Learning Outcomes
At the end of the module, students will be able to apply the principles of agile philosophy to design and engineer more flexible and changeable civil systems. Agile thinking is a state of the art technique which makes use of a user-centered approach aiming for an adaptive and responsive design process, as well as, for flexible, reconfigurable, extensible and salable products that can sustainably adjust to future conditions. The module will start with an introduction to the state of the art of Agile Systems Engineering after which students will understand the fundamentals of agile philosophy and how it applies to the engineering of complex civil systems.
Practical assignments play an important role during the course to ground the theoretical part of the module. Therefore, at the end of the module students will know how to define a minimum functional configuration for a civil system. Students will also know how to define interfaces between the different components of a system - an important part of enabling flexibility throughout the engineering/design process. Finally, students will know how to assess the overall agility of an engineering design with respect to sustainable high performance criteria that reflect the needs and requirements of a wide range of stakeholders. Students will gain experience in using SysML as a formal modeling language.