Light-weight Synchronous Java (SJL): An approach for programming deterministic reactive systems with Java

A key issue in the development of reliable embedded software is the proper handling of reactive control-flow, which typically involves concurrency. Java and its thread concept have only limited provisions for implementing deterministic concurrency. Thus, as has been observed in the past, it is chall...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Computing Vol. 97; no. 3; pp. 281 - 307
Main Authors: Motika, Christian, von Hanxleden, Reinhard
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Vienna Springer Vienna 01.03.2015
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects:
Artificial Intelligence
Case studies
Computation
Computer Appl. in Administrative Data Processing
Computer Communication Networks
Computer programming
Computer Science
Concurrency
Determinism
Embedded computer systems
Embedded systems
Handling
Information Systems Applications (incl.Internet)
Java
Java (programming language)
Preemption
Programming
Race
Real time
Scheduling
Software Engineering
Studies
Synchronous
United States > US
Reactive systems
Java
Synchronous programming
68N19
Deterministic preemption
Light-weight scheduling
MSC 68N15
Deterministic concurrency
ISSN:0010-485X, 1436-5057
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:A key issue in the development of reliable embedded software is the proper handling of reactive control-flow, which typically involves concurrency. Java and its thread concept have only limited provisions for implementing deterministic concurrency. Thus, as has been observed in the past, it is challenging to develop concurrent Java programs without any deadlocks or race conditions. To alleviate this situation, the Light-weight Synchronous Java (SJL) approach presented here adopts the key concepts that have been established in the world of synchronous programming for handling reactive control-flow. Thus SJL not only provides deterministic concurrency, but also different variants of deterministic preemption. Furthermore SJL allows concurrent threads to communicate with Esterel-style signals. As a case study for an embedded system usage, we also report on how the SJL concepts have been ported to the ARM-based Lego Mindstorms NXT system. We evaluated the SJL approach to be efficient and provide experimental results comparing it to Java threads.
Bibliography:SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 14
ObjectType-Article-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 23
ISSN:0010-485X
1436-5057
DOI:10.1007/s00607-014-0416-7