ARPI Phase III Project Summary

ARPA/SISTO is sending this message to all Principal Investigators whose
ARPA-funded projects are continuing or are about to start.  We need
information from you (described below) to conduct ARPA internal reviews. 

Material extracted from this information is also used to prepare funding
documentation for FY96, which means that we cannot begin to process payments
to your organization until this is received as specified in this document.
ARPA records show you as the active Principal Investigator, if this
information has changed please send the current Principal Investigator's name
and e-mail address to ssto-sum@arpa.mil.

As explained below, we need the following SEVEN items:


   (a) Project Summary (1 - 2 pages max.). -- (which includes an executive
   summary paragraph (50 - 100 words)

   (b) Administrative data.

   (c) Significant Event -- one paragraph description of the most
   significant accomplishment of the fiscal year now ending.  You
   can send one or two of these.

   (d) Most significant accomplishments anticipated in FY 96.

   (e) Technical Transition--a brief description of who is going to use the
   results of your work, when, why and how this is to take place
   (commercialization, joint funding, etc.)?

   (f) "Quad chart" -- this information will help us present your
   work to others.  Examples of each of these are provided below.

   (g) If available, an address for anonymous FTP, Gopher and/or a
   URL for World Wide Web/Mosaic access to program  related
   documents.



Please respond by July 5, 1995.  If you lack some information or are
experiencing any problems, please submit what you have, indicate any problems
and when the rest will follow.

Also, please send any videos that you may have available showcasing your work.
 We are building a video repository of SISTO sponsored efforts and would like
to include one representing your area.


Thanks for your help.

        Edward W. Thompson
        Director, Software & Intelligent Systems Technology Office

==========================================================================

                       GENERAL GUIDELINES

A separate project summary with associated administrative data is needed for
each contract/grant/effort.  The instructions below are designed to make
submissions consistent and effective.

A short well-written project summary will help your program manager explain
and defend your project and the overall program into which it fits. An
accurate set of administrative data will help us reconcile our books and speed
payment of future funds.

STYLE.  Each summary should be compact and technically interesting, drafted so
as to be comprehensible to any SISTO program manager.  Please make it strong
and positive, but without hyperbole.  Give a clear, top-level view. Avoid
jargon.  Write in the third person.

FORMAT.  To help us quickly put many such summaries into the proper format for
ARPA internal use, please be sure to:

  (a) Include the capitalized titles used below, substituting your
  words for the lower case instructions.

  (b) Avoid ANY indentation and any extra embedded white space.  No leading
white space, please.  (This message does not conform to the format guidelines,
for example.)

  (c) Limit each project summary to a MAXIMUM of 150 lines of text. (This will
let us reformat your text to fit within 2 pages. Summaries for small efforts
should be even shorter.  These limits do not apply to the separate
administrative data.)

=============================================================================

                  === PROJECT SUMMARY ===

ORGANIZATION:   University or company name

SUBCONTRACTORS:  List all (if there are any; otherwise type none).

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR(S):  Names, e-mail, telephone

TEAM MEMBERS / GRADUATE STUDENTS:  Names

TITLE OF EFFORT:  The title of the original project on the contract

SUBTITLE:  A more accurate descriptive title, if appropriate. (Short - one
line only.)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY PARAGRAPH:  A concise top level description of your overall
program.  This should be 50-100 words maximum.


OBJECTIVE:  A concise statement of what you are attempting to accomplish and
why.  Try to be as quantitative as possible so that is easier to determine
when you have succeeded.   At most a few sentences.

APPROACH:  A high-level description of your approach, both technical and
procedural.  Give enough context to make sense, but be brief.  Emphasis must
be on what you are doing.  Indicate what is innovative and why it is
promising.  Break into short paragraphs if appropriate.

PROGRESS:  A brief discussion of how far you have come and where you are
headed in the total contract.  Include quantitative results (here and below)
if appropriate.  Perhaps a few sentences overall.

PRODUCTS:  List military or commercial products since inception of effort.  If
none, type none.

FY95 ACCOMPLISHMENTS:  A crisp list of your most significant
technical accomplishments (by date) during this fiscal year.  One bullet per
item.
Aim for 3 to 5 items.  Must include important new ideas and important examples
of exploitation's of your work by others.  Examples may include Technological
breakthroughs, technology insertion into operational / commercial programs,
significant demos, and technology transfer.  (List publications below)


        NOTE: Emphasize technical results with externally recognizable impact
(military and/or civilian spin-off), phrasing your sentences like the two
examples below and inserting a blank line between each sentence (but don't
indent):

        "Developed a message understanding system (PUNDIT) to extract
key data (e.g., who did what to whom) from telegraphic military messages and
improved accuracy by 15%.

        Ported PUNDIT to several Navy domains (CASPREPS, 
RAINFORMS, OPREPS), to maintenance reports, to natural language 
database queries, to medical abstracts, and to air   traffic control
transmissions.
Significant reductions (7%-12%) in processing time were reported."


PUBLICATIONS:  A list of publicly accessible papers published in technical
journals, conference proceedings, magazines, etc.  Give full citation as in a
reference list for a technical publication. (and if possible URL to the
document)


DATE PREPARED:  Date.

(NOTE: This entire summary should not be more than about 150 lines
in length.)

=============================================================================
                     === ADMINISTRATIVE DATA ===

1.  ARPA ORDER NUMBER:  This is a 4-character alphanumeric example:  "Z123"

2. BAA NUMBER (if possible):  "BAA 93-01"

3.  CONTRACT/GRANT NUMBER: (or "In-house" if a government laboratory)

4.  AGENT:  The agency that administers your contract (e.g. ONR, Rome Labs,
Wright Labs).

5.  CONTRACT TITLE:  Same title as used in project summary (plus
official title, if different).

6.  CONTRACTOR/ORGANIZATION:  (Your university, government organization, or
company name)

7.  SUBCONTRACTORS:  (List all; otherwise type none.)

8.  CO-PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS:

9.  ACTUAL START DATE:  If your contract has not yet been signed,
please estimate when it will be. For new efforts, if you have an
early start authorized, say so, and include the start date.

10.  EXPECTED END DATE:  If this differs from the date in the
contract, please include both dates and explain difference.

11.  FUNDING PROFILE:

11.1. Current contract:  List the total negotiated cost for the base contract
and any contract add-ons or options which have been negotiated and exercised.

11.2. Options (Not exercised):  List all options which have been negotiated,
but not exercised (from contract).  List each option on a separate line with a
total at the bottom.
         FY     FY     FY    FY    TOTAL

11.3. Total funds provided to date for all years _________.

        Total funds expended to date _________.

        As of date __________.

11.4. Date total current funding will be expended:
       (i.e., when you run out of funds)

11.5. Funds required in FY96:
       (i.e., funds needed to fund you through 11/30/96)

Note:  The Government Fiscal year is 1 Oct. - 30 Sept.

11.  ANYTHING ELSE YOU NEED (from ARPA):

==============================================================================

                    ===SIGNIFICANT EVENTS===

These are very helpful for reminding others in the government, such as the
ARPA front office, of the important contributions from the community.
Obviously this is not required if the work is not yet on contract.  An example
of a significant event report from another SISTO supported program follows.

---OPERATING SYSTEM FOR REAL-TIME CONTROL OF DYNAMIC SYSTEMS

A computer programming environment and operating system called
Chimera II has been developed by ARPA-funded researchers for implementing
control of real-time, multi-sensor, multi-processor systems.  Chimera II will
reduce the time required to develop computer software to control autonomous
vehicles, automated fire control, flexible automation equipment, and robotic
manipulators.  We have developed Chimera II, tested it successfully on three
different systems, and started distribution of the documented system to
universities and industry.

Chimera II is notable in that it was designed especially to meet the broad
needs of sensor-based control.   Sensor-based control is performed at three
levels: the servo level, the supervisory level, and the planning level.  At
the servo level, Chimera II provides the extremely fast response required to
evaluate sensed conditions and recompute efforts at rates up to 1000 Hz.  Fast
response is achieved by providing deadline and priority scheduling,
low-overhead communications, fast context switching and interrupt latency time
through simple but rich operating system features.  Device drivers are
provided for hiding the hardware details of special-purpose processors and I/O
devices from the user.  At the supervisory level, Chimera II provides
constructs for communication and synchronization among processors and
constructs for storage of a world model in a file system and its maintenance
in a distributed environment.  At the planning level, Chimera II provides
features for accessing the full range of a Unix computing environment.
Chimera II utilizes UNIX for software development, debugging and simulation.

You can send one or two event reports.

===============================================================================
                             ===FY 96 EVENTS===

A concise one paragraph description of the most significant accomplishment
expected in FY 96.   Aim for 2 to 3 events.


NOTE: Emphasize technical results with externally recognizable impact
(military and/or civilian spin-off).


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                            ===TECHNOLOGY TRANSITION===

TECHNOLOGY TRANSITION:  A brief description of specific technology
transition activities (military/civilian).

(1) State specifically how results of this research are being exploited by
others, including other researchers.  (It is not sufficient just to say which
sites have your technology, but describe the impact that the insertion of your
technology has made; what was the value added.)  Also, who is your primary
customer?  If you haven't transitioned anything yet, what is your plan to do
so and when?

(2) How is the impact of this work measured?

(3) What key technologies are exported, including to other ARPA, Service,
commercial, or university efforts.

(4) For each system or prototype available for dissemination, provide system
name, its purpose, environment requirements, and point of contact phone and
e-mail address.

NOTE: Emphasize technical results with externally recognizable impact
(military and/or civilian spin-off).

===============================================================================
                                ===QUAD CHARTS===

A quad chart is a landscape oriented page that allows us to quickly and
efficiently brief a program.  We are requesting that you provide the following
six fields to enable us to quickly customize a chart with any four fields.

PICTURE:
Remember a picture is worth a thousand words so we would like a picture
suggestive of the research (or application of the research) being performed.

SCHEDULE:
At least 4 scheduled events or project milestones depicted on a 3 year
horizontal timeline with at least one milestone per year.


BACKGROUND / HISTORY:
A brief description of the background of the project, possible including any
previous project(s) who's technology led to this project or the driving force
that initiated the program.


TECHNICAL APPROACH:
Bulletized description of the technical steps leading toward the final product
/ goal.  Answer the question:  how will your goals and objectives be achieved?


OBJECTIVES or GOALS / PAYOFF or BENEFITS:
3-4 quantitative goals to be achieved by the effort and corresponding
quantitative benefits or payoff to DoD interests.  Answer the questions: what
are you trying to do and why?

TECHNICAL CHALLENGE & KEY IDEAS or CONCEPTS:
A brief description of the technical challenges or "hurdles" facing you right
now.  In other words, "why is this difficult?"  Also, what are the key ideas /
concepts your technical approach brings in addressing these "hurdles"?


Instructions for sending the picture will follow when the Project Summary Web 
page is up next week. 

================================================================================
                                   ===ADDRESSES===

If available, a URL  address for anonymous FTP, Gopher and/or World Wide Web
access to program  related documents.