Design of Dynamically Reconfigurable Real-Time Software Using Port-Based Objects

  • Authors:
  • David B. Stewart;Richard A. Volpe;Pradeep K. Khosla

  • Affiliations:
  • Univ. of Maryland, College Park;California Institute of Technology, Pasadena;Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA

  • Venue:
  • IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering
  • Year:
  • 1997

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Abstract

The port-based object is a new software abstraction for designing and implementing dynamically reconfigurable real-time software. It forms the basis of a programming model that uses domain-specific elemental units to provide specific, yet flexible, guidelines to control engineers for creating and integrating software components. We use a port-based object abstraction, based on combining the notion of an object with the port-automaton algebraic model of concurrent processes. It is supported by an implementation using domain-specific communication mechanisms and templates that have been incorporated into the Chimera Real-Time Operating System and applied to several robotic applications. This paper describes the port-based object abstraction, provides a detailed analysis of communication and synchronization based on distributed shared memory, and describes a programming paradigm based on a framework process and code templates for quickly implementing applications.