UML2.0 Profiles for Embedded Systems and Systems On a Chip (SOCs)

Recent embedded systems and SOCs design is confronted with the problem of the socalled productivity gap. In order to cope with this problem, authors emphasize on using UML as a system level language, so higher level of abstraction is achieved. However UML in its current form has not yet achieved the maturity necessary to enable its efficient use within current embedded systems and SOCs CAD environments. Consequently a proper tuning of UML to the specificities of such systems has became mandatory. To meet this requirement, many UML profiles have been proposed by both academia and industry. On the other hand enhancements included in UML2.0 has increased UML opportunities to model embedded systems. UML2.0 is qualified to be a component-based which is more suitable for hardware modeling. In this paper we review and compare the most known UML2.0 profiles for embedded systems and SOCs. For each profile, we try to show its defined stereotypes and the corresponding design flow if it exists. We use some objective criteria to highlight the benefits and the pitfalls of each profile.

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