Paper Session II-B - Application of Information Technology to the National Launch System

The information needs of the National Launch System program had their beginnings with the Advanced Launch System (ALS). The Technical Reference Document for ALS called for a Unified Information System (UNIS) to provide, in a timely manner, all the information required to manage, design, manufacture, integrate, test, launch, operate, and support the ALS. UNIS 9 was to provide the link between distributed, heterogeneous workstations which were to make up both the ground and flight information systems. In addition, there was to be an Advanced Launch System Model (ALSYM), a set of computerized submodels, or tools, which would work together to simulate all aspects of the ALS. These conceptual requirements were transitioned to the NLS program, and UNIS and the system simulation exist today. The current version of the NLS UNIS links geographically dispersed users to databases, analysis tools, program management tools, and communications devices. UNIS development is continuing to provide the ultimate capabilities which were described in the ALS Technical Reference Document. The approach to that development, as well as the current and planned capabilities are described. The ALSYM requirement transitioned as a requirement for a largescale, end-to-end simulation of the Space Transportation Main Engine (STME) development program, named STESYM. The approach being used to satisfy that requirement incorporates object-oriented programming, discrete-event simulation, and knowledge-based techniques to produce a simulation that captures the technical characteristics of the hardware, the processing flows, and the scheduling requirements. The outputs of the simulation will include subsystem and system reliabilities, process infrastructure statistics, schedule performance statistics, and costs. Together, UNIS and STESYM will provide program managers, engineers, logisticians, and other program participants with communications connectivity and the information to support STME program analysis

A Community-Consensus Approach to Knowledge Interoperability Within Heterogeneous Earth System Science Based Observational Systems

Within complex domains - such as Earth System Science - knowledge is constantly evolving. Observational systems used to observe Earth’s complex processes are often built in isolation, and data representations are not adequately designed for secondary use and higher order knowledge generation. Cross-community sharing of computable information is therefore difficult to achieve. Barriers to interoperability of information means that specialists cannot fully exploit the data that may be available. Much of the work done to date within the Information Science community has been to enable interoperability through standardisation, particularly at the syntactic level. The Open Geospatial Consortium’s (OGC) Observations & Measurements (O&M) standard [1] is a good example of the ongoing work towards enabling interoperability among observational systems. However, standards have a codifying and constraining effect on information. Object-oriented approaches commonly employed assume a static understanding of entities or classes of information. Therefore, these design methodologies cannot represent the true nature of knowledge within an evolving domain. Standards such as O&M avoid over constraining information objects by allowing variability. Where variability exists, interoperability is often compromised for individual use-cases. The Health domain also faces similar challenges to representing complex and evolving domain concepts. Within complex domains two categories or levels of domain concepts exist. Those concepts that remain stable over a long period of time, and those concepts that are prone to change, as the domain knowledge evolves. Health informaticians have developed a sophisticated two-level systems design approach for electronic health documentation over many years, and with the use of archetypes, have shown how knowledge interoperability among heterogeneous systems can be achieved [2]. The authors are currently engaged in translating two-level modelling approaches to geo-observational based systems [3][4]. A key differentiator of two-level modelling compared to other approaches is that it allows domain experts to be the primary drivers of digital artefacts, while also ensuring that technical validity is maintained in one highly accessible and integrated process; leading to a managed and interoperable extensibility mechanism to standards such as O&M. This presentation will highlight this ongoing work and demonstrate the tools under development to allow domain practitioners to define and manage a set of Earth System Science community defined archetypes to enable interoperability, beyond the syntactic level of observational systems. [1] S. Cox, Observations and measurements, Open Geospatial Consortium Best Practices Document. Open Geospatial Consortium, 2006. [2] T. Beale, Archetypes: Constraint-based domain models for future-proof information systems, in OOPSLA 2002 Workshop on Behavioral Semantics, 2002. [3] P. Stacey, D. Berry, “Applying two-level modelling to remote sensor systems design to enable future knowledge generation,” in IEEE YP Conference in Remote Sensing Abstracts, Barcelona, 2015. [4] P. Stacey, D. Berry, “Design and Implementation of an Archetype Based Interoperable Knowledge EcoSystem for Data Buoys” [in press] to appear in proceedings of IEEE/MTS Oceans conference, Aberdeen, June 2017

Ontology technology for the development and deployment of learning technology systems - a survey

The World-Wide Web is undergoing dramatic changes at the moment. The Semantic Web is an initiative to bring meaning to the Web. The Semantic Web is based on ontology technology – a knowledge representation framework – at its core. We illustrate the importance of this evolutionary development. We survey five scenarios demonstrating different forms of applications of ontology technologies in the development and deployment of learning technology systems. Ontology technologies are highly useful to organise, personalise, and publish learning content and to discover, generate, and compose learning objects

A web-based teaching/learning environment to support collaborative knowledge construction in design

A web-based application has been developed as part of a recently completed research which proposed a conceptual framework to collect, analyze and compare different design experiences and to construct structured representations of the emerging knowledge in digital architectural design. The paper introduces the theoretical and practical development of this application as a teaching/learning environment which has significantly contributed to the development and testing of the ideas developed throughout the research. Later in the paper, the application of BLIP in two experimental (design) workshops is reported and evaluated according to the extent to which the application facilitates generation, modification and utilization of design knowledge

Computerization of workflows, guidelines and care pathways: a review of implementation challenges for process-oriented health information systems

There is a need to integrate the various theoretical frameworks and formalisms for modeling clinical guidelines, workflows, and pathways, in order to move beyond providing support for individual clinical decisions and toward the provision of process-oriented, patient-centered, health information systems (HIS). In this review, we analyze the challenges in developing process-oriented HIS that formally model guidelines, workflows, and care pathways. A qualitative meta-synthesis was performed on studies published in English between 1995 and 2010 that addressed the modeling process and reported the exposition of a new methodology, model, system implementation, or system architecture. Thematic analysis, principal component analysis (PCA) and data visualisation techniques were used to identify and cluster the underlying implementation ‘challenge’ themes. One hundred and eight relevant studies were selected for review. Twenty-five underlying ‘challenge’ themes were identified. These were clustered into 10 distinct groups, from which a conceptual model of the implementation process was developed. We found that the development of systems supporting individual clinical decisions is evolving toward the implementation of adaptable care pathways on the semantic web, incorporating formal, clinical, and organizational ontologies, and the use of workflow management systems. These architectures now need to be implemented and evaluated on a wider scale within clinical settings

An ontology for software component matching

Matching is a central activity in the discovery and assembly of reusable software components. We investigate how ontology technologies can be utilised to support software component development. We use description logics, which underlie Semantic Web ontology languages such as OWL, to develop an ontology for matching requested and provided components. A link between modal logic and description logics will prove invaluable for the provision of reasoning support for component behaviour