SyMPLES - A SysML-based Approach for Developing Embedded Systems Software Product Lines

The evolution of hardware platforms has transferred a great amount of functionality to embedded software, thus increasing its complexity. The Software Product Line approach (SPL) has been successfully applied to the development of embedded software both to deal with complexity and to accelerate time to market. This paper contributes to enhance the application of SPL to embedded systems by extending the SysML language to include variability as well as by providing a well-defined SPL development process. The proposed approach, named SysML-based Product Line Approach for Embedded Systems (SyMPLES), includes two SysML extensions, created by means of the UML profiling mechanism both to express variability concepts and to associate SysML blocks to the main classes of functional blocks. An application example was developed for two subsystems of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) family, named Tiriba, which has been produced by the AGX Company in cooperation with the National Institute of Science and Technology for Safety-Critical Embedded Systems (INCT-SEC).