Applying Virtualization Technology to Earth Station Systems

Abstract

Melco's earth station systems are operating on virtualization environment. Virtualization is technology to emulate the hardware platform and provides great advantages such as server consolidation, software isolation, and so forth. Furthermore, virtualization technology offers flexibility of installation, especially when the earth station system is reconfigured into the next stage of the satellite operation. Since this kind of reconfiguration happens repeatedly, this flexibility saves time and costs. This paper illustrates the advantages of applying virtualization technology to earth station systems based on our performance results in satellite house keeping and in-orbit testing terms. Acronym Melco= Mitsubishi Electric Corporation COTS = Commercial Off-The-Shelf OS = Operating System VM = Virtual Machine OR = Orbit Raising IOT = In-Orbit Testing HK = House Keeping HDD = Hard Disk Drive RAID = Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks SSD = Solid State Drive NIC = Network Interface Card SMAC = Satellite Monitor and Control GMAC = Ground Monitor and Control ORAMS = Orbital Mission Analysis SOPS = Satellite Operation Planning and Scheduling SADA = Satellite Data Analysis TCT = Total Control Terminal TGW = Telesat Gateway SDP = Space Data Processing CCSDS = Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems