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Flexible Embedded Control Systems : Design and Implementation

Eker, Johan LU orcid (1999) In PhD Thesis TFRT-1055
Abstract
Embedded control system design is a complex and error prone task, and there is a great need for better development tools. Today most real-time control systems are static systems, designed in an ad-hoc fashion. A more interactive way of working would give shorter development times, reduced costs for testing, and safer, more robust systems. This thesis presents an interactive prototyping tool called Pålsjö and a controller description language called PAL. Pålsjö allows the user to interactively configure a system. Control systems are defined using block diagrams and blocks may be added and replaced on-line. The static nature of most embedded control systems makes them very sensitive to changes in the hardware or software configuration. There... (More)
Embedded control system design is a complex and error prone task, and there is a great need for better development tools. Today most real-time control systems are static systems, designed in an ad-hoc fashion. A more interactive way of working would give shorter development times, reduced costs for testing, and safer, more robust systems. This thesis presents an interactive prototyping tool called Pålsjö and a controller description language called PAL. Pålsjö allows the user to interactively configure a system. Control systems are defined using block diagrams and blocks may be added and replaced on-line. The static nature of most embedded control systems makes them very sensitive to changes in the hardware or software configuration. There is rarely any interaction between the control loops and the underlying real-time kernel or operating system. From a control engineering perspective, the system executes in open loop. In this thesis, the possibility of using feedback in the scheduling of real-time tasks is explored. This is called feedback scheduling. An algorithm for selecting sampling rates based on the linear quadratic cost is presented. The dependence of the cost function on the sampling interval is investigated. The influence on the control performance from the interaction between the control tasks running concurrently in the real-time kernel is studied. A simulation toolbox for this is presented in the thesis.



Designing flexible control systems is much simplified given the proper language support. Therefore the PAL language concept is extended into a new proposed language Friend, which is designed to support the development of flexible embedded control systems through the use of contracts. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
supervisor
opponent
  • Krogh, Bruce, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA
organization
publishing date
type
Thesis
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Automation, Feedback scheduling, Quality of service, Linear quadratic control, Toolbox, Simulation, Rapid prototyping, Programming language, Scheduling, Embedded systems, Real-time system, robotics, control engineering, Automatiska system, robotteknik, reglerteknik
in
PhD Thesis TFRT-1055
pages
212 pages
publisher
Department of Automatic Control, Lund Institute of Technology (LTH)
defense location
Room M:E
defense date
1999-12-02 10:15:00
ISSN
0280-5316
0280-5316
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
3646ec0a-42d3-4aa9-9057-ed8a3b0a1fc3 (old id 40108)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 15:28:28
date last changed
2019-05-23 15:46:40
@phdthesis{3646ec0a-42d3-4aa9-9057-ed8a3b0a1fc3,
  abstract     = {{Embedded control system design is a complex and error prone task, and there is a great need for better development tools. Today most real-time control systems are static systems, designed in an ad-hoc fashion. A more interactive way of working would give shorter development times, reduced costs for testing, and safer, more robust systems. This thesis presents an interactive prototyping tool called Pålsjö and a controller description language called PAL. Pålsjö allows the user to interactively configure a system. Control systems are defined using block diagrams and blocks may be added and replaced on-line. The static nature of most embedded control systems makes them very sensitive to changes in the hardware or software configuration. There is rarely any interaction between the control loops and the underlying real-time kernel or operating system. From a control engineering perspective, the system executes in open loop. In this thesis, the possibility of using feedback in the scheduling of real-time tasks is explored. This is called feedback scheduling. An algorithm for selecting sampling rates based on the linear quadratic cost is presented. The dependence of the cost function on the sampling interval is investigated. The influence on the control performance from the interaction between the control tasks running concurrently in the real-time kernel is studied. A simulation toolbox for this is presented in the thesis.<br/><br>
<br/><br>
Designing flexible control systems is much simplified given the proper language support. Therefore the PAL language concept is extended into a new proposed language Friend, which is designed to support the development of flexible embedded control systems through the use of contracts.}},
  author       = {{Eker, Johan}},
  issn         = {{0280-5316}},
  keywords     = {{Automation; Feedback scheduling; Quality of service; Linear quadratic control; Toolbox; Simulation; Rapid prototyping; Programming language; Scheduling; Embedded systems; Real-time system; robotics; control engineering; Automatiska system; robotteknik; reglerteknik}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  publisher    = {{Department of Automatic Control, Lund Institute of Technology (LTH)}},
  school       = {{Lund University}},
  series       = {{PhD Thesis TFRT-1055}},
  title        = {{Flexible Embedded Control Systems : Design and Implementation}},
  url          = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/4400288/8571458.pdf}},
  year         = {{1999}},
}