Martin; Cabieces, Roberto

2017-04-01

The Royal Spanish Navy Observatory (ROA), with the participation of the Cadiz University (UCA), have been developed the ALERTES-SC3 EEWS (regional approach) based on the SeisComP3 software package. This development has been done in the frame of the Spanish ALERT-ES (2011-2013) and ALERTES-RIM (2014-2016) projects, and now a days it is being tested in real time for south Iberia. Additionally, the ALERTES-SC3 system integrates an on-site EEWS software, developed by ROA-UCA, which is running for testing in real time in some seismic broad band stations of the WM network. Regional EEWS are not able to provide alerts in the area closet to the epicentre (blind zone), so a dense on-site EEWS is necessary. As it was mentioned, ALERTES-SC3 inludes the on-site software running on several WM stations but a more dense on-site stations are necessary to cover the blind zones. In order to densify this areas, inside of the "blind zones", a low cost on-site prototype "Pi-EEWS", based on a Raspberry Pi card and low cost acelerometers. In this work the main design ideas, the components and its capabilities will be shown.

Exploiting IoT Technologies and Open Source Components for Smart Seismic Network Instrumentation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Germenis, N. G.; Koulamas, C. A.; Foundas, P. N.

2017-12-01

The data collection infrastructure of any seismic network poses a number of requirements and trade-offs related to accuracy, reliability, power autonomy and installation & operational costs. Having the right hardware design at the edge of this infrastructure, embedded software running inside the instruments is the heart of pre-processing and communication services implementation and their integration with the central storage and processing facilities of the seismic network. This work demonstrates the feasibility and benefits of exploiting software components from heterogeneous sources in order to realize a smart seismic data logger, achieving higher reliability, faster integration and less development and testing costs of critical functionality that is in turn responsible for the cost and power efficient operation of the device. The instrument's software builds on top of widely used open source components around the Linux kernel with real-time extensions, the core Debian Linux distribution, the earthworm and seiscomp tooling frameworks, as well as components from the Internet of Things (IoT) world, such as the CoAP and MQTT protocols for the signaling planes, besides the widely used de-facto standards of the application domain at the data plane, such as the SeedLink protocol. By using an innovative integration of features based on lower level GPL components of the seiscomp suite with higher level processing earthworm components, coupled with IoT protocol extensions to the latter, the instrument can implement smart functionality such as network controlled, event triggered data transmission in parallel with edge archiving and on demand, short term historical data retrieval.

caGrid 1.0: A Grid Enterprise Architecture for Cancer Research

PubMed Central

Oster, Scott; Langella, Stephen; Hastings, Shannon; Ervin, David; Madduri, Ravi; Kurc, Tahsin; Siebenlist, Frank; Covitz, Peter; Shanbhag, Krishnakant; Foster, Ian; Saltz, Joel

2007-01-01

caGrid is the core Grid architecture of the NCI-sponsored cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIGTM) program. The current release, caGrid version 1.0, is developed as the production Grid software infrastructure of caBIGTM. Based on feedback from adopters of the previous version (caGrid 0.5), it has been significantly enhanced with new features and improvements to existing components. This paper presents an overview of caGrid 1.0, its main components, and enhancements over caGrid 0.5. PMID:18693901

Web Program for Development of GUIs for Cluster Computers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Czikmantory, Akos; Cwik, Thomas; Klimeck, Gerhard; Hua, Hook; Oyafuso, Fabiano; Vinyard, Edward

2003-01-01

WIGLAF (a Web Interface Generator and Legacy Application Facade) is a computer program that provides a Web-based, distributed, graphical-user-interface (GUI) framework that can be adapted to any of a broad range of application programs, written in any programming language, that are executed remotely on any cluster computer system. WIGLAF enables the rapid development of a GUI for controlling and monitoring a specific application program running on the cluster and for transferring data to and from the application program. The only prerequisite for the execution of WIGLAF is a Web-browser program on a user's personal computer connected with the cluster via the Internet. WIGLAF has a client/server architecture: The server component is executed on the cluster system, where it controls the application program and serves data to the client component. The client component is an applet that runs in the Web browser. WIGLAF utilizes the Extensible Markup Language to hold all data associated with the application software, Java to enable platform-independent execution on the cluster system and the display of a GUI generator through the browser, and the Java Remote Method Invocation software package to provide simple, effective client/server networking.

Managing mapping data using commercial data base management software.

USGS Publications Warehouse

Elassal, A.A.

1985-01-01

Electronic computers are involved in almost every aspect of the map making process. This involvement has become so thorough that it is practically impossible to find a recently developed process or device in the mapping field which does not employ digital processing in some form or another. This trend, which has been evolving over two decades, is accelerated by the significant improvements in capility, reliability, and cost-effectiveness of electronic devices. Computerized mapping processes and devices share a common need for machine readable data. Integrating groups of these components into automated mapping systems requires careful planning for data flow amongst them. Exploring the utility of commercial data base management software to assist in this task is the subject of this paper. -Author

Data and Analysis Center for Software.

DTIC Science & Technology

1980-06-01

can make use of it in their day- to -day activities of developing, maintaining, and managing software. The biblio- graphic collection is composed of...which refer to development, design, or programming approaches whicn view a software system component, or module in terms of its required or intended... practices " are also included In this group. PROCEDURES (I keyword) Procedures is a term used ambiguously in the literature to refer to functions

Integration and Assessment of Component Health Prognostics in Supervisory Control Systems

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ramuhalli, Pradeep; Bonebrake, Christopher A.; Dib, Gerges

Enhanced risk monitors (ERMs) for active components in advanced reactor concepts use predictive estimates of component failure to update, in real time, predictive safety and economic risk metrics. These metrics have been shown to be capable of use in optimizing maintenance scheduling and managing plant maintenance costs. Integrating this information with plant supervisory control systems increases the potential for making control decisions that utilize real-time information on component conditions. Such decision making would limit the possibility of plant operations that increase the likelihood of degrading the functionality of one or more components while maintaining the overall functionality of the plant.more » ERM uses sensor data for providing real-time information about equipment condition for deriving risk monitors. This information is used to estimate the remaining useful life and probability of failure of these components. By combining this information with plant probabilistic risk assessment models, predictive estimates of risk posed by continued plant operation in the presence of detected degradation may be estimated. In this paper, we describe this methodology in greater detail, and discuss its integration with a prototypic software-based plant supervisory control platform. In order to integrate these two technologies and evaluate the integrated system, software to simulate the sensor data was developed, prognostic models for feedwater valves were developed, and several use cases defined. The full paper will describe these use cases, and the results of the initial evaluation.« less

Evaluating Usability of Radiology Information Systems in Hospitals of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences.

PubMed

Rezaei-Hachesu, Peyman; Pesianian, Esmaeil; Mohammadian, Mohsen

2016-02-01

Radiology information system (RIS) in order to reduce workload and improve the quality of services must be well-designed. Heuristic evaluation is one of the methods that understand usability problems with the least time, cost and resources. The aim of present study is to evaluate the usability of RISs in hospitals. This is a cross-sectional descriptive study (2015) that uses heuristic evaluation method to evaluate the usability of RIS used in 3 hospitals of Tabriz city. The data are collected using a standard checklist based on 13 principles of Nielsen Heuristic evaluation method. Usability of RISs was investigated based on the number of components observed from Nielsen principles and problems of usability based on the number of non-observed components as well as non-existent or unrecognizable components. by evaluation of RISs in each of the hospitals 1, 2 and 3, total numbers of observed components were obtained as 173, 202 and 196, respectively. It was concluded that the usability of RISs in the studied population, on average and with observing 190 components of the 291 components related to the 13 principles of Nielsen is 65.41 %. Furthermore, problems of usability were obtained as 26.35%. The established and visible nature of some components such as response time of application, visual feedbacks, colors, view and design and arrangement of software objects cause more attention to these components as principal components in designing UI software. Also, incorrect analysis before system design leads to a lack of attention to secondary needs like Help software and security issues.

ATLAS event display: Virtual Point-1 visualization software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seeley, Kaelyn; Dimond, David; Bianchi, R. M.; Boudreau, Joseph; Hong, Tae Min; Atlas Collaboration

2017-01-01

Virtual Point-1 (VP1) is an event display visualization software for the ATLAS Experiment. VP1 is a software framework that makes use of ATHENA, the ATLAS software infrastructure, to access the complete detector geometry. This information is used to draw graphics representing the components of the detector at any scale. Two new features are added to VP1. The first is a traditional ``lego'' plot, displaying the calorimeter energy deposits in eta-phi space. The second is another lego plot focusing on the forward endcap region, displaying the energy deposits in r-phi space. Currently, these new additions display the energy deposits based on the granularity of the middle layer of the liquid-Argon electromagnetic calorimeter. Since VP1 accesses the complete detector geometry and all experimental data, future developments are outlined for a more detailed display involving multiple layers of the calorimeter along with their distinct granularities.

Technique for Early Reliability Prediction of Software Components Using Behaviour Models

PubMed Central

Ali, Awad; N. A. Jawawi, Dayang; Adham Isa, Mohd; Imran Babar, Muhammad

2016-01-01

Behaviour models are the most commonly used input for predicting the reliability of a software system at the early design stage. A component behaviour model reveals the structure and behaviour of the component during the execution of system-level functionalities. There are various challenges related to component reliability prediction at the early design stage based on behaviour models. For example, most of the current reliability techniques do not provide fine-grained sequential behaviour models of individual components and fail to consider the loop entry and exit points in the reliability computation. Moreover, some of the current techniques do not tackle the problem of operational data unavailability and the lack of analysis results that can be valuable for software architects at the early design stage. This paper proposes a reliability prediction technique that, pragmatically, synthesizes system behaviour in the form of a state machine, given a set of scenarios and corresponding constraints as input. The state machine is utilized as a base for generating the component-relevant operational data. The state machine is also used as a source for identifying the nodes and edges of a component probabilistic dependency graph (CPDG). Based on the CPDG, a stack-based algorithm is used to compute the reliability. The proposed technique is evaluated by a comparison with existing techniques and the application of sensitivity analysis to a robotic wheelchair system as a case study. The results indicate that the proposed technique is more relevant at the early design stage compared to existing works, and can provide a more realistic and meaningful prediction. PMID:27668748

Structural CNT Composites. Part I; Developing a Carbon Nanotube Filament Winder

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sauti, Godfrey; Kim, Jae-Woo; Wincheski, Russell A.; Antczak, Andrew; Campero, Jamie C.; Luong, Hoa H.; Shanahan, Michelle H.; Stelter, Christopher J.; Siochi, Emilie J.

2015-01-01

Carbon nanotube (CNT) based materials promise advances in the production of high strength and multifunctional components for aerospace and other applications. Specifically, in tension dominated applications, the latest CNT based filaments are yielding composite properties comparable to or exceeding composites from more established fibers such as Kevlar and carbon fiber. However, for the properties of these materials to be fully realized at the component level, suitable manufacturing processes have to be developed. These materials handle differently from conventional fibers, with different wetting characteristics and behavior under load. The limited availability of bulk forms also requires that the equipment be scaled down accordingly to tailor the process development approach to material availability. Here, the development of hardware and software for filament winding of carbon nanotube based tapes and yarns is described. This hardware features precision guidance of the CNT material and control of the winding tension over a wide range in an open architecture that allows for effective process control and troubleshooting during winding. Use of the filament winder to develop CNT based Composite Overwrapped Pressure Vessels (COPVs) shall also be discussed.

Applications of AN OO Methodology and Case to a Daq System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bee, C. P.; Eshghi, S.; Jones, R.; Kolos, S.; Magherini, C.; Maidantchik, C.; Mapelli, L.; Mornacchi, G.; Niculescu, M.; Patel, A.; Prigent, D.; Spiwoks, R.; Soloviev, I.; Caprini, M.; Duval, P. Y.; Etienne, F.; Ferrato, D.; Le van Suu, A.; Qian, Z.; Gaponenko, I.; Merzliakov, Y.; Ambrosini, G.; Ferrari, R.; Fumagalli, G.; Polesello, G.

The RD13 project has evaluated the use of the Object Oriented Information Engineering (OOIE) method during the development of several software components connected to the DAQ system. The method is supported by a sophisticated commercial CASE tool (Object Management Workbench) and programming environment (Kappa) which covers the full life-cycle of the software including model simulation, code generation and application deployment. This paper gives an overview of the method, CASE tool, DAQ components which have been developed and we relate our experiences with the method and tool, its integration into our development environment and the spiral lifecycle it supports.

Development and implementation of an Integrated Water Resources Management System (IWRMS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Flügel, W.-A.; Busch, C.

2011-04-01

One of the innovative objectives in the EC project BRAHMATWINN was the development of a stakeholder oriented Integrated Water Resources Management System (IWRMS). The toolset integrates the findings of the project and presents it in a user friendly way for decision support in sustainable integrated water resources management (IWRM) in river basins. IWRMS is a framework, which integrates different types of basin information and which supports the development of IWRM options for climate change mitigation. It is based on the River Basin Information System (RBIS) data models and delivers a graphical user interface for stakeholders. A special interface was developed for the integration of the enhanced DANUBIA model input and the NetSyMod model with its Mulino decision support system (mulino mDss) component. The web based IWRMS contains and combines different types of data and methods to provide river basin data and information for decision support. IWRMS is based on a three tier software framework which uses (i) html/javascript at the client tier, (ii) PHP programming language to realize the application tier, and (iii) a postgresql/postgis database tier to manage and storage all data, except the DANUBIA modelling raw data, which are file based and registered in the database tier. All three tiers can reside on one or different computers and are adapted to the local hardware infrastructure. IWRMS as well as RBIS are based on Open Source Software (OSS) components and flexible and time saving access to that database is guaranteed by web-based interfaces for data visualization and retrieval. The IWRMS is accessible via the BRAHMATWINN homepage: http://www.brahmatwinn.uni-jena.de and a user manual for the RBIS is available for download as well.

HydroDesktop as a Community Designed and Developed Resource for Hydrologic Data Discovery and Analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ames, D. P.

2013-12-01

As has been seen in other informatics fields, well-documented and appropriately licensed open source software tools have the potential to significantly increase both opportunities and motivation for inter-institutional science and technology collaboration. The CUAHSI HIS (and related HydroShare) projects have aimed to foster such activities in hydrology resulting in the development of many useful community software components including the HydroDesktop software application. HydroDesktop is an open source, GIS-based, scriptable software application for discovering data on the CUAHSI Hydrologic Information System and related resources. It includes a well-defined plugin architecture and interface to allow 3rd party developers to create extensions and add new functionality without requiring recompiling of the full source code. HydroDesktop is built in the C# programming language and uses the open source DotSpatial GIS engine for spatial data management. Capabilities include data search, discovery, download, visualization, and export. An extension that integrates the R programming language with HydroDesktop provides scripting and data automation capabilities and an OpenMI plugin provides the ability to link models. Current revision and updates to HydroDesktop include migration of core business logic to cross platform, scriptable Python code modules that can be executed in any operating system or linked into other software front-end applications.

Portable image-manipulation software: what is the extra development cost?

PubMed

Ligier, Y; Ratib, O; Funk, M; Perrier, R; Girard, C; Logean, M

1992-08-01

A hospital-wide picture archiving and communication system (PACS) project is currently under development at the University Hospital of Geneva. The visualization and manipulation of images provided by different imaging modalities constitutes one of the most challenging component of a PACS. It was necessary to provide this visualization software on a number of types of workstations because of the varying requirements imposed by the range of clinical uses it must serve. The user interface must be the same, independent of the underlying workstation. In addition to a standard set of image-manipulation and processing tools, there is a need for more specific clinical tools that can be easily adapted to specific medical requirements. To achieve this goal, it was elected to develop a modular and portable software called OSIRIS. This software is available on two different operating systems (the UNIX standard X-11/OSF-Motif based workstations and the Macintosh family) and can be easily ported to other systems. The extra effort required to design such software in a modular and portable way was worthwhile because it resulted in a platform that can be easily expanded and adapted to a variety of specific clinical applications. Its portability allows users to benefit from the rapidly evolving workstation technology and to adapt the performance to suit their needs.

Reconfigurable HIL Testing of Earth Satellites

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2008-01-01

In recent years, hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing has carved a strong niche in several industries, such as automotive, aerospace, telecomm, and consumer electronics. As desktop computers have realized gains in speed, memory size, and data storage capacity, hardware/software platforms have evolved into high performance, deterministic HIL platforms, capable of hosting the most demanding applications for testing components and subsystems. Using simulation software to emulate the digital and analog I/O signals of system components, engineers of all disciplines can now test new systems in realistic environments to evaluate their function and performance prior to field deployment. Within the Aerospace industry, space-borne satellite systems are arguably some of the most demanding in terms of their requirement for custom engineering and testing. Typically, spacecraft are built one or few at a time to fulfill a space science or defense mission. In contrast to other industries that can amortize the cost of HIL systems over thousands, even millions of units, spacecraft HIL systems have been built as one-of-a-kind solutions, expensive in terms of schedule, cost, and risk, to assure satellite and spacecraft systems reliability. The focus of this paper is to present a new approach to HIL testing for spacecraft systems that takes advantage of a highly flexible hardware/software architecture based on National Instruments PXI reconfigurable hardware and virtual instruments developed using LabVIEW. This new approach to HIL is based on a multistage/multimode spacecraft bus emulation development model called Reconfigurable Hardware In-the-Loop or RHIL.

Human-computer interaction reflected in the design of user interfaces for general practitioners.

PubMed

Stoicu-Tivadar, Lacramioara; Stoicu-Tivadar, Vasile

2006-01-01

To address the problem of properly built health information systems in general practice as an important issue for their approval and use in clinical practice. We present how a national general practitioner (GP) network was built, put in practice and several results of its activity seen from the clinician's and the software application team's points of view. We used a multi-level incremental development appropriate for the conditions of the required information system. After the development of the first version of the software components (based on rapid prototyping) of the sentinel network, a questionnaire addressed the needs and improvements required by the health professionals. Based on the answers, the functionality of the system and the interface were improved regarding the real needs expressed by the end-users. The network is functional and the collected data from the network are being processed using statistical methods. The academic software team developed a GP application that is well received by the GPs in the network, as resulted from the survey and discussions during the training period. As an added confirmation, several GPs outside the network enrolled after seeing the software at work. Another confirmation that we did a good job was that after the final presentation of the results of the project a representative from the Romanian Society for Cardiology expressed the wish of this society to access the data yielded by the network.

System for the Management of Trauma and Emergency Surgery in Space

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Houtchens, B.

1984-01-01

The need to develop a systems approach to the management of trauma and other major clinical medical events in space along with appropriate development and evaluation of surgical techniques and required hardware was investigated. A prototype zero gravity surgical module was constructed and tested aboard a KC-135 aircraft during parabolic arc zero G flight. To insure parity of quality care to that available on Earth, it was recommended that a clinical medical and bioengineering advisory committee define and help develop the necessary components of the clinical medical care system for the space station and lunar base. Key components of the system are aerospace surgical training, medical equipment development, including support hardware and software, rapid access to a network of specialty expertise, and continued research and development.

Advances in model-based software for simulating ultrasonic immersion inspections of metal components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chiou, Chien-Ping; Margetan, Frank J.; Taylor, Jared L.; Engle, Brady J.; Roberts, Ronald A.

2018-04-01

Under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation's Industry/University Cooperative Research Center at ISU, an effort was initiated in 2015 to repackage existing research-grade software into user-friendly tools for the rapid estimation of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) for ultrasonic inspections of metals. The software combines: (1) a Python-based graphical user interface for specifying an inspection scenario and displaying results; and (2) a Fortran-based engine for computing defect signals and backscattered grain noise characteristics. The later makes use the Thompson-Gray measurement model for the response from an internal defect, and the Thompson-Margetan independent scatterer model for backscattered grain noise. This paper, the third in the series [1-2], provides an overview of the ongoing modeling effort with emphasis on recent developments. These include the ability to: (1) treat microstructures where grain size, shape and tilt relative to the incident sound direction can all vary with depth; and (2) simulate C-scans of defect signals in the presence of backscattered grain noise. The simulation software can now treat both normal and oblique-incidence immersion inspections of curved metal components. Both longitudinal and shear-wave inspections are treated. The model transducer can either be planar, spherically-focused, or bi-cylindrically-focused. A calibration (or reference) signal is required and is used to deduce the measurement system efficiency function. This can be "invented" by the software using center frequency and bandwidth information specified by the user, or, alternatively, a measured calibration signal can be used. Defect types include flat-bottomed-hole reference reflectors, and spherical pores and inclusions. Simulation outputs include estimated defect signal amplitudes, root-mean-square values of grain noise amplitudes, and SNR as functions of the depth of the defect within the metal component. At any particular depth, the user can view a simulated A-, B-, and C-scans displaying the superimposed defect and grain-noise waveforms. The realistic grain noise signals used in the A-scans are generated from a set of measured "universal" noise signals whose strengths and spectral characteristics are altered to match predicted noise characteristics for the simulation at hand.

Image watermarking against lens flare effects

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chotikawanid, Piyanart; Amornraksa, Thumrongrat

2017-02-01

Lens flare effects in various photo and camera software nowadays can partially or fully damage the watermark information within the watermarked image. We propose in this paper a spatial domain based image watermarking against lens flare effects. The watermark embedding is based on the modification of the saturation color component in HSV color space of a host image. For watermark extraction, a homomorphic filter is used to predict the original embedding component from the watermarked component, and the watermark is blindly recovered by differentiating both components. The watermarked image's quality is evaluated by wPSNR, while the extracted watermark's accuracy is evaluated by NC. The experimental results against various types of lens flare effects from both computer software and mobile application showed that our proposed method outperformed the previous methods.

Activity-Centric Approach to Distributed Programming

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Levy, Renato; Satapathy, Goutam; Lang, Jun

2004-01-01

The first phase of an effort to develop a NASA version of the Cybele software system has been completed. To give meaning to even a highly abbreviated summary of the modifications to be embodied in the NASA version, it is necessary to present the following background information on Cybele: Cybele is a proprietary software infrastructure for use by programmers in developing agent-based application programs [complex application programs that contain autonomous, interacting components (agents)]. Cybele provides support for event handling from multiple sources, multithreading, concurrency control, migration, and load balancing. A Cybele agent follows a programming paradigm, called activity-centric programming, that enables an abstraction over system-level thread mechanisms. Activity centric programming relieves application programmers of the complex tasks of thread management, concurrency control, and event management. In order to provide such functionality, activity-centric programming demands support of other layers of software. This concludes the background information. In the first phase of the present development, a new architecture for Cybele was defined. In this architecture, Cybele follows a modular service-based approach to coupling of the programming and service layers of software architecture. In a service-based approach, the functionalities supported by activity-centric programming are apportioned, according to their characteristics, among several groups called services. A well-defined interface among all such services serves as a path that facilitates the maintenance and enhancement of such services without adverse effect on the whole software framework. The activity-centric application-program interface (API) is part of a kernel. The kernel API calls the services by use of their published interface. This approach makes it possible for any application code written exclusively under the API to be portable for any configuration of Cybele.

Automated support for system's engineering and operations - The development of new paradigms

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Truszkowski, Walt; Hall, Gardiner A.; Jaworski, Allan; Zoch, David

1992-01-01

Technological developments in spacecraft ground operations are reviewed. The technological, operations-oriented, managerial, and economic factors driving the evolution of the Mission Operations Control Center (MOCC), and its predecessor the Operational Control Center are examined. The functional components of the various MOCC subsystems are outlined. A brief overview is given of the concepts behind the The Knowledge-Based Software Engineering Environment, the Generic Spacecraft Analysis Assistant, and the Knowledge From Pictures tool.

Providing an empirical basis for optimizing the verification and testing phases of software development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Briand, Lionel C.; Basili, Victor R.; Hetmanski, Christopher J.

1992-01-01

Applying equal testing and verification effort to all parts of a software system is not very efficient, especially when resources are limited and scheduling is tight. Therefore, one needs to be able to differentiate low/high fault density components so that the testing/verification effort can be concentrated where needed. Such a strategy is expected to detect more faults and thus improve the resulting reliability of the overall system. This paper presents an alternative approach for constructing such models that is intended to fulfill specific software engineering needs (i.e. dealing with partial/incomplete information and creating models that are easy to interpret). Our approach to classification is as follows: (1) to measure the software system to be considered; and (2) to build multivariate stochastic models for prediction. We present experimental results obtained by classifying FORTRAN components developed at the NASA/GSFC into two fault density classes: low and high. Also we evaluate the accuracy of the model and the insights it provides into the software process.

Distributed Engine Control Empirical/Analytical Verification Tools

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

DeCastro, Jonathan; Hettler, Eric; Yedavalli, Rama; Mitra, Sayan

2013-01-01

NASA's vision for an intelligent engine will be realized with the development of a truly distributed control system featuring highly reliable, modular, and dependable components capable of both surviving the harsh engine operating environment and decentralized functionality. A set of control system verification tools was developed and applied to a C-MAPSS40K engine model, and metrics were established to assess the stability and performance of these control systems on the same platform. A software tool was developed that allows designers to assemble easily a distributed control system in software and immediately assess the overall impacts of the system on the target (simulated) platform, allowing control system designers to converge rapidly on acceptable architectures with consideration to all required hardware elements. The software developed in this program will be installed on a distributed hardware-in-the-loop (DHIL) simulation tool to assist NASA and the Distributed Engine Control Working Group (DECWG) in integrating DCS (distributed engine control systems) components onto existing and next-generation engines.The distributed engine control simulator blockset for MATLAB/Simulink and hardware simulator provides the capability to simulate virtual subcomponents, as well as swap actual subcomponents for hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) analysis. Subcomponents can be the communication network, smart sensor or actuator nodes, or a centralized control system. The distributed engine control blockset for MATLAB/Simulink is a software development tool. The software includes an engine simulation, a communication network simulation, control algorithms, and analysis algorithms set up in a modular environment for rapid simulation of different network architectures; the hardware consists of an embedded device running parts of the CMAPSS engine simulator and controlled through Simulink. The distributed engine control simulation, evaluation, and analysis technology provides unique capabilities to study the effects of a given change to the control system in the context of the distributed paradigm. The simulation tool can support treatment of all components within the control system, both virtual and real; these include communication data network, smart sensor and actuator nodes, centralized control system (FADEC full authority digital engine control), and the aircraft engine itself. The DECsim tool can allow simulation-based prototyping of control laws, control architectures, and decentralization strategies before hardware is integrated into the system. With the configuration specified, the simulator allows a variety of key factors to be systematically assessed. Such factors include control system performance, reliability, weight, and bandwidth utilization.

Dependency visualization for complex system understanding

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smart, J. Allison Cory

1994-09-01

With the volume of software in production use dramatically increasing, the importance of software maintenance has become strikingly apparent. Techniques now sought and developed for reverse engineering and design extraction and recovery. At present, numerous commercial products and research tools exist which are capable of visualizing a variety of programming languages and software constructs. The list of new tools and services continues to grow rapidly. Although the scope of the existing commercial and academic product set is quite broad, these tools still share a common underlying problem. The ability of each tool to visually organize object representations is increasingly impairedmore » as the number of components and component dependencies within systems increases. Regardless of how objects are defined, complex ``spaghetti`` networks result in nearly all large system cases. While this problem is immediately apparent in modem systems analysis involving large software implementations, it is not new. As will be discussed in Chapter 2, related problems involving the theory of graphs were identified long ago. This important theoretical foundation provides a useful vehicle for representing and analyzing complex system structures. While the utility of directed graph based concepts in software tool design has been demonstrated in literature, these tools still lack the capabilities necessary for large system comprehension. This foundation must therefore be expanded with new organizational and visualization constructs necessary to meet this challenge. This dissertation addresses this need by constructing a conceptual model and a set of methods for interactively exploring, organizing, and understanding the structure of complex software systems.« less

The caCORE Software Development Kit: Streamlining construction of interoperable biomedical information services

PubMed Central

Phillips, Joshua; Chilukuri, Ram; Fragoso, Gilberto; Warzel, Denise; Covitz, Peter A

2006-01-01

Background Robust, programmatically accessible biomedical information services that syntactically and semantically interoperate with other resources are challenging to construct. Such systems require the adoption of common information models, data representations and terminology standards as well as documented application programming interfaces (APIs). The National Cancer Institute (NCI) developed the cancer common ontologic representation environment (caCORE) to provide the infrastructure necessary to achieve interoperability across the systems it develops or sponsors. The caCORE Software Development Kit (SDK) was designed to provide developers both within and outside the NCI with the tools needed to construct such interoperable software systems. Results The caCORE SDK requires a Unified Modeling Language (UML) tool to begin the development workflow with the construction of a domain information model in the form of a UML Class Diagram. Models are annotated with concepts and definitions from a description logic terminology source using the Semantic Connector component. The annotated model is registered in the Cancer Data Standards Repository (caDSR) using the UML Loader component. System software is automatically generated using the Codegen component, which produces middleware that runs on an application server. The caCORE SDK was initially tested and validated using a seven-class UML model, and has been used to generate the caCORE production system, which includes models with dozens of classes. The deployed system supports access through object-oriented APIs with consistent syntax for retrieval of any type of data object across all classes in the original UML model. The caCORE SDK is currently being used by several development teams, including by participants in the cancer biomedical informatics grid (caBIG) program, to create compatible data services. caBIG compatibility standards are based upon caCORE resources, and thus the caCORE SDK has emerged as a key enabling technology for caBIG. Conclusion The caCORE SDK substantially lowers the barrier to implementing systems that are syntactically and semantically interoperable by providing workflow and automation tools that standardize and expedite modeling, development, and deployment. It has gained acceptance among developers in the caBIG program, and is expected to provide a common mechanism for creating data service nodes on the data grid that is under development. PMID:16398930

Software component quality evaluation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clough, A. J.

1991-01-01

The paper describes a software inspection process that can be used to evaluate the quality of software components. Quality criteria, process application, independent testing of the process and proposed associated tool support are covered. Early results indicate that this technique is well suited for assessing software component quality in a standardized fashion. With automated machine assistance to facilitate both the evaluation and selection of software components, such a technique should promote effective reuse of software components.

Effectiveness of back-to-back testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vouk, Mladen A.; Mcallister, David F.; Eckhardt, David E.; Caglayan, Alper; Kelly, John P. J.

1987-01-01

Three models of back-to-back testing processes are described. Two models treat the case where there is no intercomponent failure dependence. The third model describes the more realistic case where there is correlation among the failure probabilities of the functionally equivalent components. The theory indicates that back-to-back testing can, under the right conditions, provide a considerable gain in software reliability. The models are used to analyze the data obtained in a fault-tolerant software experiment. It is shown that the expected gain is indeed achieved, and exceeded, provided the intercomponent failure dependence is sufficiently small. However, even with the relatively high correlation the use of several functionally equivalent components coupled with back-to-back testing may provide a considerable reliability gain. Implications of this finding are that the multiversion software development is a feasible and cost effective approach to providing highly reliable software components intended for fault-tolerant software systems, on condition that special attention is directed at early detection and elimination of correlated faults.

Translator for Optimizing Fluid-Handling Components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Landon, Mark; Perry, Ernest

2007-01-01

A software interface has been devised to facilitate optimization of the shapes of valves, elbows, fittings, and other components used to handle fluids under extreme conditions. This software interface translates data files generated by PLOT3D (a NASA grid-based plotting-and- data-display program) and by computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software into a format in which the files can be read by Sculptor, which is a shape-deformation- and-optimization program. Sculptor enables the user to interactively, smoothly, and arbitrarily deform the surfaces and volumes in two- and three-dimensional CFD models. Sculptor also includes design-optimization algorithms that can be used in conjunction with the arbitrary-shape-deformation components to perform automatic shape optimization. In the optimization process, the output of the CFD software is used as feedback while the optimizer strives to satisfy design criteria that could include, for example, improved values of pressure loss, velocity, flow quality, mass flow, etc.

An Integrated Software Suite for Surface-based Analyses of Cerebral Cortex

PubMed Central

Van Essen, David C.; Drury, Heather A.; Dickson, James; Harwell, John; Hanlon, Donna; Anderson, Charles H.

2001-01-01

The authors describe and illustrate an integrated trio of software programs for carrying out surface-based analyses of cerebral cortex. The first component of this trio, SureFit (Surface Reconstruction by Filtering and Intensity Transformations), is used primarily for cortical segmentation, volume visualization, surface generation, and the mapping of functional neuroimaging data onto surfaces. The second component, Caret (Computerized Anatomical Reconstruction and Editing Tool Kit), provides a wide range of surface visualization and analysis options as well as capabilities for surface flattening, surface-based deformation, and other surface manipulations. The third component, SuMS (Surface Management System), is a database and associated user interface for surface-related data. It provides for efficient insertion, searching, and extraction of surface and volume data from the database. PMID:11522765

The Trial Software version for DEMETER power spectrum files visualization and mapping

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lozbin, Anatoliy; Inchin, Alexander; Shpadi, Maxim

2010-05-01

In the frame of Kazakhstan's Scientific Space System creation for earthquakes precursors research, the hardware and software of DEMETER satellite was investigated. The data processing Software of DEMETER is based on package SWAN under IDL Virtual machine and realizes many features, but we can't find an important tool for the spectrograms analysis - space-time visualization of power spectrum files from electromagnetic devices as ICE and IMSC. For elimination of this problem we have developed Software which is offered to use. The DeSS (DEMETER Spectrogram Software) - it is Software for visualization, analysis and a mapping of power spectrum data from electromagnetic devices ICE and IMSC. The Software primary goal is to give the researcher friendly tool for the analysis of electromagnetic data from DEMETER Satellite for earthquake precursors and other ionosphere events researches. The Input data for DeSS Software is a power spectrum files: - Power spectrum of 1 component of the electric field in the VLF range (APID 1132); - Power spectrum of 1 component of the electric field in the HF range (APID 1134); - Power spectrum of 1 component of the magnetic field in the VLF range (APID 1137). The main features and operations of the software is possible: - various time and frequency filtration; - visualization of time dependence of signal intensity on fixed frequency; - spectral density visualization for fixed frequency range; - spectrogram autosize and smooth spectrogram; - the information in each point of the spectrogram: time, frequency and intensity; - the spectrum information in the separate window, consisting of 4 blocks; - data mapping with 6 range scale. On the map we can browse next information: - satellite orbit; - conjugate point at the satellite altitude; - north conjugate point at the altitude 110 km; - south conjugate point at the altitude 110 km. This is only trial software version to help the researchers and we always ready collaborate with scientists for software improvement. References: 1. D.Lagoutte, J.Y. Brochot, D. de Carvalho, L.Madrias and M. Parrot. DEMETER Microsatellite. Scientific Mission Center. Data product description. DMT-SP-9-CM-6054-LPC. 2. D.Lagoutte, J.Y. Brochot, P.Latremoliere. SWAN - Software for Waveform Analysis. LPCE/NI/003.E - Part 1 (User's guide), Part 2 (Analysis tools), Part 3 (User's project interface).

Perspectives on distributed computing : thirty people, four user types, and the distributed computing user experience.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Childers, L.; Liming, L.; Foster, I.

2008-10-15

This report summarizes the methodology and results of a user perspectives study conducted by the Community Driven Improvement of Globus Software (CDIGS) project. The purpose of the study was to document the work-related goals and challenges facing today's scientific technology users, to record their perspectives on Globus software and the distributed-computing ecosystem, and to provide recommendations to the Globus community based on the observations. Globus is a set of open source software components intended to provide a framework for collaborative computational science activities. Rather than attempting to characterize all users or potential users of Globus software, our strategy has beenmore » to speak in detail with a small group of individuals in the scientific community whose work appears to be the kind that could benefit from Globus software, learn as much as possible about their work goals and the challenges they face, and describe what we found. The result is a set of statements about specific individuals experiences. We do not claim that these are representative of a potential user community, but we do claim to have found commonalities and differences among the interviewees that may be reflected in the user community as a whole. We present these as a series of hypotheses that can be tested by subsequent studies, and we offer recommendations to Globus developers based on the assumption that these hypotheses are representative. Specifically, we conducted interviews with thirty technology users in the scientific community. We included both people who have used Globus software and those who have not. We made a point of including individuals who represent a variety of roles in scientific projects, for example, scientists, software developers, engineers, and infrastructure providers. The following material is included in this report: (1) A summary of the reported work-related goals, significant issues, and points of satisfaction with the use of Globus software; (2) A method for characterizing users according to their technology interactions, and identification of four user types among the interviewees using the method; (3) Four profiles that highlight points of commonality and diversity in each user type; (4) Recommendations for technology developers and future studies; (5) A description of the interview protocol and overall study methodology; (6) An anonymized list of the interviewees; and (7) Interview writeups and summary data. The interview summaries in Section 3 and transcripts in Appendix D illustrate the value of distributed computing software--and Globus in particular--to scientific enterprises. They also document opportunities to make these tools still more useful both to current users and to new communities. We aim our recommendations at developers who intend their software to be used and reused in many applications. (This kind of software is often referred to as 'middleware.') Our two core recommendations are as follows. First, it is essential for middleware developers to understand and explicitly manage the multiple user products in which their software components are used. We must avoid making assumptions about the commonality of these products and, instead, study and account for their diversity. Second, middleware developers should engage in different ways with different kinds of users. Having identified four general user types in Section 4, we provide specific ideas for how to engage them in Section 5.« less

Development of a microcomputer data base of manufacturing, installation, and operating experience for the NSSS designer

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Borchers, W.A.; Markowski, E.S.

1986-01-01

Future nuclear steam supply systems (NSSSs) will be designed in an environment of powerful micro hardware and software and these systems will be linked by local area networks (LAN). With such systems, individual NSSS designers and design groups will establish and maintain local data bases to replace existing manual files and data sources. One such effort of this type in Combustion Engineering's (C-E's) NSSS engineering organization is the establishment of a data base of historical manufacturing, installation, and operating experience to provide designers with information to improve on current designs and practices. In contrast to large mainframe or minicomputer datamore » bases, which compile industry-wide data, the data base described here is implemented on a microcomputer, is design specific, and contains a level of detail that is of interest to system and component designers. DBASE III, a popular microcomputer data base management software package, is used. In addition to the immediate benefits provided by the data base, the development itself provided a vehicle for identifying procedural and control aspects that need to be addressed in the environment of local microcomputer data bases. This paper describes the data base and provides some observations on the development, use, and control of local microcomputer data bases in a design organization.« less

Deepak Condenser Model (DeCoM)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Patel, Deepak

2013-01-01

Development of the DeCoM comes from the requirement of analyzing the performance of a condenser. A component of a loop heat pipe (LHP), the condenser, is interfaced with the radiator in order to reject heat. DeCoM simulates the condenser, with certain input parameters. Systems Improved Numerical Differencing Analyzer (SINDA), a thermal analysis software, calculates the adjoining component temperatures, based on the DeCoM parameters and interface temperatures to the radiator. Application of DeCoM is (at the time of this reporting) restricted to small-scale analysis, without the need for in-depth LHP component integrations. To efficiently develop a model to simulate the LHP condenser, DeCoM was developed to meet this purpose with least complexity. DeCoM is a single-condenser, single-pass simulator for analyzing its behavior. The analysis is done based on the interactions between condenser fluid, the wall, and the interface between the wall and the radiator. DeCoM is based on conservation of energy, two-phase equations, and flow equations. For two-phase, the Lockhart- Martinelli correlation has been used in order to calculate the convection value between fluid and wall. Software such as SINDA (for thermal analysis analysis) and Thermal Desktop (for modeling) are required. DeCoM also includes the ability to implement a condenser into a thermal model with the capability of understanding the code process and being edited to user-specific needs. DeCoM requires no license, and is an open-source code. Advantages to DeCoM include time dependency, reliability, and the ability for the user to view the code process and edit to their needs.

Information Extraction for System-Software Safety Analysis: Calendar Year 2008 Year-End Report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Malin, Jane T.

2009-01-01

This annual report describes work to integrate a set of tools to support early model-based analysis of failures and hazards due to system-software interactions. The tools perform and assist analysts in the following tasks: 1) extract model parts from text for architecture and safety/hazard models; 2) combine the parts with library information to develop the models for visualization and analysis; 3) perform graph analysis and simulation to identify and evaluate possible paths from hazard sources to vulnerable entities and functions, in nominal and anomalous system-software configurations and scenarios; and 4) identify resulting candidate scenarios for software integration testing. There has been significant technical progress in model extraction from Orion program text sources, architecture model derivation (components and connections) and documentation of extraction sources. Models have been derived from Internal Interface Requirements Documents (IIRDs) and FMEA documents. Linguistic text processing is used to extract model parts and relationships, and the Aerospace Ontology also aids automated model development from the extracted information. Visualizations of these models assist analysts in requirements overview and in checking consistency and completeness.

ICEG2D: An Integrated Software Package for Automated Prediction of Flow Fields for Single-Element Airfoils with Ice Accretion

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thompson, David S.; Soni, Bharat K.

2000-01-01

An integrated software package, ICEG2D, was developed to automate computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for single-element airfoils with ice accretion. ICEG2D is designed to automatically perform three primary functions: (1) generating a grid-ready, surface definition based on the geometrical characteristics of the iced airfoil surface, (2) generating a high-quality grid using the generated surface point distribution, and (3) generating the input and restart files needed to run the general purpose CFD solver NPARC. ICEG2D can be executed in batch mode using a script file or in an interactive mode by entering directives from a command line. This report summarizes activities completed in the first year of a three-year research and development program to address issues related to CFD simulations for aircraft components with ice accretion. Specifically, this document describes the technology employed in the software, the installation procedure, and a description of the operation of the software package. Validation of the geometry and grid generation modules of ICEG2D is also discussed.

Preparing a scientific manuscript in Linux: Today's possibilities and limitations.

PubMed

Tchantchaleishvili, Vakhtang; Schmitto, Jan D

2011-10-22

Increasing number of scientists are enthusiastic about using free, open source software for their research purposes. Authors' specific goal was to examine whether a Linux-based operating system with open source software packages would allow to prepare a submission-ready scientific manuscript without the need to use the proprietary software. Preparation and editing of scientific manuscripts is possible using Linux and open source software. This letter to the editor describes key steps for preparation of a publication-ready scientific manuscript in a Linux-based operating system, as well as discusses the necessary software components. This manuscript was created using Linux and open source programs for Linux.

Integrated prototyping environment for programmable automation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

da Costa, Francis; Hwang, Vincent S. S.; Khosla, Pradeep K.; Lumia, Ronald

1992-11-01

We propose a rapid prototyping environment for robotic systems, based on tenets of modularity, reconfigurability and extendibility that may help build robot systems `faster, better, and cheaper.' Given a task specification, (e.g., repair brake assembly), the user browses through a library of building blocks that include both hardware and software components. Software advisors or critics recommend how blocks may be `snapped' together to speedily construct alternative ways to satisfy task requirements. Mechanisms to allow `swapping' competing modules for comparative test and evaluation studies are also included in the prototyping environment. After some iterations, a stable configuration or `wiring diagram' emerges. This customized version of the general prototyping environment still contains all the hooks needed to incorporate future improvements in component technologies and to obviate unplanned obsolescence. The prototyping environment so described is relevant for both interactive robot programming (telerobotics) and iterative robot system development (prototyping).

Enhanced CARES Software Enables Improved Ceramic Life Prediction

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Janosik, Lesley A.

1997-01-01

The NASA Lewis Research Center has developed award-winning software that enables American industry to establish the reliability and life of brittle material (e.g., ceramic, intermetallic, graphite) structures in a wide variety of 21st century applications. The CARES (Ceramics Analysis and Reliability Evaluation of Structures) series of software is successfully used by numerous engineers in industrial, academic, and government organizations as an essential element of the structural design and material selection processes. The latest version of this software, CARES/Life, provides a general- purpose design tool that predicts the probability of failure of a ceramic component as a function of its time in service. CARES/Life was recently enhanced by adding new modules designed to improve functionality and user-friendliness. In addition, a beta version of the newly-developed CARES/Creep program (for determining the creep life of monolithic ceramic components) has just been released to selected organizations.

The design of electric vehicle intelligent charger

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xu, Yangyang; Wang, Ying

2018-05-01

As the situation of the lack of energy and environment pollution deteriorates rapidly, electric vehicle, a new type of traffic tool, is being researched worldwide. As the core components of electric vehicle, the battery and charger's performance play an important roles in the quality of electric vehicle. So the design of the Electric Vehicle Intelligent Charger based on language-C is designed in this paper. The hardware system is used to produce the input signals of Electric Vehicle Intelligent Charger. The software system adopts the language-C software as development environment. The design can accomplish the test of the parametric such as voltage-current and temperature.

The Generalized Support Software (GSS) Domain Engineering Process: An Object-Oriented Implementation and Reuse Success at Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Condon, Steven; Hendrick, Robert; Stark, Michael E.; Steger, Warren

1997-01-01

The Flight Dynamics Division (FDD) of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) recently embarked on a far-reaching revision of its process for developing and maintaining satellite support software. The new process relies on an object-oriented software development method supported by a domain specific library of generalized components. This Generalized Support Software (GSS) Domain Engineering Process is currently in use at the NASA GSFC Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL). The key facets of the GSS process are (1) an architecture for rapid deployment of FDD applications, (2) a reuse asset library for FDD classes, and (3) a paradigm shift from developing software to configuring software for mission support. This paper describes the GSS architecture and process, results of fielding the first applications, lessons learned, and future directions

Quadratic Blind Linear Unmixing: A Graphical User Interface for Tissue Characterization

PubMed Central

Gutierrez-Navarro, O.; Campos-Delgado, D.U.; Arce-Santana, E. R.; Jo, Javier A.

2016-01-01

Spectral unmixing is the process of breaking down data from a sample into its basic components and their abundances. Previous work has been focused on blind unmixing of multi-spectral fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (m-FLIM) datasets under a linear mixture model and quadratic approximations. This method provides a fast linear decomposition and can work without a limitation in the maximum number of components or end-members. Hence this work presents an interactive software which implements our blind end-member and abundance extraction (BEAE) and quadratic blind linear unmixing (QBLU) algorithms in Matlab. The options and capabilities of our proposed software are described in detail. When the number of components is known, our software can estimate the constitutive end-members and their abundances. When no prior knowledge is available, the software can provide a completely blind solution to estimate the number of components, the end-members and their abundances. The characterization of three case studies validates the performance of the new software: ex-vivo human coronary arteries, human breast cancer cell samples, and in-vivo hamster oral mucosa. The software is freely available in a hosted webpage by one of the developing institutions, and allows the user a quick, easy-to-use and efficient tool for multi/hyper-spectral data decomposition. PMID:26589467

Quadratic blind linear unmixing: A graphical user interface for tissue characterization.

PubMed

Gutierrez-Navarro, O; Campos-Delgado, D U; Arce-Santana, E R; Jo, Javier A

2016-02-01

Spectral unmixing is the process of breaking down data from a sample into its basic components and their abundances. Previous work has been focused on blind unmixing of multi-spectral fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy (m-FLIM) datasets under a linear mixture model and quadratic approximations. This method provides a fast linear decomposition and can work without a limitation in the maximum number of components or end-members. Hence this work presents an interactive software which implements our blind end-member and abundance extraction (BEAE) and quadratic blind linear unmixing (QBLU) algorithms in Matlab. The options and capabilities of our proposed software are described in detail. When the number of components is known, our software can estimate the constitutive end-members and their abundances. When no prior knowledge is available, the software can provide a completely blind solution to estimate the number of components, the end-members and their abundances. The characterization of three case studies validates the performance of the new software: ex-vivo human coronary arteries, human breast cancer cell samples, and in-vivo hamster oral mucosa. The software is freely available in a hosted webpage by one of the developing institutions, and allows the user a quick, easy-to-use and efficient tool for multi/hyper-spectral data decomposition. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Design and implementation of I2Vote--an interactive image-based voting system using windows mobile devices.

PubMed

van Ooijen, P M A; Broekema, A; Oudkerk, M

2011-08-01

To develop, implement and test a novel audience response system (ARS) that allows image based interaction for radiology education. The ARS developed in this project is based on standard Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) (HP iPAQ 114 classic handheld) running Microsoft® Windows Mobile® 6 Classic with a large 3.5 in. TFT touch screen (320×240 pixel resolution), high luminance and integrated IEEE 802.11b/g wireless. For software development Visual Studio 2008 professional (Microsoft) was used and all components were written in C#. Two test sessions were conducted to test the software technically followed by two real classroom tests in a radiology class for medical students on thoracic radiology. The novel ARS, called I2Vote, was successfully implemented and provided an easy to use, stable setup. The acceptance of both students and teachers was very high and the interaction with the students improved because of the anonymous interaction possibility. An easy to use handheld based ARS that enables interactive, image-based, teaching is achieved. The system effectively adds an extra dimension to the use of an ARS. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Characterizing and Modeling the Cost of Rework in a Library of Reusable Software Components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Basili, Victor R.; Condon, Steven E.; ElEmam, Khaled; Hendrick, Robert B.; Melo, Walcelio

1997-01-01

In this paper we characterize and model the cost of rework in a Component Factory (CF) organization. A CF is responsible for developing and packaging reusable software components. Data was collected on corrective maintenance activities for the Generalized Support Software reuse asset library located at the Flight Dynamics Division of NASA's GSFC. We then constructed a predictive model of the cost of rework using the C4.5 system for generating a logical classification model. The predictor variables for the model are measures of internal software product attributes. The model demonstrates good prediction accuracy, and can be used by managers to allocate resources for corrective maintenance activities. Furthermore, we used the model to generate proscriptive coding guidelines to improve programming, practices so that the cost of rework can be reduced in the future. The general approach we have used is applicable to other environments.

Prompting Teacher Geometric Reasoning through Coaching in a Dynamic Geometry Software Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Knapp, Andrea K.; Barrett, Jeffrey E.; Moore, Cynthia J.

2016-01-01

This study investigated the ways in which four middle grades teachers developed mathematical knowledge for teaching (MKT) geometry as they implemented dynamic geometry software in their classrooms with the assistance of a coach. Teachers developed various components of MKT by observing coaches teach, by dynamic discourse with students, which is…

TMT approach to observatory software development process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Buur, Hanne; Subramaniam, Annapurni; Gillies, Kim; Dumas, Christophe; Bhatia, Ravinder

2016-07-01

The purpose of the Observatory Software System (OSW) is to integrate all software and hardware components of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) to enable observations and data capture; thus it is a complex software system that is defined by four principal software subsystems: Common Software (CSW), Executive Software (ESW), Data Management System (DMS) and Science Operations Support System (SOSS), all of which have interdependencies with the observatory control systems and data acquisition systems. Therefore, the software development process and plan must consider dependencies to other subsystems, manage architecture, interfaces and design, manage software scope and complexity, and standardize and optimize use of resources and tools. Additionally, the TMT Observatory Software will largely be developed in India through TMT's workshare relationship with the India TMT Coordination Centre (ITCC) and use of Indian software industry vendors, which adds complexity and challenges to the software development process, communication and coordination of activities and priorities as well as measuring performance and managing quality and risk. The software project management challenge for the TMT OSW is thus a multi-faceted technical, managerial, communications and interpersonal relations challenge. The approach TMT is using to manage this multifaceted challenge is a combination of establishing an effective geographically distributed software team (Integrated Product Team) with strong project management and technical leadership provided by the TMT Project Office (PO) and the ITCC partner to manage plans, process, performance, risk and quality, and to facilitate effective communications; establishing an effective cross-functional software management team composed of stakeholders, OSW leadership and ITCC leadership to manage dependencies and software release plans, technical complexities and change to approved interfaces, architecture, design and tool set, and to facilitate effective communications; adopting an agile-based software development process across the observatory to enable frequent software releases to help mitigate subsystem interdependencies; defining concise scope and work packages for each of the OSW subsystems to facilitate effective outsourcing of software deliverables to the ITCC partner, and to enable performance monitoring and risk management. At this stage, the architecture and high-level design of the software system has been established and reviewed. During construction each subsystem will have a final design phase with reviews, followed by implementation and testing. The results of the TMT approach to the Observatory Software development process will only be preliminary at the time of the submittal of this paper, but it is anticipated that the early results will be a favorable indication of progress.

Advanced data acquisition and display techniques for laser velocimetry

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kjelgaard, Scott O.; Weston, Robert P.

1991-01-01

The Basic Aerodynamics Research Tunnel (BART) has been equipped with state-of-the-art instrumentation for acquiring the data needed for code validation. This paper describes the three-component LDV and the workstation-based data-acquisition system (DAS) which has been developed for the BART. The DAS allows the use of automation and the quick integration of advanced instrumentation, while minimizing the software development time required between investigations. The paper also includes a description of a graphics software library developed to support the windowing environment of the DAS. The real-time displays generated using the graphics library help the researcher ensure the test is proceeding properly. The graphics library also supports the requirements of posttest data analysis. The use of the DAS and graphics libraries is illustrated by presenting examples of the real-time and postprocessing display graphics for LDV investigations.

Software For Graphical Representation Of A Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcallister, R. William; Mclellan, James P.

1993-01-01

System Visualization Tool (SVT) computer program developed to provide systems engineers with means of graphically representing networks. Generates diagrams illustrating structures and states of networks defined by users. Provides systems engineers powerful tool simplifing analysis of requirements and testing and maintenance of complex software-controlled systems. Employs visual models supporting analysis of chronological sequences of requirements, simulation data, and related software functions. Applied to pneumatic, hydraulic, and propellant-distribution networks. Used to define and view arbitrary configurations of such major hardware components of system as propellant tanks, valves, propellant lines, and engines. Also graphically displays status of each component. Advantage of SVT: utilizes visual cues to represent configuration of each component within network. Written in Turbo Pascal(R), version 5.0.

Pharmacophore modeling, docking, and principal component analysis based clustering: combined computer-assisted approaches to identify new inhibitors of the human rhinovirus coat protein.

PubMed

Steindl, Theodora M; Crump, Carolyn E; Hayden, Frederick G; Langer, Thierry

2005-10-06

The development and application of a sophisticated virtual screening and selection protocol to identify potential, novel inhibitors of the human rhinovirus coat protein employing various computer-assisted strategies are described. A large commercially available database of compounds was screened using a highly selective, structure-based pharmacophore model generated with the program Catalyst. A docking study and a principal component analysis were carried out within the software package Cerius and served to validate and further refine the obtained results. These combined efforts led to the selection of six candidate structures, for which in vitro anti-rhinoviral activity could be shown in a biological assay.

Conversion of Component-Based Point Definition to VSP Model and Higher Order Meshing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ordaz, Irian

2011-01-01

Vehicle Sketch Pad (VSP) has become a powerful conceptual and parametric geometry tool with numerous export capabilities for third-party analysis codes as well as robust surface meshing capabilities for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis. However, a capability gap currently exists for reconstructing a fully parametric VSP model of a geometry generated by third-party software. A computer code called GEO2VSP has been developed to close this gap and to allow the integration of VSP into a closed-loop geometry design process with other third-party design tools. Furthermore, the automated CFD surface meshing capability of VSP are demonstrated for component-based point definition geometries in a conceptual analysis and design framework.

An Architecture, System Engineering, and Acquisition Approach for Space System Software Resiliency

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Phillips, Dewanne Marie

Software intensive space systems can harbor defects and vulnerabilities that may enable external adversaries or malicious insiders to disrupt or disable system functions, risking mission compromise or loss. Mitigating this risk demands a sustained focus on the security and resiliency of the system architecture including software, hardware, and other components. Robust software engineering practices contribute to the foundation of a resilient system so that the system "can take a hit to a critical component and recover in a known, bounded, and generally acceptable period of time". Software resiliency must be a priority and addressed early in the life cycle development to contribute a secure and dependable space system. Those who develop, implement, and operate software intensive space systems must determine the factors and systems engineering practices to address when investing in software resiliency. This dissertation offers methodical approaches for improving space system resiliency through software architecture design, system engineering, increased software security, thereby reducing the risk of latent software defects and vulnerabilities. By providing greater attention to the early life cycle phases of development, we can alter the engineering process to help detect, eliminate, and avoid vulnerabilities before space systems are delivered. To achieve this objective, this dissertation will identify knowledge, techniques, and tools that engineers and managers can utilize to help them recognize how vulnerabilities are produced and discovered so that they can learn to circumvent them in future efforts. We conducted a systematic review of existing architectural practices, standards, security and coding practices, various threats, defects, and vulnerabilities that impact space systems from hundreds of relevant publications and interviews of subject matter experts. We expanded on the system-level body of knowledge for resiliency and identified a new software architecture framework and acquisition methodology to improve the resiliency of space systems from a software perspective with an emphasis on the early phases of the systems engineering life cycle. This methodology involves seven steps: 1) Define technical resiliency requirements, 1a) Identify standards/policy for software resiliency, 2) Develop a request for proposal (RFP)/statement of work (SOW) for resilient space systems software, 3) Define software resiliency goals for space systems, 4) Establish software resiliency quality attributes, 5) Perform architectural tradeoffs and identify risks, 6) Conduct architecture assessments as part of the procurement process, and 7) Ascertain space system software architecture resiliency metrics. Data illustrates that software vulnerabilities can lead to opportunities for malicious cyber activities, which could degrade the space mission capability for the user community. Reducing the number of vulnerabilities by improving architecture and software system engineering practices can contribute to making space systems more resilient. Since cyber-attacks are enabled by shortfalls in software, robust software engineering practices and an architectural design are foundational to resiliency, which is a quality that allows the system to "take a hit to a critical component and recover in a known, bounded, and generally acceptable period of time". To achieve software resiliency for space systems, acquirers and suppliers must identify relevant factors and systems engineering practices to apply across the lifecycle, in software requirements analysis, architecture development, design, implementation, verification and validation, and maintenance phases.

Using CORBA to integrate manufacturing cells to a virtual enterprise

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pancerella, Carmen M.; Whiteside, Robert A.

1997-01-01

It is critical in today's enterprises that manufacturing facilities are not isolated from design, planning, and other business activities and that information flows easily and bidirectionally between these activities. It is also important and cost-effective that COTS software, databases, and corporate legacy codes are well integrated in the information architecture. Further, much of the information generated during manufacturing must be dynamically accessible to engineering and business operations both in a restricted corporate intranet and on the internet. The software integration strategy in the Sandia Agile Manufacturing Testbed supports these enterprise requirements. We are developing a CORBA-based distributed object software system for manufacturing. Each physical machining device is a CORBA object and exports a common IDL interface to allow for rapid and dynamic insertion, deletion, and upgrading within the manufacturing cell. Cell management CORBA components access manufacturing devices without knowledge of any device-specific implementation. To support information flow from design to planning data is accessible to machinists on the shop floor. CORBA allows manufacturing components to be easily accessible to the enterprise. Dynamic clients can be created using web browsers and portable Java GUI's. A CORBA-OLE adapter allows integration to PC desktop applications. Other commercial software can access CORBA network objects in the information architecture through vendor API's.

Introduction to COFFE: The Next-Generation HPCMP CREATE-AV CFD Solver

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Glasby, Ryan S.; Erwin, J. Taylor; Stefanski, Douglas L.; Allmaras, Steven R.; Galbraith, Marshall C.; Anderson, W. Kyle; Nichols, Robert H.

2016-01-01

HPCMP CREATE-AV Conservative Field Finite Element (COFFE) is a modular, extensible, robust numerical solver for the Navier-Stokes equations that invokes modularity and extensibility from its first principles. COFFE implores a flexible, class-based hierarchy that provides a modular approach consisting of discretization, physics, parallelization, and linear algebra components. These components are developed with modern software engineering principles to ensure ease of uptake from a user's or developer's perspective. The Streamwise Upwind/Petrov-Galerkin (SU/PG) method is utilized to discretize the compressible Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations tightly coupled with a variety of turbulence models. The mathematics and the philosophy of the methodology that makes up COFFE are presented.

xSDK Foundations: Toward an Extreme-scale Scientific Software Development Kit

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Heroux, Michael A.; Bartlett, Roscoe; Demeshko, Irina

Here, extreme-scale computational science increasingly demands multiscale and multiphysics formulations. Combining software developed by independent groups is imperative: no single team has resources for all predictive science and decision support capabilities. Scientific libraries provide high-quality, reusable software components for constructing applications with improved robustness and portability. However, without coordination, many libraries cannot be easily composed. Namespace collisions, inconsistent arguments, lack of third-party software versioning, and additional difficulties make composition costly. The Extreme-scale Scientific Software Development Kit (xSDK) defines community policies to improve code quality and compatibility across independently developed packages (hypre, PETSc, SuperLU, Trilinos, and Alquimia) and provides a foundationmore » for addressing broader issues in software interoperability, performance portability, and sustainability. The xSDK provides turnkey installation of member software and seamless combination of aggregate capabilities, and it marks first steps toward extreme-scale scientific software ecosystems from which future applications can be composed rapidly with assured quality and scalability.« less

xSDK Foundations: Toward an Extreme-scale Scientific Software Development Kit

DOE PAGES

Heroux, Michael A.; Bartlett, Roscoe; Demeshko, Irina; ...

2017-03-01

Here, extreme-scale computational science increasingly demands multiscale and multiphysics formulations. Combining software developed by independent groups is imperative: no single team has resources for all predictive science and decision support capabilities. Scientific libraries provide high-quality, reusable software components for constructing applications with improved robustness and portability. However, without coordination, many libraries cannot be easily composed. Namespace collisions, inconsistent arguments, lack of third-party software versioning, and additional difficulties make composition costly. The Extreme-scale Scientific Software Development Kit (xSDK) defines community policies to improve code quality and compatibility across independently developed packages (hypre, PETSc, SuperLU, Trilinos, and Alquimia) and provides a foundationmore » for addressing broader issues in software interoperability, performance portability, and sustainability. The xSDK provides turnkey installation of member software and seamless combination of aggregate capabilities, and it marks first steps toward extreme-scale scientific software ecosystems from which future applications can be composed rapidly with assured quality and scalability.« less

Parameterized hardware description as object oriented hardware model implementation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Drabik, Pawel K.

2010-09-01

The paper introduces novel model for design, visualization and management of complex, highly adaptive hardware systems. The model settles component oriented environment for both hardware modules and software application. It is developed on parameterized hardware description research. Establishment of stable link between hardware and software, as a purpose of designed and realized work, is presented. Novel programming framework model for the environment, named Graphic-Functional-Components is presented. The purpose of the paper is to present object oriented hardware modeling with mentioned features. Possible model implementation in FPGA chips and its management by object oriented software in Java is described.

How to Purchase, Set Up, & Safeguard a CD-ROM Network.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Almquist, Arne J.

1996-01-01

Presents an overview of the hardware and software required to network CD-ROMs in schools. Topics include network infrastructures, networking software, file server-based systems, CD-ROM servers, vendors of network components, workstations, network utilities, and network management. (LRW)

Precise Documentation: The Key to Better Software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Parnas, David Lorge

The prime cause of the sorry “state of the art” in software development is our failure to produce good design documentation. Poor documentation is the cause of many errors and reduces efficiency in every phase of a software product's development and use. Most software developers believe that “documentation” refers to a collection of wordy, unstructured, introductory descriptions, thousands of pages that nobody wanted to write and nobody trusts. In contrast, Engineers in more traditional disciplines think of precise blueprints, circuit diagrams, and mathematical specifications of component properties. Software developers do not know how to produce precise documents for software. Software developments also think that documentation is something written after the software has been developed. In other fields of Engineering much of the documentation is written before and during the development. It represents forethought not afterthought. Among the benefits of better documentation would be: easier reuse of old designs, better communication about requirements, more useful design reviews, easier integration of separately written modules, more effective code inspection, more effective testing, and more efficient corrections and improvements. This paper explains how to produce and use precise software documentation and illustrate the methods with several examples.

A loosely coupled framework for terminology controlled distributed EHR search for patient cohort identification in clinical research.

PubMed

Zhao, Lei; Lim Choi Keung, Sarah N; Taweel, Adel; Tyler, Edward; Ogunsina, Ire; Rossiter, James; Delaney, Brendan C; Peterson, Kevin A; Hobbs, F D Richard; Arvanitis, Theodoros N

2012-01-01

Heterogeneous data models and coding schemes for electronic health records present challenges for automated search across distributed data sources. This paper describes a loosely coupled software framework based on the terminology controlled approach to enable the interoperation between the search interface and heterogeneous data sources. Software components interoperate via common terminology service and abstract criteria model so as to promote component reuse and incremental system evolution.

Data to inform a social media component for professional development and practices: A design-based research study.

PubMed

Novakovich, Jeanette; Shaw, Steven; Miah, Sophia

2017-02-01

This DIB article includes the course artefacts, instruments, survey data, and descriptive statistics, along with in-depth correlational analysis for the first iteration of a design-based research study on designing curriculum for developing online professional identity and social media practices for a multi-major advanced professional writing course. Raw data was entered into SPSS software. For interpretation and discussion, please see the original article entitled, "Designing curriculum to shape professional social media skills and identity in virtual communities of practice" (J. Novakovich, S. Miah, S. Shaw, 2017) [1].

PhysioNet: physiologic signals, time series and related open source software for basic, clinical, and applied research.

PubMed

Moody, George B; Mark, Roger G; Goldberger, Ary L

2011-01-01

PhysioNet provides free web access to over 50 collections of recorded physiologic signals and time series, and related open-source software, in support of basic, clinical, and applied research in medicine, physiology, public health, biomedical engineering and computing, and medical instrument design and evaluation. Its three components (PhysioBank, the archive of signals; PhysioToolkit, the software library; and PhysioNetWorks, the virtual laboratory for collaborative development of future PhysioBank data collections and PhysioToolkit software components) connect researchers and students who need physiologic signals and relevant software with researchers who have data and software to share. PhysioNet's annual open engineering challenges stimulate rapid progress on unsolved or poorly solved questions of basic or clinical interest, by focusing attention on achievable solutions that can be evaluated and compared objectively using freely available reference data.

Demonstration of a Safety Analysis on a Complex System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Leveson, Nancy; Alfaro, Liliana; Alvarado, Christine; Brown, Molly; Hunt, Earl B.; Jaffe, Matt; Joslyn, Susan; Pinnell, Denise; Reese, Jon; Samarziya, Jeffrey;

RF control at SSCL — an object oriented design approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dohan, D. A.; Osberg, E.; Biggs, R.; Bossom, J.; Chillara, K.; Richter, R.; Wade, D.

1994-12-01

The Superconducting Super Collider (SSC) in Texas, the construction of which was stopped in 1994, would have represented a major challenge in accelerator research and development. This paper addresses the issues encountered in the parallel design and construction of the control systems for the RF equipment for the five accelerators comprising the SSC. An extensive analysis of the components of the RF control systems has been undertaken, based upon the Schlaer-Mellor object-oriented analysis and design (OOA/OOD) methodology. The RF subsystem components such as amplifiers, tubes, power supplies, PID loops, etc. were analyzed to produce OOA information, behavior and process models. Using these models, OOD was iteratively applied to develop a generic RF control system design. This paper describes the results of this analysis and the development of 'bridges' between the analysis objects, and the EPICS-based software and underlying VME-based hardware architectures. The application of this approach to several of the SSCL RF control systems is discussed.

Remote media vision-based computer input device

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arabnia, Hamid R.; Chen, Ching-Yi

1991-11-01

In this paper, we introduce a vision-based computer input device which has been built at the University of Georgia. The user of this system gives commands to the computer without touching any physical device. The system receives input through a CCD camera; it is PC- based and is built on top of the DOS operating system. The major components of the input device are: a monitor, an image capturing board, a CCD camera, and some software (developed by use). These are interfaced with a standard PC running under the DOS operating system.

Development of a Web-Based Registry to Support Diabetes Care in Free Medical Clinics.

PubMed

McFadden, Norman; Daniel, Bryan; Hoyt, Robert; Snider, Dallas

2017-01-01

The United States has more than 1,000 free medical clinics. Because these clinics do not bill Medicare or Medicaid, they are not eligible for federal reimbursement for electronic health record (EHR) adoption. As a result, most do not have EHRs or electronic disease registries. A web-based diabetes registry was created with all open-source components for use in an urban free clinic to manage patients with type 2 diabetes and comorbidities. The registry was modeled after the Chronic Disease Electronic Management System and recommendations of the American Diabetes Association. The software was enhanced to include multiple other features, such as progress notes, so that it can function as a simple EHR. The configuration permits other free clinics to join securely, and the software can be shared.

A Co-modeling Method Based on Component Features for Mechatronic Devices in Aero-engines

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Bin; Zhao, Haocen; Ye, Zhifeng

2017-08-01

Data-fused and user-friendly design of aero-engine accessories is required because of their structural complexity and stringent reliability. This paper gives an overview of a typical aero-engine control system and the development process of key mechatronic devices used. Several essential aspects of modeling and simulation in the process are investigated. Considering the limitations of a single theoretic model, feature-based co-modeling methodology is suggested to satisfy the design requirements and compensate for diversity of component sub-models for these devices. As an example, a stepper motor controlled Fuel Metering Unit (FMU) is modeled in view of the component physical features using two different software tools. An interface is suggested to integrate the single discipline models into the synthesized one. Performance simulation of this device using the co-model and parameter optimization for its key components are discussed. Comparison between delivery testing and the simulation shows that the co-model for the FMU has a high accuracy and the absolute superiority over a single model. Together with its compatible interface with the engine mathematical model, the feature-based co-modeling methodology is proven to be an effective technical measure in the development process of the device.

CARES/Life Ceramics Durability Evaluation Software Used for Mars Microprobe Aeroshell

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nemeth, Noel N.

1998-01-01

The CARES/Life computer program, which was developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center, predicts the probability of a monolithic ceramic component's failure as a function of time in service. The program has many features and options for materials evaluation and component design. It couples commercial finite element programs-which resolve a component's temperature and stress distribution-to-reliability evaluation and fracture mechanics routines for modeling strength-limiting defects. These routines are based on calculations of the probabilistic nature of the brittle material's strength. The capability, flexibility, and uniqueness of CARES/Life has attracted many users representing a broad range of interests and has resulted in numerous awards for technological achievements and technology transfer.

Health care professional workstation: software system construction using DSSA scenario-based engineering process.

PubMed

Hufnagel, S; Harbison, K; Silva, J; Mettala, E

1994-01-01

This paper describes a new method for the evolutionary determination of user requirements and system specifications called scenario-based engineering process (SEP). Health care professional workstations are critical components of large scale health care system architectures. We suggest that domain-specific software architectures (DSSAs) be used to specify standard interfaces and protocols for reusable software components throughout those architectures, including workstations. We encourage the use of engineering principles and abstraction mechanisms. Engineering principles are flexible guidelines, adaptable to particular situations. Abstraction mechanisms are simplifications for management of complexity. We recommend object-oriented design principles, graphical structural specifications, and formal components' behavioral specifications. We give an ambulatory care scenario and associated models to demonstrate SEP. The scenario uses health care terminology and gives patients' and health care providers' system views. Our goal is to have a threefold benefit. (i) Scenario view abstractions provide consistent interdisciplinary communications. (ii) Hierarchical object-oriented structures provide useful abstractions for reuse, understandability, and long term evolution. (iii) SEP and health care DSSA integration into computer aided software engineering (CASE) environments. These environments should support rapid construction and certification of individualized systems, from reuse libraries.

78 FR 17940 - Certain Computerized Orthopedic Surgical Devices, Software, Implants, and Components Thereof...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-03-25

..., Software, Implants, and Components Thereof; Notice of Receipt of Complaint; Solicitation of Comments... Certain Computerized Orthopedic Surgical Devices, Software, Implants, and Components Thereof, DN 2945; the... importation of certain computerized orthopedic surgical devices, software, implants, and components thereof...

Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE): a universal unattended ground sensor controller

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gold, Joshua; Klawon, Kevin; Humeniuk, David; Landoll, Darren

2011-06-01

Under the Terra Harvest Program, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) has the objective of developing a universal Controller for the Unattended Ground Sensor (UGS) community. The mission is to define, implement, and thoroughly document an open architecture that universally supports UGS missions, integrating disparate systems, peripherals, etc. The Controller's inherent interoperability with numerous systems enables the integration of both legacy and future Unattended Ground Sensor System (UGSS) components, while the design's open architecture supports rapid third-party development to ensure operational readiness. The successful accomplishment of these objectives by the program's Phase 3b contractors is demonstrated via integration of the companies' respective plug-'n-play contributions that include various peripherals, such as sensors, cameras, etc., and their associated software drivers. In order to independently validate the Terra Harvest architecture, L-3 Nova Engineering, along with its partner, the University of Dayton Research Institute (UDRI), is developing the Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE), a Java based system running on an embedded Linux Operating System (OS). The Use Cases on which the software is developed support the full range of UGS operational scenarios such as remote sensor triggering, image capture, and data exfiltration. The Team is additionally developing an ARM microprocessor evaluation platform that is both energyefficient and operationally flexible. The paper describes the overall THOSE architecture, as well as the implementation strategy for some of the key software components. Preliminary integration/test results and the Team's approach for transitioning the THOSE design and source code to the Government are also presented.

Earth Science Data Grid System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chi, Y.; Yang, R.; Kafatos, M.

2004-05-01

The Earth Science Data Grid System (ESDGS) is a software system in support of earth science data storage and access. It is built upon the Storage Resource Broker (SRB) data grid technology. We have developed a complete data grid system consistent of SRB server providing users uniform access to diverse storage resources in a heterogeneous computing environment and metadata catalog server (MCAT) managing the metadata associated with data set, users, and resources. We also develop the earth science application metadata; geospatial, temporal, and content-based indexing; and some other tools. In this paper, we will describe software architecture and components of the data grid system, and use a practical example in support of storage and access of rainfall data from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) to illustrate its functionality and features.

An adaptable product for material processing and life science missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wassick, Gregory; Dobbs, Michael

1995-01-01

The Experiment Control System II (ECS-II) is designed to make available to the microgravity research community the same tools and mode of automated experimentation that their ground-based counterparts have enjoyed for the last two decades. The design goal was accomplished by combining commercial automation tools familiar to the experimenter community with system control components that interface with the on-orbit platform in a distributed architecture. The architecture insulates the tools necessary for managing a payload. By using commercial software and hardware components whenever possible, development costs were greatly reduced when compared to traditional space development projects. Using commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) components also improved the usability documentation, and reducing the need for training of the system by providing familiar user interfaces, providing a wealth of readily available documentation, and reducing the need for training on system-specific details. The modularity of the distributed architecture makes it very amenable for modification to different on-orbit experiments requiring robotics-based automation.

Trusted Computing Technologies, Intel Trusted Execution Technology.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Guise, Max Joseph; Wendt, Jeremy Daniel

2011-01-01

We describe the current state-of-the-art in Trusted Computing Technologies - focusing mainly on Intel's Trusted Execution Technology (TXT). This document is based on existing documentation and tests of two existing TXT-based systems: Intel's Trusted Boot and Invisible Things Lab's Qubes OS. We describe what features are lacking in current implementations, describe what a mature system could provide, and present a list of developments to watch. Critical systems perform operation-critical computations on high importance data. In such systems, the inputs, computation steps, and outputs may be highly sensitive. Sensitive components must be protected from both unauthorized release, and unauthorized alteration: Unauthorizedmore » users should not access the sensitive input and sensitive output data, nor be able to alter them; the computation contains intermediate data with the same requirements, and executes algorithms that the unauthorized should not be able to know or alter. Due to various system requirements, such critical systems are frequently built from commercial hardware, employ commercial software, and require network access. These hardware, software, and network system components increase the risk that sensitive input data, computation, and output data may be compromised.« less

Model-Drive Architecture for Agent-Based Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gradanin, Denis; Singh, H. Lally; Bohner, Shawn A.; Hinchey, Michael G.

2004-01-01

The Model Driven Architecture (MDA) approach uses a platform-independent model to define system functionality, or requirements, using some specification language. The requirements are then translated to a platform-specific model for implementation. An agent architecture based on the human cognitive model of planning, the Cognitive Agent Architecture (Cougaar) is selected for the implementation platform. The resulting Cougaar MDA prescribes certain kinds of models to be used, how those models may be prepared and the relationships of the different kinds of models. Using the existing Cougaar architecture, the level of application composition is elevated from individual components to domain level model specifications in order to generate software artifacts. The software artifacts generation is based on a metamodel. Each component maps to a UML structured component which is then converted into multiple artifacts: Cougaar/Java code, documentation, and test cases.

Educational Software: Evaluation? No! Utility? Yes!

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hofmann, Rich

1985-01-01

The utility of educational software is associated with three components: (1) type of learning (cognitive development, individually facilitated acquisition of knowledge, teacher-facilitated acquisition of knowledge, memorization); (2) type of experience (self-directed or purposive environmental experience); and (3) user perception of software…

Automation for System Safety Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Malin, Jane T.; Fleming, Land; Throop, David; Thronesbery, Carroll; Flores, Joshua; Bennett, Ted; Wennberg, Paul

2009-01-01

This presentation describes work to integrate a set of tools to support early model-based analysis of failures and hazards due to system-software interactions. The tools perform and assist analysts in the following tasks: 1) extract model parts from text for architecture and safety/hazard models; 2) combine the parts with library information to develop the models for visualization and analysis; 3) perform graph analysis and simulation to identify and evaluate possible paths from hazard sources to vulnerable entities and functions, in nominal and anomalous system-software configurations and scenarios; and 4) identify resulting candidate scenarios for software integration testing. There has been significant technical progress in model extraction from Orion program text sources, architecture model derivation (components and connections) and documentation of extraction sources. Models have been derived from Internal Interface Requirements Documents (IIRDs) and FMEA documents. Linguistic text processing is used to extract model parts and relationships, and the Aerospace Ontology also aids automated model development from the extracted information. Visualizations of these models assist analysts in requirements overview and in checking consistency and completeness.

High resolution ultrasonic spectroscopy system for nondestructive evaluation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chen, C. H.

1991-01-01

With increased demand for high resolution ultrasonic evaluation, computer based systems or work stations become essential. The ultrasonic spectroscopy method of nondestructive evaluation (NDE) was used to develop a high resolution ultrasonic inspection system supported by modern signal processing, pattern recognition, and neural network technologies. The basic system which was completed consists of a 386/20 MHz PC (IBM AT compatible), a pulser/receiver, a digital oscilloscope with serial and parallel communications to the computer, an immersion tank with motor control of X-Y axis movement, and the supporting software package, IUNDE, for interactive ultrasonic evaluation. Although the hardware components are commercially available, the software development is entirely original. By integrating signal processing, pattern recognition, maximum entropy spectral analysis, and artificial neural network functions into the system, many NDE tasks can be performed. The high resolution graphics capability provides visualization of complex NDE problems. The phase 3 efforts involve intensive marketing of the software package and collaborative work with industrial sectors.

Image manipulation software portable on different hardware platforms: what is the cost?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ligier, Yves; Ratib, Osman M.; Funk, Matthieu; Perrier, Rene; Girard, Christian; Logean, Marianne

1992-07-01

A hospital wide PACS project is currently under development at the University Hospital of Geneva. The visualization and manipulation of images provided by different imaging modalities constitutes one of the most challenging components of a PACS. Because there are different requirements depending on the clinical usage, it was necessary for such a visualization software to be provided on different types of workstations in different sectors of the PACS. The user interface has to be the same independently of the underlying workstation. Beside, in addition to a standard set of image manipulation and processing tools there is a need for more specific clinical tools that should be easily adapted to specific medical requirements. To achieve operating and windowing systems: the standard Unix/X-11/OSF-Motif based workstations and the Macintosh family and should be easily ported on other systems. This paper describes the design of such a system and discusses the extra cost and efforts involved in the development of a portable and easily expandable software.

75 FR 34482 - Certain Biometric Scanning Devices, Components Thereof, Associated Software, and Products...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-06-17

..., Components Thereof, Associated Software, and Products Containing the Same; Notice of Investigation AGENCY: U... scanning devices, components thereof, associated software, and products containing the same by reason of... after importation of certain biometric scanning devices, components thereof, associated software, or...

JAMS - a software platform for modular hydrological modelling

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kralisch, Sven; Fischer, Christian

2015-04-01

Current challenges of understanding and assessing the impacts of climate and land use changes on environmental systems demand for an ever-increasing integration of data and process knowledge in corresponding simulation models. Software frameworks that allow for a seamless creation of integrated models based on less complex components (domain models, process simulation routines) have therefore gained increasing attention during the last decade. JAMS is an Open-Source software framework that has been especially designed to cope with the challenges of eco-hydrological modelling. This is reflected by (i) its flexible approach for representing time and space, (ii) a strong separation of process simulation components from the declarative description of more complex models using domain specific XML, (iii) powerful analysis and visualization functions for spatial and temporal input and output data, and (iv) parameter optimization and uncertainty analysis functions commonly used in environmental modelling. Based on JAMS, different hydrological and nutrient-transport simulation models were implemented and successfully applied during the last years. We will present the JAMS core concepts and give an overview of models, simulation components and support tools available for that framework. Sample applications will be used to underline the advantages of component-based model designs and to show how JAMS can be used to address the challenges of integrated hydrological modelling.

Random Vibrations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Messaro. Semma; Harrison, Phillip

2010-01-01

Ares I Zonal Random vibration environments due to acoustic impingement and combustion processes are develop for liftoff, ascent and reentry. Random Vibration test criteria for Ares I Upper Stage pyrotechnic components are developed by enveloping the applicable zonal environments where each component is located. Random vibration tests will be conducted to assure that these components will survive and function appropriately after exposure to the expected vibration environments. Methodology: Random Vibration test criteria for Ares I Upper Stage pyrotechnic components were desired that would envelope all the applicable environments where each component was located. Applicable Ares I Vehicle drawings and design information needed to be assessed to determine the location(s) for each component on the Ares I Upper Stage. Design and test criteria needed to be developed by plotting and enveloping the applicable environments using Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet Software and documenting them in a report Using Microsoft Word Processing Software. Conclusion: Random vibration liftoff, ascent, and green run design & test criteria for the Upper Stage Pyrotechnic Components were developed by using Microsoft Excel to envelope zonal environments applicable to each component. Results were transferred from Excel into a report using Microsoft Word. After the report is reviewed and edited by my mentor it will be submitted for publication as an attachment to a memorandum. Pyrotechnic component designers will extract criteria from my report for incorporation into the design and test specifications for components. Eventually the hardware will be tested to the environments I developed to assure that the components will survive and function appropriately after exposure to the expected vibration environments.

Pratt and Whitney Overview and Advanced Health Management Program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Inabinett, Calvin

2008-01-01

Hardware Development Activity: Design and Test Custom Multi-layer Circuit Boards for use in the Fault Emulation Unit; Logic design performed using VHDL; Layout power system for lab hardware; Work lab issues with software developers and software testers; Interface with Engine Systems personnel with performance of Engine hardware components; Perform off nominal testing with new engine hardware.

Art & Design Software Development Using IBM Handy (A Personal Experience).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McWhinnie, Harold J.

This paper presents some of the results from a course in art and design. The course involved the use of simple computer programs for the arts. Attention was geared to the development of graphic components for educational software. The purpose of the course was to provide, through lectures and extensive hands on experience, a basic introduction to…

Preparing a scientific manuscript in Linux: Today's possibilities and limitations

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Increasing number of scientists are enthusiastic about using free, open source software for their research purposes. Authors' specific goal was to examine whether a Linux-based operating system with open source software packages would allow to prepare a submission-ready scientific manuscript without the need to use the proprietary software. Findings Preparation and editing of scientific manuscripts is possible using Linux and open source software. This letter to the editor describes key steps for preparation of a publication-ready scientific manuscript in a Linux-based operating system, as well as discusses the necessary software components. This manuscript was created using Linux and open source programs for Linux. PMID:22018246