Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Gladden, Roy.
Version 2.0 of the autogen software has been released. "Autogen" (automated sequence generation) signifies both a process and software used to implement the process of automated generation of sequences of commands in a standard format for uplink to spacecraft. Autogen requires fewer workers than are needed for older manual sequence-generation processes and reduces sequence-generation times from weeks to minutes.
"Automated sequence generation" (autogen) signifies both a process and software used to automatically generate sequences of commands to operate various spacecraft. The autogen software comprises the autogen script plus the Activity Plan Generator (APGEN) program. APGEN can be used for planning missions and command sequences.
Sequence Translator, Editor, and Expander Resource (STEER) is a computer program that facilitates construction of sequences and blocks of sequences (hereafter denoted generally as sequence products) for commanding a spacecraft. STEER also provides mechanisms for translating among various sequence product types and quickly expanding activities of a given sequence in chronological order for review and analysis of the sequence. To date, construction of sequence products has generally been done by use of such clumsy mechanisms as text-editor programs, translating among sequence product types has been challenging, and expanding sequences to time-ordered lists has involved arduous processes of converting sequence products to "real" sequences and running them through Class-A software (defined, loosely, as flight and ground software critical to a spacecraft mission). Also, heretofore, generating sequence products in standard formats has been troublesome because precise formatting and syntax are required. STEER alleviates these issues by providing a graphical user interface containing intuitive fields in which the user can enter the necessary information. The STEER expansion function provides a "quick and dirty" means of seeing how a sequence and sequence block would expand into a chronological list, without need to use of Class-A software.
Multi-Mission Telecom Analysis Tool (MMTAT) is a C-language computer program for analyzing proposed spacecraft telecommunication systems. MMTAT utilizes parameterized input and computational models that can be run on standard desktop computers to perform fast and accurate analyses of telecommunication links. MMTAT is easy to use and can easily be integrated with other software applications and run as part of almost any computational simulation. It is distributed as either a stand-alone application program with a graphical user interface or a linkable library with a well-defined set of application programming interface (API) calls. As a stand-alone program, MMTAT provides both textual and graphical output. The graphs make it possible to understand, quickly and easily, how telecommunication performance varies with variations in input parameters. A delimited text file that can be read by any spreadsheet program is generated at the end of each run. The API in the linkable-library form of MMTAT enables the user to control simulation software and to change parameters during a simulation run. Results can be retrieved either at the end of a run or by use of a function call at any time step.