A Hardware Development Tool Stack for Future Space Exploration - Tool Selection Criteria

摘要

The concept of a hardware development tool stack for future space exploration was first presented at the International Astronautical Congress in Adelaide 2017. This paper extends those finding and describes selection criteria for a tool stack to further streamline the engineering process. Modern hardware engineering can be greatly improved by choosing the right tool stack based on three key criteria; 1) browser-based, 2) concurrency, and 3) data-driven integration. A detailed overview of the three criteria is presented as well as an evaluation of a set of common engineering tools from different disciplines based on the identified criteria. It is shown that the vision of a modern engineering workflow is enabled by browser-based engineering tools which implement concurrency, integrations and seamless updates across disciplines. With the given examples, it becomes evident that a browser-based hardware development tool stack is a necessary foundation for the agile development of future space exploration missions due to their high level of interdisciplinary complexity.