Towards a flow analysis for embedded system C programs

Reliable program Worst-Case Execution Time (WCET) estimates are a key component when designing and verify-ing real-time systems. One way to derive such estimates is by static WCET analysis methods, relying on mathemat-ical models of the software and hardware involved. This paper describes an approach to static flow analysis for de-riving information on the possible execution paths of C pro-grams. This includes upper bounds for loops, execution de-pendencies between different code parts and safe determi-nation of possible pointer values. The method builds upon abstract interpretation, a classical program analysis tech-nique, which is adopted to calculate flow information and to handle the specific properties of the C programming lan-guage. 1