Every embedded real-time system is inevitably timerestricted. Therefore, worst-case execution times (WCETs) have to be known. The static timing analysis of embedded software promises the calculation of safe upper time bounds. We present the results of a case study which reveal the special challenges of this methodology in the automotive domain. For most of the encountered problems we describe our solutions or propose possible methods for a solution.

Software is an important part of automotive product development, and it is commonly known that software quality assurance consumes considerable effort in safety-critical embedded software development. Increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of this effort thus becomes more and more important. Identifying problematic code areas which are most likely to fail and therefore require most of the quality assurance attention is required. This article presents an exploratory study investigating whether the faults detected by static analysis tools combined with code complexity metrics can be used as software quality indicators and to build pre-release fault prediction models. The combination of code complexity metrics with static analysis fault density was used to predict the pre-release fault density with an accuracy of 78.3%. This combination was also used to separate high and low quality components with a classification accuracy of 79%.

The increase in software functions and software complexity of automotive applications requires appropriate software architectures. A promising approach is the component architecture which also stands in the centre of the automotive standardisation project AUTOSAR [2]. As every embedded real-time system inevitably has upper time bounds, we present an integrated method of timing estimation for highly flexible and variant applications based on a prototype component architecture. Therefore, we especially develop methods for parameterised timing estimation which depend on the grade of complexity, variability and necessary exactness. The feasibility of the introduced concept is shown in the prototype architecture and a prototype application.

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