Evolution of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project: The Effects of the “Third” on the Interplay Between Cooperation and Competition

The paper investigates the evolution of the first manned international space mission – a rendezvous and docking between a US and a Soviet spacecraft in 1975 known as the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP). The aim is to reconsider the rationales behind the ASTP from both a conceptual and an empirical perspective in order to get a better understanding of the evolution of international cooperation in the highly competitive and strategic field of space technology. Based on archival sources from Moscow, it sheds some light on those factors that led to a change in the previous reluctance of Soviets to cooperate with the US in the manned spaceflight. From the theoretical point of view, it argues that the ASTP was as much a tool of competition as one of cooperation and resulted from an interplay between cooperative and competitive logics. To explain the turn towards cooperative practices, the article looks at the complex constellation of competitive relations that existed within the national and international context of space exploration and changed in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The decisive role in those changes was played by factors that can be subsumed under the notion of the so-called “third.”

A Test Procedure Optimization Method for an Industrial Robot Servo System on an Integrated Testing Platform

A test procedure optimization method was proposed in this paper to improve the test efficiency of the industrial robot servo system (IRSS) to be tested on the IRSS integrated testing platform (IITP). First, an ordered sequence was used to define the IRSS test project when tested on the IITP. The ordered sequence consisted of execution subelements, which were a combination of control variable parameters of the IITP. Second, the optimization relationships among the IRSS test projects were dug out according to the IRSS test project sequences. Finally, by using the traveling salesmen problem (TSP), an optimization model was established based on the optimization relationships of the IRSS test projects, and the optimal test order of the IRSS test projects to be tested on the IITP was obtained by solving the model. A case analysis showed that the proposed method optimized the test procedure on the IITP effectively, and the test time when implementing the test on the IITP according to the optimized order was nearly 50% shorter than before optimization. The optimization effect was thus found to be significant.

Implementation of solutions for distributed team management in IT sector companies

The article presents the results of a comparative analysis of selected IT tools supporting the management of a distributed IT team in companies from the IT sector. The research was carried out using two methods: scientific experiment (implementation of a test project in the tested tools) and comparative analysis (assessment of tools from the side of management and contractors of a distributed team according to the proposed criteria). The research results were aimed at choosing the best solutions that could be implemented to manage a distributed team in IT sector companies.