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Software quality is one of the biggest concerns of the automotive industry. Releasing a product with defects and having a recall can have enormous direct and indirect cost for an automotive OEM. In order to improve software quality is not sufficient to only increase the number of tests. It is extremely important to establish more sophisticated tests that can cover corner cases which are not unveiled during normal operation. Typically, corner cases are very difficult to test as those are often only triggered when the underlying hardware fails or the software gets unexpectedly corrupted. How to test those cases, to make sure that the right SW routines are executed and that the system moves back on time to a safe state? Fault-injection methods are typically used to cover a subset of these tests. However, there are quite some limitations on how effective and cost efficient existing methods can be applied for a more extensive coverage.

Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) requirements and the effort to fulfill them are increasing steadily in automotive applications. This paper demonstrates the usage of virtual prototyping to efficiently investigate the EMC behavior of a gasoline direct injection system. While the system worked functionally as designed, tests indicated that current and especially future client-specific EMC limits could not be met. The goal of this investigation was to identify and eliminate the cause of EMC emissions using a virtual software prototype including the controller ASIC, boost converter, pi filter, injection valves and wire harness. Applying virtual prototyping techniques it was possible to capture the motor control system in a simulation model which reproduced EMC measurements in the frequency ranges of interest.

This paper describes how distributive computing along with statistical subsystem simulation can be applied to produce near production ready embedded vehicle software and calibrations. Coupling distributive computing and statistical simulation was first employed over a decade ago at General Motors to design and analyze propulsion subsystem hardware. Recently this method of simulation has been enhanced extending its capabilities to both test embedded vehicle code as well as develop calibrations. A primary advantage of this simulation technique is its ability to generate data from a statistically significant population of subsystems. The result is the acquisition of an optimal data set enabling the development of a robust design now including both embedded code and calibrations. Additionally it has been shown that there are significant economic advantages in terms of time and cost associated with this type of development when compared to traditional method.

X-by-Wire implementations can lower manufacturing costs by reducing packaging problems and assembly costs. It also offers weight reductions combined with new safety features as well as an opportunity and challenge to couple electronic control and mechanical subsystems via mechatronics. Specialized software tools can expedite the design of X-by-Wire systems and enhance system reliability to steer around expensive recalls or liability problems. A brake-by-wire system will serve as an example for this advanced virtual design process using the iQBus™ design environment and the Saber® Simulator.

An embedded control system is commonly used in the automotive industry to achieve complex and accurate control functionality. An embedded control system consists of three portions including a control object, i.e. the peripheral under control, a micro-controller and control software that is executed on the micro-controller. This paper presents an approach that meets well the challenge in entire embedded control system simulation. Two examples are presented to illustrate how an embedded control system can be simulated as an entity to explore the interaction among the three elements, including the customer code, the micro-controller and the control object of the system. The entire embedded control systems are implemented in Saber, a mixed-signal, mixed-technology simulator.

Automotive vehicles today consist of very complex network of electronic control units (ECU) connected with each other using different network implementations such as Controller Area Network (CAN), FlexRay, etc. There are several ECUs inside a vehicle targeting specific applications such as engine, transmission, body, steering, brakes, infotainment/navigation, etc. comprising on an average more than 50 ECUs executing more than 50 million lines of software code. It is expected to increase exponentially in the next few years. Such complex electric/electronic (E/E) architecture and software calls for a comprehensive, flexible and systematic development and validation environment especially for a system level or vehicle level development. To achieve this goal, we have built a virtual multi-ECU high fidelity cyber-physical multi-rate cosimulation that closely resembles a realistic hardware based automotive embedded system.