Modeling distributed systems with reconfigurable logic

Reconfigurable logic is hardware that can change its functionality by downloading a new configuration. A new branch of research-called Reconfigurable Computing-is investigating the application of reconfigurable logic. One main obstruction to the widespread use of reconfigurable logic is the lack of high level modeling techniques. Modeling reconfigurable systems for automation systems needs defined concepts. Since the implementation may be not well defined at the system level, it will be necessary to model the behavior of the reconfigurable part of the system. In this paper we present concepts to model behavior of automation systems and ways to implement it. Our modeling methodology is based on SDL and VHDL. Our implementation concept is based on function blocks.