JPH076056A - Software inspecting device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To efficiently inspect whether application software is actualized according to specifications without impairing reliability while a process is executed in an ideal state on a system which uses an OS of a real-time processing system. CONSTITUTION:On the system which uses the OS of the real-time processing system, the units of processes are tasks. For the processes execution of a task, the treaty to be satisfied the both of 'preconditions' for the process which should be satisfied in advance and 'postconditions' which should be guaranteed when the process ends under the conditions is prescribed as a precondition. Then messages are transferred to a separately provided inspecting device, process by process, and compared and matched with 'standards of preconditions and postconditions' which are registered there to perform the inspection simultaneously in parallel.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a software inspection device in a system using a real-time processing system OS for measuring and controlling equipment.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in this type of real-time processing system, as a method of confirming that the software has been realized according to specifications, for example, a function for checking the validity of input parameters has been added to the processing software. An error check method is adopted in which when embedding or abnormality is detected, the status is immediately output. With this method, it is necessary to describe in the software a function that is not required for the corresponding original work. This means that extra processing will be added, which not only affects the execution time of the work originally, but also cannot be processed within a fixed time in a system that strongly requires real-time processing. The time-series relationship will change, which will affect the software functions. In other words, depending on the existence of the error check function, not only the execution processing speed,
This raises doubts about whether or not the processing result is a truth value, and the reliability will be impaired.

[0003]

In a measurement or control device that requires the use of a real-time processing OS, a signal of data input each time is received and processed, and each time it is immediately processed. I have to deal with it. Moreover, data may be input continuously, discontinuously, or irregularly. Therefore, in the method of embedding the check function in the processing software program of the original work and making it function as described in the prior art, it takes time for that and the necessary processing timing with the input data. Will be damaged. In other words, there is a problem that the software cannot be operated according to the specifications, the normal processing result can be guaranteed, and the efficient inspection cannot be performed while continuing the real-time processing of the original work.

Therefore, according to the present invention, in a system using a real-time processing system OS, the software for controlling the execution of the intended original work is executed according to the specifications while executing the original work in an ideal state. If it can be confirmed that the progress is being made, the reliability of the result will be guaranteed, so this can be realized by constructing an efficient inspection system without affecting the time of the original work. The purpose is to do.

[0005]

[Means for Solving the Problems] Real-time processing system OS
In a system that requires, the unit of processing is for each task. Therefore, in order to check whether or not the processing software is being realized according to the specifications, it is necessary to check that each of the constituent tasks functions according to the specifications.

In view of this, the present invention employs a method in which the preconditions are defined in advance as promises, the processing is performed, and the results are checked and checked by comparison with the reference conditions to be satisfied, and the process is continued. . In the work of processing a task, "preconditions" that must be met when the task is called and whether the task is finished in the expected state when the processing execution is finished It is specified as a precondition that the two conditions "post-conditions" must be met.
Therefore, according to the present invention, the task is to determine whether the message is the result of being completed while being executed after both the precondition and the postcondition are satisfied, and the message is transferred. According to the “pre-condition criteria” and “post-condition criteria” registered in the inspection device, comparison and collation are performed, and the inspection is performed simultaneously in parallel.

The inspection device has a "standard of preconditions" for preliminarily determining an ID (recognition mark) message and its quality in all the activated tasks.
Also, register the “post-condition criteria” in advance. Further, since the inspection device has a real-time processing function, it is possible to inspect in parallel while comparing and collating the registered contents and the transferred contents.

If the result of the inspection is an error, an interrupt is made, and the result is returned to the main unit for notification. [In order to minimize the influence of the execution time of the device under test, the exchange of all these messages is performed by DMA (Direct Memory Acces).
s) etc., use a high speed data transfer channel. ]

[0009]

The operation of the software inspection device configured as described above will be described. According to the present invention, it is essential to apply a real-time processing system OS such as in the field of measurement equipment and control equipment, and in the case of a system dedicated to the field, the software inspection is conventionally performed. In such a method that incorporates such inspection software, it is not possible to completely remove the software bug (error) and ship the product. It will be huge. The reason for this is that if all possible conditions are set for each conceivable specification, the number of combinations will become enormous and it will have to be verified.

In the present invention, in the system using the real-time processing system OS, the processing unit is each task.
In order to verify that the software is implemented according to specifications, it is necessary to verify that each of the constituent tasks functions according to specifications. That is, for each task to be processed, specify the conditions to be satisfied, while executing the task processing,
Evaluation is performed by comparing or collating the conditions with reference conditions incorporated in a separately provided inspection device.

The task to be processed is executed under the conditions that are considered to be actually used, and the conditions are checked in parallel. In the real-time processing system OS, taking advantage of the characteristic that the unit to be processed is each task, evaluation is made for each unit, judgment of pass / fail is made, software bugs (errors) such as mistakes in software input are detected, If there is a soft bug (error), the device to be inspected is notified, the device is stopped at that point, error processing is performed, and the process is progressively inspected. It can be a complete product that is maintained.

Further, in the configuration of the present invention, the inspection CPU 11 shown in FIG. 2 is not limited to this, and may be another one such as a comparator that can compare and collate. Furthermore, since the hardware as the inspection device 15 is separately provided and the system configuration is such that the inspection can be performed indirectly, the inspected device 14 is not affected by the presence or absence of the inspection, and the situation where the real time property should be maintained. While setting and executing processing, it is possible to inspect at the same time in parallel. To this end, a high-speed data transfer 12 such as DMA and an interrupt controller 13 for error processing are provided.

[0013]

EXAMPLES Examples will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows a basic configuration. Usually real-time processing system O
In the system using S, the task structure is divided into two: a client task (operation unit requesting processing) 1 and a server task (operation unit executing processing) 3. The client task side submits a message 4 to OS2, and if certain conditions are met, OS2
Transfers the execution right to the server task side 3. The precondition 6 when the execution right is transferred and the precondition 7 when the message processing 8 is executed and ends are further compared with the postcondition 7.
The collation is performed, the result is evaluated, and the execution right is returned to the OS2 again. This is repeated. (The precondition is the definition of the argument.)

FIG. 2 shows the exchange of messages between the inspection device 15 and the device under inspection 14. When the server task receives the message and the execution right is transferred, first the task I
The "precondition" associated with the D message content is transferred to the inspection device 15 through the high-speed data transfer channel 12 such as DMA. Therefore, after the process corresponding to the message is executed, the related "post-conditions" are further added together with the task ID.
Similarly, the data is transferred to the inspection device 15. (The postcondition is a group of data to be referred to.) The inspection device 15 uses the real-time processing function to inspect these in parallel, but if the inspection result is an error, interrupt processing
13. Then, the processing corresponding to the error can be performed. If an error occurs, stop the entire operation. After that, the error state will be clarified.

FIG. 3 shows a flow of the system of the present invention. In the inspection device section described so far, ID / messages 16 for all activated tasks, “precondition criteria” 16 and “postcondition criteria” used for evaluation.
16 and are registered in advance. Therefore, the inspections 17 and 18 can be performed while comparing and collating the registered standard and the transferred content.

That is, as shown in the flow of FIG. 3, the message received by the server task 3 includes task I
D, there are preconditions that define the message content and its associated desired state, first of all, D
The data is transferred to the inspection device section through the high-speed data transfer channel 12 such as MA. There, a precondition inspection 17 is carried out according to a precondition criterion 16 that is registered in advance.
Next, in the server task 3, after the process 8 corresponding to the message is executed, the task ID and the post-condition that defines the state that should be at that time are similarly set as D
The data is transferred to the inspection device section through the high-speed data transfer channel 12 such as MA. In the inspection device section, the post-condition inspection 18 is performed according to the post-condition criteria 16. Then, if an error occurs at that time, the interrupt process 13 is performed, the entire processing operation is stopped, and the action corresponding to the error is taken. Thus, the soft bug (error) is detected and the countermeasure is taken, and the correctness can be sequentially and progressively confirmed for each task.

[0017]

The present invention is as described above. Next, its effect will be described. In a system using an OS of a real-time processing system, it is possible to inspect that the applied software is being realized according to the specifications while executing the processing in an ideal state without impairing efficiency and reliability. The object of the present invention was to obtain the effects of the present invention as follows. Since an extra software program is not embedded in the original work, it is possible to perform simultaneous inspection while the original work is being executed, so efficiency is not impaired. Since it is a system in which a separate inspection device is provided and the inspection is performed indirectly, regardless of whether or not the inspection is being performed, the time series is not impaired, so that the software is guaranteed to be realized as expected, The reliability of the output result is also guaranteed.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram showing a basic configuration of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram showing the exchange of messages between the inspection device and the device under inspection of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a conceptual diagram showing a flow of the system of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 client task 2 OS 3 server task 4 message submission 5, 9 task switching 6 precondition 7 postcondition 8 processing 10 CPU to be inspected 11 CPU to be inspected 12 DMA controller 13 Interrupt controller 14 Device to be inspected 15 Inspection device 16 Register task ID, message, precondition criteria, postcondition criteria 17 Precondition inspection 18 Postcondition inspection

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a system using a real-time processing system OS, means for receiving data of a task ID / message content transferred from an inspected device (14) and preconditions (6) related thereto, and then , The device under test (14) executes the process corresponding to the message,
Means for receiving the post-condition (7) data related to the transferred task ID and means (17), () for comparing, collating, and inspecting the received data in parallel at the same time. 18) and a high-speed data transfer channel control unit (12) such as a DMA for minimizing the influence on the execution time of the device under test (14), and an interrupt process when the result of the test results in an error. And an interrupt control section (13) for notifying the device under test (14), and a software inspection device.