Digital waves of change

A characteristic of our lifestyle as island-dwellers is our constant interaction with the sea. Just a few weeks ago we stood on the bastions overlooking the Grand Harbour to witness the start of the Middle Sea Race. In fact, yachting has been identified by the Malta Tourism Authority as one of the target growth sectors in Malta.

While yachting is not usually an area we associate with research and innovation, S-TEC (Superyacht Technology Expansion Centre) Ltd., the testing and experimentation living lab within MARSEC-XL, the Marine Software Engineering Cluster of Excellence, and the Malta College for the Arts, Science & Technology (MCAST) have shown that it is the ideal platform for applying new ICT developments.

This may seem like an odd combination to some, however, when you stop and think about it, there is so much that goes into the design of various components of a boat, why shouldn’t there be advanced digital systems with which to manage them?

We have all heard of the “black box” which logs all the information related to the various components of an aircraft. The log allows airplane manufacturers to identify faults and improve designs or implement procedures for improved safety. Similarly, commercial vessels are required to log data, however, this is a logistical nightmare for mariners who need to manually collect and input information into a log. In the case of the leisure marine industry, this is not even mandatory, meaning that all the data is lost. With S-TEC Ltd.’s strong software engineering expertise and experi­ment­ation/prototyping facilities and MCAST’s contact with mariners and research expertise, the consortium has set out to develop an automatic digital logbook.

MARLON, a project funded through the national Research & Innovation (R&I) Programme 2011, which is administered by the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST), aims to facilitate this necessary task by providing an electronic solution for logging, where a significant portion of the required data is logged automatically through a cloud.

“Log keeping is fundamental for a mariner, however, it may become a burden to keep an up-to-date log in pen and paper – something we have confirmed with the captains themselves,” explains Alan Grech, the primary investigator within S-Tec Ltd. “Together with MCAST we came up with MARLON, a digital logbook. We thought now is the right time. The application to the national (R&I) Programme was very smooth and pretty fast.”

For this project, the application will be developed for the Apple iPad tablet, but MARLON’s results can also be used to develop other versions on different platforms. An online community website will also be launched to support the future of digital log keeping. The pilot will be carried out in a leisure vessel, where log keeping, though deemed to be good practice, is not obligatory; however, results will be assessed for future extension into the commercial sector, where log keeping is mandatory and bound by stringent laws. The fact that logbooks are considered to be legal documents requiring signatures means amendments to the law may be necessary for digital log keeping.

Joshua Bugeja, the MCAST project leader added: “The idea fascinated me, so I was pleased to have been assigned the project. My first thought was, ‘how is it possible that logbooks still use pen and paper nowadays?’ This is truly a golden opportunity to introduce the latest in open web and mobile technologies into a sphere which, to date, has been immune to such advances. The focus of this challenge, however, is not the technology itself but a new application which will bring vast improvements and increased automation from which mariners will benefit.”

The idea of automatic or assisted logging has not been explored yet. One of the challenges related to such a system is the fact that most marine electronic systems only allow integration between devices operating on the same network which has been created by the same manufacturer. This makes communication between devices from different manufacturers is impossible.

MARLON will be implemented as an application on MARSSA, the Marine Systems Software Architecture, launched by MARSEC-XL in February 2011, as the first open source community-driven project in the marine industry. MARSSA can be visualised as the blueprint of electronic systems on board which drastically improves access to data and through it all software-dependent devices can communicate through a private onboard cloud.

Mariners must be looking forward to the results of this project which will allow them to reduce the time spent collecting data, obtain more regular and accurate data, store the data on a “cloud” which can be accessed through various devices, and access information regarding the vessel operation and safety.

MCST is already inviting potential innovators to come forward with their ideas for the R&I Programme 2012. Proposals will be accepted, as from tomorrow in four priority sectors: energy & environment, ICT, health & biotechnology, and value-added manufacturing. More information at www.mcst.gov.mt or e-mail rtdi.mcst@gov.mt

Ms Pace is an executive as the National Funding Unit at the Malta Council for Science and Technology.