Porting a WCET analysis tool to Hitachi H8 and Lego Mindstorms. (aw)

Description: Tools for static worst-case execution time (WCET)
analysis are now starting to get commersially available.
However, the usage of such tools has not really yet reached
academia or any larger parts of industry. This Master Thesis
work aims for porting an existing WCET analysis tool, Bound-T,
to the Hitachi H8 microprocessor. This microprocessor is part
of Lego Mindstorms which is used in many real-time courses
in academia. Thereby, this work will make students (and
industry) aware of the benefits of WCET analysis tools. As a case
study, the work should make WCET analysis part of the Asterix
real-time lab given at Mälardalens University (Mdh) in Västerås.

Time: 5 month (20 points), 1 student, D-level.
Approx start date: 15 April 2004

Contact person at Mdh:
Andreas Ermedahl, [email protected], +4621151716
The Master Thesis work will be mainly be performed at Mdh.

Company: Tidorum (developer of Bound-T). Contact person: Niklas Holsti

Detailed job description:
1. Write a time plan and a job specification. Get a computer
environment at Mdh.
2. Read material on WCET analysis to understand the basic
principles behind static analysis and WCET analysis tools.
3. Set up and run Bound-T for some already supported
microprocessor.
4. Investigate the Asterix OS and the Lego Mindstorm lab.
Investigate the H8 object code format (COFF-H8300) produced
by the gcc compiler.
5. Implement the parts needed to perform WCET analysis on
Hitachi H8 code using Bound-T (the major work).
6. Adapt the Asterix OS lab environment to work with the
Bound-T tool. Integrate WCET analysis in the lab assignment.
7. Write a report.
8. Present the result of the Master Thesis project at Mdh.

Related links:
Short intro to WCET analysis: http://www.idt.mdh.se/~ael01/WCETInfoFolder.pdf (Swedish) http://www.idt.mdh.se/~ael01/WCETInfoFolderEng.pdf (English)
Bound-T: http://www.bound-t.com
Lego Mindstorms: http://www.legomindstorms.com
Lego Mindstorm RT labs: http://www.idt.mdh.se/kurser/ct3200/regular/ht03/html/labs.html
http://www.docs.uu.se/docs/undergrad/instances/spring2002/RTSystemDvpMnp/assignments/legos_assignment.html

Useful courses (no direct demands):
Realtime systems, operating systems, compiler technology,
embedded systems, computer architecture. Good programming skills are beneficial. Most of the programming will be made in Ada.