Applying RMA to improve a high-speed, real time data acquisition system

Abstract

Unlike other real-time systems, data acquisition applications spend most of their time performing synchronous and asynchronous U 0 operations. This fact, that affects tasks' ability to meet deadlines, can be modelled with some extensions to the classic rate momtonic schedulability test. In this paper we ad* this issue by investigating a case study for the application of rate monotonic analysis to data acquisition systems. We describe a technique for modelling tasks that pedonn asynchronous I/o at the end of their executing perid and we also show the logistic and technical problems that can arise when applying the rate monotonic analysis at different stages during the development process of an application. We illustrate our ideas w i t h a real-time data acquisitian system that we have developed, characterized by a very heterogeneous architecture whose technological components have bten pushed to the limits of their performance and capcity.' 1.