LFU:online

Theoretical foundations and principles of the analysis and design of embedded and real-time systems. Practical aspects of embedded system design, mainly software design.

The course has two components:

• Lecture: Communicate principles and practical aspects of embedded systems.
• Exercise: Use paper and pencil to deepen your understanding of analysis and design principles.

Embedded systems are everywhere. Different to well known general purpose computing systems like personal computers or servers these computing systems form the workhorse backbone of our ever more digitalized daily life: Microwave ovens, anti-locking brakes, smart sensors and satellite-based navigation are only select examples. Without the highly specialized input-/output and comutational capabilities of emebedded systems all these applications would be unthinkable. Moreover, embedded processors by far lead the worldwide production of computing elements in numbers.

Syllabus

• Introduction
• Software Development
• Hardware Components
• HW-SW Interface
• Programming Models
• Operating Systems
• Real-time Scheduling
• Scheduling of Aperiodic, Periodic and Mixed Task Sets
• Shared Resources
• Power and Energy
• Architecture Synthesis
• Networked Embedded Systems

20% midterm exam

80% written exam, 120 minutes, open book

Edward A. Lee and Sanjit A. Seshia: Introduction to Embedded Systems, A Cyber-Physical Systems Approach, Second Edition, MIT Press, ISBN 978-0-262-53381-2, 2017.

P. Marwedel: Embedded System Design, Springer, ISBN 978-3-319-56045-8, 2018.

G.C. Buttazzo: Hard Real-Time Computing Systems. Springer Verlag, ISBN 978-1-4614-0676-1, 2011.

M. Wolf: Computers as Components – Principles of Embedded System Design. Morgan Kaufman Publishers, ISBN 978-0-128-05387-4, 2016.

In order to follow this lecture and the adjoining exercises you should have basic prerequisites in computer architecture, computer engineering and know how to program in C. We will cover system architecture both from a software as well as a hardwar perspective, programming models, specialized embedded operating systems, real-time scheduling, architecture synthesis together with the ever-more prominent topic of power-aware design.

We recommend in-depth familiarity with Hennessy/Patterson: Computer Organization and Design as well as preferably Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach or similar literature.