Authors:
Vladimir Estivill-Castro
and
René Hexel
Affiliation:
Griffith University, Australia
Keyword(s):
Model-driven Engineering, Software Modelling, Behaviour Models, Middleware.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Cross-Feeding between Data and Software Engineering
;
Formal Methods
;
Model-Driven Engineering
;
Simulation and Modeling
;
Software Engineering
;
Software Engineering Methods and Techniques
Abstract:
There are many areas where software components must interact witch each other and where middleware provides
the appropriate benefits of robustness, decoupling, and modularisation. However, there is a potential
performance overhead that, for autonomous robotic and embedded systems, may be critical. Proposals for
robotic middleware continue to emerge, but surprisingly, they repeatedly follow the publish-subscriber model.
There are several disadvantages to the push paradigm of the publisher-subscriber approach; in particular, its
implication of a closer coupling where the subscriber must be active and able to keep up with the pace of
events. We propose an alternative pull model, where consumers of messages handle information at their own
time. We show that our proposal aligns with fundamental, time-triggered design principles, and produces simple
module communication that reduces thread management and can enable rapid prototyping, validation, and
formal verification.