Play-out for Hierarchical Component Architectures

One approach to cope with the growing complexity of today’s embedded systems software, especially in the automotive domain, is component-based software development. For systems based on hierarchical component architectures like AUTOSAR and developed in conformance with process models such as Automotive SPICE, requirements should be specified for the whole system under development and partitioned subsequently onto the particular components across several hierarchy layers. In previous work, we developed a formal requirements engineering (RE) approach based on a recent Live Sequence Chart (LSC) variant, so-called Modal Sequence Diagrams (MSDs). This scenario-based RE approach allows to validate the requirements by means of simulation (i.e., the play-out algorithm originally conceived for LSCs) and to formally verify the requirements for consistency. However, these scenarios are specified on a plain structural basis that does not reflect the typical structure of component architectures, which are arranged in a hierarchical way and encompass ports, interfaces, and directed connectors. In order to tackle this problem, we introduce in this paper a modeling and simulation approach for MSDs based on hierarchical component architectures. By binding these two aspects together, we foster an integrated and iterative RE and component architecture design.