The importance of Systems Engineering

http://www.raeng.org.uk/education/vps/pdf/RAE_Systems_Report.pdf

The importance of Systems Engineering

NASA specified and developed, at great expense, a

ball point pen that Apollo astronauts could use in

spacewhere gravity would not make the ink flow.

Russian cosmonauts used pencils.

Moral:specify what you want to achieve, not how to achieve it

What would Laser spectrometry tell a water company

http://www.ted.com/talks/greg_asner_ecology_from_the_air.html

What would Laser spectrometry tell a water company about drought, ecosystems and wastewater

3D printing in concrete

3D printing in Concrete

http://data.london.gov.uk/dashboard-summary/environment

Collective Intelligence - design patterns to make it work

http://asmarterplanet.com/blog/2013/06/mits-thomas-malone-on-collective-intelligence.html

1. What is being done
2. Who is doing it
3. Why are they doing it
4. How is it being done

Cognitive computing mixes people and computers to work better

Making sense of Water management challenges - and using the approach that fits the system

When tackling a problem around Water Management it is vital to know what kind of problem it is to be able to design an effective solution:

e.g Leakage Management
Some part of this problem are
Simple - the issue is known, the solution is good practice Plan, Do, Close, Report
Complicated - before action is taken there needs to be some analytics, some expertise is needed and there are many ways that it could be tackled. Part of the challenge is finding effective ways. e.g. pipe failure prediction across a city with incomplete data.
Complex - This is where the problem lies in a complex adaptive system e.g. coordinating the digging up of underground assets. The help in these situation there is the need for advanced situational awareness and tools to test next best actions before they happen and monitor how things are going in near real-time to create better solutions for today's unique set of circumstances.
When things are Chaotic just do something  to get the system into another domain and then take it from there. e.g. For a major burst turn off all the water to make the system simple and then work out a systematic way of turning things back on.