A requirements engineering framework for developing COTS GIS applications : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Information Science in Information Systems at Massey University

There has been an increase in recent years in the number of Geographic Information System (GIS) applications being developed for stakeholders using Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) software. There are a lack of guidelines in both industry and the literature on how to acquire user requirements for the development of GIS applications in this COTS software environment. This study investigates process activities in order to build a framework to address these inadequacies. The construction of the framework incorporates requirements engineering and COTS software evaluation and selection process activities from the Information Systems (IS) area. The framework is used to explore three issues related to developing GIS applications and used to determine whether: 1) a life cycle model is used to guide the gathering and analysing of requirements when developing GIS applications, 2) standard IS requirements processes can be used for developing GIS solutions, and 3) standard IS COTS software acquisition processes can be used for developing GIS solutions. Case studies were used to analyse current practices in the GIS industry and to validate the usefulness of these activities in the framework. The results of this investigation suggest that RE practices associated with the COTS paradigm within the IS arena are suitable for developing GIS applications based on user requirements

Going on-line on a shoestring: An experiment in concurrent development of requirements and architecture

A number of on-line applications were built for a small university using a micro-sized development team. Four ideas were tested during the project: the Twin Peaks development model, using fully functional prototypes in the requirements elicitation process, some core practices of Extreme Programming, and the use of open-source software in a production environment. Certain project management techniques and their application to a micro-sized development effort were also explored. These ideas and techniques proved effective in developing many significant Internet and networked applications in a short time and at very low cost

Safety Engineering with COTS components

Safety-critical systems are becoming more widespread, complex and reliant on software. Increasingly they are engineered through Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) (Commercial Off The Shelf) components to alleviate the spiralling costs and development time, often in the context of complex supply chains. A parallel increased concern for safety has resulted in a variety of safety standards, with a growing consensus that a safety life cycle is needed which is fully integrated with the design and development life cycle, to ensure that safety has appropriate influence on the design decisions as system development progresses. In this article we explore the application of an integrated approach to safety engineering in which assurance drives the engineering process. The paper re- ports on the outcome of a case study on a live industrial project with a view to evaluate: its suitability for application in a real-world safety engineering setting; its benefits and limitations in counteracting some of the difficulties of safety en- gineering with COTS components across supply chains; and, its effectiveness in generating evidence which can contribute directly to the construction of safety cases

On Systematic Design of Protectors for Employing OTS Items

Off-the-shelf (OTS) components are increasingly used in application areas with stringent dependability requirements. Component wrapping is a well known structuring technique used in many areas. We propose a general approach to developing protective wrappers that assist in integrating OTS items with a focus on the overall system dependability. The wrappers are viewed as redundant software used to detect errors or suspicious activity and to execute appropriate recovery when possible; wrapper development is considered as a part of system integration activities. Wrappers are to be rigorously specified and executed at run time as a means of protecting OTS items against faults in the rest of the system, and the system against the OTS item's faults. Possible symptoms of erroneous behaviour to be detected by a protective wrapper and possible actions to be undertaken in response are listed and discussed. The information required for wrapper development is provided by traceability analysis. Possible approaches to implementing “protectors” in the standard current component technologies are briefly outline

Software reliability and dependability: a roadmap

Shifting the focus from software reliability to user-centred measures of dependability in complete software-based systems. Influencing design practice to facilitate dependability assessment. Propagating awareness of dependability issues and the use of existing, useful methods. Injecting some rigour in the use of process-related evidence for dependability assessment. Better understanding issues of diversity and variation as drivers of dependability. Bev Littlewood is founder-Director of the Centre for Software Reliability, and Professor of Software Engineering at City University, London. Prof Littlewood has worked for many years on problems associated with the modelling and evaluation of the dependability of software-based systems; he has published many papers in international journals and conference proceedings and has edited several books. Much of this work has been carried out in collaborative projects, including the successful EC-funded projects SHIP, PDCS, PDCS2, DeVa. He has been employed as a consultant t

Small Satellite Industrial Base Study: Foundational Findings

This report documents findings from a Small Satellite (SmallSat) Industrial Base Study conducted by The Aerospace Corporation between November 2018 and September 2019. The primary objectives of this study were a) to gain a better understanding of the SmallSat communitys technical practices, engineering approaches, requirements flow-downs, and common processes and b) identify insights and recommendations for how the government can further capitalize on the strengths and capabilities of SmallSat offerings. In the context of this study, SmallSats are understood to weigh no more than 500 kg, as described in State of the Art Small Spacecraft Technology, NASA/TP-2018- 220027, December 2018. CubeSats were excluded from this study to avoid overlap and duplication of recently completed work or other studies already under way. The team also touched on differences between traditional space-grade and the emerging mid-grade and other non-space, alternate-grade EEEE (electrical, electronic, electromechanical, electro-optical) piece part categories. Finally, the participants sought to understand the potential effects of increased use of alternate-grade parts on the traditional space-grade industrial base. The study team was keenly aware that there are missions for which non-space grade parts currently are infeasible for the foreseeable future. National security, long-duration and high-reliability missions intolerant of risk are a few examples. The team sought to identify benefits of alternative parts and approaches that can be harnessed by the government to achieve greater efficiencies and capabilities without impacting mission success

Radiation Risks and Mitigation in Electronic Systems

Electrical and electronic systems can be disturbed by radiation-induced effects. In some cases, radiation-induced effects are of a low probability and can be ignored; however, radiation effects must be considered when designing systems that have a high mean time to failure requirement, an impact on protection, and/or higher exposure to radiation. High-energy physics power systems suffer from a combination of these effects: a high mean time to failure is required, failure can impact on protection, and the proximity of systems to accelerators increases the likelihood of radiation-induced events. This paper presents the principal radiation-induced effects, and radiation environments typical to high-energy physics. It outlines a procedure for designing and validating radiation-tolerant systems using commercial off-the-shelf components. The paper ends with a worked example of radiation-tolerant power converter controls that are being developed for the Large Hadron Collider and High Luminosity-Large Hadron Collider at CERN.Comment: 19 pages, contribution to the 2014 CAS - CERN Accelerator School: Power Converters, Baden, Switzerland, 7-14 May 201

Developing a grid computing system for commercial-off-the-shelf simulation packages

Today simulation is becoming an increasingly pervasive technology across major business sectors. Advances in COTS Simulation Packages and Commercial Simulation Software have made it easier for users to build models, often of large complex processes. These two factors combined are to be welcomed and when used correctly can be of great benefit to organisations that make use of the technology. However, it is also the case that users hungry for answers do not always have the time, or possibly the patience, to wait for results from multiple replications and multiple experiments as standard simulation practice would demand. There is therefore a need to support this advance in the use of simulation within today’s business with improved computing technology. Grid computing has been put forward as a potential commercial solution to this requirement. To this end, Saker Solutions and the Distributed Systems Research Group at Brunel University have developed a dedicated Grid Computing System (SakerGrid) to support the deployment of simulation models across a desktop grid of PCs. The paper identifies route taken to solve this challenging issue and suggests where the future may lie for this exciting integration of two effective but underused technologies

Investigating distributed simulation at the Ford motor company

Engine production is a complex process that requires the manufacturing and assembly of a wide variety of components to create a varied product mix. Simulation plays a key role in the planning process of a new production line to determine if it can meet expected demand. However, these simulations can be very time consuming and can often take up to a day to execute a single run. This paper investigates how distributed simulation based on the IEEE 1516 High Level Architecture and the emerging standard COTS Simulation Package Interoperability Product Development Group (CSPI-PDG) Type I Interoperability Reference Model could be used to reduce the time taken for a single simulation run. CSP interoperability and the problem of integrating CSPs with HLA software (the runtime infrastructure) are presented. New prototype benchmarking software, the COTS Simulation Package Emulator (CSPE), which is being developed to investigate distributed simulation problems, is discussed. The paper then develops a case study of how this was used to investigate the feasibility of using distributed simulation at Ford. The paper discusses results obtained from this case study and suggests that distributed simulation could indeed be beneficial to Ford

Uncertainty explicit assessment of off-the-shelf software: A Bayesian approach

Assessment of software COTS components is an essential part of component-based software development. Poorly chosen components may lead to solutions of low quality and that are difficult to maintain. The assessment may be based on incomplete knowledge about the COTS component itself and other aspects (e.g. vendor’s credentials, etc.), which may affect the decision of selecting COTS component(s). We argue in favor of assessment methods in which uncertainty is explicitly represented (‘uncertainty explicit’ methods) using probability distributions. We provide details of a Bayesian model, which can be used to capture the uncertainties in the simultaneous assessment of two attributes, thus, also capturing the dependencies that might exist between them. We also provide empirical data from the use of this method for the assessment of off-the-shelf database servers which illustrate the advantages of ‘uncertainty explicit’ methods over conventional methods of COTS component assessment which assume that at the end of the assessment the values of the attributes become known with certainty