Toward Methods and Tools for Critical Examination of Disparate Systems for Discovery of Hidden Dependencies in Engineering of Autonomous and Semi-Autonomous Systems

We present a methodology, an initial AI Skill package, and emerging results, for enhancing software engineers' acquisition and application of domain knowledge and system-wide engineering perspectives towards the development of an autonomous or semi-autonomous system in a domain that may be new to them. At the core of the approach is a process involving proactive adversarial critiquing of videos of disparate systems in related environments. Among other things, the engineers and automated AI tools look for interactions, dependencies, and environment assumptions manifested in the observed systems, which are applicable also to the target system, but that otherwise might remain unarticulated in project artifacts. The approach and its supporting tools can enhance the quality of the target system, the individual engineer's skills and the organization's engineering practices.