The ELEKTRA Testbed: Architecture of a Real-time Test Environment for High Safety and Reliability Requirements

Abstract

ELEKTRA is the electronic railway interlocking system developed by Alcatel Austria in cooperation with the Austrian Research Centre Seibersdorf. High safety and reliability requirements are met by means of a certain system architecture combining redundancy and diversity principles additional to an extensive software quality assurance programme Since testing still is a very important activity during all phases of a systems life cycle, the architecture of the test environment, the procedures and tools need a careful design too, for ELEKTRA, an application dependent approach has been chosen for efficiency and effectiveness (as approved to a generic approach).The tools ACHILLES (module test in a simulated process environment of concurrant processes and signal flow) and PAMIR (system test on a real-time basis with host-target support) are described in more detail.Both tools are designed for (automated) regression testing and analyses and for efficient support of system assessment. Test cases are derived from the user requirements specification and by simulating normal operation of the station.Experiences of the test team will be reported.