Embedded.com - Software synthesis for embedded systems

Embedded.com - Software synthesis for embedded systems: "Software synthesis for embedded systems
By Bob Zeidman
Embedded Systems Programming
(01/20/05, 14:32:00 H EST)


Synthetic operating systems might mean never having to port software again. Software can be automatically generated-synthesized-to meet the demands of a changing system.

For decades hardware design began with a schematic-a graphical representation of the hardware that could be turned into components and wires, a printed circuit-board layout, or a semiconductor chip. At first the process was done manually with hand-drawn schematics that were translated to layouts by highly trained draftsmen. The process was later automated with schematic-capture tools, automatic netlist generation, and physical-layout programs, though the concepts remained the same. Eventually, chip designs grew very large and a new design method was needed. Thus was hardware synthesis born.

Hardware-description languages (HDLs) similar to programming languages were developed and now all chip designs begin as lines of code. The code is written at a high level that hides much of the complexity from the designer, and then is synthesized into a low-level description for layout and analysis. I'm proposing that the time is right for a similar evolution in embedded systems software design.

Synthesis is the process of taking a high-level description and turning it into a lower-level description that, in the case of software, can be compiled directly. By working at a higher level, the user is kept uninvolved with implementation details. Synthesis employs automatic code generation (ACG) but there's more to it than that. Some popular and useful code-generation tools already exist. Microsoft Visual Basic and HTML-layout tools like Macromedia's Dreamweaver allow users to create graphics and buttons with little or no knowledge of the underlying code. These kinds of ACG tools are indispensable for creating a user interfa"