Accelerate the Development of Certified Software for Train Control & Monitoring Systems

International audienceThe rail transportation industry is highly dynamic and driven by the need to meet with mandatory safety criteria. Modern railway transportation systems are ever more sophisticated and rely heavily on embedded systems and communication networks. Train builders and their suppliers have to develop and deliver these increasingly sophisticated embedded systems while meeting increasingly stringent quality, safety and certification constraints. Driven by the EN-50128 standard 'Software For Railway Control And Protection Systems' [3], which proposes needed methods to be used in order to provide software for control systems, train builders have applied processes and adopted tools that help to develop and validate software in compliance with safety constraints. This paper will illustrate how model based system engineering approaches and frameworks provide full business process support to: - Validate the functional requirements of the systems (requirement management); - Design control and safety functions at the train, vehicle and equipment levels (functional design and software architecture); - Design and develop the software applications of electronic controllers;- Integrate, validate and qualify electronic systems in a progressive integration process;- Manage all changes during the lifecycle of the product (change management but also option and variant management); - Demonstrate the compliance with the required safety integrated level, - Train and educate drivers, rail network operators and maintenance technicians.Train Control Engineers are facing increased certification constraints since the new 2011 version of the EN50128 standard. The demonstration of the compliance of the software with the related safety rules and criteria (development process, coding rules, defensive code, unitary tests …) costs more and more.This paper will illustrate a model based system engineering approach for the design and the validation of the Control & Monitoring Systems (successfully used on today’s most advanced train OEMs) and propose a new way for the delivery of certified software that comply with the SSIL2 (Software Safety Integrated Level) defined by the EN-50128 standard