NASA Ground Control Station - Collision Detection Design Challenge

Welcome to the “NASA Ground Control Station - Collision Detection Design Challenge”! The scope of this challenge is to design Ground Control Station (GCS) software for operating drones. This software will safely be used for live flight operations, while also providing functionality for researching advanced algorithms and human-automation teaming concepts.

By building upon the foundation of a trusted open-source GCS software (QGroundControl), the NASA GCS can leverage existing safety and testing while adding experimental features.

Safety is important for flying drones. In addition to the ground control station design, we will focus this challenge on mechanisms to avoid collision between drones.

Please read the challenge specifications carefully and let us know if you have any questions in the forums.

Note: This will be a series of challenges for the same project, so jump in now to have a good start!

Round 1

Submit your initial designs for checkpoint review. Feel free to add any screens which are necessary to explain your concept.
1. Fly View - single drone
2. Fly View - multiple drones
7. ICAROUS - Detect and Avoid Collision - one drone
8. ICAROUS - Detect and Avoid Collision - multiple drones
9. ICAROUS - Waypoint Trails - one dron

Round 2

Submit your final designs plus checkpoint feedback implemented. Feel free to add any screens which are necessary to explain your concept.
1. Fly View - single drone
2. Fly View - multiple drones
3. Video Mode - single drone
4. Video Mode - multiple drones
5. Instrument Panel - one drone
6. Instrument Panel - multiple drone
7. ICAROUS - Detect and Avoid Collision - one drone
8. ICAROUS - Detect and Avoid Collision - multiple drones
9. ICAROUS - Waypoint Trails - one drone
10. ICAROUS - Waypoint Trails - multiple drones

Challenge Objectives

• Desktop application for Windows 10 (however the application will work on all platforms)
• 5 screens to be designed
• The design will be based on an existing GCS software (QGroundControl) which will be updated with NASA branding and have additional features added
• The design should be focused more towards touch interactions than desktop mouse interactions (similar to QGroundControl)

Application Overview

• The purpose of this challenge is to design the user interface for the NASA Ground Control Station and to add new integrated features related to collision detection
• The user will be able to see the drone position at any time with different stats, and be notified in case of a collision with another drone
• At this moment, the user is able to launch the drone, track it and detect collision using several softwares, but with this project we are looking to integrate all the features into 1 application that can be expanded in the future

Audience
NASA employees who use drones for live flight operations, and also to provide functionality necessary for researching advanced algorithms

Persona

• Name: Mike
• Occupation: NASA drone researcher
• Goals:
  • Easily launch one or more drones from NASA GCS (one system) and track their position
  • See all vehicles data on one or more displays to take actions if needed
  • Get notifications on possible collisions with other drones and recommendations on how to avoid those
• Frustrations:
  • The launch of drone, tracking and collision detection is done using several softwares and that hinders the user experience and adds delay in reacting to potential collisions
  • Having one display only, the user can see a limited amount of data, while there is more useful information to visualize
• Wants:
  • Possibility to use several displays to view all the data at once
  • Have one software (NASA GCS) for performing all drone related operations, including collision detection

User Story
Mike is using an open source QGroundControl software to launch his drone, set up its trajectory and track it. QGroundControl (QGC) can run flight simulations with virtual drones or real drones.  

Once the drone is launched, he can create waypoints to define a specific path or open a file to load a predefined path. He can set up the interface to display different vehicle parameters to observe during flight etc. In addition to QGroundControl software, Mike is using ICAROUS (Independent Configurable Architecture for Reliable Operations of Unmanned Systems) software to detect and avoid other drones. Mike would prefer to have both of these systems in a single tool, NASA CGS, for ease of use.

Design Goals & Principles

• Base your design for the NASA GCS on the existing QGroundControl station design.
• The logo should be changed to the NASA meatball
• Color theme should be changed to reflect NASA branding (blue, red and white)
• Keep in mind that the main OS for this is Windows 10, however the application will work on all platforms
• The design should be more focused on touch interactions than desktop mouse interactions (similar to QGroundControl)

Exploration Score
In terms of expectations, we would like to measure the concept against the following in the one to ten scales:

• Creativity: 3
  • 1: barely new ideas
  • 10: a utopic product with features not proven to be able to be fully implemented
• Aesthetics: 8
  • 1: low-fidelity design, wireframe or plain sketch
  • 10: top-notch finished looking visual design
• Exploration: 1
  • 1: strictly follow an existing reference or production guideline
  • 10: open to alternative workflows/features not listed here that would help the overall application
• Branding: 7
  • 1: don’t care at all about the branding just functionality
  • 10: without a properly branded product there is no success

Glossary
GCS = Ground Control Station is a control software for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs also named drones). The hardware includes the Human-Machine Interface, computer, telemetry, video capture card and aerials for the control, video and data links to the UAV. You can see some examples here

NGCS = NASA Ground Control Station

QGC = QGroundControl - is an open-source software that provides full flight control and mission planning for drones. NASA Ground Control Station will be built on it to leverage existing safety while adding experimental features.

Waypoint trail = represents the vehicle flight plan and consists of several points with coordinates where the drone will fly through

ICAROUS = Independent Configurable Architecture for Reliable Operations of Unmanned Systems is a software that is used to detect and avoid any collisions with other drones as well as for its waypoint trail capabilities.

WebGS  =  a web-based ground control station that is compatible with ICAROUS and capable of multi-aircraft simulations.

RTL = Return to Landing

DAA = Detect and Avoid

Background
Note: This is background information for your understanding. You do NOT need to design how the connection is happening. Only design the required screens listed below.

The NASA Ground Control Station we are designing is built upon the foundation of a trusted open-source GCS software (QGroundControl), to leverage existing safety and testing while adding experimental features. QGroundControl (QGC) is an open-source GCS that provides full flight control and mission planning for drones. The software is designed to provide a single codebase that can run across multiple OS platforms and devices. We are going to focus on Windows 10 OS.

Another open-source GCS software that is similar to QGC, and can be referenced for implementation ideas, is ArduPilot Mission Planner. Mission Planner is only mentioned here for reference. It will not be integrated with the NASA GCS.  

QGC doesn’t have simulation capabilities built in now. However, in order to do simulations we use ArduPilot Mission Planner to get the vehicle running, and then connect with QGC to track all data.  To set up your vehicle, follow the steps from this video.

Safety is important for flying drones. In addition to the NASA Ground Control Station main interface, we will focus this challenge on mechanisms to avoid collision between drones, based on ICAROUS software.

Important: The interface should be reusing elements from QGroundControl and applying the NASA branding.

Screens Requirements

1. Fly View - single drone
The Fly View is the main display, used to command and monitor the vehicle when flying. You can see here how this screen looks for 1 drone and check this page for details on each component. When the interface is flying multiple vehicles it will look like this. The path a drone is flying is called a flight path and consists of individual waypoints.

The interface has several components:

• Map: Displays the positions of all connected vehicles and the mission for the current vehicle.
• Fly Toolbar: shows Key status information for sensors (GPS, battery, RC control), and vehicle state (Flight mode, Armed/Disarmed status).
• Fly Tools: options to takeoff/ land, pause/restart, safety return (RTL), action button for current state
• Attitude / Compass: widget that displays compass and vehicle orientation relative to the ground
• Instrument Panel: multi-page widget that displays vehicle information including telemetry, camera, video, system health, and vibration.
• Confirmation Slider: Context sensitive slider to confirm requested actions.
• Video/Switcher: Toggle between video or map in a window

Note: The representation of the icons should be similar to what we see now on QGroundControl.

You can use Google maps to display a map in satellite view for this screen.

When the ICAROUS feature is enabled in the NASA GCS, the area displaying the Instrument Panel data should also show the status (active, inactive) of ICAROUS onboard the vehicle. (Read below about ICAROUS). This can be a separate widget.

2. Fly View - multiple drones
We’d like to see the above fly view page displayed with 10 drones as well.  The data to use for each drone widget can be taken from this screenshot, and in addition the ICAROUS state - on/off should be represented as well for each of them.
Plan your layout well and think about space usage so you don’t clutter the interface - how can you show the information in a clear way, easy to read for the viewer and still keep the same look and feel. You can also be creative and show additional options, to expand the widget for a drone to see more information about it or change configuration. This applies to all the views below, where we need to represent 10 drones.
 
3. Video Mode - single drone
Show us how the toggling between map view and video would look. In map view, the video would be shown small on the bottom right area. In video view, the video from the camera would be displayed on the screen and the map would be displayed small.

4. Video Mode - multiple drones
We’d like to see how this page looks when displaying 10 drones as well.

5. Instrument Panel - one drone
The Instrument Panel will also display on the Fly View. It can be customized by selecting the gear icon to show different values for the drone/vehicle. For example: Roll, Pitch, Heading, Ground Speed, etc. We’d like to see this interaction displayed.

6. Instrument Panel - multiple drones
We’d like to see how customizing the Instrument Panel looks when displaying 10 drones.

7. ICAROUS – Detect and Avoid Collision - one drone
The ICAROUS view should also be displayed on the Fly View, over the satellite map.
ICAROUS (Independent Configurable Architecture for Reliable Operations of Unmanned Systems) software provides detect and avoid capabilities (DAA) as well as waypoint rerouting capabilities for drones. The examples shown below are from WebGS, a web-based ground control station, that is compatible with ICAROUS. This functionality is a feature we’d like to incorporate in the NASA ground control station as well.

If 2 drones are flying at the same time and ICAROUS detects their flight trajectories will intersect in the future, it will provide alert that this will happen and show an alert/heading band across the vehicle. See the example shown in this image.
 
The heading band is represented as a circle, marked with green and red. ICAROUS highlights the direction/area that might lead to collision with red. The green highlight indicates the area where it is safe to fly. An orange warning band should also be included in the display.

Note: The yellow line in the image above is just a trail to show the recent position of the vehicle/drone.

In Summary: ICAROUS provides alerts and guidance on where to go to avoid the collision.   

8. ICAROUS – Detect and Avoid Collision - multiple drones
We’d like to see how 10 drones will be displayed in the flight view with ICAROUS alerts, and how the heading bands would be represented for them (same as above section requirements).

9. ICAROUS Waypoints Trail - one drone
The ICAROUS planned Waypoints Trail view should also be displayed on the Fly View, over the satellite map.
In addition to providing alerts and guidance on how to avoid collision, ICAROUS provides a new trail of waypoints, different from the initial ones, to avoid a potential conflict situation. You can see an example here, of a new waypoint trail created to avoid the conflict.

10. ICAROUS Waypoints Trail - multiple drones
We’d like to see how 10 drones will be displayed in the flight view with ICAROUS Waypoints Trails without cluttering the interface.

Assets

• You can find all assets mentioned above in this Google Drive folder.

Branding Guidelines

• Follow the NASA branding for colors only and logo
• Use the NASA Logo from here
• Fonts: use web safe fonts only - something as close as possible to QGroundControl fonts
• Icons: try to keep the look and feel close to what we have now for QGroundControl to avoid any safety issues

Size

• Desktop: 1920px x 1080px (width x height)

Stock Photos and Icons

• Photos are not allowed in this challenge
• Icons: you can only use icons that are free (based on Topcoder icons policy) without giving attribution or design the icons yourself. If the icons are not free, we will ask them to be fixed in the final fixes.
• Fonts: use web safe fonts only - something as close as possible to QGroundControl fonts

Marvel Prototype

• Upload your screens to Marvel App.
• Send your marvel app request to keyla. blue1@gmail.com or ask in the forums
• Include your Marvel app URL as a text file in your final submission. Label it “MarvelApp URL”.

Final Deliverables

• An archive called Source.zip file to include:
  • All original source files created in Adobe Photoshop, XD or Sketch.
• An archive called Submission.zip file to include:
  • All your design files in PNG or JPG format
  • MarvelApp link for review and to provide feedback
  • Your declaration files to include any notes about fonts usage, photo and icon declaration and link to your Marvel project
• Create a JPG preview file of 1024 x 1024 px