Brendan Jackman

An introduction to FlexRay as an industrial network

The FlexRay Protocol was developed by the FlexRay consortium which was started when BMW and DaimlerChrysler worked together to create a new network scheme that would suit their current and future needs. They were soon joined by other companies such as Bosch and Phillips [1]. FlexRay is set to become widely used in the automotive industry where it will replace or support existing networking schemes such as CAN. It has already been implemented by BMW in the 2006 X5 [2]. This paper will introduce the key features of the FlexRay protocol and where relevant it will be compared it to CAN and the existing Fieldbus technologies such as PROFIBUS and Foundation Fieldbus.

Using UML 2.0 to Create Executable Code from Requirements Capture and Consistent Requirement Specifications for Real-Time Automotive Software Development

The development of vehicle control systems has evolved to become an exercise in the design and integration of complex, distributed hardware and software components. The various components are typically developed by geographically dispersed, multicultural teams from both OEMs and suppliers. This paper gives a brief overview of using the Unified Modelling Language (UML) as a means of capturing the requirements of real-time distributed systems in a graphical notation shared by all team members. UML is commonly used to model system concepts, albeit typically as system “sketches” without any formal definition of the model’s semantics. This paper specifically addresses the additions to the latest version of UML that supports higher levels of