Design Approach for Real-Time Reactive Systems

Mika Katara(*) and Tommi Mikkonen(**)
*Tampere University of Technology
**Nokia Telecommunications
FINLAND

Abstract

We propose a design approach for real-time reactive systems. The core of the approach is to use abstract real-time requirements or constraints arising from different views of a system. These requirements are specified separately in the early phases of the development. When conjoining such views, it is a design decision to partition real-time requirements given in the views into those needed for lower-level concepts. An explicit introduction of real-time requirements in a high-level specification, and their verifiable partitioning into implementable operations then provides justification for the final design. The approach is demon­ strated with an example, where requirements related to telecommanding of a simple device are first formalized in an abstract fashion, and then partitioned into implementation-level operations.

Keywords: reactive systems, action systems, formal methods, real time, partitioning.


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