A hardware/software codesign methodology and workbench for predictable development of hard real-time systems

The prime goal for the implementation of a real-time system is to guarantee that it fulfils its timing constraints. The response times which are limited by the constraints depend on what hardware is used to implement the system, and often violations of the constraints are discovered late in the design process, leading to major design revisions, thus making the development unpredictable. This is because different subsystems are developed quite independently, and it therefore becomes hard to validate the system-level timing constraints before the integration phase. The paper presents a hardware/software codesign methodology that addresses these issues by taking a unified view on the system description. It also describes a workbench of supporting tools