Systems engineer

Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary field of engineering that allows us to study and understand reality, with the purpose of implementing or optimizing complex systems. It can also be seen as the technological application of systems theory to engineering efforts, adopting in all this work the systems paradigm. Systems engineering integrates other disciplines and specialty groups in a team effort, forming a focused development process.

In a broad sense, Systems Engineering has, as a field of study, any existing system. For example, systems engineering may study the human digestive system or immune system, or perhaps the tax system of a specific country. In this sense, although in some countries systems engineering is associated solely with computer systems, this is incorrect, since computer systems are a small part of a huge range of types and classes of systems.

Systems engineering is the application of the mathematical and physical sciences to develop systems that economically use the materials and forces of nature for the benefit of mankind.

One of the main differences of systems engineering from other traditional engineering disciplines is that systems engineering does not build tangible products. While civil engineers might design buildings or bridges, electronic engineers might design circuits, systems engineers deal with abstract systems with the help of systems science methodologies, and also rely on other disciplines to design and deliver tangible products. they are the realization of those systems.

History

The origin of the term systems engineering can be traced back to the Bell Telephone Laboratories in the 1940s. The need to identify and manipulate the properties of a system as a whole, which in complex engineering projects can differ greatly from the sum of the properties of the parts, motivated several industries, especially those that developed systems for the United States Army, to apply the discipline.

When it was no longer possible to rely on design evolution to improve a system and existing tools were no longer sufficient to meet the increasing demands, new methods began to be developed that addressed complexity directly. The continuous evolution of systems engineering includes the development and identification of new modeling methods and techniques. These methods help to better understand and control the design and development of engineering systems as they become more complex. Popular tools that are often used in the context of systems engineering were developed around this time, including USL, UML, QFD, and IDEF0.

Systems engineering began to develop in the second part of the 20th century with the rapid advance of systems science. Companies began to have a growing acceptance that such engineering could manage unpredictable behavior and the appearance of unforeseen characteristics of teams and projects with increasing levels of complexity (emergent properties). Decisions made at the beginning of a project, the consequences of which may not have been clearly understood, have enormous implications later in the life of a system. A systems engineer must explore these questions and make critical decisions.

Concept

Although systems engineering was initially only considered a method, recently it has begun to be considered a discipline within engineering. The objective of teaching systems engineering is to formalize various methodologies and thus identify novel methods and research opportunities in a similar way to what is done in other branches of engineering. As a methodology, systems engineering has a strong holistic and interdisciplinary imprint.

Traditional origin and scope

The traditional scope of engineering encompasses the conception, design, development, production, and operation of physical systems. Systems engineering, as initially conceived, falls within that scope. The "systems engineering", in this sense, refers to the set of distinctive concepts, methodologies, organizational structures that have been developed to meet the challenges of engineering effective functional systems of unprecedented dimensions and complexity. within time, budget, and other constraints. The Apollo program is an important example of a large and complex project organized around a systems engineering approach.

Evolution towards a broader scope

Use of the term "systems engineer" has evolved over time to encompass a broader and more holistic concept of "systems" and process engineering. This evolution of the definition has been a subject of constant controversy, and the term continues to be applied in both its narrower and broader scope.

Traditional systems engineering was seen as a branch of engineering in the classical sense, that is, it applied only to physical systems, such as spacecraft and airplanes. More recently, systems engineering has evolved to take on a broader meaning, especially when humans are viewed as an essential component of a system. Checkland, for example, captures the broader meaning of systems engineering by stating that "engineering" can be read in its general sense: you can engineer a meeting or a political deal".

In keeping with the broader scope of systems engineering, the Systems Engineering Body of Knowledge (SEBoK-Systems Engineering Body of Knowledge) has defined There are three types of systems engineering: (1) Product Systems Engineering (PSE) is traditional systems engineering focused on the design of physical systems consisting of hardware and software. (2) Enterprise Systems Engineering (ESE) refers to the view of enterprises, that is, organizations or combinations of organizations, as systems. (3) Service Systems Engineering (SSE) is concerned with the engineering of service systems. Checkland defines a service system as a system that is designed to provide service to another system. Most civil infrastructure systems are service systems.

Holistic approach

Systems engineering focuses on analyzing and pinpointing customer needs and required functionality early in the development cycle, documenting the requirements, and then continuing with design synthesis and validation of the system by considering the problem in its completeness, the life cycle of the system. This fully encompasses all stakeholders involved in the project. Oliver, states that the systems engineering process can be decomposed into

• One Technical Process of Systems Engineeringand
• One Systems Engineering Management Process.

In Oliver's model, the objective of the Management Process is to organize the technical effort in the life cycle, while the Technical Process includes evaluating the available information, defining measures of effectiveness, create a behavior model, create a structure model, perform a commitment analysis, and create a sequential plan of construction and testing.

Depending on your application, although there are several models used in the industry, they all aim to identify the relationship between the various stages mentioned above and incorporate feedback. Examples of such models include the development waterfall model and the VEE model.

Interdisciplinary Field

System development often requires input from various technical disciplines. By providing a systems (holistic) view of development, systems engineering helps mold all technical contributors into a unified team effort, forming a structured development process that spans from concept through production and operation and, in some cases, through completion and disposal. In an acquisition, the integrative discipline combines contributions and balances competing decisions affecting cost, schedule, and efficiency, while maintaining an acceptable level of risk that spans the entire life cycle of the item.

This perspective is often replicated in educational programs, as systems engineering courses are taught by faculty from other engineering departments, helping to create an interdisciplinary environment.

Managing complexity

The need for systems engineering arose with the increasing complexity of systems and projects, in turn exponentially increasing the possibility of problems between various components and therefore the unreliability of the design. Speaking in this context, complexity embodies not only engineering systems, but also the human logical organization of data. At the same time, a system can become more complex due to an increase in size as well as an increase in the amount of data, variables, or the number of fields that are involved in the design. The International Space Station is an example of a system with such characteristics.

The International Space Station is an example of a highly complex system whose management requires the use of Systems Engineering.

The development of more intelligent control algorithms, the design of microprocessors, and the analysis of environmental systems also fall within the purview of systems engineering. Systems engineering promotes the use of tools and methods to better understand and manage the complexity of systems. Some examples of these tools are:

• System architecture,
• System model, Modeling, and Simulation,
• Optimization,
• System dynamics,
• Systems analysis,
• Statistical analysis,
• Reliability analysisand
• Decision-making

Systems Engineering Topics

The tools that systems engineering uses are strategies, procedures, and techniques that help to carry out the systems engineering that a project or product requires. The objective of these tools covers a wide spectrum, which includes database management, navigation of information systems in graphical form, simulation, and reasoning, to document production, neutral export / import processes, among others.

System Definition

There are numerous definitions of what constitutes a system in the field of systems engineering. Some definitions enunciated by relevant organizations are:

• ANSI/EIA-632-1999: "A set of products and product facilitators to achieve a certain purpose."
• DAU System Engineering Foundation: "an integrated set of people, products and processes that provide the ability to meet a particular need or goal."
• IEEE Std 1220-1998: "A set or cluster of elements and processes that are related and whose behavior meets the needs of a customer or operational and that allows the support of the products to be provided throughout their life cycle."
• ISO/IEC 15288:2008: "A combination of elements that interact organized to achieve one or more purposes."
• NASA Systems Engineering Manual: "(1) The combination of elements that work together to produce the ability to meet a need. The elements include equipment, software, industrial plants, personnel, processes, and procedures required to achieve that purpose. (2) The final product (which performs the required operational functions) and the facilitating products (which provide life-cycle support services to the operational products) that make up a system. "
• INCOSE Systems Engineering Manual: "Homogeneous entity that presents predefined behavior in the real world and that it is made up of heterogeneous parts which in individual form do not present such behavior and an integrated configuration of components and/or subsystems."
• INCOSE: "A system is an agglomeration or collection of different elements that together produce results that are not obtained by the elements themselves. The elements or parts can include people, equipment, software, industrial plants, policies, and documents; that is, all the elements that are necessary to produce results at the system level. Results include system-level qualities, properties, features, functions, behavior and performance. The value added by the system as a whole, beyond what each party contributes independently, is largely created by the relationships that are established between its parties; that is, they are interconnected. "

Related fields

Many of the related fields could be considered to have close ties to systems engineering. Many of these areas have contributed to the development of systems engineering as an independent area.

Information Systems

An information system or (IS) is a set of elements that interact with each other in order to support the activities of a company or business. An Information System does not always have to be automated (in which case it would be a computerized system), and it is valid to speak of Manual Information Systems. They are normally developed following Information Systems Development Methodologies.

Computer equipment: the hardware necessary for the information system to operate. The human resource that interacts with the Information System, which is made up of the people who use the system.

An information system performs four basic activities: input, storage, processing, and output of information.

It is the updating of real and specific data to streamline operations in a company.

Operations Research

Operations research or (IO) is sometimes taught in industrial engineering or applied mathematics departments, but the tools of OR are taught in a Systems Engineering course of study. OR deals with the optimization of an arbitrary process under multiple constraints. The fundamental ideas on which the systems approach is based, the types of systems problems and the most appropriate methodologies to be elaborated are presented.

Cognitive Systems Engineering

Cognitive systems encompass natural or artificial information processing systems capable of perception, learning, reasoning, communication, acting, and adaptive behavior.

Cognitive systems engineering is a branch of systems engineering that treats cognitive entities, whether human or not, as a type of system capable of processing information and using cognitive resources such as perception, memory or processing of information. It depends on the direct application of experience and research in both cognitive psychology and systems engineering. Cognitive systems engineering focuses on how cognitive entities interact with the environment. Systems engineering works at the intersection of:

1. The development of society in this new era
2. Problems imposed by the hungry world
3. The needs of agents (human, hardware, software)
4. The interaction between the various systems and technologies that affect (and/or are affected by) the situation.

Sometimes referred to as human engineering or human factors engineering, this branch also studies ergonomics in systems design. However, human engineering is often treated as another engineering specialty that the systems engineer must integrate.

Usually, advances in cognitive systems engineering are developed in computer science departments and areas, where artificial intelligence, knowledge engineering and the development of human-machine interfaces (usability designs) are deeply studied and integrated. The science

The Systems Engineer usually learns to program, to direct programmers and at the time of creating a program he must know and take into account the basic methods as such, that is why it is important that he learns to program but his function is really design and planning, and everything related to the system or networks, their maintenance and effectiveness, response and technology.