Interaction Analysis for Integrated Embedded Systems

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Rinard, MartinCCR-0209075The project will investigate a new program analysis, interactionanalysis, and a new set of implementation techniques to supportfuture generations of embedded systems. Instead of executing low-levelcode whose sole responsibility is to control a specific piece ofhardware, these future systems will be built in a layered fashion,with the core control software surrounded by outer layers of softwarethat integrate the core software and the device that it controls intoa larger integrated, distributed system of devices and users.The key challenge associated with realizing this vision is the need toeffectively apply implementation mechanisms that enable the outerlayers to share the hardware device without disrupting the actions ofthe time and safety critical core code. The economics of developinglarge software systems will ensure that most of the outer layers willconsist of standard, off-the-shelf software components from the worldof laptop, desktop, and server computing. The outer layer softwarewill therefore have been developed to use implementation mechanismsthat are unsuited for use in time-critical controlsoftware. Nevertheless, the core software and the outer layer softwarewill need to interact. With standard implementation mechanisms,interactions mediated by objects shared with outer layers could easilylead to unacceptable delays and a loss of real-time control in thecore.The focus of this research is the development and investigation of newinteraction analysis algorithms that extracts the interaction patternsbetween the core and outer layers, then uses these patterns toclassify objects into several categories. Each category can then usean implementation mechanism appropriate for how it is used in thesystem. The end result is a system in which the outer layers and coresoftware effectively cooperate without a loss of safety orpredictability.The envisioned analysis has several properties that will make itsuitable for this application. First, it is capable of extracting ameaningful result with an analysis of only part of the program.Second, it can effectively analyze the multithreaded programs thatcome from the integration of the outer layers and the core. Third, thepartial analysis is goal-driven to extract the required informationwith an analysis of only those parts of the program required to obtainthe result.