An important aspect of dynamic analysis and control design is developing
simulations. However, students and engineers are rarely exposed to large-scale,
advanced, or reusable simulation concepts, but instead are relegated to
reinventing simple simulations for each and every investigation. There
are numerous software packages that provide simulation capabilities, but
these lend little insight into the operation of modeling code or allow
the user complete freedom in developing their own models.
Therefore, the Space
Systems Simulation Laboratory has kicked off an open-source project
developing a spacecraft simulation framework to provide students and engineers
the tools for satellite dynamics and controls analysis and a basis for
implementing spacecraft models.
The Open-Source, Extensible Spacecraft Simulation And Modeling Environment
(Open-SESSAME) is a collection of libraries, toolkits, and extension points
that provide a framework for creating and analyzing spacecraft models
of varying complexity. The framework is open-source, so users can examine
and modify the source code without worrying about copyrights or proprietary
information. The collection of tools also includes other open-source projects
that already include a broad user support base. The framework is extensible
by allowing users the ability to provide added functionality and models
and propagate these extensions back to the user community through a publicly
hosted repository.
Students and engineers are encouraged to download and use the Open-SESSAME
Framework by checking out the Sourceforge
Repository.
|
There are numerous components of the framework, with the
ability to add more as necessary. The following are the main components
of the framework and a short description of their functionality:
- Matrix Library - vector and matrix container classes for
representing and manipulating linear algebra operations
- Rotation Library - library of coordinate frame representations
and operations (ie quaternions, direction cosine matrices, etc.)
- Attitude Toolkit - collection of rigid-body attitude representations,
kinematics, and dynamics
- Orbit Toolkit - collection of orbital representations, dynamics
and operations
- Environment - models of environmental characteristics affecting
a spacecraft (ie gravity, atmospheric drag, solar radiation pressure,
magnetic fields)
- Integrator Library - numerical integration techniques (ie
Runge-Kutta, Adams-Bashforth, Cubic-Spline interpolation)
- Export Components - for exporting simulation results to
other software packages (ie gnuplot, AGI SatelliteToolkit, Mathwork's
MatLab, Microsoft Excel) for further analysis and display.
- Server Components - components for running the simulator
as a server, allowing for distributed processing, hardware-in-the-loop
testing, and flight software verification.
|