In the past, great claims have been set forth as to the potential of the heuristic procedure or "heuristic programming," References 1 and 2. As early as 1958 Simon and Newell, Reference 2, wrote of "Heuristic Problem Solving: The Next Advance in Operations Research." However, and this is strictly the opinion of the authors (although it is shared by most others we have discussed the matter with), rather than seeing a relative increase in heuristic program solution techniques in the literature, the converse appears to be true. Most of the journals dealing with operations research, management science, industrial engineering, and related fields have evolved (or perhaps dissolved, depending on one's point of view) into journals of mathematics, or perhaps abstract mathematics. The fundamental idea of engineering as being directed toward real world applications often seems to have been lost. As a result, we (industrial engineers/operations researchers) are now caustically described as pseudo-mathematicians, and the field has been defined as the "science of providing elegant solutions to trivial problems." OR has even been credited with such things as our poor performance and defeats in the Indo-China war, Reference 5, cost overruns on defense contracts and so on. Such criticism comes from both outside and within our profession, References 3, 4, 5.
The formation of temporary task teams necessary to solve complex technical problems is analyzed via a questionnaire. Responses were acquired from 125 high technology individuals who had participated in temporary task teams.The questionnaire data was analyzed utilizing the Chi-square approxi mation statistic. Results indicate that the task team which develops team spirit early in the task team lifetime is more likely to produce a high quality result. There is a strong indication that the leaders* instructions play a significant role in developing this team spirit.
A significant number of computer based systems currently exist that perform human related critical functions (e.g., medical diagnosis/treatment support, weapon systems, banking financial systems, transportation systems). The Software Engineering Directorate (SED) of the United States Army Aviation and Missile Command (AMCOM) develops and maintains numerous critical systems that fall into this category. Prior to operational deployment of AMCOM aviation and missile systems, the SED has responsibility for the certification of these critical systems. This paper will describe a four pronged engineering based analysis for determining a Flight Readiness Risk Index and a Certification for Flight Readiness recommendation.Developers of critical systems have generally approached the certification for flight readiness by performing an independent audit of the development process and technical standards. While the independent audit is a good step towards determining operational readiness, a more rigorous analysis of the software and its execution is necessary to establish high confidence in the system deployment decision. The SED is developing a procedure utilizing an engineering based approach which permits the determination of the operational worthiness of these systems. The engineering based approach addresses four analyses that determine the following: Software Reliability: Measured by frequency of failure Correctness: Measured by error experience and test coverage Safety: Measured by resistance to hazards Operational Usability: Measured by operational scenario driven automated testing, user testing, and/or operational user simulation resultsIt has been standard procedure to audit the development process and engineering standards used for the development of these systems as well as perform in-process oversight (i.e., Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V)) of the software. The purpose of this standard audit is to determine if the approved best practices and established
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