The ISS Program is currently working a number of potential opportunities to assess crew-self-scheduling: the International Space Station Testbed for Analog Research (ISTAR) effort, the one-year studies, and upcoming NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) missions. The goal of a study on crew self-scheduling is to assess questions of plan and constraint complexity that can be handled on crew-side, integration of collaborative and individual crew planning, and integration of crew generated plans with plans generated by ground controllers when there is time delay. Previously, ISS Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) has tried to evaluate crew self-scheduling with two sets of planning tools (Score and the On-board Short-Term Plan Viewer, OSTPV). The assessment of Score, the tool currently used for crew activity planning by MOD, was conducted as a part of the 2011 Deep Space Habitat analog study. The assessment of OSTPV was conducted in 2014 as an MOD-directed ISTAR study. From crew feedback during self-scheduling exercises, both experiences showed that neither option was viable for meeting the objective to study crew autonomy with crewmembers on ISS due to limitations in the design of current mission planning tools. Score is designed to build plans but not execute. OSTPV is designed to execute plans as scheduled but cannot easily modify or reschedule plans. There is a need for a highly usable (including low training time) tool that enables efficient self-scheduling and execution within a single package. The ISS Program has identified Playbook as a potential option. It already has high crew acceptance as a plan viewer from previous analogs and would as an ideal candidate to support a crew self-scheduling assessment on ISS or on another mission (e.g., ESA Soyuz). The work proposed here, a collaboration between the Human Research Program and the ISS Program, will not only inform the design of systems for more autonomous crew operations, it will also provide a platform for research on crew autonomy for future deep space missions.

The proposed work has four specific aims:

Aim 1: Support ISS Program evaluation of crew self-scheduling and plan execution through Playbook, providing a platform for future research on crew autonomy for deep space mission operations as well as an assessment of the potential for limited crew self-scheduling in more near-term ISS operations.

Aim 2: Provide Playbook as an operations tool to increase the realism and efficiency of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) and NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analogs.

Aim 3: Determine the appropriate level of information (e.g., constraints, plan complexity) required for crewmembers to schedule their time autonomously with limited ground support by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing Playbook use data.

Aim 4: Characterize task workload (e.g., time spent planning versus execution of plans, time on self-scheduled activities) of crewmembers completing and executing self-scheduling tasks by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing initial Playbook use data.

The efforts in the proposal effort have revealed several findings. Originally when we started this work, the idea of having the crew perform mission planning had not really been explored and previous small lab tests by other groups indicated a need for better tools before attempting an operational test (Rosenbaum, “ISTAR Scheduling Exercise Results (using OSTPV).” Internal Report (2014)). We set out to build an intuitive, walk up and use mission planning tool designed for use by the crew, and we were successful in demonstrating walk up and use collaborative self-scheduling in a mission operational environment. Furthermore, our thought of what the ideal balance between mission control and crew in an autonomous environment was originally that the crew would be able to handle only lightweight plan editing, and larger more systematic plan changes would need to be delegated to mission control. From our directed research project (DRP) results the crew is capable to handle large scale planning changes such as planning and replanning an EVA (extravehicular activities), planning and replanning entire mission days, and planning out their interior science. These types of planning problems are typical of what mission planners for the International Space Station or Mars rover missions would handle and show that the crew is able to handle more complex planning problems than we originally anticipated. We have also shown in the numerous crew autonomy tests that we ran as part of this DRP that the concept of crew autonomous mission planning is no longer theoretical and we were able to demonstrate this successfully several times.

New organic use cases for crew autonomy mission planning were observed which gave additional insights into how the crew progressed in their plan and may indicate unmet needs back to mission control (such as blocking off personal time, adding insights into how activity or plan execution could be improved, etc.). Additionally, the ability to add in intent information became an important concept to clarify why a mission plan was planned or executed in a certain way.

Through the DRP efforts we found that lightweight planning such as task list scheduling, small additions, and updates of activities on the same day of execution require relatively low effort and can be done in the margins (such as in the time between activities). More complex planning such as EVA planning and replanning and interior science planning is also successfully accomplished if the crew has been scheduled explicit time to do that planning.

In conclusion, we have demonstrated through this DRP effort, that the crew can successfully autonomously plan and reschedule complex mission operation tasks if they are provided with a tool, which provides the necessary capabilities. Testing prototypes in high-fidelity analogs and on ISS has enabled identification of features required in future tools for autonomous self-scheduling. And the results from this DRP can be used to develop recommendations for necessary guidelines and standards.

For future work, the focus should be on increasing the cost benefit of using crew time for complex planning. Out of our DRP research, we have found a promising technique in the use of the Plan Fragment strategy of using nominal relative planning blocks and then tweaking them to the current mission day’s constraints. Further investigation to this technique as well as other novel planning strategies and tool features to assist in the planning process are recommended to make crew planning more efficient.

The ISS Program is currently working a number of potential opportunities to assess crew-self-scheduling: the International Space Station Testbed for Analog Research (ISTAR) effort, the one-year studies, and upcoming NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) missions. The goal of a study on crew self-scheduling is to assess questions of plan and constraint complexity that can be handled on crew-side, integration of collaborative and individual crew planning, and integration of crew generated plans with plans generated by ground controllers when there is time delay. Previously, ISS Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) has tried to evaluate crew self-scheduling with two sets of planning tools (Score and the On-board Short-Term Plan Viewer, OSTPV). The assessment of Score, the tool currently used for crew activity planning by MOD, was conducted as a part of the 2011 Deep Space Habitat analog study. The assessment of OSTPV was conducted in 2014 as an MOD-directed ISTAR study. From crew feedback during self-scheduling exercises, both experiences showed that neither option was viable for meeting the objective to study crew autonomy with crewmembers on ISS due to limitations in the design of current mission planning tools. Score is designed to build plans but not execute. OSTPV is designed to execute plans as scheduled but cannot easily modify or reschedule plans. There is a need for a highly usable (including low training time) tool that enables efficient self-scheduling and execution within a single package. The ISS Program has identified Playbook as a potential option. It already has high crew acceptance as a plan viewer from previous analogs and would as an ideal candidate to support a crew self-scheduling assessment on ISS or on another mission (e.g., ESA Soyuz). The work proposed here, a collaboration between the Human Research Program and the ISS Program, will not only inform the design of systems for more autonomous crew operations, it will also provide a platform for research on crew autonomy for future deep space missions.

The proposed work has four specific aims:

Aim 1: Support ISS Program evaluation of crew self-scheduling and plan execution through Playbook, providing a platform for future research on crew autonomy for deep space mission operations as well as an assessment of the potential for limited crew self-scheduling in more near-term ISS operations.

Aim 2: Provide Playbook as an operations tool to increase the realism and efficiency of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) and NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analogs.

Aim 3: Determine the appropriate level of information (e.g., constraints, plan complexity) required for crewmembers to schedule their time autonomously with limited ground support by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing Playbook use data.

Aim 4: Characterize task workload (e.g., time spent planning versus execution of plans, time on self-scheduled activities) of crewmembers completing and executing self-scheduling tasks by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing initial Playbook use data.

As part of this effort we trained Astronaut Peggy Whitson on the Playbook tool and have been working closely with our FOD (Flight Operations Directorate) counterparts to prepare for this new technology demonstration. The goal of CAST is to inform policy and process decisions on crew autonomy for future deep space missions.

In Year 2 we completed development of the Playbook Data Analysis Tool culminating in our first version that incorporates the playback and analysis features. With this tool we are able to playback the unobtrusively collected use data (clicks, gestures, etc.) from the analog missions in a video tape like fashion.

The interface includes a playback interface for the session, allowing you to click to seek to the exact time you’re interested in, play, and pause the playback. Below the playback controls there are individual timelines that show the frequency of usage of specific views (such as the Timeline, Mission Log, Procedures, etc.) or formulaic queries throughout the self-scheduling session. For example, one query that may be called “view=Timeline”, will show me usage of the Timeline throughout the unobtrusively collected session.

New queries can be added and existing queries can be edited on the fly. For example, if you were interested in sessions when the users were using the tablet in a portrait orientation but then wanted to refine that to only show the transitions from a portrait orientation to a horizontal orientation, you can update the query inline, which will render a new timeline for that result. This allows users to tweak and compare their queries as they are performing their analysis. When a user finishes adding the queries they would like to visualize, these information metrics can be exported as part of the CSV (comma-separated value) export, as well as the original raw unobtrusively collected data.

Playbook continued to be deployed and used as the primary operations tool for the HERA analog in year two of this proposal effort. The HERA crew and operations staff used Playbook to communicate and simulate communication time delay, status activity plan execution, view procedures for experiments, and to status and review the mission plan. It was deployed and used as the primary mission planning and text communications tool for all four HERA Campaign 3 missions within year 2 of the proposal effort.

In year 2 we were able to have the crew perform limited self-scheduling of actual mission activities and were able to fully collect unobtrusive data and user surveys, in contrast to year 1. In addition to that we were able to conduct several self-scheduling exercises to exercise and evaluate the usability of the features in the analog. These self-scheduling exercises are done using a separate fictional timeline and allow us to look at more complex self-scheduling problems as well as thoroughly evaluate the usability of the self-scheduling features. We are currently performing an initial analysis of this data as Campaign 3 wraps up.

Playbook was used on NEEMO 21 in support of all four of our proposal aims. We were able to gather input and evaluate all features created for a future ISS deployment, supported NEEMO 21 operationally using Playbook, evaluated crew self-scheduling in an operationally realistic setting, and collected click and gesture data using our unobtrusive data collection functionality which we built into the Playbook tool as part of the proposal research effort. We were also able to give the crew surveys on Playbook use.

This year on the NEEMO 21 mission, we had two main iterations of our crew autonomy research. Following up on our work last year, we were trying to address the issue of the cost benefit analysis of crew self-scheduling. Specifically, we were trying to figure out if we could transfer some of the more tedious tasks of self-scheduling from crew to ground to lower the overall amount of effort involved with self-scheduling. This was done in one of two ways: strategic and tactical planning. The idea was to further abstract the more tedious aspects of planning that are not necessary to be done by the crew, such as fine tuned placement of activities and manipulation of small activities, and instead focus on allowing the crew to express their overall intent. So with the strategic planning concept, which was derived from the idea of “Plan Suggestions” mentioned in the previous annual report, we allowed the crew to plan their EVA (extravehicular activities) using a new feature we introduced this year into Playbook called “Add Activities.” This feature lets you freely add, edit, or remove crew-created activities into your mission plan. For the tactical planning concept, we updated the exercise that we conducted last year with a couple of new features, the ability to have groups in the task list and the ability to move groups to and from the Scratchpad. In both strategies the crew planned out two days of their EVA activities. These concepts were executed separately with the strategic planning concept taking part in the first half of the mission and the tactical planning concept taking part in the second half of the mission. It should be noted that there was a partial crew change out during the NEEMO 21 mission so only 2 crewmembers experienced both planning strategies.

The latest version of Playbook includes the ability to link to ISHORT procedures if the activity has an associated ISHORT procedure. This feature was built and deployed out for the NEEMO 21 analog; however, since ISHORT was not on NEEMO 21, it is yet to be tested in an analog environment. We tested the linking behavior internally in the lab environment during development.

The ISS Program is currently working a number of potential opportunities to assess crew-self-scheduling: the International Space Station Testbed for Analog Research (ISTAR) effort, the one-year studies, and upcoming NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) missions. The goal of a study on crew self-scheduling is to assess questions of plan and constraint complexity that can be handled on crew-side, integration of collaborative and individual crew planning, and integration of crew generated plans with plans generated by ground controllers when there is time delay. Previously, ISS Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) has tried to evaluate crew self-scheduling with two sets of planning tools (Score and the On-board Short-Term Plan Viewer, OSTPV). The assessment of Score, the tool currently used for crew activity planning by MOD, was conducted as a part of the 2011 Deep Space Habitat analog study. The assessment of OSTPV was conducted in 2014 as an MOD-directed ISTAR study. From crew feedback during self-scheduling exercises, both experiences showed that neither option was viable for meeting the objective to study crew autonomy with crewmembers on ISS due to limitations in the design of current mission planning tools. Score is designed to build plans but not execute. OSTPV is designed to execute plans as scheduled but cannot easily modify or reschedule plans. There is a need for a highly usable (including low training time) tool that enables efficient self-scheduling and execution within a single package. The ISS Program has identified Playbook as a potential option. It already has high crew acceptance as a plan viewer from previous analogs and would as an ideal candidate to support a crew self-scheduling assessment on ISS or on another mission (e.g., ESA Soyuz). The work proposed here, a collaboration between the Human Research Program and the ISS Program, will not only inform the design of systems for more autonomous crew operations, it will also provide a platform for research on crew autonomy for future deep space missions.

The proposed work has four specific aims:

Aim 1: Support ISS Program evaluation of crew self-scheduling and plan execution through Playbook, providing a platform for future research on crew autonomy for deep space mission operations as well as an assessment of the potential for limited crew self-scheduling in more near-term ISS operations.

Aim 2: Provide Playbook as an operations tool to increase the realism and efficiency of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) and NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analogs.

Aim 3: Determine the appropriate level of information (e.g., constraints, plan complexity) required for crewmembers to schedule their time autonomously with limited ground support by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing Playbook use data.

Aim 4: Characterize task workload (e.g., time spent planning versus execution of plans, time on self-scheduled activities) of crewmembers completing and executing self-scheduling tasks by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing initial Playbook use data.

Playbook was deployed and used as the primary operations tool for the HERA analog in year one of this proposal effort. The HERA crew and operations staff used Playbook to communicate and simulate communication time delay, status activity plan execution, view procedures for experiments, and to status and review the mission plan. It was deployed and used as the primary mission planning and text communications tool for all four HERA Campaign 2 missions within year 1 of the proposal effort.

Playbook was used on NEEMO 20 in support of all four of our proposal aims. We were able to gather input and evaluate all features created for our ISS deployment, supported NEEMO 20 operationally using Playbook, evaluated crew self-scheduling in an operationally realistic setting, and collected click and gesture data using our unobtrusive data collection functionality which we built into the Playbook tool as part of the proposal research effort. We were also able to give the crew surveys on Playbook use.

Lab usability tests were performed prior to ISS deployment and the NEEMO 20 analog. Participants were asked to run through a self-scheduling exercise similar to what was expected to be performed on ISS. Any usability problems found were recorded and logged. Any severe usability problems found were fixed before deployment in the analog or ISS.

Early work has been started on the Playbook Data Analysis Tool. For our initial version we have demonstrated the video-like playback functionality of the collected use data from NEEMO 20. We are currently still in the design phase with the Playbook Data Analysis Tool and are reviewing the observations and data from the collected data in year 1 to determine the best design that will allow researchers and flight controllers to derive useful metrics.

The ISS Program is currently working a number of potential opportunities to assess crew-self-scheduling: the International Space Station Testbed for Analog Research (ISTAR) effort, the one-year studies, and upcoming NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) missions. The goal of a study on crew self-scheduling is to assess questions of plan and constraint complexity that can be handled on crew-side, integration of collaborative and individual crew planning, and integration of crew generated plans with plans generated by ground controllers when there is time delay. Previously, ISS Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) has tried to evaluate crew self-scheduling with two sets of planning tools (Score and the On-board Short-Term Plan Viewer, OSTPV). The assessment of Score, the tool currently used for crew activity planning by MOD, was conducted as a part of the 2011 Deep Space Habitat analog study. The assessment of OSTPV was conducted in 2014 as an MOD-directed ISTAR study. From crew feedback during self-scheduling exercises, both experiences showed that neither option was viable for meeting the objective to study crew autonomy with crewmembers on ISS due to limitations in the design of current mission planning tools. Score is designed to build plans but not execute. OSTPV is designed to execute plans as scheduled but cannot easily modify or reschedule plans. There is a need for a highly usable (including low training time) tool that enables efficient self-scheduling and execution within a single package. The ISS Program has identified Playbook as a potential option. It already has high crew acceptance as a plan viewer from previous analogs and would as an ideal candidate to support a crew self-scheduling assessment on ISS or on another mission (e.g., ESA Soyuz). The work proposed here, a collaboration between the Human Research Program and the ISS Program, will not only inform the design of systems for more autonomous crew operations, it will also provide a platform for research on crew autonomy for future deep space missions.

The proposed work has four specific aims:

Aim 1: Support ISS Program evaluation of crew self-scheduling and plan execution through Playbook, providing a platform for future research on crew autonomy for deep space mission operations as well as an assessment of the potential for limited crew self-scheduling in more near-term ISS operations.

Aim 2: Provide Playbook as an operations tool to increase the realism and efficiency of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) and NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analogs.

Aim 3: Determine the appropriate level of information (e.g., constraints, plan complexity) required for crewmembers to schedule their time autonomously with limited ground support by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing Playbook use data.

Aim 4: Characterize task workload (e.g., time spent planning versus execution of plans, time on self-scheduled activities) of crewmembers completing and executing self-scheduling tasks by unobtrusively (through automated software logging) gathering and analyzing initial Playbook use data.