Developing Real-Time Embedded Products

Presenter Name
Kim R. Fowler

Affiliation
Coolstream, LLC, Baltimore, USA

Photograph

Biography
Kim Fowler has 24 years experience in designing, developing, and managing medical, military, and satellite equipment projects.  He wrote the textbook, “Electronic Instrument Design: Architecting for the Life Cycle." He is the Editor-In-Chief for the IEEE Instrumentation & Measurement Magazine and a columnist. He co-founded a medical products company, which sold in 2003. He lectures on real-time embedded systems on the international circuit and at the Embedded Systems Conferences.  Mr. Fowler has published widely in biomedical and engineering journals and proceedings, placed in national design contest, has three patents, two filed, and 13 invention disclosures.

Abstract
Part 1: Introduction and Noise and Shielding
This tutorial will give an introduction to the issues and overall picture in designing real-time embedded systems.

First the tutorial will provide the general principles used in design and development, illustrated with case studies and examples.  Topics include: systems engineering, documentation, human interface, packaging, grounding and shielding, circuit design, power, cooling, software, review and testing, production, procurement, maintenance, and disposal.

After the introduction will be specific discussions into electromagnetic noise and how to design circuits and shielding to avoid it. The topics include: mechanisms of noise coupling, shielding, electrostatic discharge (ESD), general diagnostics, layout of signal traces, cables, and enclosures.

Part 2: Tradeoffs, Scheduling, Mission-Critical and Safety-Critical Systems, and Failures
The second set of lectures gets into specifics of design and development and their tradeoffs.

The lecture will begin by addressing the eternal question that faces most of us: Do we build? Or do we buy? What architecture do we choose? The choice is between custom development and purchasing components or subsystems for the final design. Issues covered are: specifications, time, cost, and resources. Many case studies and examples will be given.

Then the tutorial will present specifics of scheduling and estimating design and development. Hopefully you will find ways you can improve your estimating accuracy.

The tutorial will then cover issues in designing mission-critical and safety-critical systems. It will provide the general processes used in design and development and illustrate them with two case studies: a satellite subsystem and a medical device.

Finally. the tutorial will finish with a discussion about failure. Failure can be the source of useful information. It can advance the state of the art. This portion of the tutorial will present several case studies of failures and one success story. They illustrate what went wrong, what we can do to avoid them, and how we might advance the state of the art.

Target audience
The lectures are for academics wanting to know more about product development for commercial markets, practicing engineers, graduate students, and senior (or final year) university students.