Authoring Procedures with Timing and Ordering Constraints, Phase I

The paper-based manual crew procedures that formed the basis of mission management for the manned space program are being replaced by electronic procedure representations and execution engines that support adjustable autonomy. Adhering to the conventions of the legacy procedures makes procedure authoring intuitive and less error prone than approaches that require the author to program in a formal planning language. However, this approach also preserves a drawback of the paper-based procedure: inflexibility in execution due to a lack of information about constraints implicit in the procedure. We propose to develop the Procedure Authoring with Constraints Tool (PACT), an intuitive graphical drag-and-drop and WYSIWYG authoring environment that preserves the conventions of the paper-base procedure, but adds the capability to capture timing and ordering constraints with minimal additional effort. During this Phase I project, we will specify user interface and functional requirements, create representative use cases, design the Phase II system, and develop and evaluate a proof-of-concept prototype to illustrate our approach and demonstrate its utility and feasibility.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

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