Software Engineering Payload Ground Control System: The ISSAC™ Project.

The advent of software systems for space exploration and orbital operation has fueled the development of autonomous systems, chiefly because of the time latency in communicating with such systems. The University of North Dakota has just concluded development and operations of a space orbital system, code named ISSAC (International Space Station Agricultural Camera). This system has two main software components, the Flight Software System (FSS) and the Ground Control System (GCS). This paper chronicles the software engineering experience of developing the Ground Control System with details of the Flight Software System already chronicled in our previous paper []. We also list the lessons learned in applying software engineering principles and models on a project of this importance and complexity. Most of the content in the introduction and ISSAC background sections in this paper is taken from our previous paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]