System Engineering Assignment

Introduction

Systems Engineering is an interdisciplinary development that safeguards that the customer's needs are satisfied throughout a system's complete life cycle. It assimilates the inputs of all the obligatory technical disciplines into a coordinated work that meets desired performance, cost, and schedule target. Systems Engineering is a subject that has developed relatively recently. Its main aim is to consider engineering systems as a whole rather than just to concentrate on one particular component within them. Systems Engineering Integrates Technical Effort Across the Development Project:

What is Systems Engineering?

According to NASA Systems Engineering handbook: Systems engineering is a methodical, disciplined approach for the design, realization, technical management, operations, and retirement of a system. A system is a construct or collection of different elements that together produce results not obtainable by the elements alone. The elements, or parts, can include people, hardware, software, facilities, policies, and documents; that is, all things required to produce system-level results. The results mentioned above include system-level abilities, properties, features, functions, attitude, and performance. It is a strategy of achieving functional, physical, and operational performance requirements in the intended use environment over the planned life of the systems. In other words, systems engineering is a logical way of thinking. At times system engineering is considered as a sub system of 1. Electrical Engineering 2. Industrial and Systems Engineering 3. Engineering /Technology Management

Systems engineering within Electrical engineering tends to emphasize control techniques which are often software-intensive. It is believed that one of the first uses of systems engineering was in Bell Labs. Managing complexity is an important element of many courses taught within these programs. Modeling, simulation, consistency, and safety analysis of complex systems are considered to as pillars of System engineering.

Industrial engineers create a new system or improve an existing system, The word system is meant to remind the Engineers of three key points which System Engineering emphasize more than other engineering disciplines: (1) Components (including machines and people) interact with each other to create the overall behavior of the system. (2) The system being studied is always a subsystem of a larger system and these interactions must also be considered. (3) Systems include humans. In Technology management, systems engineering includes taking into consideration all aspects of the lifecycle of the system. Thus the systems engineering approach is said to account for manufacturability, installation, operations, maintenance, repair, and disposal of a system. When manufacturing or selling a product, a systems engineer is likely to view the current technological phase of the product as a critical feature. For instance, in the early 1990s, cell phones were in their early technological phases. Designing, manufacturing, and selling cell phones in those years were activities achieved with objectives and mechanisms that were different than those employed in the first decade of this century. A systems engineer is acutely aware of this issue when considering every aspect of managing a business and designing a product.

Why Systems Engineering?

The systems engineering process coordinates and oversees the transformation of a user need to an operational system and integrates all the technical disciplines that is required to develop the specified system. In the words of Robert Ryan, Marshall Space Flight Center Once a credible design and architecture are established, the systems engineers job is to maintain technical integrity throughout the complex systems very rigorous and challenging lifecycle phases. Systems engineering is not only about the details of requirements and interfaces among subsystems. Such details are important; of course, in the same way that accurate accounting is important to an organizations chief financial officer. But accurate accounting does not distinguish between a good financial plan and a bad one, nor help to make a bad one better. Similarly, accurate control of interfaces and requirements is necessary to good systems engineering, but no amount of care in such matters can make a poor design concept better.

Systems engineering is first and foremost about getting the right designand then about maintaining and enhancing its technical integrity, as well as managing complexity with good processes to get the design right. We define interfaces in a system design to minimize unintended interactions and simplify development and operationsand then we document and control the design. Neither the worlds greatest design, poorly implementednor a poor design, brilliantly implementedis worth having. By using the Systems Engineering approach, project costs and timescales are managed and controlled more effectively by having greater control and awareness of the project requirements, interfaces and issues and the consequences of any changes. Systems engineers work with programme managers to achieve system and project success. Research indicates that effective use of systems engineering can save 10-20% of the project budget.

Summary
Systems engineering is a powerful and structured tool to design complex systems using step by step approach and calculate the cost and other factors including risk and maintenance. By using the Systems Engineering approach, project costs and timescales are managed and controlled more effectively by having greater control and awareness of the project requirements, interfaces and issues and the consequences of any changes.

Bibliography
1. http://www.incoseonline.org.uk . 2. Engineering Accreditation Commission, ABET, Inc. Criteria for Accrediting Engineering
Programs. Effective for Evaluations During the 2010-2011 Accreditation Cycle. Accessed December 30, 2009 at http://www.abet.org . 3. The Art and Science of Systems Engineering by Michael Ryschkewitsch & Dawn Schaible, NASA. 4. System Engineering by Abhijit Gosavi.

Recommended online resources

1. www.ocw.mit.edu 2. www.incoseonline.org.uk