4.5.2 Model‐based automatic generation and selection of safe architectures

Abstract

Modern avionics systems are characterized by their increasing complexity and demanding safety requirements. The fulfillment of safety constraints is often only tested after the design of the systems, which leads to costly and time‐consuming design iterations. The complexity of avionics systems is still managed through a number of predominantly manual, paper‐based procedures. Relying on systems engineering and operations research methods and tools, a methodology was developed to support the design process. This methodology should reduce the design duration through an earlier consideration of safety constraints. It should also contribute to the overall improvement of the design, through an automated approach of its complexity. A generic meta‐model is created, suitable for various kinds of avionics systems, which contains requirements ‐ including safety requirements ‐ and design goals. From these formal requirements and goals an algorithm creates corresponding mathematical constraints and optimization criteria. All valid architectures fulfilling these constraints are automatically generated. Sets of efficient and diverse architectures among the generated solutions are selected by an algorithm.

A Data- and Knowledge-Driven Methodology for Generating Eco-Industrial Park Architectures

“…This number is usually associated with the number of alternatives a decision-makers can properly take into account. This result has been confirmed in the literature on cognitive psychology and conceptual design and systems architecting literature (Condat et al, 2012;Miller, 1956). These architectures have been selected based upon the likelihood that they can be realized.…”

“…In case the number of eco-industrial park architectures after this step is still larger than 10, architectures that are similar to other architectures are eliminated. The objective is to provide the decision-maker with a variety of "good" solutions (Condat et al, 2012). Performing these steps will lead to the desired output of 5-10 eco-industrial park architectures.…”

A model‐based method for the synthesis and optimization of systems architectures

“…Techniques based on matrixes (Bryant et al 2005;Holey 2010;Condat 2011) are also able generate design alternatives for system architectures. In these approaches, the problem and its solutions are described using matrixes (function-to-component, function-to-function, component-to-component…) that permit to represent one-to-one relations between the objects of the problem.…”