The components data flow machine: An intermediate modeling format to support the design of automobiles E/E systems architectures

The design of the architectures of automobiles E/E (Electric/Electronic) systems consists in the allocation of the hardware platform and the distribution of the computing and the communication loads of the application software within the allocated hardware. This operation is called the partitioning. Following the actual model-driven design schemes, the input of the partitioning is generally a functional specification of the system under development in the form of communicating software components that must be mapped on the allocated hardware platform. However, even though these models are sufficient to describe the structure of a system, they are not good enough to support a CAD-supplied partitioning. They lack the facilities needed to support the analysis of the data flow and to investigate the closeness between the elements of the specification, thus to support the mapping. In this paper, we define the Components Data Flow Machine (CDFM), a modeling format that is def ined to support the design of automobiles E/E systems architectures. The CDFM defines the semantics of a synthesis model that results from a transformation of standard models like SysML, EAST ADL or AUTOSAR models.