Product Management Challenges and Risks at NASA Workshop

National Aeronautics and Space Administration National Aeronautics and Space Administration cFS Workshop Product Management core Flight System Workshop Caltech December 12, 2016 David McComas NASA Goddard Space Flight Center 1

Agenda Historical context Current state of product management & governance Challenges and risks with current state Potential transition options Call to serve 2

Historical Context Who controls which artifacts? What is scope of who can submit trouble tickets? Community What is scope of who can make contributions? How is technology infusion managed? ? How do we control quality? NASA Configuration Control Board (CCB), established in December 2014, has successfully managed multiple releases of cFS components NASA January 2015 cFS released as open source to allow anyone developing FSW with some fortitude to use the cFS cFS originally created by GSFC FSW Branch to reduce GSFC FSW costs GSFC Successfully met this goal by using a product line approach with reusable and configurable lifecycle artifacts 3

Current Product Management State NASA Releases NASA CCB Change Requests OSAL & PSPs cFE & Tools Apps Contributions Tools Apps User Executive Platform 4

Current Product Management Challenges Adoption - Users must assemble their own distribution (cFS is not productized) - Difficulty evaluating, performing trades, and configuring for different platforms - 4:1 ratio of cFE-to-Apps downloads Engagement & Participation - Non-NASA users can t submit trouble tickets - No non-NASA contributions - Communication limited to email lists - Participation in community, internal & external to NASA, not clearly defined Resources - CCB takes on more responsibility without additional resources - We capitalize on some NASA resources, but not leveraging the community s extensive resources 5

Current Risks Duplication and fragmentation - Simulink Interface Layer (SIL), Software Bus Network (SBN) - This isn t always a bad thing for innovation Sustainability - NASA resources too limited to address growing challenges - Isolated knowledge in individuals What if they leave? Community member retention & growth - We need to build trust & loyalty Manage expectations Funding - 6

State of the Community Business Model Funding Model - No institutional funding, Advanced Exploration Systems (JSC) provides a lifeline - Members use local funding to support community activities - New release content driven by upcoming member mission needs No formal community charter, by-laws, or operating procedures in place - Original 2012 draft charter never signed - Some original concepts still valid, but top-down funding approach needs rework Product Management is evolving and a management plan needs to be defined to cover - Scope of products controlled by the CCB - Product release strategies and versioning - Product delivery and community feedback 7

The Power of Community Microsoft releases digital encyclopedia called Encarta 1993 - 2001 - Wikipedia launched 2009 - Microsoft terminates Encarta Microsoft s market capitalization is 25 years of NASA budgets 8

Community Governance Transition Approach What Review Why How Understand our goals Review the plans and create a path for concurrence Design systems & processes that implement the product management model Create a product management model Understand the context Define governance needs Draft governance plan Topics for workshop 9

Transition Challenges We may not share the same vision or sense of purpose - Therefore we may not agree on what needs to change NASA is a government organization so inherent obstacles - First about think why & what without getting bogged down with how - Second ask questions of how this could be realized. What type of governance model would take us to our goals? Once we align to a common mission then we can create the right infrastructure that enables us to achieve the mission Remainder of session - Propose a cFS mission statement - Present a couple of ideas for discussion - Not trying to solve today, trying create a starting point for a working group 10

cFS Community Purpose Advance the creation, evolution, promotion, and support of a NASA Class B flight software system - Important we stay focused on our domain Cultivate both an open source community and an ecosystem of complementary products, capabilities, and services. - All inclusive in terms of organizations - No constraints on complementary products 11

Idea #1 NASA Centric Transition from - A NASA board that collects and maintains NASA assets To - A NASA managed organization that provides Products, processes, and tools that allow distributors to integrate and distribute complete solutions 12

Idea #1 - NASA Centric cFS Community Assets Change Requests Assets Change Requests Contributions NASA CCB Distributor Change Requests Contributions Custom Distributions NASA Release Tools Tools Apps Apps Tools Executive Executive Apps Platform Platform Executive Platform Mission 13

Idea #1 NASA Centric Clearly identify what NASA CCB controls and releases NASA Release would be a small set of platforms abstractions, cFE, and a set of architectural significant applications such as SCH, CI, TO, HS, CF, FM, & SBN. Create clear architectural model, processes, and tools for community component contributions - Platform abstractions: OSAL/PSP Device drivers Apps cFS Developer Kits Distributors assemble components into releases - - - - - - Any organization, including NASA, can be a distributor Releases could be targeted to specific user community 14

Idea #2 - Governance Model Committee Committee Committee Board of Directors Technical Steering Committee User Committee cFS cFE PSP/OSAL Apps cFS NASA cFS CubeSat CF Core Groups cFS Distribution Groups 15

Top-Level Governance Board of Directors - The Board of Directors provides strategic and financial oversight of Foundation resources and staff. Technical Steering Committee (TSC) - Technical Committee members define and steward the technical direction of cFS software, including cross-program issues. The committee is made up of PTLs and members by the project s Active Technical Contributors User Committee (UC) - Represents a broad set of users with the Technical Committee and Board of Directors 16

Participation Categories Active Technical Contributors An ATC is an Individual Member who has had a contribution approved for inclusion in any of the official cFS projects during one of the two prior release cycles of the cFS Group ( Approved Contribution ). Such Individual Member shall remain an ATC for three hundred and sixty five days after the date of acceptance of such Approved Contribution. Individual Members Individual membership within the cFS Community is free and open to anyone. Individual Members are expected to participate in the community through technical contributions or community building efforts. Non-members who contribute in technical or non-technical ways to the project but who is not able to make decisions about the product or hold elected offices. Contributor 17

What Is A Group Independent & Self-Governing Utilize cF organizational framework, processes, policies and infrastructure Led by participant-elected Group Team Lead (PTL) - PTLs are elected for each project team. They manage day-to-day operations, drive the project team goals and resolve technical disputes within their project team. 18

cF Group Types Associated Groups Candidate Groups Core Groups cFS Distributions New Technology Incubation EDS Distributed Systems SatKit? Etc. Early stage projects which have not been accepted as an official cF Associated Group cFS cFE OSAL/PSP Apps 19

Sponsors In-Kind Sponsors - Organizations or individuals who contribute in-kind support (infrastructure, software, services, etc.) Paid Sponsorships - - Organizations or individuals who contribute money Three Levels Bart Lisa Maggie Sponsorship benefits TBD 20

Potential Board Committees Educational Outreach Evangelism / Marketing Operations Legal Community Management 21

Conclusion Create a working group to - Define a product management and governance model - Lead a transition to the new model Mike Aguilar, NASA Engineering Safety Committee (NESC) will discuss some activities 22

Backup Slides 23

A Few Questions... To Foundation or Not To Foundation? Governance model Board officer positions New software license? Member categories/types Contribution process definition Membership agreement Initial board and project members Etc. 24 24

cFS Community Members COSMOS ITOS Ground Systems ASIST Government Development Tools & APIs Unit Test Performance EDS Table International cFE Apps Core Lab Apps NASA Product Management Academia Applications App Library Apps Industry App Libraries cFE API Executive cFE cFE Platform Support Package API OS Abstraction API Platform Abstraction OS OS PSPs PSPs Abstract Abstract Contributors: Bug Fixes, Verification Users: Feedback, Feature Requests, Bug Reports User Support NASA Controlled Assets Member Sponsored Assets External to cFS 25

A Few Realities ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) and the EAR (Export Administration Regulations) - - Export control regulations Recent ITAR changes have moved some space related items from the U.S. Munitions List (USMAL) to the Commerce Control List (CCL) NASA Software Engineering Requirements, NPR-7150.2B (11/19/14 11/19/19) Establishes the engineering requirements for software acquisition, development, maintenance, retirement, operations, and management consistent with the governance model contained in NASA Policy Directive (NPD) 1000.0, NASA Governance and Strategic Management Handbook. This NASA Procedural Requirements (NPR) supports the implementation of the NASA Policy Directive (NPD) 7120.4. Release of NASA Software, NPR-2210.1C (expired 8/11/15) - Establishes procedures and responsibilities for the reporting, review, assessment, and release of software created by or for NASA Inventions Made By Government Employees, NPD 2091.1B (4/21/08 4/21/18) - - Civil servant or contractors receiving research and development funding are required to report their findings to the Technology Transfer Office 26

Virtual Teams Groups of people aligned with a common interest - E.g. Multicore processors, Xenomai, Electronic Data Sheets Two types - Integrated Team: Organized as a project - Cooperative: Parallel teams that maintain communication Challenges - Funding source(s) may not agree with producing cFS assets in addition to their own goals. Think global, act local doesn t work in every situation. - Restrictions on sharing information - Aligning teams with NASA Controlled Asset deliverables 27

Virtual Team Topic Area - Architecture Multicore, Partitioned Systems, Memory Protection Software Bus Network Driver Plugins Libraries Non-volatile configurations, EEPROM File System (EEFS) Security 28

Virtual Teams Topic Area - Tools Deployment, Configuration Parameter profiles Automated unit testing Platform-independent build testing Application Certification Electronic Data Sheets Code Generation: Simulink Interface Layer Benchmarks Integrated Development Environment Ground systems 29

Virtual Team Topic Area - Communication Website Training courses Promotional material Business case material Outreach & Education - Learning platforms: Quadcopter, PiSat, 30

User Scenarios Identify and prioritize user scenarios that need to be supported by the community. Helpful for testing the product management and governance model 1. Obtain and build the cFS Locate product and follow instructions Ask questions Configure and target the cFS to a platform - - 2. - - Submit a trouble ticket Learn whether desired target has been done before Get training 3. 4. Make a contribution back to a product: NASA or user sponsored 5. Obtain a list of outstanding tickets 6. Get information on future release plans 7. Submit a Member Sponsored Artifact 8. Form a virtual team 9. Create a collaboration project 31

Use Cases 1. What product does the CCB control? How does it release and distribute them? 2. Obtain and build the cFS - Locate product and follow instructions - Ask questions 3. Configure and target the cFS to a platform - Learn whether desired target has been done before - Get training 4. Submit a trouble ticket: Internal to NASA (i.e. NDC account) or external to NASA 5. Make a contribution back to a product: NASA product or user sponsored 6. Obtain a list of outstanding tickets 7. Get information on future release plans 8. Submit a Member Sponsored Artifact A. Platforms Make a platform available to community Certify a platform B. Hardware device Make a hardware driver available to the community Certify a hardware plugin C. Applications Make an application available to community Certify an application 9. Form a virtual team 10. Create a collaboration project 32 32