Ask the user: a practical approach to test program set development

The development of a military weapon system is a long and arduous process. How to maintain that system after it is fielded is often a quick afterthought. The automatic test equipment (ATE) and associated test program sets (TPS) are selected and developed based solely on the physical operating specifications and test parameters of the system. The people who actually use the ATE to repair the system and those who maintain the TPS software usually have little or no input until the ATE and TPS are delivered to them. This paper provides a case study of the development and acceptance of an ATE and TPS for the AN/ALQ-172 electronic countermeasures (ECM) system. It does not dwell on the specific technology and mathematical analyses designed into the TPS, but instead focuses on the end goal - using the TPS to repair the system. The paper discusses the initial development of the TPS without user input, then discusses some of the problems discovered when software maintenance engineers and system repair technicians became involved. The case study concludes with a review of the final TPS acceptance testing and an overview of the benefits and costs of involving the user throughout the development process.