Embedded software verification in hardware–software codesign

Abstract

Abstract Concurrent Embedded Real-Time Software (CERTS) is intrinsically different from traditional, sequential, independent, and temporally unconstrained software. The verification of software is more complex than hardware due to inherent flexibilities (dynamic behavior) that incur a multitude of possible system states. The verification of CERTS is all the more difficult due to its concurrency and embeddedness. The work presented here shows how the complexity of CERTS verification can be reduced significantly through answering common engineering questions such as when, where, and how one must verify embedded software. First, a new Schedule-Verify-Map strategy is proposed to answer the when question. Second, verification under system concurrency is proposed to answer the where question. Finally, a complete symbolic model checking procedure is proposed for CERTS verification. Several application examples illustrate the usefulness of our technique in increasing verification scalability.