In today’s cyber physical systems, adaptability concepts can be used to fulfill fail-operational requirements while enabling optimized resource utilization. However, the applicability of such concepts highly depends on the support for the engineering during system development. We propose an approach to cope with the challenges of fail-operational behavior of CPS in which engineers are supported by design concepts for realizing safety, reliability, and adaptability requirements through the use of architectural patterns. The approach allows expressing concepts for fail-operational behavior at the software architecture level. By our approach, the effort for developing adaptive CPS can be kept low by utilizing fail-operational architectural patterns for general and reoccurring safety-relevant mechanisms. This is demonstrated by an application to an automotive case system

To deal with fail-operational (FO) requirements in today's safety-critical networked embedded systems (SCNES), engineers have to resort to concepts such as redundancy, monitoring, and special shutdown procedures. Hardware-based redundancy approaches are not applicable to many embedded systems domains (e.g., automotive systems), because of prohibitive costs. In this scenario, adaptability concepts can be used to fulfill these FO requirements while enabling optimized resource utilization. However, the applicability of such concepts highly depends on the support for the engineering during system development. We propose an approach to cope with the challenges of fail-operational behavior of SCNES in which engineers are supported by design concepts for realizing safety, reliability, and adaptability requirements through the use of architectural patterns. The approach allows expressing FO concepts at the software architecture level. This lowers the effort for developing SCNES by utilizing generic patterns for general and reoccurring mechanisms.