Robert Hackenberg

Bob Hackenberg recently retired from Lockheed Martin's Advanced
Technology Laboratories where he worked for twenty years in the
Artificial Intelligence Lab. He served as a software developer and
project lead on a wide range of projects focused on aiding the human
in doing complex tasks.

One of his earliest efforts was VOCAM, a
natural language system that made it possible for a human to interact
with a remotely controlled robot via speech. Bob developed Lisp
software that interpreted the user's free-form speech commands into
instructions being sent to an industrial robot being used to install
Oribital Replacement Units on a mockup of a space vehicle. His system
also provided computer-generated spoken feedback to the user when the
remote actions have been completed.

A more recent project that Bob developed is WebSat. WebSat is an
extensive suite of software tools that constantly collect telemetry
and payload test data from A2100 communications satellites being built
at various locations within the company. The data collected is stored
in central database. Payload test engineers can then visit the WebSat
site via browser and receive the test results in the form of a complex
report that is generated on the fly by the WebSat system. Because the
engineer can do this from the office or the home, it has significantly
reduced the need to travel to the site where the satellite is being
built. In addition, because all WebSat data is stored online, it is
possible to instantly retrieve test data from satellites that have
been in orbit for years.

Prior to coming to Lockheed Martin, Bob taught for 12 years at three
different universities. He served as a Senior Fulbright-Hays Lecturer
at the Universidad Nacional de Nicragua for two year, as an Assistant
Professor of Linguistics at Vanderbilt University, and as an Associate
Professor of Linguistics at Texas A&M-Commerce. He has a PhD in
Linguistics from Georgetown University and an MS in Computer Science
from Texas A&M-Commerce.