HW/SW partitioning and code generation of embedded control applications on a reconfigurable architecture platform

This paper studies the use of a reconfigurable architecture platform for embedded control applications aimed at improving real time performance. The HW/SW codesign methodology from POLIS is used. It starts from high-level specifications, optimizes an intermediate model of computation (extended finite state machines) and derives both hardware and software, based on performance constraints. We study a particular architecture platform, which consists of a general purpose processor core, augmented with a reconfigurable function unit and data-path to improve run time performance. A new mapping flow and algorithms to partition hardware and software are proposed to generate implementations that best utilize this architecture. Encouraging preliminary results are shown for automotive electronic control examples.