AUTOSAR Timing Models Minimize ECU Risks

Publication: EE Times Automotive Designline
Contributor: Symtavision GmbH

February 27, 2012 -- AUTOSAR has been introduced as an automotive standard for electronic control unit (ECU) software development and is now used in series projects either in version 3.2 or 4.0 (including Timing Extensions), depending on the OEM. From the software development perspective, AUTOSAR is already increasing productivity tremendously through standardization.

However, from the system development perspective, key questions remain:

Feasibility -How much software can be handled by the ECU? Will all real-time requirements/ timing constraints be fulfilled? Safety/ availability/ expendability - How to avoid late and costly design modifications? Documentation of real-time capability and requirements (including requirements specifications).

The goal is to have a system integration available at the end of the development which fulfils the above mentioned requirements, which uses the ECU resources in the best way, and which can accommodate extensions. The steps to this system integration include the mapping of functional architectures to software architectures, the creation of the run-time environment (RTE) and OS configuration (schedule), and the integration of basic software (BSW) elements.

By Christoph Ficek and Kai Richter. (Ficek and Richter are with Symtavision GmbH.)

Reprinted from SOCcentral.com, your first stop for ASIC, FPGA, EDA, and IP news and design information.
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