Lessons Learned: Our Decade in Plug-and-play for Spacecraft James Lyke Air Force Research Laboratory 3550 Aberdeen Ave SE,

Lessons Learned: Our Decade in Plug-and-play for Spacecraft James Lyke Air Force Research Laboratory 3550 Aberdeen Ave SE,

Beginning in 2004, the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) pursued the adaptation of the well-established plug-and-play model from the personal computer to spacecraft. In the intervening decade, the government invested over $100M in developing “Space Plug-and-play Avionics” (SPA). The pursuit was intended to make possible the “six-day spacecraft”, supporting operationally responsive space (ORS). SPA is a special branding of open architecture that combines black-box modularity and standard, intelligent interfaces to form composable networks. With a goal to make complex systems appear simple, a full range of open architecture (OA) concepts in hardware, software, and protocols emerged from this work. A number of flight projects (most notably the ORS Modular Space Vehicle) and international agreements (especially Sweden) have since been undertaken in the name of this work. Ten SPA standards been published by the AIAA, and an open-source knowledge base is nearing completion that represents a repository of key intellectual products from this work. This paper will review the history, technology, and status of this ambitious development.