Managing Complexity of Automotive Electronics Using the EAST-ADL
The complexity of embedded automotive systems calls for a more rigorous approach to system develo... more The complexity of embedded automotive systems calls for a more rigorous approach to system development compared to current state of practice. A critical issue is the management of the engineering information that defines the embedded system. Development time, cost efficiency, quality and dependability all benefit from appropriate information management. System modeling based on an architecture description language is a way to keep the engineering information within one information structure. The EAST-ADL was developed in the EAST-EEA project (www.easteea.net) and is an architecture description language for automotive embedded systems. It is currently refined in the ATESSTproject (www.atesst.org). This paper gives an overview of the EAST-ADL and accounts for some recent refinements as developed in the ATESST project. Areas covered include the relation to other standardization initiatives such as UML2.0, AADL, AUTOSAR, SysML, Marte profile, requirements management and variability.
Using Product Sets to Define Complex Product Decisions
Product family engineering consists of several activities commonly separated into the areas of do... more Product family engineering consists of several activities commonly separated into the areas of domain engineering and product engineering. The main part of product engineering is the definition of product decisions, which means in the context of feature modeling that for each feature the product engineer has to define in what products it will be included. In the automotive domain – and probably in many other embedded real-time domains as well – the considerations that influence these feature selections are extremely complex and, at the same time, need to be documented as closely as possible for later reference. In this paper, we (1) present a detailed description of this problem and (2) try to show that existing approaches do not sufficiently meet these concerns. We then (3) provide a detailed definition of product sets as a means to solve the problem and (4) show what methodological implications arise from the use of this concept.
Feature trees are a well-established instrument for domain analysis and modeling. But for highly ... more Feature trees are a well-established instrument for domain analysis and modeling. But for highly complex product families like a vehicle manufacturer's product range comprising well-above a thousand technical features - they become very large, and thus cumbersome and inflexible, especially when managing changes to the tree's structure over a long time. Furthermore, a conflict of aims arises when using feature trees in large organizations: while a single global feature tree for the entire company is desirable, local amendments for individual units or projects are indispensable in practice. In this paper, we present a detailed description of this problem and show its great relevance to the automotive domain. We then provide a detailed definition of multi-level feature trees as a possible solution to the above problem. Finally, we describe scenarios how such multi-level feature trees can be put into practice and introduce a prototypical tool implementation of this concept
Managing Complexity of Automotive Electronics Using the EAST-ADL
The complexity of embedded automotive systems calls for a more rigorous approach to system develo... more The complexity of embedded automotive systems calls for a more rigorous approach to system development compared to current state of practice. A critical issue is the management of the engineering information that defines the embedded system. Development time, cost efficiency, quality and dependability all benefit from appropriate information management. System modeling based on an architecture description language is a way to keep the engineering information within one information structure. The EAST-ADL was developed in the EAST-EEA project (www.easteea.net) and is an architecture description language for automotive embedded systems. It is currently refined in the ATESSTproject (www.atesst.org). This paper gives an overview of the EAST-ADL and accounts for some recent refinements as developed in the ATESST project. Areas covered include the relation to other standardization initiatives such as UML2.0, AADL, AUTOSAR, SysML, Marte profile, requirements management and variability.
Using Product Sets to Define Complex Product Decisions
Product family engineering consists of several activities commonly separated into the areas of do... more Product family engineering consists of several activities commonly separated into the areas of domain engineering and product engineering. The main part of product engineering is the definition of product decisions, which means in the context of feature modeling that for each feature the product engineer has to define in what products it will be included. In the automotive domain – and probably in many other embedded real-time domains as well – the considerations that influence these feature selections are extremely complex and, at the same time, need to be documented as closely as possible for later reference. In this paper, we (1) present a detailed description of this problem and (2) try to show that existing approaches do not sufficiently meet these concerns. We then (3) provide a detailed definition of product sets as a means to solve the problem and (4) show what methodological implications arise from the use of this concept.
Feature trees are a well-established instrument for domain analysis and modeling. But for highly ... more Feature trees are a well-established instrument for domain analysis and modeling. But for highly complex product families like a vehicle manufacturer's product range comprising well-above a thousand technical features - they become very large, and thus cumbersome and inflexible, especially when managing changes to the tree's structure over a long time. Furthermore, a conflict of aims arises when using feature trees in large organizations: while a single global feature tree for the entire company is desirable, local amendments for individual units or projects are indispensable in practice. In this paper, we present a detailed description of this problem and show its great relevance to the automotive domain. We then provide a detailed definition of multi-level feature trees as a possible solution to the above problem. Finally, we describe scenarios how such multi-level feature trees can be put into practice and introduce a prototypical tool implementation of this concept
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Papers by Matthias Weber