MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Etiquette Jimmy Whitaker Payload Operations Director

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 2 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama Outline  Purpose  General Information  OCR Generation  OCR Review

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 3 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama Purpose  With the significant OCR traffic flow the POIC contends with, a few lessons have been learned in how to make the process flow easier and more efficiently  In this presentation, some best practices, or “etiquette”, for OCR processing and handling are provided that the POIC would like your help in implementing.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 4 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama General Information  Be familiar with the OCR SOPs that are located in Volume 2 of the Payload Operations Handbook. The SOPs are located on the POIF Web Site (  SOP 10.8 Operations Change Request Processing via PIMS  SOP 10.9 OCR Generation via PIMS  SOP OCR Generation for New or Extensively Modified Activities or Sequences  SOP 5.3 U.S. PODF Manual Crew Procedure Changes for iPV  OCR tools are available via a POIC Web interface with PIMS.  Contact Barbara Tepper ( ) to schedule PIMS training at MSFC.  If experiencing problems with PIMS applications call the HOSC Help Desk at

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 5 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Generation  The Description of Change (SOP 10.9, Step 9) and Reason for Change (SOP 10.9, Step10) fields in the OCR should be standalone and complete. Reviewers should not have to dig into attachments to determine what products are being changed/added or what activities are being scheduled.  Most of the people reviewing your OCR were not participants in the meetings and\or discussions leading to the OCR submittal. These reviewers need to understand exactly what products\activities are being changed or requested with your OCR and why the changes are needed. Attachments should be used to document the details of the products or activities that have been identified in the Description of Change. If this OCR is requesting multiple changes, provide an itemized list. e.g.  Description of Change (Example) 1. Update ALTEA Dosimetry Operations procedure per Supporting Attachment TBD1.doc 2. Update ALTEA Lockup Recovery procedure per Supporting Attachment TBD2.doc 3. Schedule ALTEA Lockup Recovery procedure for CDR or FE2. 4. Uplink 10 files identified in Supporting Attachment TBD3.doc to the ER4 ELC. Files are stored in PIMS.  Note: All procedures that are being added or updated must be identified by Number and Title in the Description of Change Field.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 6 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Generation cont.  The Implementation Requirements (SOP 10.9, Step 8) includes the earliest, desired, and latest date, or a Due Event, when the change must be onboard.  At a minimum, you need to include either a Latest Date or Due Event.  This information will be used by the POIC when prioritizing OCRs. If you don’t care about the earliest date, use the date that the OCR was submitted.  If it is a time critical event, use the same date for earliest, desired, and latest date.  Thou shall not ignore the Resource Impacts Tab.  Please reference SOP 10.9, Step 11 for help in filling out this section – you only need to enter requirements on the parts (Activity/Sequence, Manual Procedures, Commanding, Downlink Data, and File Uplink Request (to PL MDM)) that are applicable.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 7 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Generation cont.  Avoid submitting last minute OCRs. Too many times, OCRs are dropped on Friday for operations scheduled to occur early the next week.  It is almost impossible for the POIC to do a complete review of an OCR over the weekend because of the limited number of cadre that work 24/7.  Please see Table of SOP 10.8 (OCR Processing via PIMS) to see the advance times required for different categories of OCRs.  If submitting an OCR on Friday is unavoidable, then the submitter needs to be available over the weekend to resolve issues that arise in the review process.  Since reviewers cannot see change bars in the OCR Review Library, all procedure changes must be specifically identified in either the Description of Change field or in a "From/To" form that is included as a Supporting Attachment.  If you are making a minor or simple change you can document those changes in the Description of Change field (e.g. Deleted Steps 3-5 and renumbered). For non-trivial updates, you must submit a “From/To” form as a Supporting Attachment that identifies all of the changes to the procedure.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 8 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Generation cont.  When requesting the PRO to uplink files to the PL MDM, or to an EXPRESS Rack EMU or Laptop, include as a Supporting Attachment a Microsoft Word file that includes a complete listing of the PIMS file names, on-board file names, FAT table ID numbers, and requested uplink times for each file to be uplinked (see SOP 6.22).  And a reminder, OCRs requesting file uplinks should be submitted at least 3 days prior to the need date so that the PRO can create and coordinate a File Uplink Plan.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 9 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Review  All comments, questions, and answers in the CM Log should be itemized and include your initials and a GMT Day/Time (Format as follows: DDD/HH:MM, e.g. 101/22:36).  One of the more difficult tasks in closing out an OCR is the final review to see if all inputs have been addressed. Without the itemized list that includes dates and times it can become difficult to follow the trail of bread crumbs in all reviewers CM Logs and determine whether the OCR is ready for actions to be assigned.  Reviewer Attachments should have a revision date (GMT Day/Time included in the file name; e.g. 241_1200_Reviewer_Attachment1.doc). Also, there should be a corresponding CM Log Entry that documents the purpose of the file. Reviewers should also document in the CM Log if a reviewer attachment has been modified and include an updated revision date in the filename.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 10 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Review Cont.  OCR authors should maintain ownership of their change request and perform the tasks required to get the OCR to completion. This should include:  Daily reviewing of other reviewer’s CM Log comments\questions  Requesting support from the On Console POD if reviewers are not responding and the need date (either the Latest Date or Due Event) is approaching.  Requesting support from the On Console POD if one of the POIC Cadre needs to answer question(s) in the CM Log.  Accepting or rejecting all reviewer comments in their own CM Log. If the author and reviewer cannot reach agreement on a reviewer comment, then the OCR author should document their rationale for rejecting the comment in the CM Log and immediately notify the On Console POD for a final disposition of the comment.  Note: Comments dispositioned by the POD will be documented in the POD CM Log.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 11 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Review Cont.  When an OCR is submitted to update several section(s) of a procedure, it is not open season for reviewers to recommend cleanup of other sections or even linked procedures.  However, if identified procedure changes invalidate other parts of the procedure or linked procedures, then those comments are invited and must be resolved prior to approval.  Note, the POD has discretion to require that any comment to a procedure be accepted and addressed if the procedure will be needed soon for RT Ops and there is not enough time to generate a second OCR.

MOL The Mission Operations Laboratory Page 12 NASA MSFC Engineering Directorate Huntsville, Alabama OCR Review Cont.  All reviewers should attempt to identify major comments that are submitted after reviewers have concurred and notify POD. POD has responsibility to re-add reviewers as necessary.  Reviewers should document the actions required for their team in the CM Log.  OCR authors should be the last position to concur on an OCR during the review process.  The rationale is that the author needs to respond (agree with or reject) to all comments that are submitted against their OCR.  Reviewers should not Concur with an OCR until all of their comments have been satisfactorily addressed – or until a decision has been made by the POD on comments rejected by the author.