Andrew P. Sage, Editor
A complete list of the titles in this series appears at the end of this volume.
SECOND EDITION
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Systems engineering : principles and practice/Alexander Kossiakoff … [et al.].—2nd ed.
p. cm.—(Wiley series in systems engineering and management; 67)
Rev. ed. of: Systems engineering: principles and practices/Alexander
Kossiakoff, William N. Sweet. 2003.
ISBN 978-0-470-40548-2 (hardback)
1. Systems engineering. I. Kossiakoff, Alexander, 1945– II. Title.
TA168.K68 2010
620.001′171–dc22
2010036856
oBook ISBN: 9781118001028
ePDF ISBN: 9781118001011
ePub ISBN: 9781118009031
To Alexander Kossiakoff,
who never took “no” for an answer and refused to believe that anything was impossible. He was an extraordinary problem solver, instructor, mentor, and friend.
Samuel J. Seymour
Steven M. Biemer
It is an incredible honor and privilege to follow in the footsteps of an individual who had a profound influence on the course of history and the field of systems engineering. Since publication of the first edition of this book, the field of systems engineering has seen significant advances, including a significant increase in recognition of the discipline, as measured by the number of conferences, symposia, journals, articles, and books available on this crucial subject. Clearly, the field has reached a high level of maturity and is destined for continued growth. Unfortunately, the field has also seen some sorrowful losses, including one of the original authors, Alexander Kossiakoff, who passed away just 2 years after the publication of the book. His vision, innovation, excitement, and perseverance were contagious to all who worked with him and he is missed by the community. Fortunately, his vision remains and continues to be the driving force behind this book. It is with great pride that we dedicate this second edition to the enduring legacy of Alexander Ivanovitch Kossiakoff.
Alexander Kossiakoff, known to so many as “Kossy,” gave shape and direction to the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory as its director from 1969 to 1980. His work helped defend our nation, enhance the capabilities of our military, pushed technology in new and exciting directions, and bring successive new generations to an understanding of the unique challenges and opportunities of systems engineering. In 1980, recognizing the need to improve the training and education of technical professionals, he started the master of science degree program at Johns Hopkins University in Technical Management and later expanded it to Systems Engineering, one of the first programs of its kind.
Today, the systems engineering program he founded is the largest part-time graduate program in the United States, with students enrolled from around the world in classroom, distance, and organizational partnership venues; it continues to evolve as the field expands and teaching venues embrace new technologies, setting the standard for graduate programs in systems engineering. The first edition of the book is the foundational systems engineering textbook for colleges and universities worldwide.
Traditional engineering disciplines do not provide the training, education, and experience necessary to ensure the successful development of a large, complex system program from inception to operational use. The advocacy of the systems engineering viewpoint and the goal for the practitioners to think like a systems engineer are still the major premises of this book.
This second edition of Systems Engineering Principles and Practice continues to be intended as a graduate-level textbook for courses introducing the field and practice of systems engineering. We continue the tradition of utilizing models to assist students in grasping abstract concepts presented in the book. The five basic models of the first edition are retained, with only minor refinements to reflect current thinking. Additionally, the emphasis on application and practice is retained throughout and focuses on students pursuing their educational careers in parallel with their professional careers. Detailed mathematics and other technical fields are not explored in depth, providing the greatest range of students who may benefit, nor are traditional engineering disciplines provided in detail, which would violate the book’s intended scope.
The updates and additions to the first edition revolve around the changes occurring in the field of systems engineering since the original publication. Special attention was made in the following areas:
In addition to the topics mentioned above, the chapter summaries have been reformatted for easier understanding, and the lists of problems and references have been updated and expanded. Lastly, feedback, opinions, and recommendations from graduate students have been incorporated where the wording or presentation was awkward or unclear.
This book continues to be used to support the core courses of the Johns Hopkins University Master of Science in Systems Engineering program and is now a primary textbook used throughout the United States and in several other countries. Many programs have transitioned to online or distance instruction; the second edition was written with distance teaching in mind, and offers additional examples.
The length of the book has grown, with the updates and new material reflecting the expansion of the field itself.
The second edition now has four parts:
Each chapter contains a summary, homework problems, and bibliography.
The authors of the second edition gratefully acknowledge the family of Dr. Kossiakoff and Mr. William Sweet for their encouragement and support of a second edition to the original book. As with the first edition, the authors gratefully acknowledge the many contributions made by the present and past faculties of the Johns Hopkins University Systems Engineering graduate program. Their sharp insight and recommendations on improvements to the first edition have been invaluable in framing this publication. Particular thanks are due to E. A. Smyth for his insightful review of the manuscript.
Finally, we are exceedingly grateful to our families—Judy Seymour and Michele and August Biemer—for their encouragement, patience, and unfailing support, even when they were continually asked to sacrifice, and the end never seemed to be within reach.
Much of the work in preparing this book was supported as part of the educational mission of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
SAMUEL J. SEYMOUR
STEVEN M. BIEMER
2010
Learning how to be a successful systems engineer is entirely different from learning how to excel at a traditional engineering discipline. It requires developing the ability to think in a special way, to acquire the “systems engineering viewpoint,” and to make the central objective the system as a whole and the success of its mission. The systems engineer faces three directions: the system user’s needs and concerns, the project manager’s financial and schedule constraints, and the capabilities and ambitions of the engineering specialists who have to develop and build the elements of the system. This requires learning enough of the language and basic principles of each of the three constituencies to understand their requirements and to negotiate balanced solutions acceptable to all. The role of interdisciplinary leadership is the key contribution and principal challenge of systems engineering and it is absolutely indispensable to the successful development of modern complex systems.
Systems Engineering Principles and Practice is a textbook designed to help students learn to think like systems engineers. Students seeking to learn systems engineering after mastering a traditional engineering discipline often find the subject highly abstract and ambiguous. To help make systems engineering more tangible and easier to grasp, the book provides several models: (1) a hierarchical model of complex systems, showing them to be composed of a set of commonly occurring building blocks or components; (2) a system life cycle model derived from existing models but more explicitly related to evolving engineering activities and participants; (3) a model of the steps in the systems engineering method and their iterative application to each phase of the life cycle; (4) a concept of “materialization” that represents the stepwise evolution of an abstract concept to an engineered, integrated, and validated system; and (5) repeated references to the specific responsibilities of systems engineers as they evolve during the system life cycle and to the scope of what a systems engineer must know to perform these effectively. The book’s significantly different approach is intended to complement the several excellent existing textbooks that concentrate on the quantitative and analytical aspects of systems engineering.
Particular attention is devoted to systems engineers as professionals, their responsibilities as part of a major system development project, and the knowledge, skills, and mind-set they must acquire to be successful. The book stresses that they must be innovative and resourceful, as well as systematic and disciplined. It describes the special functions and responsibilities of systems engineers in comparison with those of system analysts, design specialists, test engineers, project managers, and other members of the system development team. While the book describes the necessary processes that systems engineers must know and execute, it stresses the leadership, problem-solving, and innovative skills necessary for success.
The function of systems engineering as defined here is to “guide the engineering of complex systems.” To learn how to be a good guide requires years of practice and the help and advice of a more experienced guide who knows “the way.” The purpose of this book is to provide a significant measure of such help and advice through the organized collective experience of the authors and other contributors.
This book is intended for graduate engineers or scientists who aspire to or are already engaged in careers in systems engineering, project management, or engineering management. Its main audience is expected to be engineers educated in a single discipline, either hardware or software, who wish to broaden their knowledge so as to deal with systems problems. It is written with a minimum of mathematics and specialized jargon so that it should also be useful to managers of technical projects or organizations, as well as to senior undergraduates.
The main portion of the book has been used for the past 5 years to support the five core courses of the Johns Hopkins University Master of Science in Systems Engineering program and is thoroughly class tested. It has also been used successfully as a text for distance course offerings. In addition, the book is well suited to support short courses and in-house training.
The book consists of 14 chapters grouped into five parts:
Each chapter also contains a summary, homework problems, and a bibliography. A glossary of important terms is also included. The chapter summaries are formatted to facilitate their use in lecture viewgraphs.
The authors gratefully acknowledge the many contributions made by the present and past faculties of the Johns Hopkins University Systems Engineering Masters program. Particular thanks are due to S. M. Biemer, J. B. Chism, R. S. Grossman, D. C. Mitchell, J. W. Schneider, R. M. Schulmeyer, T. P. Sleight, G. D. Smith, R. J. Thompson, and S. P. Yanek, for their astute criticism of passages that may have been dear to our hearts but are in need of repairs.
An even larger debt is owed to Ben E. Amster, who was one of the originators and the initial faculty of the Johns Hopkins University Systems Engineering program. Though not directly involved in the original writing, he enhanced the text and diagrams by adding many of his own insights and fine-tuned the entire text for meaning and clarity, applying his 30 years’ experience as a systems engineer to great advantage.
We especially want to thank H. J. Gravagna for her outstanding expertise and inexhaustible patience in typing and editing the innumerable rewrites of the drafts of the manuscript. These were issued to successive classes of systems engineering students as the book evolved over the past 3 years. It was she who kept the focus on the final product and provided invaluable assistance with the production of this work.
Finally, we are eternally grateful to our wives, Arabelle and Kathleen, for their encouragement, patience, and unfailing support, especially when the written words came hard and the end seemed beyond our reach.
Much of the work in preparing this book was supported as part of the educational mission of the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.
ALEXANDER KOSSIAKOFF
WILLIAM N. SWEET
2002
Part I provides a multidimensional framework that interrelates the basic principles of systems engineering, and helps to organize the areas of knowledge that are required to master this subject. The dimensions of this framework include
Chapter 1 describes the origins and characteristics of modern complex systems and systems engineering as a profession.
Chapter 2 defines the “systems engineering viewpoint” and how it differs from the viewpoints of technical specialists and project managers. This concept of a systems viewpoint is expanded to describe the domain, fields, and approaches of the systems engineering discipline.
Chapter 3 develops the hierarchical model of a complex system and the key building blocks from which it is constituted. This framework is used to define the breadth and depth of the knowledge domain of systems engineers in terms of the system hierarchy.
Chapter 4 derives the concept of the systems engineering life cycle, which sets the framework for the evolution of a complex system from a perceived need to operation and disposal. This framework is systematically applied throughout Parts II–IV of the book, each part addressing the key responsibilities of systems engineering in the corresponding phase of the life cycle.
Finally, Chapter 5 describes the key parts that systems engineering plays in the management of system development projects. It defines the basic organization and the planning documents of a system development project, with a major emphasis on the management of program risks.