Advances in Science, Technology and Engineering Systems Journal Vol. 4, No. 5, 23-29 (2019) www.astesj.com Special Issue on Advancement in Engineering and Computer Science ASTES Journal ISSN: 2415-6698 Application of Open-Source Optimization Library ”Extremum” to the Syn- thesis of Feedback Control of a Satellite Andrei Panteleev * , Valentin Panovskiy Moscow Aviation Institute (National Research University), department ”Mathematics and Cybernetics”, Moscow, Russia ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received: 28 May, 2019 Accepted: 20 August, 2019 Online: 06 September, 2019 Keywords: Open-source Optimization algorithm Optimal control Current work demonstrates how open-source optimization library ”Extremum” (OSOL Extremum) can be used to build feedback controller of a satellite. Proposed software was developed to as an attempt to eliminate current problems that are present in scientific area: black-box effect (i.e. there is no opportunity to explore source code, modify it, or simply verify), no code reuse (i.e. implemented procedures are accessible only within software that includes it), limitated application of modern optimization algorithms (i.e. number of optimization algorithms increases but most of them were verified only on synthetic tests). All of them lead to so-called reproducibility crisis. 1 Introduction This paper is an extension of work originally presented in 2018 IV International Conference on Information Technologies in Engineer- ing Education (Inforino) [1]. Optimization is a field of mathematics that is widely applied in engineering, e.g. optimal component design and control theory [2, 3, 4]. Traditionally, optimization algorithms are divided into two groups: • analytic – these are determined algorithms which efficiency and convergence properties are proved; their main disadvan- tage is relatively poor performance which reduces the scope of applied problems that can be solved by them [5], • (meta)heuristic – on the contrary, this group of algorithms has problems with the convergence of results: it is not guar- anteed that an appropriate solution will be found, but these algorithms are much more computationally efficient and prac- tically verified [6]. The current work consists of several parts: • Prerequisites – explains reasons which led to the OSOL Ex- termum development; • Description of OSOL Extremum – provides information about software structure and technology stack; • Synthesis of Feedback Control of a Satellite via the OSOL Extremum – describes mathematical task formulation; • Application Results – demonstrates particular results of ap- plication of the developed software; • Conclusion – summarizes the results and provides informa- tion about further research. 2 Prerequisites In order to understand why the development of a new software was performed it is necessary to describe its background. It will be explained in details in the following subsections. 2.1 Black-Boxing This is the double-edged sword of software development. On the one hand, it allows one to use given tools without necessity to imple- ment desired algorithm, but on the other - it deprives the opportunity to modify code the way you need it for the exact task. In other words, black-boxing makes all your software tools not as flexible as they can be. Also, you must be totally confident in the quality of the software that you use, because you have no opportunity to check confusing moments. * Corresponding Author: Andrei Panteleev, Moscow Aviation Institute (National Research University), department ”Mathematics and Cybernetics”, Moscow, Russia, avpanteleev@inbox.ru www.astesj.com https://dx.doi.org/10.25046/aj040503 23