[ Project 1 ]: Prognostics System on a Military Wheeled Vehicle
[ Project 2 ]: Applications of Specification-based Testing in Flight Software Development for HST Mission Operations
[ Project 3 ]: Electrical Viewpoint for Building Information Modeling
[ Project 4 ]: Boarding Pass Issuance of Passengers in Airport
[ Project 5 ]: Validating Behavior of an Airport Control Tower with LTSA
[ Project 6 ]: Optimization of Ski Resort Layouts
[ Project 7 ]: Ontology-Enabled Validation of Systems containing Electric Terminals

Class presentations will be on Nov. 29 and December 6. Don't worry if your project isn't complete -- just talk about your main ideas, what you are hoping to accomplish and the method. Plan for 20 minutes + 10 minutes of questions/discussion. The purpose is to share ideas and receive constructive feedback.

Title: Prognostics System on a Military Wheeled Vehicle
Authors: Craig Hershey

Abstract: This case study looks at the availability problem of fielded military wheeled vehicle systems. The basic problem is that military vehicles have components which fail due to fatigue damage from the severe usage in military applications. If a component fails while the vehicle is in the field one or more things can occur: the vehicle is lost, mission will be unsuccessful, or fatality. The system chosen to attack the availability problem of fielded military vehicles is a prognostics system that monitors the life remaining of chosen components on board the vehicle. This years project will focus in on requirements/specification verification using systems engineering tools.

Class Presentation: Prognostics System on a Military Wheeled Vehicle
Final Report: Prognostics System on a Military Wheeled Vehicle

Title: Applications of Specification-based Testing in Flight Software Development for HST Mission Operations
Author: Nzinga Tull

Abstract: Specification-based testing, also referred to as functional testing or black-box testing, is a software testing technique whereby the internal workings of the item being tested are not known by the tester. The tester only knows the inputs and what the expected outcomes should be and not how the software arrives at those outputs. The tester does not ever examine the software code and does not need any further knowledge of the program other than its specifications.

In the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) mission operations environment, subsystem and system engineers (SEs) develop operational concepts for new or enhanced spacecraft functions to improve the performance of the spacecraft and/or to extend mission life. Specification-based testing is particularly useful for the development of test cases and requirements for software applications in mission operations for HST for several reasons:

1. The test is unbiased because the designer and the tester are independent of each other. SEs and flight software personnel (developers and testers) are distinct groups and both provide critical input to code development.
2. The tester does not need knowledge of any specific programming languages. Many HST SEs are not programmers. So specification-based testing techniques allow them to use their system level expertise for software development without needing to learn programming languages.
3. The test is done from the point of view of the user, not the designer. This keeps the focus of testing on achieving the results the SEs desired within the greater context of spacecraft operations.
4. Test cases can be designed as soon as the specifications are complete. This reduces the lag time between development of requirements and code development and testing, reducing the overall development time for code.

This project will examine specification-based testing techniques and tools that are applicable to software development for HST Mission Operations. Case studies will be conducted to illustrate uses of these techniques and tools for specific applications.

Final Report: Specification-based Testing in Flight Software Development for HST Mission Operations

Title: Electrical Viewpoint for Building Information Modeling
Authors: Vineet Gupta and Abhinav Fatehpuria

Abstract: Last Semester we defined and categorized the design requirements of a building from an architectural view point and prepared the system structure (class diagram) at a higher level of abstraction.

This semester we will try to validate a part of the requirements via a spatial logic framework. The requirements under consideration are

• Apartment Level:
  Area of the apartment should be at least 10000 sq units.
  The apartment should have 1 bedroom, 1 living room, 1 kitchen, 1 restroom and one passageway.
  The apartment should have easy access to exit in case of fire.
  
• Room Level:
  Occupancy of the bedroom should be two.
  Bedroom should be adjacent to the restroom.
  Proximity strength between restroom and bedroom is 1.
  Bedroom should have air tight and sound proof doors.
  Orientation of the bedroom should be towards the west.
  

The main components of spatial logic that can be used are the concept of hyper planes and half spaces. Using these concepts and properties such as adjacency and mathematical formulas for region definition we can validate the requirements.

Class Presentation: Using Spatial Logic for Building Layouts
Final Report: Validation/Verification using Spatial Logic Framework for Building Layouts

Title: Boarding Pass Issuance of Passengers in Airport
Authors: Bargava Subramanian and Soe Zarni

Abstract: Each airport has a fixed space which it allots to different airlines so that they can set-up their boarding pass issuance counter. We consider a simplistic case where a group of airlines have decided amongst themselves to share a bunch of counters. The number of counters each airline will operate will depend upon number of passengers arriving for each of the airlines. Given this the boundary of operation of each airlines vary across time. For each airline, given the limited operating space, they have to come up with a queue length for the passengers (whether to have a single line or in some zigzag format).

For this problem statement our approach this semester is divided into parts

• How do the airlines decide their operating space (spatial constraint)
• The second one (and the greater emphasis of the project) is to evaluate the temporal constraints.

The temporal constraint determines

• Whether the passenger who joins the queue is able to catch his flight or not.
• Whether the airline is able to process the passenger within the given time frame so that he is able to catch the flight.

The temporal logic is basically a timed automaton and we are using UPPAAL to verify/validate our system. We will construct the system in UPPAAL using defined requirements and try to verify/validate the system with different queuing time, process time and WIP time calculated from different arrival rates, number of counters, process rate, etc.

Class Presentation: Boarding Pass Issuance for Passengers at Airport
Final Report: Boarding Pass Issuance for Passengers at Airport

Title: Validating Behavior of an Airport Control Tower with LTSA
Author: Kerin Thornton

Abstract. In ENSE 622, a decision support tool was developed to:

• Model the operations at a small airport, and
• Generate actions for the airport tower controller based on the location of planes on the airport surface and in the surrounding airspace.

This tool is meant to facilitate the decision-making process by telling the controller what to do in a given situation, reducing the possibility of human error. Now, LTSA will be used to validate the finite state processes that are the basis behind the architecture of this decision support tool. LTSAs animation capabilities will test the scenarios generated by the decision support tool to verify that the airports capacity constraints are not violated and that all controller actions ensure safety.

Class Presentation: Airspace Management Decision Tool
Final Report: Airspace Management Decision Tool: Validating the Behavior and Structure of Software Design

Title: Optimization of Ski Resort Layouts
Author: Nate Tharnish and Chris Recla

Abstract. The optimization of the ski resort layout is expanded further through the use of full and fractional factorial design. The input parameters of each layout are observed to determine which parameter is most sensitive to the system response. For an existing mountain with a predetermined layout of lifts, a ski resort planner weighs the cost effectiveness of lifts with varying speed, number of seats per chair, and length to make each run. Rather than performing all possible experiments, this model provides a quick and accurate estimate to show which parameter has the greatest effect on increasing the lift and run capacity, which reduces the number of people waiting in the lift lines.

Final Report: Optimization of Ski Resort Layouts

Title: Ontology-Enabled Validation of Systems containing Electric Terminals
Author: Francisco Gallo

Abstract. When validating the process of integrating systems, it is often difficult to ensure that the rules used are compliant with a certain meta-model defining the consistency that the entities should meet when interacting. The purpose of this project is to show how Protégé can be used to define an ontology and then from it, create an XML hierarchy that can be used to validate the process of integrating elements.

The process of using the XML database is done using VBA built on top of Excel. XML is manipulated using XSLT. Within the framework of this project, the elements to be integrated are electrical terminals.

Final Report: Ontology-Enabled Validation of Systems containing Electric Terminals

Developed in October 2005 by Mark Austin
Copyright © 2005, Institute for Systems Research, University of Maryland