A Simple Model Of Software Costs For The Square Kilometre Array
- Resource Type
- Authors
- T. J. Cornwell; A. J. Kemball
- Source
- Experimental Astronomy. 17:317-327
- Subject
- SIMPLE (military communications protocol)
business.industry
Computer science
Software development
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Atacama Large Millimeter Array
law.invention
Radio telescope
Moment (mathematics)
Telescope
Software
Computer engineering
Space and Planetary Science
law
business
Activity-based costing
- Language
- ISSN
- 1572-9508
0922-6435
Software costs for radio telescopes have nearly always been underestimated. Since the Square Kilometre Array is often called a software telescope, repeating the usual error would be particularly egregious. We estimate software costs by scaling from the reasonably well-known costs for the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. The resulting model has sharp dependency on the complexity of the SKA, suggesting the obvious - that software costs can most easily be limited by constraining the scientific and operational requirements. A bottom-up costing will not be possible until SKA is much more clearly defined. For the moment, we recommend that 20% of the SKA budget be allocated to software development.