Franz J. Rammig

System Level Design

In this contribution, some aspects of system level design are discussed. After a short characterization of the term system level, most emphasis is laid on modelling aspects. Various modelling techniques are discussed and a specific model, extended Pr/T-Nets are introduced in detail. A short overview of other system level activities concludes this paper.

BASIC CONCEPTS OF REAL TIME OPERATING SYSTEMS

Real-time applications usually are executed on top of a Real-time Operating System (RTOS). Specific scheduling algorithms can be designed. When possi- ble, static cyclic schedules are calculated off-line. If more flexibility is needed on-line techniques are applied. These algorithms are bound to priorities which can be assigned statically or dynamically. Designing a proper RTOS architec- ture needs some delicate decisions. The basic services like process manage- ment, inter-process communication, interrupt handling, or process synchroniza- tion have to be provided in an efficient manner making use of a very restricted resource budget. Various techniques like library-based approaches, monolithic kernels, microkernels, or virtual machines/exokernels are applied, based on spe- cific demands. Safety critical application can be supported by separation of ap- plications either in the time or the space domain. Multi-core architectures need special techniques for process management, memory management, and synchro- nization. The upcoming Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) generate special de- mands for RTOS support leading to dedicated solutions. Another special area is given by multimedia applications. Very high data rates have to be supported un- der (soft) RT constraints. Based on the used encoding techniques (e.g. MPEG) dedicated solutions can be created.

Aspect-Oriented Model-Driven Engineering for Embedded Systems Applied to Automation Systems

Automation and control systems include many “intelligent” automation devices, which are usually implemented as complex embedded systems. New methods and tools are demanded to cope with the increasing design complexity, while keeping the project on schedule. Proper handling of nonfunctional system requirements is a key factor during the design of industrial automation systems, since in some application domains they are as important as (sometimes, more important than) functional requirements. This paper presents a model-driven engineering approach, which combines Unified Modeling Language (UML) and aspect-oriented software development (AOSD) to design real-time and embedded automation systems. The proposed approach allows a smooth transition from the initial phases to implementation by using software tools, comprising the system specification and the automatic generation of source code. By combining UML with model-level aspects and a script-base code generation tool, it enables the use of AOSD during system design and implementation, even though the target platform does not natively support such concepts. Experimental results on using this approach to design real-world examples of automation systems are presented. The results indicate a positive impact on the design of automation systems. The encapsulation of nonfunctional requirements was improved, increasing the reuse of developed artifacts. Generated source code statistics indicate that the proposed approach can generated a fair amount of code per model element.

Design Methodology for Intelligent Technical Systems

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Emergent Topology Control Based on Division of Labour in Ants

Advances in the area of wireless sensor networks enable a myriad of new applications. Communication is however still the most costly function in these networks. Regions with higher node density lead to a greater amount of energy waste through overhearing, collisions, etc., while not increasing the networks capacity. Therefore, we propose an emergent approach to topology control reducing the number of active nodes in such areas. Facing the necessity to minimize the amount of data exchanged for achieving this goal, given the high cost of communication, the approach is motivated by the division of labour observed in ants promising lower overhead, more robustness and better scalability. Nodes actively involved in network operation are modeled as transporters, other nodes as workers. State changes are realized using a response function incorporating a response threshold and stimulus. The response threshold determines the tendency of a node to respond to a stimulus and reflects the ability to perform a state change. The intensity of stimulus is determined by quantitative cues perceived

Online Model Checking for Dependable Real-Time Systems

This paper presents a lightweight verification technique, which is applicable to dependable real-time systems, provided that the (abstract) model and the (concrete) implementation of the system under test are given in advance. In addition to the usual quality assurance techniques at design time (e.g., formal verification) and at implementation time (e.g., testing), we provide a special form of model checking at run time. That is, we check the correctness of an actual system execution by means of exploring a partial model space covering the current execution trace. In doing so, concrete state information is observed from time to time while the system to be checked is running. This runtime information is used to guide model checking to reduce the model space to be explored. In this sense, we call this method online model checking. Since we do not directly check the execution trace itself, our online checking at model level is capable of checking a running system some steps ahead of the actual state of execution. In this paper, we describe online model checking as well as the underlying system architecture in general, explain the basic algorithm and its extension to improve performance, and provide experimental results.

Analysis, Architectures and Modelling of Embedded Systems

Modelling.- State Machine Based Method for Consolidating Vehicle Data.- Automatic HW/SW Interface Modeling for Scratch-Pad and Memory Mapped HW Components in Native Source-Code Co-simulation.- Modelling of Device Driver Software by Reflection of the Device Hardware Structure.- An Infrastructure for UML-Based Code Generation Tools.- A Configurable TLM of Wireless Sensor Networks for Fast Exploration of System Communication Performance.- ConcurrenC: A New Approach towards Effective Abstraction of C-Based SLDLs.- Transaction Level Modelling.- Automatic Generation of Cycle-Approximate TLMs with Timed RTOS Model Support.- Transaction Level Modeling of Best-Effort Channels for Networked Embedded Devices.- Modeling Cache Effects at the Transaction Level.- Scheduling and Real-Time Systems.- Event Stream Calculus for Schedulability Analysis.- Real-Time Scheduling in Heterogeneous Systems Considering Cache Reload Time Using Genetic Algorithms.- Task-Dependent Processor Shutdown for Hard Real-Time Systems.- Experimental Evaluation of a Hybrid Approach for Deriving Service-Time Bounds of Methods in Real-Time Distributed Computing Objects.- Simulation, Verification and Test.- Efficient Parallel Transaction Level Simulation by Exploiting Temporal Decoupling.- Formal Verification for Embedded Systems Design Based on MDE.- Systematic Model-in-the-Loop Test of Embedded Control Systems.- Platforms and Processors.- Proteus, a Hybrid Virtualization Platform for Embedded Systems.- Constructing a Multi-OS Platform with Minimal Engineering Cost.- A Synchronization Method for Register Traces of Pipelined Processors.- Automotive Systems.- Development of Automotive Communication Based Real-Time Systems - A Steer-by-Wire Case Study.- Automatic Transformation of System Models in Automotive Electronics.- Towards a Load Balancing Middleware for Automotive Infotainment Systems.- Case Studies.- Towards an Irritable Bowel Syndrome Control System Based on Artificial Neural Networks.- A Hybrid Hardware and Software Component Architecture for Embedded System Design.- Low-Level Space Optimization of an AES Implementation for a Bit-Serial Fully Pipelined Architecture.- Wireless Sensor Networks.- The Case for Interpreted Languages in Sensor Networks.- Characterization of Inaccessibility in Wireless Networks: A Case Study on IEEE 802.15.4 Standard.- FemtoNode: Reconfigurable and Customizable Architecture for Wireless Sensor Networks.- Tutorials.- Efficient Modeling of Embedded Systems Using Computer-Aided Recoding.- New Challenges for Designers of Fault Tolerant Embedded Systems Based on Future Technologies.

Run-time reconfigurable RTOS for reconfigurable systems-on-chip

High computational performance and flexibility are the requirements of nowadays embedded systems and they are increasing constantly. Moreover, a single architecture must be able to support different applications with dynamically requirements (changing environments). Reconfigurable computing based on hybrid architectures, comprising general purpose processor (CPU) and Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), is very attractive because it can provide high computational performance as well as flexibility to support the requirements of todays embedded systems. As an Operating System (OS) is desired to provide support for such systems, it has to use the available resources in an optimal way (competing with the application), since an embedded system architecture usually lack of resources. Therefore, we present here our approach towards a reconfigurable RTOS that is able to distribute itself over a hybrid architecture (comprising FPGA and CPU). In this work we will present the main concepts and methods used to achieve the desired RTOS. Moreover, we present some preliminary evaluation results which show the applicability of our approach.

Biologically-Inspired Collaborative Computing

Keynote Presentations.- Swarm Robotics: The Coordination of Robots via Swarm Intelligence Principles.- Immuno-engineering.- Inspiration Based on Insect Behaviors.- Heuristics for Uninformed Search Algorithms in Unstructured P2P Networks Inspired by Self-Organizing Social Insect Models.- Congestion Control in Ant Like Moving Agent Systems.- Resource-Aware Clustering of Wireless Sensor Networks Based on Division of Labor in Social Insects.- Sensors, Actuators and Networks.- Self-stabilizing Automata.- Experiments with Biologically-Inspired Methods for Service Assignment in Wireless Sensor Networks.- Robotics and Multi-Agent Systems.- Evolving Collision Avoidance on Autonomous Robots.- Local Strategies for Connecting Stations by Small Robotic Networks.- Measurement of Robot Similarity to Determine the Best Demonstrator for Imitation in a Group of Heterogeneous Robots.- Distributed Fault-Tolerant Robot Control Architecture Based on Organic Computing Principles.- Immunocomputing and Biological-Inspiration.- Intrusion Detection via Artificial Immune System: a Performance-based Approach.- Immuno-repairing of FPGA designs.- An Organic Computing Approach to Sustained Real-time Monitoring.- Applications.- A Case Study in Model-driven Synthetic Biology.- Image Segmentation by a Network of Cortical Macrocolumns with Learned Connection Weights.- Integrating Emotional Competence into Man-Machine Collaboration.- Hardware Issues.- Self-optimized Routing in a Network on-a-Chip.- On Robust Evolution of Digital Hardware.- Collaboration.- A Model of Self-Organizing Collaboration.- Guiding Exploration by Combining Individual Learning and Imitation in Societies of Autonomous Robots.

A Petri Net Approach for The Design of Dynamically Modifiable Embedded Systems

A Petri net based approach for modeling dynamically modifiable embedded realtime systems is presented. The presented work contributes to the extension of a Petri net based design methodology for distributed embedded systems towards the handling of dynamically modifiable systems. Extensions to the underlying high-level Petri net model are introduced that allow for dynamic modifications of a net at run time.