Digital sensor simulation frame work for hardware-in-the-loop testing

Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) simulation is a dynamic testing technique that simulates the Input/output (I/O) behavior of a physical system that interfaces to a control system. HIL testing allows the designer to simulate the real-time behavior and characteristics of the physical system, so as to test the Device Under Test (DUT) which operates on the physical system, without the need for the actual hardware or operational environment. In this paper, the physical system considered is digital sensors and the control system is a QT based application which utilizes the output from these sensors. Thus, models of the sensors of interest will be created with the help of data sheets of the same and will be implemented in the modeling hardware. The proposed HIL simulator could be used for simulating sensors with I2C outputs. Accelerometer sensors-BMA280 and BMC150 is implemented on the hardware of choice and code libraries for the same are created. This provides a cost effective way of testing large systems including various sensors and actuators.