Manzano High School (83)

The Manzano High School team (#83) is from Albuquerque. This year they've submitted a project titled Air Traffic Control: The Next Step!.

Proposal
http://mode.lanl.k12.nm.us/get_proposal1112.php?team_id=83

Although there are many people who work in air traffic control, many mistakes are made as they try to manage air traffic. Our goal is to reduce the amount of human error by creating a program that efficiently directs airplanes at a medium sized airport. With this program, the risk of human error will decrease for managing air traffic on and off runways and in result, increase the safety of air travel and maximize the capability of an airport. The program will be based on the layout of a medium sized airport, but can easily be adaptable to other airports.

Our course of action for creating the program is to first obtain data. We will study the physics of airplanes; learn about airport layouts and the way they function. Our next step is to write basic engine code that uses the calculations of airplane physics in order to form an algorithm. Then, we will use the program to create a model of its efficiency. The final step is to formulate codes for handling events like emergency landings, fires, repairs on runways, etc. and to incorporate it into our program.

For the next 6 weeks, our immediate plan of action is to formulate what exact data is needed for the program, what is going to be the basics of the program, and focus on the main objectives on the program. Then, we will utilize 3 weeks of time to write the engine code and test the program's applicability.

This program will be a java-based extension of a C++-based airport traffic management project done for the Challenge by Manzano Team 127 in 2009-2010

Interim Report
http://mode.lanl.k12.nm.us/get_interim1112.php?team_id=83

Problem Definition:
Air Traffic Control is a process that takes many people communicating, and thinking to prevent aircraft collisions, and keep planes on time if possible. There are many mistakes on both ground, and in air. Planes have been miss tracked, misplaced, and often are delayed due to slight mistakes that could have been avoided. Although there are many people who work in air traffic control, many mistakes are made as they try to manage air traffic. Also human controlled air traffic controls systems are slow, and you can’t use the airport to its full potential.

Problem Solution:
Our goal is to reduce the amount of human error by creating a program that efficiently directs airplanes at a medium sized airport. With this program, the risk of human error will decrease for managing air traffic on and off runways and in result, increase the safety of air travel and maximize the capability of an airport. The program will be based on the layout of a medium sized airport, but can easily be adaptable to other airports, big or medium or small. Eventually we will have a working simulation of an airport, with different problems like weather delays, pilot error, emergencies, and other things that an airport would confront.

Progress to Date:
So far we have been working on learning java in the Netbeans IDE within an AP Computer Science programming class at Manzano High School. We have done over 30 different small projects that cover the topics of arrays, applets, math operations, JOptionPane from the swing classes, conditionals, loops, multiple classes management, basic programming skills, Grid World case study, and more.

Expected Results:
We expect to have a program capable of predicting the planes paths at any given time and quickly display information on the planes at any moment in order to efficiently track, land, and take off planes in a staggered sequence, and thus use the airport to its full potential and speed up the general operation of the airport. This program will be a java-based extension and re-write of a C++-based airport traffic management project done for the Challenge by Manzano Team 127 in 2009-2010.

Bibliography:
Adema, Hensel, & Keller (2010), “Efficient Air Traffic Control”, MHS, Team 127, NMSCC

Deitel & Deitel (2003), Java How to Program, 5th Ed, Prentice Hall

Giancoli (2005), Physics: Principles with Applications, 6th Ed., Pearson/Prentice Hall

Lambert & Osborne (2003), Fundamentals of Java, Thomson/Course Technology

Johnston, B. (2004), Java Programming Today, Pearson/Prentice Hall

Introduction
Hi,

My name is LD "Gus" Landis. See the biography on my User Page.

Progress
It seems to me that you are still talking quite generally about what you are intending to do.

Mentors
If you do not yet have a mentor, please contact consult for help in finding a mentor to help you with this ambitious project.

Specifically, given your currently stated goal, I strongly encourage you to find someone involved with the "air traffic control" industry to help you identify the key elements (agents) for you project.

Model
From your description of your goals, it seems you are going to be using an agent model. You don't say specifically what you are doing.

If you are using an agent based model:
 * what are your agents?
 * roughly how will the agents interact?
 * what external controls do you plan to implement?
 * what are the planned outputs?

Teams Continuing Work on Prior Year's Project
You clearly state that this project is a "rewrite" of the C++ implementation done by team 127 in the 2009-2010 challenge.

Be aware that you are "raising the bar" by continuing a previous year's efforts, and that may be a tough act to follow.

You need to decide, I believe, whether your project is intended to compare and contrast C++ vs Java implementations (in performance, modifyability, etc), or whether you are going to be working toward your goal of developing a useful (to air traffic control) model. These are very different projects, but I think you must pick one.

Recall that you are expected to do a "year's worth of new work" and need to clearly indicate what you have done... Merely "rewriting" C++ to Java is not that easy, but also does not really demonstrate as much as developing toward your currently stated goal.

Face to Face Evaluation
Your next milestone is a |face to face evaluation in February.

Rubrics
The judges will use these rubrics to evaluate your projects. Use them as checklists for what you need to communicate to the judges.


 * Expo Judges Rubric
 * Finalist Judges Rubric

Team Comments
We are doing something agent based, the program will also be more based on making a working air traffic control program than comparing C++ to java. Right now i feel that the program display will have a few different elements, one will be a visual representation of where the planes are, and next to that to the right will be different controls for someone monitoring the aircraft control program.