Data processing: software development – installation – and managem – Software program development tool
Reexamination Certificate
1999-07-01
2002-10-15
Morse, Gregory (Department: 2122)
Data processing: software development, installation, and managem
Software program development tool
C717S101000, C717S120000, C717S135000, C707S793000, C707S793000, C703S003000, C703S013000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06467078
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a program development system, a method for developing programs and a storage medium storing programs for development of programs and more particularly to a program development system, a method for developing programs and a storage medium storing programs for development of programs to be suitably used for developing programs that can be incorporated into a real time control system such as various electronic apparatus including a facsimile, copying machine as well as a monitoring/controlling system including power facilities, which has to be controlled in real time.
2. Description of the Related Art:
A real time control system is required to carry out processing of an event which is a stimulus from the outside and inside of the system including reception of various signals, of a state which is a condition held by the system including a standby state to receive signals, of a combination of the above event and state and of a lot of actions to be executed by the system when a specific event occurs in a specified state. As one of approaches for developing programs to be incorporated into such a real time control system, a method using a State Transition Matrix is known. The State Transition Matrix is a two-dimensional matrix wherein an event or state is assigned to a string or a row and both the actions corresponding to a cell which is a point of intersection of an event and a state and the state subsequent to transition taking place after the action are arranged. Though the current real time control system has recently been made large-scale and increased in complexity, this method for developing programs allows basic design of the system by even a less experienced person, resulting in labor saving and acceleration of developing periods.
FIG. 22
is a block diagram showing an example of electrical configurations of a conventional program development system disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. Hei9-325952.
The program development system in this example is approximately composed of a definition matrix inputting section
1
to input information about abstract mechanical definition which defines, by using a hierachically related state transition matrix, an operation of a system including activity that means processing performed continuously during time required for processing in each state and in a current state, a storing section
2
to store the information about the inputted abstract mechanical definition as an abstract mechanical definition matrix, a state hierarchy extracting section
3
used to extract a hierarchical structure of a state from the abstract mechanical definition matrix read from the storing section
2
, a forecast processing time calculating section
4
used to calculate a forecast processing time assigned to its lower state in each state in the abstract mechanical definition matrix and to judge whether or not the calculated result exceeds the forecast processing time of the state to be handled at present, and a warning display section
5
used to check the calculated result and to issue a warning if a total processing time required in the lower state exceeds that required in the upper state.
This configurations allows, prior to actual operations of a system, a verification, by using a combination of fragmentary information about processing time, that an operation is carried out without delay.
In the conventional program development system, the forecast processing time calculating section
4
is used to calculate the forecast processing time assigned to its lower state in each state in the abstract mechanical definition matrix and the warning display section
5
is employed to issue a warning if the total time required for processing in the lower state exceeds that in the upper state being handled at present.
However, the processing time is ideal time based on specifications of a real time control system and no consideration is given to a variety of actually occurring events.
Accordingly, when a program developed on the basis of such an abstract mechanical definition matrix is incorporated into a system, if a malfunction that the system is not actuated to specifications occurs, it is necessary to retrace steps to the extent that even basic design is amended, causing development periods longer. This is one disadvantage of the conventional system.
Another disadvantage of the conventional system is that, the development time is usually restricted within a limit and if such a malfunction as described above occurs at the last stage of the development, retracing steps to the extent that basic design is amended is not allowed and there would be no way but choose rough and temporizing amendments, thus degrading the quality of the system
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In view of the above, it is an object of the present invention to provide a program development system, a method for developing programs and a storage medium storing programs for development of programs by which the reduction in development periods of a program to be incorporated into a real time control system and the improvement of qualities are realized.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a program development system comprising:
a state transition matrix storing section having two or more cells designated by a state taken by a system for which a program is developed and by an event being a stimulus from the outside or inside of the system, and storing a state transition matrix describing contents of processing to be performed by the system or a state subsequent to transition;
a time information storing section to store time information corresponding to each cell in the state transition matrix; and
a simulator to obtain processing time required for a simulation of operations of the system by accumulating events inputted sequentially and time information corresponding to a cell sequentially designated by a state inputted as an initial state and by a state subsequent to transition.
In the foregoing, a preferable mode is one wherein the program development system is provided with an inputting section to detect the designation of any of indication positions each corresponding to two or more events or states constituting the state transition matrix displayed in the display section and to input the positional information about the indication positions into the simulator and wherein the simulator comprises an analysis section to convert positional information inputted by the inputting section to an event code or state code corresponding to the display section, a state storing section to store a state corresponding to the state code or a state subsequent to transition described in each cell, a time accumulating section to accumulate the time information, and a state transition judging section to store a state corresponding to the state code, as the initial state, to the state storing section and to decide a corresponding cell based on an event corresponding to the event code and a state stored in the state storing section and by referring to a state transition matrix read from the state transition matrix storing section and, after reading time information corresponding to the decided cell, to store it to the time accumulating section, and further after reading the state subsequent to transition described in the decided cell, to store it to the state storing section.
Also, a preferable mode is one wherein the program development system is provided with an event inputting section to input the initial state and a test script file describing timing of occurrence of each event described in the state transition matrix or timing in operations of constituting factors of the system to be performed to specifications to the simulator and wherein the simulator comprises an event analysis section to create an event inputting sequence obtained by re-arranging, in order of occurrence time, two or more events in a test script file inputted by the event inputting section, a state storing section to
Matsuba Harumi
Watanabe Masahiko
Das Chameli C.
Morse Gregory
Scully Scott Murphy & Presser
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