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PERICLES: a new knowledge management programme
applied to SOLAR data on COLUMBUS.
Christian Muller, Didier Moreau, Nadia This. Alice Michel, Rani Pinchuk, Jelle Pelfrenne, Saliha Klai, Carla Jacobs and
The PERICLES consortium.
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Agenda
• About PERICLES
• The PERICLES Space Science use case – SOLAR
• SOLAR Data to be preserved
– Engineering Data
– Operation Data & Documentation
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USOC – User Support & Operations Center
Operation Documents
Data generated during operations
Documents generated during operations
Operations Tools
– Science Data
– Example
• Conclusions
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About PERICLES
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What is Pericles?
• A FP7 ICT project aimed at “preservation by design” of
large data sets.
• Two case studies - media and art (TATE Gallery) and
space science (B.USOC).
• A key challenge here is the need to cater for the
evolution of user communities in circumstances that are
unanticipated when the data was created. PERICLES
will address this by considering the evolution or
socialization of data sets.
• The ICT partners are already present in the DCC
(data curation centre).
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Partners
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1 King’s College London KCL UK: ccordinator
2 University of Borås HB Sweden: ICT (large fashion and textile data base)
3 CERTH-ITI CERTH Greece: ICT
4 Dotsoft DOT Greece: ICT
5 Georg-August-Universität Göttingen UGOE Germany: ICT (scientific library)
6 University of Liverpool ULIV UK: ICT
7 Space Application Services SpaceApps Belgium: ICT
8 Xerox XEROX France: ICT
9 University of Edinburgh EDIN UK: ICT
10 Tate Gallery TATE UK: art & media case
11 Industrious Media IM UK: ICT
12 B.USOC (IASB BIRA) BUSOC Belgium: space science case
Two partners are essentially data providers, while all the others are
essentially ICT.
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The PERICLES Space Science
use case – SOLAR
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SOLAR
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The SOLAR payload is built from three complementary space science
instruments that measure the solar spectral irradiance with an
unprecedented accuracy across almost the whole spectrum: 17-3000 nm.
This range carries 99% of the Sun's energy emission. Apart from the
contributions to solar and stellar physics, knowledge of the solar energy flux
(and its variations) entering the Earth's atmosphere is of great importance
for atmospheric modeling, atmospheric chemistry and climatology. The
three instruments are:
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SOLSPEC (Solar Spectra Irradiance
Measurements, developed by CNRS,France
and IASB/BIRA, Belgium)
SOL-ACES (Auto-Calibrating Extreme
Ultraviolet and Ultraviolet Spectrophotometers,
developed by the Fraunhofer Institute,
Deutschland)
SOVIM (Solar Variable and Irradiance Monitor,
jointly developed by the Observatory of
DAVOS, Switzerland and the Royal
Meteorological Institute, Belgium)
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SOLAR HISTORY
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Why preserve solar data?
• Total solar irradiance and spectral solar
irradiances are the main energy source of
the earth system.
• Their short and long term variations
influence the earth climate.
• We have verified data for only the last 3040 years, the space age.
• Anything longer comes from proxies.
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SOLAR Data to be Preserved
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Engineering Documentation
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ESR : Experiment Science Requirements, drafted by ESA project Scientists
detailing the requirements from the Principal Investigator (actually for
SOLAR this ESR was only drafted when the payload was already
operational for several years). Generally this is document is part of phase A.
For SOLAR, in the Engineering DB there are 923 documents from the
preparation phases 0 to D, these include:
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Specifications and design documents
Acceptance data packages
Test plans
Acceptance, Functional and other Test Reports
Instrument/PL ICDs
Other ICDs (Interface Control Document)
Assessment reports
Safety data packages
Design Reports
CIDL (Configuration Item Design List)/ABCLs
User/Operations manuals
Certifications
Thermal analysis
Verification Control Document
...
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USOC – User Support & Operations Center
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In 1998, ESA Manned Space Program board decided to adopt a
decentralized infrastructure for the support of European payloads on-board
the International Space Station (ISS). This concept was based on operating
multiple User Support and Operations Centres (USOCs), each assigned to
supporting a majority of tasks related to the preparation and in-flight
operations of European payloads.
The USOCs are based in national centres distributed throughout Europe.
Depending on the tasks assigned to a USOC, they have the responsibility of
a Facility Responsible Centre (FRC) or Facility Support Centre (FSC).
Columbus five internal payload
racks at launch (courtesy ESA)
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USOC – User Support & Operations Center
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All these USOCs use common software and hardware infrastructure to be
securely connected to the Columbus Control Centre (Col-CC). Two kinds of
datastream are exchanged between USOCs and Col-CC, telemetry and
telecommands.
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Operations Documents
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JOIP: Joint Operations and Interface Procedures. It outlines the
operational interfaces and guidelines for all mission phases of the ESA
Human Spaceflight programme. OIP: Operations Interface Procedure. It
outlines operational interfaces and guidelines for all mission phases of the
USOS programme.
Flight Rules: a set or pre-planned decisions concerning off nominal
situations; also a set of definitions, delegations of authority and
responsibilities of all organizations involved in the conduct of mission
operations.
Payload regulations: definition is the same as flight Rules, with the
difference that payload regulations address only nominal and off-nominal
payload operations that DO NOT have safety and vehicle integrity
implications.
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Operations Documents
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PODF: Payload Data File is a XML file, providing a pre-defined sequence
of commands and checks to operate the payload. For payloads interfacing
Columbus every ground operator and crew member needs to follow a
PODF to execute a payload activity. PODFs are retrieved from IPV. IPV is
a web application for managing and displaying the database of on-board
and ground procedures.
Operations Manual: B.USOC specific guidelines and procedures for the on
console operations. It consists of references to documents, information for
on console, Point of contacts and ground procedures.
BUSOC wiki (https://virtualweb.busoc.be/): the BUSOC wikipages provide
an overview of the roles and responsibilities, guidelines on Increment
preparation, use of the Predictor tool etc..
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Operations Documents
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eRoom: the eRoom is a Documentum installation that serves as a
repository of interface control documents, user manuals, specifications,
technical notes, procedures, protocols, minutes, presentation, reports,
operational products, databases and emails. (a list and an example of
manuals can be provided if required)
Minutes of Meetings: on a weekly basis there are meetings focused on the
preparation and on-going operations. These can be internal only or with
external parties from the Flight operations or the scientists (European
Weekly operations Conference (EWOC), Mission Science Office telecon,
BUSOC Ops days, ... ). Information of these meetings is spread through
email or Minutes of Meeting
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Documents generated during operations
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OSTPV (Onboard Short Term Planner Viewer) – OSTPV is a web
application that displays timeline information about ground and onboard
procedures, schedules and activities. Data can be received from a remote
site in a textual, structured format. However, the primary OSTP user
interface is horizontally scrollable web page with a timeline over several
days and various events scattered on it. BUSOC Operator views OSTPV in
read-only mode, a dedicated user account from NASA is required to access
the OSTP .
MDB – The Mission DataBase contains a machine-readable description of
the telemetry, including the size of various parameters sent in telemetry
packets and their interpretation from binary to engineering values, soft and
hard limits as defined in the Design phase.
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Data generated during operations
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YAMCS is a mission control system. It allows to acquire telemetry and
dispatch telecommands. It can parse the telemetry stream and store it.
YAMCS is an open source software developed by SpaceApps and BUSOC.
Telemetry: Telemetry is data organized into packets that is sent by the
payload to the control centre. Three main different kind of telemetry can be
considered:
Housekeeping
Health and status
Science: The science data is accepted as raw data, and then processed to
include the information from the calibration curves. It may later be further
processed to include other calculations of the scientists.
Science data final processing is made at the scientists UHB’s.
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Data generated during operations
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Telecommands – Telecommands are structured data sent to payloads
during the operations. They may contain control structures for shutting up or
starting various modules, as well as uploads of data and scripts. A complete
history of telecommands over the operating live of the payload is saved and
is made available to the operational environment and to the scientific
partners. Activities are usually performed following PODFs, where a manual
stack of commands is used. These manual stacks are just lists of
telecommands, but under configuration control and following a PODF
Auxiliary data – most of auxiliary data comes from public sources. For
instance, current B.USOC operations related to the SOLAR payload heavily
depend on TLE (two-line elements) to predict the position of the ISS and on
the ISS attitude timeline (ATL) to predict the orientation of ISS towards the
Sun. The two external data sources are combined in order to create a full
prediction of the upcoming month allowing to create a clear science
planning and optimal operations support plan. In more details, the data are
automatically downloaded to the server.
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Documents generated during operations
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CEFN Tool (– Columbus Flight Notes (CEFNs) Tool provides an automated
workflow for written communication, review, processing and tracking. It is a
tracking web application accessible for all Columbus Flight control team
members. It is coded in PHP and does not provide any functionality to
export contents of the notes in machine-readable format. A CEFN may refer
to draft, Inter-console or Flight Note:
– Draft:
– Inter-console Note (ICN)
• Used to coordinate CEFN inputs or share information among Flight Control
team members
• Accessible by author and his/her selected recipients
• May be promoted to a CEFN by author or recipients
– Flight Note (CEFN)
• Review process controlled by Columbus Flight Director
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Documents generated during operations
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Console Logs – Console logs are short timestamped messages that the
operators update every time they make an operation or retrieve information
on console which is useful for the operations. Console logs are primarily
used for passing over information in between shifts and can also be used
for forensic analysis
SOLAR Mission Tool Light – the SOLAR Mission Tool light was the
precursor of the Predictor Tool. At the time of the development it covered
planning of the activities, automatically identifying constraints or conflicts
with respect to external factors such as visiting vehicles or SAA passes. It
consists of an excel sheet with different tabs for different features. Currently
it is still used for short and long term handover information and to gather
inputs for the BUSOC optimization board.
Checklist - the checklist remains on console and provides the operator a
list of routine tasks to be performed during his/her shift
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Documents generated during operations
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DOR – Daily Operations Report provides an overview of the 24 hours of
SOLAR science activities. It includes a summary of the operations, planning
of the coming days within a Sun Window as well as reports on
discrepancies and anomalies. The DOR is automatically generated by the
Predictor Tool.
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The DOR is the main source of day to day informations and alerts for the
science teams.
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Predictor Tool
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Predictor Tool: The SOLAR Predictor tool automatically fetches and parses information
from a series of sources relevant for SOLAR Operations, such as the real-time planning
(OSTPV), attitude timeline and vehicle traffic (ATL), orbit-related data (TOPO and TLE),
and of course the SOLAR telemetry (TM) data. This allows the tool to provide
predictions of Sun observation conditions and operations constraints based on the latest
available information. These are then used by the operator team to plan the execution of
activities, like the upload and execution of on-board scripts or the execution of PODF
procedures. The tool graphically highlights identified conflicts in the planning, allowing
the planning to be easily fine-tuned by operators in successive shifts.
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Anomaly Tracking Tools
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SPRdb: the System problem Report database is an online issue tracking
system for ground and on board issues about Columbus, its payloads and
control centres. It used mainly to report problems to ground segment and
payload developers while CEFN is used for operations communication. It
has several sections that list SPRs, ARs (anomaly Reports) and IOT-TS
(Industrial Operation Ticket System) tickets.
Local bugs database: The local bug database is running on Bugzilla and is
used by B.USOC operators to enter bug reports related to the software
running inside B.USOC.
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Planning Tools
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ISS planning – 9 months prior to the Increment BUSOC provides the
Columbus planning team their planning inputs for the payload operations for
6 months. These planning inputs are based on the payload requirements,
hence for SOLAR limited to the planning of command windows (no crew
activities) during the predicted observation periods, or Sun Visibility
Windows ,and special activities required due to external factors such as
visiting vehicles. For such a long term prediction the ISS Baseplate is used
providing the prediction of the ISS beta angle Science planning – prior to
each science phase, or Sun visibility Window, the operator will request the
scientists by mail their science planning. After reception of the proposed
planning, BUSOC will insert the planning into the predictor tool allowing the
identification of files (scripts) that need to be uploaded.
Command schedules - the command schedules are scripts listing timetagged commands to the instrument of SOLAR Platform. These commands
schedules are drafted by the scientists (instruments) or by the operator (for
SOLAR) and uplinked by the FCT (Flight Control Team) to SOLAR. The
script can then be started via a dedicated telecommand.
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Science data
– The science data is accepted as raw data, and then processed to include the
information from the calibration curves. It may later be further processed to
include other calculations of the scientists.
– The raw data is usually referred to as level 0 data. The data processed with the
calibration curves information is called level 1 data. However, in different
projects the exact definition of the levels may change.
– Sample of level 1 (already processed) SOLACE level 1 data as graphs:
Science data generation is a scientific
process by which the science team
generates a products, reuse of the data
should produce updated and new
products. All the steps used in the original
process should thus be preserved as
metadata.
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Scientists point of view
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The scientists group is divided to two sub groups – the scientists who work on a
specific space experiment and the other scientists.
Scientists working on space experiments are usually not interested in the very long
term. They are interested in publishing papers about their findings, and are maybe
careful to keep the data from competitor scientists. Currently there are no incentives
to take the long-term view for the data. They consider the published science data as
the final record.
few new initial requirements for the longer scale:
– Allowing to use the data together for further research.
– Correlate the data from different missions.
– Availability of both raw data with information of the instrument for proper
interpretation for similar research.
– Availability of processed data for future research – the data must be easily
accessible for future research. For example, providing a searching tool allowing
to enter some search criteria (for example some key words related to solar
activity, or a time frame) and then the data of interest is displayed for download.
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An example: Degradation and mitigation
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Example: contamination of
detectors of SOL-ACES
The transmission of the
spectrometer is restored by heating
to 50°C. The filter wheel has been
analysed as non contaminated. The
correction process needs both
attended operations and an
instrument science team.
The analysis of this and other
contamination incidents on the ISS
is still in progress.
The history of corrections and mitigation procedures is essential
for data reuse.
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Which rules are considered by solar scientists for
accepting the release of scientific data?
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Peer review: publication in the
refereed literature.
Acceptance by international
bodies: COSPAR.
The final objective might vary with
time, coming from an initial
objective: the solar constant to
short and long term variations of
solar output (in 2013 some
radiative models still use a
parameter called solar constant).
The comparison process requires intimate instrument knowledge and
needs the scientific team to be present and cannot be reproduced when
the scientific institutes have disappeared: the data should be archived to
be reprocessed without the support of the PI.
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Conclusions
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Conclusions
• The PERICLES projects lasts until 2017 and an initial
inventory of the data sources for the SOLAR project has
already been done.
• The deliverable will be a prototype allowing to use the
record as an archive and to reuse it for further studies of
the earth and solar environment and climate.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the European Space Agency (ESA) (Directorate of
Human Spaceflight) and the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO) (ESA
Prodex and other programs) for SOLAR funding.
PERICLES is funded under FP7 ICT Call 9, and addresses work programme
objective ICT-2011.4.3 Digital Preservation and we are grateful to the European
Commission for its support.
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Final delivery: a product outliving its designers