Putting the Users in Charge: A Collaborative, User Composable Interface for NASA's Mission Control

The software used by flight controllers in NASA's Mission Control is made up of monolithic applications--a paradigm that comes with limitations. Each application is its own self contained world, limiting the granularity of collaboration to the application or screen level, and creating functional stovepipes and information redundancies. Applications are difficult to modify, they require recoding and compilation. Change control processes necessary for safe space flight limit changes after the start of mission training, but the start of training is the first time that users can use the software in a mission context. Mission Control Technologies (MCT) has been developed to put the users in control by allowing users to compose software (policy controlled), and allow fine-grained sharing of information at the level of "user object" information entities. By replacing applications with shareable compositions, users of diverse needs get flexibility to interact and collaborate.