Science Activity Planner Developing with Open Source Software

Science Activity Planner SAP is the primary science downlink analysis and uplink planning tool for NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover (MER) Mission. (http:// mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mer). During each sol (Martian day) of mission operations, scientists and engineers use SAP to visualize the data acquired by the rover on previous sols and develop a plan of activities for the rover to accomplish on the next sol. Other operations tools then refine the plan and transmit it to the spacecraft. NASA classifies SAP as a missioncritical application because a failure in SAP could jeopardize an entire sol of operations. Engineers also use SAP to operate research rovers in the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Mars Technology Program and are developing a version of SAP for use in NASA’s 2009 Mars Science Laboratory mission. Finally, SAP has played a major role in NASA’s public outreach efforts: versions of the SAP software have been freely available for download by the general public since the 1997 Mars Pathfinder Mission. The public version of the MER version of SAP can be downloaded at http://wits.sdsu.edu/. SAP provides a broad range of capabilities, including 2D and 3D data visualization, image focus