Other
Scientific paper
Jul 2002
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002esasp.509e..15p&link_type=abstract
In: Proceedings of DASIA 2002, 13 - 16 May 2002, Dublin, Ireland. Ed.: R. A. Harris. ESA SP-509, Noordwijk, Netherlands: ESA Pub
Other
Space Research: Computing, Software
Scientific paper
Real-time spacecraft simulators are routinely used by the European Space Agency (ESA) to support pre-launch operations preparations activities. The objective is to make them indistinguishable from the real spacecraft from the spacecraft controller's perspective. Their uses include training the spacecraft operations team, validation of flight control (operations) procedures, and testing of the mission control system. The simulator must be ready to support the start of the simulations campaign approximately six months prior to the spacecraft's launch. The simulations campaign is a series of day-long training sessions involving the whole of the operations team. A simulations officer prepares a scenario to be run that day in which the operations team have to operate the spacecraft and respond to emergencies triggered by the simulations officer. These are usually failures injected into the simulated spacecraft but can be other events that require the operations team to respond in an appropriate manner. Each session is run in a highly realistic manner and followed by a debrief with the simulations officer. These simulations campaigns help to create highly motivated teams who are able to operate the spacecraft efficiently and can respond to emergencies in a clear and effective manner. This has contributed to ESA's enviable record of never having lost a spacecraft due to an operational error. The functions of spacecraft are increasingly controlled by embedded software running in one or more processors onboard the spacecraft. To achieve the realism required for the operational simulators it is necessary to incorporate the onboard software within the simulator by one of the following: recompilation of the onboard software, functional models, hardware emulation or software emulation. A real-time software emulator provides a virtual machine within which the real onboard software image can be run. This emulates the instructions of the target processor, translating them into instructions that run on the host processor. A software emulator is always attractive from the end-user view-point: It provides an almost exact model of the onboard software that can be easily updated as new versions of the onboard software are provided and can be patched by "uplinking" telecommands to the simulator. Emulators running on commercial-off-the-shelf hardware avoid the expense and complexity of breadboard or flight-spare hardware, and the schedule dependencies associated with it. Software emulation is an important technology in spacecraft simulations and has the potential for application in other domains where embedded software is used. In this paper, we describe spacecraft simulators and software emulators, and discuss the pros and cons of alternative approaches to modelling onboard software, describe how software emulators can be used for a variety of purposes and describe the emulator suite that includes emulators of the ESA standard MIL-STD-1750 and ERC32 processors.
Dartnell Alan
Dawe Garreg
Pidgeon Alastair
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