Towards the definition of a pattern sequence for real-time applications using a model-driven engineering approach

Real-Time (RT) systems exhibit specific characteristics that make them particularly sensitive to architectural decissions. Design patterns help integrating the desired timing behaviour with the rest of the elements of the application architecture. This paper reports a pattern story that shows how a component-based design has been implemented using periodic concurrent tasks with RT requirements. This work has been done in the context of the development of robotic applications using a Model-Driven Software Development (MDSD) approach. In this context the model-to-code transformations are designed taking into account both the system requirements and the patterns that satisfy them. MDSD provides the conceptual technology for implementing a pattern-guided transition from component-based models to object-oriented implementations. The results of applying the described story of patterns are shown by an application that initializes, configures and schedules the execution of platform-specific components.This work has been partially supported by the Spanish CICYT Project EXPLORE (ref. TIN2009-08572), and the Fundación Séneca Regional Project COMPAS-R (ref. 11994/PI/09)