The IMMOS research project aims to devise an integrated method for the model-based development of embedded control units. The method will integrate existing model-based techniques, in particular model-based requirements engineering, model-based code generation and model-based testing, to form a single coherent development method. The project focuses on the automotive area, i.e. on the software development for automotive control units. Accordingly, the appropriateness of the approach to be developed will be demonstrated by means of an industrial-scale case study involving an automotive function.

The project is funded by the German Ministry for Research and Education as part of the ”IT-Forschung 2006” programme. It began in 2004 and will finish in the middle of 2006.

The main research subjects of the project are outlined below.

The systematic integration of the model-based techniques outlined in the subsequent sections must define the interplay between these individual techniques. To this end, we will describe and relate the information units that are captured during requirements determination, modelling and the test. Based on these relationships, we will elaborate an integrated method for the model-based development of distributed control systems in the automotive area. As a prerequisite, we will use an information model, which describes all the essential information units occurring in model-based development (e.g., requirements, models and test cases) and their relationships in an abstract way.

Model-based Requirements Engineering

A basic project goal in the area of requirements engineering is the definition of a semantic core, which supports both textual requirements and a refinement of functional and non-functional requirements into the model-based development process. On the basis of this kind of semantic foundation, requirements management and verification will be of central importance and contribute directly to quality assurance.

Code Generation in Safety-critical Applications

In the course of the project, we will investigate the certification of code generators, or of the code generated, in the automotive area. To this end, a generic test suite for code generators is to be developed that effectively supports safeguarding code generators for safety-critical applications. On the basis of the continuous information model, which will be the foundation of IMMOS’s integrated method, we will devise safeguard procedures for the process of automatic code generation. This will enable us to conduct the process of control unit implementation in compliance with current quality assurance standards.

Model-based Testing

The systematic test is the most important quality assurance element in the process of control unit development. We use the term model-based testing to refer to a test process that is closely interlocked with model-based development and that combines several complementary test methods. One of IMMOS’s fundamental goals is to identify a basis of elementary units for test description that is complete in the context of model-based functional testing.

Partner

• DaimlerChrysler AG
• dSpace GmbH
• Forschungszentrum Informatik an der Universität Karlsruhe
• IT Power Consultants
• Universität Paderborn, Institut für Informatik