Product category: Design and Development Software
News Release from: Verum
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 6 August 2004
Analysis questions safety
of automotive software
Verum Consultants has demonstrated the extent to which modern car manufacturers cannot wholly guarantee that software based electronic systems incorporated in modern vehicles are safe and reliable
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Using a new mathematics-based technique called Analytical Software Design (ASD) developed by Verum, it showed that a software-controlled cruise control system would need to undergo more than 800,000 unique test scenarios before software errors that could cause a malfunction were completely removed.
The number of test scenarios required is so high, that it would prove economically impossible to implement using standard software development techniques.
Software driven features have become a key differentiator in the automotive sector.
Controlling information, navigation and entertainment systems, up to 90% of in-car innovations are enabled by software.
In the near future, software is expected to account for up to 10 to 20% of the overall cost of a car.
Yet there are many published accounts of new products reaching the market with unreliable and unpredictable software, with high-profile product recalls damaging both the brand and reputation of leading vehicle manufacturers.
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Dutch programme to focus on automotive software
Verum Consultants is to sponsor research at the Technical University of Eindhoven to develop a rigorous methodology for the production of verifiable embedded software for automotive applications
Quality crisis hits the embedded software industry
Increased reliance on embedded software in electronic products gives rise to three degrees of failure
Seminar fouses on predictable software design
Verum Consultants is sponsoring a seminar on "Predictable software design in business-critical systems" in Amsterdam on 22th September 2004
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"The software complexity in basic vehicle components means it is not possible to prove correctness using existing software development techniques and as a consequence the automotive industry is bringing unverified software products to market".
"Unlike typical software products, car manufacturers do not have 'shrink wrapped' software licence agreements that leave them blameless for all consequences of embedded software failure".
"They must accept liability", said Robert Howe, CEO, Verum.
"Certainly there have been improvements in the quality with which most organisations develop in-car software systems".
"But these improvements have been largely incremental, while the growth in complexity of software systems has been and remains exponential", said Guy Broadfoot, CTO, Verum.
Verum believes that existing software development models, based on testing as the principle means to remove software defects, are flawed.
Because no design verification is possible, software testing involves finding and removing not only implementation defects, but all defects introduced through the development lifecycle, and the inherently nondeterministic nature of complex behavioural software means that it is essentially untestable.
"Every experienced software professional and computer scientist knows that software correctness cannot be established by testing alone".
"It is simply impossible to test all aspects of a complex software system".
"Even if this were not the case, the number of tests required would be so large as to be economically infeasible", said Broadfoot.
"Estimates for the amount of software in a modern vehicle are hard to come by".
"However the typical electronic content in a car, which includes software, is approximately 20%, and forecast to rise over the next decade to 24% of the production cost".
"The value of semiconductors for automotive application will double from today's 9% today to 18% of a car's production cost in the same timeframe", said Malcolm Penn, CEO, Future Horizons.
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