T4.3 Small, Fast and Reusable: A Satellite Planning and Scheduling System

Steven Kleiner (SAO)

Reference URL: http://www.quaternion.harvard.edu

The planning and scheduling system developed for the SWAS Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite is discussed with reference to:

• a novel graphical user interface using a ``mixer board'' to adjust the composition of the schedule and an interactive schedule display to select targets and candidate observations,
• a dynamic scheduling strategy which can rebuild schedules on the fly while still retaining the planning work already done,
• a set of software components which have been used to build an assortment of mission planning and scheduling tools.

This talk should be of interest to those involved with GUI design or human-computer interaction and to those who are or will be building spacecraft planning and scheduling tools. The software was written for reuse by other satellite missions and is available for the asking.