179
1 INTRODUCTION
In2010theEuropeanUnionlaunchedanewre‐search
and development program to protect the Bal‐tic Sea
worth EUR 100 million over the period 2010‐2017,
called Baltic Organizations Network for Funding
SciencesEEIG(BONUS).BONUSisconsideredasthe
firstmodelcaseforthedevelopmentofscience‐ba
sed
management of the European regional seas by
bringing together the research com‐munities of
marine,maritime,economicalandsocietalresearchto
addressthemajor challengesfaced bythe BalticSea
region(BonusPortal,2014).
TheEuropeanUnione‐Maritimeinitiativeaimsto
promote the use of advanced information
technologies for working and doing business in the
ma
ritimetransportsector.TheESABALTisaresearch
and development joined (Finnish Geodetic Institute,
FURUNO Finland, SSPA Sweden and Maritime
University of Szczecin, 2014) project studying the
feasibilityof a novel systemfor enhancing maritime
safety. Theaim ofthis paper isto present results of
i
dentificationandanalysisofkeyrequirementsforthe
potentialESABALTsystem.
2 SITUATIONALAWARENESS
The term situational awareness refers to the abstract
conceptofbeingawareofone’scurrentordeveloping
situation. In the maritime context, a vessel’s crew
mustmaintaingoodsituationalawarenessinorderto
safelyandefficientlyoperatethevessel.Thisincludes
awareness ab
out the environment (e.g. developing
weatherconditions),themaritimetrafficsurrounding
the ship, andthecondition of one’s own vessel and
crew. Especially in the case of an emergency,
situational awareness may also include information
abouttheconditionofotherships,suchasadamaged
shipwhosenavigationalabilit
yhasbeenjeopardized.
Inageneralsense,situationalawarenessencompasses
anyinformationthatcanpotentiallyhaveaneffecton
the crew’s objectives, namely safe and efficient
navigation of one’s own vessel. In addition to this,
Analysis and Identification of Requirements for
a System to Enhance Situational Awareness at Sea
P.Banaś
M
aritimeUniversityofSzczecin,Poland
S.Thombre&R.Guinness
FinnishGeospatialResearchInstitute,NationalLandSurvey,Finland
ABSTRACT: Thispaper presents theresearch results of identifying and analyzingkeyrequirements for the
ESABALTsystembasedonpre‐defineduserprofilegroups.Theserequirementshavebeenidentifiedthrough
multiplesources,whichincludeanelectronicsurveyofpotentialusersofthesystem,int
erviewswithspecialists
innavigation,lawandcomputerscience,analysisofstate‐of‐the‐artinmaritimesafetyprocedures,andstudyof
past R&D projects in this field. Finally, these requirements are classified into user level, domain level and
systemlevelrequirementsforeasyinterpretationwhiledesigningthesystemarchitectureandit
sfunction‐al
specifications.Thepresentedsystemspecificationisdiscussed.
http://www.transnav.eu
the International Journal
on Marine Navigation
and Safety of Sea Transportation
Volume 9
Number 2
June 2015
DOI:10.12716/1001.09.02.03
180
situational awareness is an important concept for
VesselTraffic Services(VTS)and Searchand Rescue
(SAR) centers, who must maintain good situational
awarenessinordertofulfilltheirmissions.
ESABALTaimstoincreasethesafetyofallvessels
operating in the Baltic Sea by providing tools and
serviceswhichenhance
situationalawareness.Thisis
achieved using the latest technological advances in
sensing,positioning,e‐Navigation,Earthobservation
systems, and multi‐channel cooperative
communications. In addition, ESABALT aims to
facilitatecrowdsourcingofrelevantinformationfrom
amultitudeofusers.Thatis,byreportinginformation
to a central repository, all end‐users
will be able to
achievea greaterlevelof situational awarenessthan
theywouldbyactingindependently.Aguidingtenet
oftheESABALTconceptisthatallmaritimeusersin
the Baltic Sea can operate more safely by
collaboratively building and maintaining situational
awareness.
According to a web‐based survey conducted
by
the ESABALT project, the vast majority of maritime
actors are already familiar with the concept of
situational awareness (84.9% of respondents to the
survey). Furthermore, maritime actors consider
situational awareness to be an important factor in
maintaining safe maritime operations. The average
ratingoftheimportanceofsituationalawareness
was
4.4onascaleofonetofivewithfivebeingthehighest
levelofimportance.Theseinitialresultssuggestthat
systemscapableofenhancingsituationalawarenessat
sea would have a strong possibility to improve
overallsafetyofmaritimeoperations.
At the same time, however, it was noted in
the
survey results that a new system introduced to the
maritime operating environment should not require
significant additional interaction or sustained
attention of the crew. Traditional methods of
situational awareness include monitoring the
situation by visual means or through established
electronic means (radar, AIS). Thus, an additional
system introduced by
ESABALT should not detract
from the time available for the crew to monitor the
situation using these traditional methods. In
particular,anynewsystemshouldexhibitahighlevel
ofautonomyand,ifpossible,itshouldbeintegrated
intoexistingsystems.
3 REQUIREMENTSIDENTIFICATION
Theidentificationofkeyrequirementsforthe
system
wasdividedintofollowingsteps:
1 identificationofstakeholders,
2 identificationofpotentialsystemusersandgroups
ofpotentialusers,
3 preparation and conduct the survey for potential
userstoprovideuserrequirements,
4 interviewswithspecialistsinnavigation,lawand
computer science to provide system and domain
requirements,
5 analysis of ESABALT project assumptions and
outputofpreviousstagesoftheproject,
6 reviewofmaritimesafetyapproachesandanalysis
ofdifferentR&Dprojectsin thefieldofmaritime
safety,navigation,communicationandsituational
awareness.
The steps 1, 2 and 6 are presented in different
papers.
3.1 Userrequirements
In the case of ESABALT project, the list of user
requirements specifies the expectations of potential
users of the potential system. To find them, the
electronic survey in the form of web‐based
questionnaires was prepared. The survey contained
38questionsfocusingontheissuesofmaritimesafety,
situationalawareness,
crowdsourcingandpreferences
inITsolutionssuchasuserinterfaceandintegration
with other on‐board systems. The answers for
examplequestionarepresentedintable1.
Table1. The answers to example question: “What kind of
difficultyintheworkduetothefollowingcharacteristicsof
previouslyusedsystemsarethemostimportant?”.
_______________________________________________
ItemScore
1
Overall
Rank
_______________________________________________
interfacemuchdifferentfrominterfaces 291 1
inuse
excessivequantityofinformation229 2
thecomplexityoftheinformation209 3
providedbythesystem
lackofmanual209 4
inabilitytoadaptsystemstopersonalneeds 193 5
obligatoryregistration/logininthesystem 189 6
lackofsystem
help187 7
on‐lineworkonly175 8
delaysinthesystem172 9
_______________________________________________
1
Scoreisaweightedcalculation.Itemsrankedfirstare
valuedhigherthanthefollowingranks,thescoreisthesum
ofallweightedrankcounts.
There was 83 responses and 52 of them were
complete. The analysis of the survey’s output
combined with the results of previous stages of the
projectandinterviewswithexpertsgavethelistof28
user requirements. The examples of defined user
requirementsarepresentedintable2.
Table2.Theexamplesofuserrequirementgotfromtheweb
survey.
_______________________________________________
No. Userrequirements
_______________________________________________
1 Theuserinterfaceandworkingmannerofthesystem
shouldmeetthestandardsfornavigational
informationsystems(ex.ECDIS,ARPA,AIS).
2 Theuserinterfaceshouldbeassimpleaspossiblein
ordertopreventinformationoverload–onlythebasic
informationshouldbepresented,detailedinformation
shouldbeavailableondemandonly.
_______________________________________________
3.2 Systemrequirements
Designing any IT or ITC system there should be
determined itsarchitectureand functionalityaswell
asitsrequirementsforhardwareandsoftware.These
informationisplacedinalistofsystemrequirements.
In the case of ESABALTproject, its assumptions,
outcome of previous stages, results of
R&D projects
and existing systems analysis and interviews with
181
expertswereused.Thelistof53systemrequirements
was formulated. Some of them are presented in
table3.
Table3.Theexamplesofsystemrequirementgot fromthe
interviewswithexperts.
_______________________________________________
No. Systemrequirements
_______________________________________________
1 Thesystemshouldprovidecontinuousaccesstodata
residingontheserver.
2 Informationtransmittedinthesystemshouldbemade
availabletousersimmediatelyaftertheir
introduction/approval.
3 Informationshouldbecertifiedwithuseofdigital
signaturesassociatedtoindividualusers(account).
4 Thetransmissionofinformation
shouldbeencrypted.
_______________________________________________
3.3 Domaindrivenrequirements
Aseveryspecializedsystem,thepotentialESABALT
solutionshouldmeettherequirementsinthespecific
field.Thesesocalleddomaindrivenrequirementsare
specified in the documents relating to the maritime
field(suchasIMOorIHOnorms)butalsoarisefrom
less formal rules and
customs. The interviews with
experts in navigation gave the set of such domain
drivenrequirements. Theexampleof domaindriven
requirementsarepresentedintable4.
Table4.Theexamplesofsystemrequirementgot fromthe
interviewswithexperts.
_______________________________________________
No. Domaindrivenrequirements
_______________________________________________
1 Thesystemshallfulfillasmanyaspossible
requirementslistedinIEC60945norm:Navigation
andmarineradiocommunicationequipmentand
systems‐generalrequirements,
2 Thesystemshallfulfillasmanyaspossible
requirementslistedinIEC60936norm:Guidanceof
forusingAISinformationdisplayon
radarscreen,
3 Thesystemshallfulfillasmanyaspossible
requirementslistedinIEC62288norm:Navigation
andmarineradiocommunicationsequipmentand
systems–Presentationofnavigation‐related
informationonshipboarddisplays‐requirementsfor
handlingandoperation,methodsandperformance.
_______________________________________________
4 REQUIREMENTSANALYSIS
On the basis of identified user, system and domain
requirements functional and nonfunctional system
requirements are specified. Functional requirements
definetheexpected functionalityofasystemand its
components whereas non‐functional requirements
specifycriteriathatcanbeusedtojudgetheoperation
ofasystem,rather
thantospecifysystembehavior.
To simplify the process of system requirement
analysis and assessment, the lists of functional and
non‐functional requirements are integrated and
reordered focusing on system analysis, design,
implementationandtesting.Theidentificationofthe
significanceofparticularrequirementsfromtheuser
pointofviewis
done.Thisallowsthedetermination
of the requirements hierarchy. On this basis key
requirements are specified. The key requirements
represent the core of the system and facilitate the
development of the system architecture. The
summarized list of final system requirements is
showninTable5.
Table5. The examples of final requirement for the
ESABALTsystemtoenhancesituationalawarenessatsea.
_______________________________________________
ModuleDomaindrivenrequirements
_______________________________________________
Accesstothe AuthorizedusersintheBalticSearegion
systemcanbeassignedtooneormorecategories
whichdefinetheaccessrightstoenter
and/orreadspecifiedtypesofinformation.
Information Thesystemshouldhaveatleastthe
inthesystem followingcategoriesofinformation:
‐weatherinformation,
‐navigationalinformation,
‐navigationalwarnings,
‐trafficinformation,
‐detailedinformationaboutthenearest
vessels.
Computations Thesystemshouldhavethecapabilityto
andAlgorithms proposesolutionstoapresentnavigational
situationbasedonhistoricaldataof
hazards,riskassessment,andprior
workingsolutions.
Userinterface Theuserinterfaceand
workingmannerof
thesystemshouldmeetthestandardsfor
navigationalinformationsystems(ex.
ECDIS,ARPA,AIS).Also,thepresentation
ofinformationshouldcomplywith
navigationalstandardsandguidelines
Theuserinterfaceshouldbeassimpleas
possibleinordertopreventinformation
overload–only
thebasicinformation
shouldbepresented,detailedinformation
shouldbeavailableondemand.
DataInformationshouldbecertifiedwithuseof
transmission digitalsignaturesassociatedtoindividual
users(account).
Thetransmissionofinformationshouldbe
encryptedtomaintainintegrity.
Clientmodule TheESABALTterminalshouldbea
software
programinstalledonacomputer
oranapplicationwithinamobiledevice.
Thesystemshouldalsobeavailableusing
athinclient(accessibleviawebbrowser).
Normsand Thesystemshallbealignedwith:
standards‐(IEC60945)
‐(IEC62388)
‐(IEC62288)
Othertechnical ESABALTshouldcomplementandnot
guidelines competewiththeexistingshipsystems.
ThesystemshoulddisplayVirtualAidsto
Navigation.
Ausermanualandcontexthelpshouldbe
developed.
_______________________________________________
The full list of system requirements provide
guidelines for next stages of system design. The
results of web survey gave the opinion of potential
users. The analysis of existing systems and R&D
projects gave the overview of the solutions used in
maritime systems. The of domain driven
requirements showed the law
guidelines that the
projected system should fulfil. And finally, the
interviewwithspecialistsinnavigationandcomputer
science gave the requirements for internal system
architecture.
182
5 CONCLUSIONS
In this paper the research results of identifying and
analyzingkeyrequirementsfortheESABALTsystem
based on pre‐defined user profile groups was
presented. The multiple sources for requirements
identification ware used: electronic survey for
potentialusersofthesystem,interviewswithexperts
innavigation, lawand
computer science,analysisof
state‐of‐the‐art in maritime safety procedures, and
study of past R&D projects in this field. All found
requirements ware classified into user, domain and
system levels what should provide easier
interpretation while the system architecture and its
functionalspecificationswillbedesigned.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This
research has been conductedwithin the project
Enhanced Situational Awareness to Improve Maritime
Safety in the Baltic (ESABALT), funded by the
European Union’s Joint Baltic Sea System Research
Programme called Baltic Organizations Network for
FundingSciencesEEIG(BONUS).
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