Event-Based Processor Extensions for Interference-Free ECU Consolidation
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Solution Overview
Problem
The automotive industry faces challenges in consolidating electronic control units (ECUs) into fewer devices while ensuring freedom from interference between aggregated communication channels, as existing solutions either over-design hardware or rely on complex software designs, leading to cost and performance issues.
Innovation Solution
The use of event-based hardware extensions, including hardware event latches, masks, and an interrupt timer for time division multiplexing, allows a single processor core to manage multiple virtual machines or contexts, filtering events to prevent interference by sequentially applying event masks and using wait-for-event instructions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If multiple ECUs are consolidated into a single device with aggregated communication channels, then device complexity and cost are reduced, but freedom from interference between communication channels cannot be guaranteed
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the aggregated communication channels into separate virtual channels through time-division multiplexing. Each virtual channel is assigned to specific ECUs during specific time slots, creating isolated execution contexts that guarantee freedom from interference while sharing the same physical communication hardware.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically switches between different communication channel configurations by changing the time-division multiplexing assignments. The processor can reconfigure which ECUs access which communication channels at different times, providing both consolidation benefits and interference freedom through dynamic resource allocation.
2Reliability
If dedicated hardware interfaces are provided for each ECU to guarantee freedom from interference, then reliability is improved, but device complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent makes a single physical communication interface serve multiple ECUs through time-division multiplexing. The same hardware resources are universally shared among multiple ECUs by allocating different time slots to different ECUs, eliminating the need for dedicated hardware interfaces for each ECU while maintaining interference freedom.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a virtualization layer as an intermediary between the physical communication hardware and the ECUs. This virtual layer manages time-division multiplexing and channel allocation, providing freedom from interference through software-controlled resource management rather than dedicated hardware.
3Device complexity
If a single processor core handles all communication channels for multiple ECUs, then device complexity is reduced, but processing overhead and latency increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements periodic time-division multiplexing where the single processor core cyclically switches between serving different ECUs and their respective communication channels. Each ECU receives dedicated time slots in a repeating cycle, ensuring that communication latency remains bounded and predictable while using only one processor core.
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AI summary
A system, method, and apparatus are provided for handling communications with external communication channel hardware devices by a processor executing event-based programming code to interface a plurality of virtual machines with the external communication channel hardware devices by providing the processor with an event latch for storing hardware events received from the external communication channel hardware devices, with a timer circuit that generates a sequence of timer interrupt signals, and with a masking circuit that masks the hardware events stored in the event latch with an event mask in response to each timer interrupt signal, where each event mask is associated with a different virtual machine running on the processor such that each virtual machine is allowed to communicate only on a masked subset of the hardware events specified by the event mask to ensure freedom from interference between the plurality of virtual machines when communicating with the external communication channel hardware devices.