Avionics Software Development
Together with the data handling system (DHS), the flight software (FSW) forms the "brain" of every modern spacecraft. This is where all information and data come together, are processed and sent to the ground. This is where anomalies and errors in the entire system are detected and rectified, ensuring safe operation. The software in particular provides a significant part of the functionality of the overall system, either directly or as an intermediary between the ground and the subsystem.
Accordingly, the FSW is critical for every mission and its development can hardly be given enough importance.
In order to be able to build reliable, efficient, autonomous and, last but not least, affordable spacecraft in the future, we are working on innovative software technologies and software architectures for hardware abstraction, communication protocols and drivers as well as applications for modern on-board computers (OBC) and their ecosystem in the Avionics Software working group. Our focus is on the driver, middleware and application level as well as the development process and corresponding tools.
The most important product is our flight software library OUTPOST (Open modUlar sofTware PlatfOrm for SpacecrafT), written in modern C++, which serves as the basis for our software solutions and covers a wide range of hardware and operating system abstractions, driver interfaces, data structures and communication primitives through to important protocols for communication between the ground and space segments.
In addition to the development of reliable software systems with OUTPOST, the declared aim is the seamless transition between the development phases of a spacecraft, in particular with regard to on-board data processing and telemetry (TM) as well as telecommands (TC) and corresponding communication protocols, and the establishment of agile software engineering processes in space travel. To this end, we use model-driven development methods, for example for the TM and TC model.
In addition to development, research plays a key role in the working group. Our main areas of research are as follows:
- System autonomy
- Software development
- process for spacecraft
- Model-based development
- Fault-tolerant systemsScalability
Our approach is based on cooperation with universities, industry and space agencies to offer consulting, transfer knowledge, develop market-ready solutions and participate in standardization activities. Our group members are part of standardization committees at ESA and ECSS, especially in the field of communication protocols.