Software Units Research Articles

Discrete-event diagnostic model for a distributed computational system. independent chains

We consider synthesis problems for a discrete event model of a real time distributed computational system. The model reflects information exchange events between software units of the system and is intended to construct special test sequences that detect faults in these exchanges.

The System of Tensile Test Based on Multi-Agent Virtual Instrument

This paper presents a system of tensile test based on multi-agent virtual instrument to reduce difficulty and improve intelligence of virtual instrument development. Each software unit of the virtual instrument was designed independent agent. The multi-agent system was generated by the interaction between the agents, and applied successfully to low-carbon steel tensile test experiments. The experimental results show that the response speed and sensitivity of virtual instrument have been improved. Other the development of virtual instrument becomes more simplified, and enhance the ability of the system reconfigurable and intelligent level.

N-version programming-based protection scheme for microgrids: A multi-agent system based approach

Abstract Islanded mode and grid-connected mode are the two operational modes of a microgrid (MG). It is essential to develop a suitable protection scheme for an MG network to protect it against all types of faults in both of the modes. The fault current in an inverter-dominated MG is limited by the ratings of the semiconductor devices. Only traditional over-current protection schemes are not adequate for such inverter-based grids. In order to cover the drawbacks of conventional protection schemes, an N-version programming-based protection scheme has been proposed in this paper. An N-version software unit with N = 3 has been developed in MATLAB Simulink and all the agents in the developed multi-agent scheme have been equipped with this unit. The three developed protection versions are Clark’s transformation-based current protection, positive sequence phase differential-based protection and conventional over-current-based protection scheme. The software unit makes the final decision about the fault through a polling process. Different types of faults have been tested in both the islanded and grid-connected modes. The proposed protection scheme has given desired results in all the tested cases and hence proved to be a reliable and accurate method for fault identification in microgrid networks. Finally, a framework has been presented for possible realization of the proposed protection scheme through existing IEC 61850-based intelligent electronic devices (IEDs).

Performance evaluation of SD – cards by "system-on-chip" technology

Subject matter. We propose the hardware and software block for performing write or read operation and testing the performance of different SD-cards using the technology of "system-on-chip" in integrated environment by Altera. This task is relevant for the design of high-performance parallel systems on a chip, where the lower limit for writing speed (and/or reading) is critical and significant. Method. The proposed approach is based on three items. First, schemes are used with programmable logic to create a compact hardware and software unit as part of video system on chip. Secondly, reprogrammable structures are applied that support serial and parallel modes of exchange. Thirdly, the increment of data bus width is possible, via the serial transfer and the parallel connection of multiple units simultaneously. Main Results. The analysis of test results of different memory cards has shown that the speed of writing and reading for all cards differs from the declared one by manufacturer, and the error rate of writing (and reading) of data is 30...50% (for reading ~30%). A maximum download speed of memory cards is possible by increasing the number of cascade-connected blocks. The results show that the simplest implementation of this hardware-software unit requires resources of the order of 2000-2500 elementary logic cells. Each cell implements the logical operation "AND-OR with memory", while the resource ЕР3С25F256C8 of the popular chip family Cyclone III consists of 5976 (26%) of these cells with the chip price equal to $5-10 apiece. Practical Relevance. The authors believe that the proposed hardware-software unit can be regarded as the cheapest specialized component in the ECB domestic microelectronics industry to create video information in real time systems.

Knowledge transfer of software tool development for functional requirements analysis

ABSTRACTKnowledge transfer is a key function in software development. Software tool development is an important skills in the software engineering. However, generic teaching courses are hard to evaluate the integrated development skills from undergraduate students. This paper proposed a continuous collaboration model (CCM) and a view‐based semi‐automatic tool, OpenNeeds, develop and run as an Eclipse plug‐in to proceed the functional requirements' analysis. These selected methods and tools include programming languages, markup language, information exchange standards, modeling language, model‐view‐controller (MVC) software framework, virtual machine handling, interface development environment, version control platform, knowledge management, software documentation, and software unit tests. The MVC tool can simply manipulate several requirement‐related graphical components, such as mind view and use case view. The lateral thinking approach is adapted in grid view to assist in analyzing other potential requirements from the original ones. Subsequently, the source codes of this tool are opened and can be distributed via the Eclipse Public License from the OpenFoundry and Github repositories. There are three professors who come from two distinct colleges to share their learning experiences. Meanwhile, 26 and 27 college students attend this team in the first and second year, respectively. Professors can truly understand the fortes of the individual attendee through the attending performance and promote his/her merits in the future tasks. Further, their industrial practices and related outcomes might disclose that the proposed CCM is feasible and trustable in college environment, especially for the software development activities in the software engineering field. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput. Appl. Eng. Educ. 24:131–143, 2016; View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/cae; DOI 10.1002/cae.21679

An Auto-Tuning PI Control System for an Open-Circuit Low-Speed Wind Tunnel Designed for Greenhouse Technology.

Wind tunnels are a key experimental tool for the analysis of airflow parameters in many fields of application. Despite their great potential impact on agricultural research, few contributions have dealt with the development of automatic control systems for wind tunnels in the field of greenhouse technology. The objective of this paper is to present an automatic control system that provides precision and speed of measurement, as well as efficient data processing in low-speed wind tunnel experiments for greenhouse engineering applications. The system is based on an algorithm that identifies the system model and calculates the optimum PI controller. The validation of the system was performed on a cellulose evaporative cooling pad and on insect-proof screens to assess its response to perturbations. The control system provided an accuracy of <0.06 m·s−1 for airflow speed and <0.50 Pa for pressure drop, thus permitting the reproducibility and standardization of the tests. The proposed control system also incorporates a fully-integrated software unit that manages the tests in terms of airflow speed and pressure drop set points.

Use of Cloud Computing Applications in Reference Services

Cloud computing is a computing platform that allows access the information over internet by using desktop computers, laptops, tablet PCs and smart phones without any software and storage unit. Many organizations use this technology and save time and money, such as libraries. Libraries have been adopting their reference services to the new technology and library services have been moving to the cloud. This paper defines cloud computing, presents the opportunities and challenges, also include how to use cloud based applications in reference services. A survey was applied to identify the use of cloud based Software as a Service (SaaS) models by references librarians who work at university libraries in Ankara. According to results, the degree of usage of this tools generally low.

Impact of Communication Timeouts on Meeting Functional Requirements for IEC 61131–3 Distributed Control Systems

The control software is frequently used in various systems that perform important and responsible tasks in industry. During its development, it is crucial to ensure that the solution is created in a way consistent with assumptions and meets all functional requirements. One of important steps consists of testing particular software units, separated from the rest of system, using the off-line simulator. However, test results can be different in case of a fully-connected system when external factors, such as communication issues, should be also taken into account. In this paper, the authors present a concept of specification and execution of system tests, using the dedicated test definition language, named CPTest+. It has been extended by the additional ASSERT_COM instruction, which performs an assertion that is able to detect problems related to external factors, including communication. To enable automatic and systematic testing, the dedicated metric has been proposed. It takes into account the current link status and archived results to calculate the probability that the test case has failed due to communication problems.

Representing Tactics for Fault Recovery: A Reconfigurable, Modular, and Hierarchical Approach

We show the advantages of modular and hierarchical design in obtaining fault-tolerant software. Modularity enables the identification of faulty software units simplifying key operations, like software removal and replacement. We describe three approaches to repair faulty software based on replication, namely, Passive Replication, N-Version Replication, and Active Replication, based on modular components. We show that the key construct to represent these tactics is the ability to makead hocchanges in software topologies. We consider hierarchical mobility as a useful operation to introduce new software units for replacing faulty ones. For illustration purposes, we useconnecton, a hierarchical, modular, and self-modifying software specification formalism, and its implementation in theDesmosframework.

Conceptual design of a low-cost real-time hardware-in-the-loop simulator for satellite attitude control system

Integration of flight hardware with real-time simulation increases satellite attitude control system (ACS) reliability by providing greater test coverage through end-to-end testing in a realistic test environment. In this paper, a compound hardware and software simulator has been designed for evaluation and testing of the spacecraft ACS, placing emphasis on the real-time hardware-in-loop (RTHIL) architecture. The environment comprises both real-time control and data acquisition applications on a network of ACS hardware, the MATLAB Real-Time Workshop, and a PCI device to join the hardware and software units. Moreover, a graphical 3D simulator has been designed, enabling the designers and researchers to intuitively analyze the quality of spacecraft maneuvers. Finally, an ad hoc attitude-stabilizing control law for magnetic actuated satellites has been proposed and implemented in the proposed environment and the efficiency, correctness, and robustness of this control law have been verified using RTHIL simulation results.

A formal model of service-oriented dynamic object groups

Services are autonomous, self-describing, technology-neutral software units that can be published, discovered, queried, and composed into software applications at runtime. Designing and composing software services to form applications or composite services, require abstractions beyond those found in typical object-oriented programming languages. This paper explores service-oriented abstractions such as service adaptation, discovery, and querying in an object-oriented setting. We develop a formal model of dynamic object-oriented groups which offer services to their environment. These groups fit directly into the object-oriented paradigm in the sense that they can be dynamically created, they have an identity, and they can receive method calls. In contrast to objects, groups are not used for structuring code. A group exports its services through interfaces and relies on objects to implement these services. Objects may join or leave different groups. Groups may dynamically export new interfaces, they support service discovery, and they can be queried at runtime for the interfaces they support. We define an operational semantics and a static type system for this model of dynamic object groups, and show that well-typed programs do not cause method-not-understood errors at runtime.

Research on the Secondary System Design Method of Smart Substation

This paper presents the design of intelligent substation secondary system which is the method to design units of electricity drawing software as a platform to the primary system and the secondary device ICD grid model file for initial design information. Designers carried out a system model configuration of secondary device, performed a virtual terminal connection to generate visual virtual secondary circuit, network interoperability and functional physical wiring diagram which is used to describe the configuration and structure of the intelligent substation secondary system and SCD file and CID is automatically generated into description files. This method provides a visual means of intelligent substation secondary system design and standardization of substation in favor of system integration work, but also conducive to intelligent substation installation, updating expansion and renovation.

TEORETICKÝ PŘÍSTUP K TVORBĚ UŽIVATELSKÉHO ROZHRANÍ SOFTWAROVÝCH SYSTÉMŮ

A graphical user interface (GUI) of any web-based object or classical structural enterprise business software constantly hasn’t lost its user importance. It really stays as a one of very relevant manners for a client communication with any contemporary developed software units (programs, applications, modules and Software Complex Systems). In addition to this mission, every GUI is regarded as a one of three considerable basic software unit layers. GUI units can be inherently positioned inside software units or we can separate them and construct a special GUI system over GUI units. Naturally, we have to define a manner of communication between software units and GUI units. This approach enables, on a system platform, to investigate not only structure and functionality of GUI units, but also relations among them. We can use the system platform on three levels, a theoretical level, a level of GUI modeling and a level of GUI development. Especially the theoretical investigation of the GUI system can bring for analysts and developers-programmers a new knowledge about the GUI units’ behavior and relations. It can equip them by very detailed information about formal tools concerning any GUI system functionality description and help them to improve a process of GUI system construction.

Research on the Flexible Simulation Model Framework Based on Components

—According to the foreign and domestic experiences about the design work and the practical application effects of the simulation model components’ framework, it’s obviously concluded that this design pattern of the components framework has broad development prospects in the future. The components are some independent software units with specified functions. This paper presents some useful analysis and research work on the design of the simulation model framework based on component technology.

An Analysis of Historical Transformation of an IT Giant Based on Sound Strategic Vision

INTRODUCTION Company Background and IT Industry IBM is short for International Business Machines. It is also known as Big Blue. IBM is considered one of the world's biggest Information Technology Company. In the 2009 Fortune 500 list, the company is ranked 14th best company in the world. It also ranks as the 28th best of global companies on the 2009 Forbes Global 400 list. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and offers infrastructure services, hosting services, and consulting services in areas ranging from mainframe computers to nanotechnology. It is difficult to find a company that deals in so many areas. IBM faces intense competition from other major players in the industry such as Microsoft for desktop productivity application, Oracle for database products, and Cisco for cloud computing (IBM at 100, 2010). Even though being the second most profitable company in the world in 1990, IBM began posting considerable losses between 1991 and 1993. IBM lost a staggering $16 billion. Mainframe computers were the cornerstone of IBM till the '90s, which was the source of almost half of IBM's revenues. But at the time other companies such as Compaq and Dell gave priorities to interconnect mainframe, midrange and increasingly mobile personal computers with distributed data sources and applications that led to fewer sales of IBM's mainframe computers. The company was originally founded as the Tabulating Machine Company by Herman Hollerith; it was renamed and incorporated by Thomas J. Watson as IBM when Tabulating Machine Company was merged with International Time Recording Company and the Computing Scale Corporation in 1911. Presently, it is known as International Business Machine Corporation. IBM has operations in more than 170 countries; it has customer /client relationships with more than 219 companies such as 3Com, VMware, NVidia, and the like. IBM develops and manufactures information technology related products and services that help its clients to deliver business values and be more innovative. The company maintains its operations through its five key segments: Global Technology Services (GTS) unit, Global Business Services (GBS) unit, Systems and Technology unit, Software unit and Global Financing unit. Through the Global Technology Services unit, IBM provides critical information technology infrastructure services and business process services that help clients to integrate resources for continuous innovation. The Global Business Services unit provides professional consulting services and application outsourcing services which is intended to deliver business value for its clients. The System and Technology unit provides solutions for business clients that need advanced computing power and storage management. The Software unit provides middleware such as Web Sphere, Tivoli and operating systems that can be used to enhance the capabilities of a business's IT infrastructure. Additionally, the company assists its internal and external clients with financing through its Global Financing unit. IBM encourages people from diverse background to work for the company. It has employed 399,409 employees worldwide and five of its researchers have received Nobel Prizes. IBM reported revenue of $95.757 billion and total asset of $109.0 billion for full-year 2009. Samuel J. Palmisano now serves as the current President and Chief Executive Officer of IBM. The company is trading in New York Stock Exchange under the name of IBM (Bryan, 1990). Motivating Factors Under the leadership of Thomas Watson Jr., IBM became the leading player in the growing field of Information technology. IBM products such as its mainframe computers were universally considered as the best solutions to a variety of problems. The Company became so successful that it became the target of US Government's antitrust suits by the mid 1960s. IBM's domination started to dwindle from the early 1990s. …

A quality cost reduction model for large-scale software development

Understanding quality costs is recognized as a prerequisite for decreasing the variability of the success of software development projects. This paper presents an empirical quality cost reduction (QCR) model to support the decision-making process for additional investment in the early phases of software verification. The main idea of the QCR model is to direct additional investment into software units that have some fault-slip potential in their later verification phases, with the aim of reducing costs and increasing product quality. The fault-slip potential of a software unit within a system is determined by analogy with historical projects. After a preliminary study on a sample of software units, which proves that we can lower quality costs with additional investment into particular verification activities, we examine the effectiveness of the proposed QCR model using real project data. The results show that applying the model produces a positive business case, meaning that the model lowers quality costs and increases quality, resulting in economic benefit. The potential to reduce quality costs is growing significantly with the evolution of software systems and the reuse of their software units. The proposed model is the result of a research project performed at Ericsson.

Development and Testing of a Multimodal Acquisition Platform for Human-Robot Interaction Affective Studies

Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) studies have recently received increasing attention in various fields, from academic communities to engineering firms and the media. Many researchers have been focusing on the development of tools to evaluate the performance of robotic systems and studying how to extend the range of robot interaction modalities and contexts. Because people are emotionally engaged when interacting with computers and robots, researchers have been focusing attention on the study of affective human-robot interaction. This new field of study requires the integration of various approaches typical of different research backgrounds, such as psychology and engineering, to gain more insight into the human-robot affective interaction.In this paper, we report the development of a multimodal acquisition platform called HIPOP (Human Interaction Pervasive Observation Platform). HIPOP is a modular data-gathering platform based on various hardware and software units that can be easily used to create a custom acquisition setup for HRI studies. The platform uses modules for physiological signals, eye gaze, video and audio acquisition to perform an integrated affective and behavioral analysis. It is also possible to include new hardware devices into the platform. The open-source hardware and software revolution has made many high-quality commercial and open-source products freely available for HRI and HCI research. These devices are currently most often used for data acquisition and robot control, and they can be easily included in HIPOP.Technical tests demonstrated the ability of HIPOP to reliably acquire a large set of data in terms of failure management and data synchronization. The platform was able to automatically recover from errors and faults without affecting the entire system, and the misalignment observed in the acquired data was not significant and did not affect the multimodal analysis. HIPOP was also tested in the context of the FACET (FACE Therapy) project, in which a humanoid robot called FACE (Facial Automaton for Conveying Emotions) was used to convey affective stimuli to children with autism. In the FACET project, psychologists without technical skills were able to use HIPOP to collect the data needed for their experiments without dealing with hardware issues, data integration challenges, or synchronization problems. The FACET case study highlighted the real core feature of the HIPOP platform (i.e., multimodal data integration and fusion). This analytical approach allowed psychologists to study both behavioral and psychophysiological reactions to obtain a more complete view of the subjects' state during interaction with the robot.These results indicate that HIPOP could become an innovative tool for HRI affective studies aimed at inferring a more detailed view of a subject's feelings and behavior during interaction with affective and empathic robots.

The Research on Reusable Expression and Rules of the Business Component

Component library as a component of assets classification and management of infrastructure becomes more and more important, in the practice of component quantity increasing, component is updated according to the technology and the field evolution, to search for suitable in numerous artifacts climb hydrophobic component must establish the effective component of said mechanism and the feasible component library management system. Business component is a fusion of business objects and components, is a business object software realization of the autonomy of business concepts and reusable software unit. An ordered set of business component, constitute the basis of the actual business activities. This paper proposes a framework based on component representation method, and put forward the major methods based on the use of business component to adapt to the change of the process, so as to realize the reorganization of business processes.

Dynamic feature modelling for closed-loop machining process control of complex parts

Dynamically changing machining conditions and uncertain manufacturing resource availability are forcing manufacturing enterprises to implement advanced process planning and control systems with an adaptive machining information model in order to increase productivity and ensure product quality. This article proposes a dynamic feature modelling method for closed-loop machining process control of complex parts. A software platform is developed to include feature modelling software units with algorithms to represent and integrate geometric, machining, inspection and monitoring information and a service software unit with algorithms to update dynamic feature information and trigger online inspection. A multi-thread execution approach and a finite state machine method are adopted to support the execution and collaboration of multiple algorithms for dynamic feature modelling. A sharing memory approach is utilised for real-time communication between software units and the computer numerical control (CNC) kernel. The dynamic feature model is highly informative and can support autonomous decision-making and bidirectional information flow. By implementing the proposed dynamic feature modelling, a closed-loop process machining control including the integration of process planning, machining, inspection and monitoring for complex parts can be achieved.

Linear Software Models: Standard Modularity Highlights Residual Coupling

Modularity — the decoupling of software units — is essential for composition of real software systems from ready-made components. But for a long time one lacked a formal theory of modularity. Recently we have been developing Linear Software Models as rigorous theoretical modularity standards based upon plain Linear Algebra. By these models, decoupling means just linear independence, within a modularity matrix. This paper applies Linear Software Models to software systems, obtaining three consequences: (1) besides decoupling, various informal notions of software engineering, such as software modules, cohesion, and single responsibility, have for the first time a well-defined formal counterpart; (2) canonical building blocks like Software Design Patterns strictly obey the Linear Software Models; (3) larger software systems obey bordered Linear Models, allowing precise location and visualization of residual coupling. The latter consequences are demonstrated by case studies of software systems from the literature. The applicability of the Linear Software Models is quantitatively shown to scale well with system size, for the given case studies.