ECHO

ECHO is a web-based application to simulate interplanetary communication delays between two sites in analog or laboratory studies. It can be run in a closed network or over the Internet depending on the needs of the study or habitat environment where it is deployed. The application supports both public and one-on-one private conversations between users, with message types including text, audio, video, and data attachments.

ECHO was designed with features to facilitate work in high latency environments. All of these can be enabled/disabled depending on the needs of the study.

• Message Timestamps - Messages have a sent and expected delivery timestamp.
• Message Delivery Status - All messages are marked as "In Transit" or "Delivered."
• Progress Bar - A progress bar is used to show messages in transit.
• Out-of-Order Indicator - Messages that crossed paths in transit are flagged with an out-of-order indicator to alert users that they should read the messages carefully to understand the context.
• Important Messages - Ability to send high-priority or important messages to draw attention to them.
• Conversation Threads - Users can create threads to organize conversations.

Finally, since ECHO is designed as a research tool, it includes functionality to download archives of all conversations for post-mission analysis.