T1.timing

Whether during software development, integration or verification, without the visualization of the real system there is no insight into what is actually happening on the processor. T1.scope enables this insight and puts developers, integrators and testers in the position to be able to verify the timing of their embedded software.

Key benefits include:

• Intuitive visualization of what is actually going on in the software – it has never been easier to track down the cause of timing issues.
• Pure software instrumentation-based approach: no hardware modification or special hardware required
• Minimal overhead of typically only 0.2% to 0.4% CPU-load for tracing all tasks and all interrupts in a typical set-up of an ECU for engine management or chassis control
• Detailed profiling: capturing of CPU-load and all kinds of timing parameters with min/max/average/distribution information
• Constraints: verification of timing requirements
• T1 offers the best insight for any target interface bandwidth:
  • Environments with low bandwidth (e. g. CAN): snapshots of a few hundred milliseconds
  • Environments with high bandwidth (e. g. Ethernet): streaming with real-time visualization and analysis for seconds, minutes, hours and days through add-on product T1.streaming

Definition of timing parameters

Who said instrumentation-based tracing is not flexible and requires software compilation when moving instrumentation points around? Be prepared to see some magic when using T1.flex, the flexible on-target and at-run-time instrumentation. Select any function or even some lines of code and immediately see the corresponding timing parameters such as min/max/average core-execution-time (CET), delta-time (DT) and CPU-load.

Key benefits include:

• On-the-fly instrumentation while the software is executing
• Suitable for functions and code-fragments (providing min/max/average CET, DT, CPU-load and more)
• Suitable also for data-accesses (providing min/max data age, access frequency)

Permanent timing analysis and timing supervision

Who or what takes care of the timing when there is no PC connected to the ECU? T1.cont provides timing analysis on the target with minimal impact on the existing software. What’s more, T1.cont not only measures, it can also continuously supervise the timing – permanently making sure timing requirements are met.

Key benefits include:

• Permanent timing analysis and timing supervision
• Ideal for profiling the software (min/max timing parameters for selected tasks, runnables, data ages)
• Results can optionally be stored in non-volatile memory – allowing profiling over weeks with billions of executions

Test timing-related aspects of future versions of your software today! T1.delay makes it possible by providing scalable delay routines which consume a specified amount of net-run-time. These can be placed in the schedule at places where future functionality is to be added. Other use-cases include determination of “head-room”: an empirical way to find out how much more CET can be added before the systems is overloaded.

Around the world every night hundreds of HILs execute automated timing tests using T1. They collect timing parameters such as CPU-load, core execution time (CET), response time (RT) etc.; see also figure “Definition of timing parameters” above. At the same time they ensure no timing constraints are violated — a basis for safe and reliable embedded systems.
T1.api provides a REST API for test automation and thus is easily controllable from virtually any programming language. In test automation mode, T1 runs as a server in the background listening to commands on a configurable http port. It also provides a website with interactive documentation meaning that with a target board connected, T1.api commands can simply be sent from within the documentation. Getting a good grip on an automation interface has never been as easier.

See how timing parameters evolve over the time. Compare different versions of your software with a focus on the timing aspects. T1.diff provides numerical comparison as well as diagrams showing selected timing parameters for different versions of your software. It also allows you to configure thresholds for deviations from previous versions. T1.diff e.g. can highlight any parameter which increases or decreases by more than x% compared to the previous release eliminating the possibility for unwanted changes to slip through.

A minor but very handy feature allowing reading from and writing to arbitrary memory. The intuitive symbol browser makes navigating to the data of interest much easier.