Avionics Display System GPU Vertex Shader Rendering
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional electronic flight instrument systems (EFIS) in aircraft require significant processing power and complex coding, leading to increased developer time and error likelihood due to their proprietary technology, which hinders the benefits of newer processors and adds weight and heat to aircraft systems.
Innovation Solution
An avionics display system utilizing a central processing unit (CPU) coupled with a graphics processing unit (GPU) that offloads rendering tasks to a vertex shader, reducing data transfer and simplifying coding, allowing the use of low-power standard processors and reducing cooling requirements.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If conventional CPU render code is used to generate high-resolution graphics for EFIS displays, then complex display functionality and resolution can be achieved, but processing power requirements increase and coding complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces conventional CPU-based rendering code with a GPU-based rendering pipeline that uses vertex shaders and fragment shaders. This substitution moves the rendering workload from general-purpose CPU code to specialized GPU hardware, dramatically reducing coding complexity while maintaining high-resolution display capabilities. The shader-based approach provides a standardized, hardware-accelerated method for generating complex graphics.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a frame buffer as an intermediary between the GPU rendering pipeline and the display output. This frame buffer serves as a standardized interface that decouples the complex rendering operations from the final display output, simplifying the overall system architecture and reducing coding complexity while preserving high-resolution output capabilities.
2Adaptability or versatility
If more processing power is added to proprietary technology processors to generate complex high-resolution graphics, then display functionality and resolution improve, but developer time increases and error possibility increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent adopts a universal GPU rendering pipeline with vertex shaders and fragment shaders that can handle multiple display functions and resolutions through a single standardized architecture. This multi-functional approach eliminates the need for separate proprietary rendering code for each display function, significantly reducing developer time and the associated error risk while maintaining high display functionality and resolution.
3Productivity
If conventional CPU-based rendering is used, then processing can be performed, but data transfer between CPU and GPU increases and rendering speed decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces CPU-based rendering with GPU-based rendering using vertex shaders and fragment shaders. This substitution eliminates the need for continuous data transfer between CPU and GPU for rendering operations, as the GPU performs all rendering computations locally using its own memory and processing units. This dramatically improves rendering speed while reducing the energy loss associated with data transfer.
Data Source
AI summary
The avionics display system is for displaying a scene in an aircraft cockpit. The avionics display system includes a central processing unit CPU, a graphics processing unit GPU operably coupled to the CPU, and a display. The GPU comprises at least one vertex shader, and the CPU is configured to provide vertex data representing at least one graphics primitive to the at least one vertex shader and to call the at least one vertex shader in order to render the at least one graphics primitive, representing at least a part of the scene, into a frame buffer. The display is operably coupled to the frame buffer and displays the scene. The system architecture of the avionics display system simplifies the coding process for the developer and also speeds up image processing in comparison to conventional systems.