Reconfigurable hardware control software using anonymous libraries

This work extends RHCS with the capability to link to additional libraries at runtime just by specifying the libraries' filenames. The software components defined in the libraries are made available to the system by means of prototypes. By retaining the abstract interfaces from RHCS we are now able to dynamically compose a complete control framework at runtime without referring to any implementation of the components as building blocks. Also it is possible to extend and adapt the software at runtime according to the needs of reconfigured hardware, or even switch to emulation mode without recompiling the software. Additional components can be build and loaded independently of the existing runtime. This leads to the possibility to build the control software from a textual database describing the hardwares properties. Another possibility would be to use a graphical editor to compose the components to a running system. The performance overhead due to software indirection is monitored and the correctness of architecture is verified by implementing a functional prototype.