[SystemSafety] Separating critical software modules from non-critical software modules

Wed Jul 24 03:01:08 CEST 2013

Our exerience in automotive is that it is effectively impossible for most automotive products to have the kind of separation José speaks of; for example "two separate board groups".  Much of our software (although not SIL4 - often SIL2 equivalent) runs on a single micro in a single device.  Very high integrity product might have 2 independent micros in a single enclosure, with some redundancy of function in other devices in the vehicle (for example, data redundancy). Many of the micros used do not have memory-protection units, and micros may be running only scheduling executives, not full operating systems (in the interests of simplicity, proven field use, and testability).  In this circumstance, it makes the most sense (to me) to develop all of the software in the micro to the highest integrity level required by any component.

I share the concerns raised in to Myriam's post; as a matter of practicality, few developers are feasibly able to swap back and forth between "safety" and "no-safety" development methodologies (to say nothing of the cost and complexity of maintaining two sets of procedures, two sets of training, duplicated QA, the complexity of planning and tracking, and so on.  To answer Myriam's rhetorical question; no, for me it does not make sense that developers can swap back and forward between two different mindsets without mistakes, and no, it does not make much sense that tightly-coupled modules can be part of significantly different lifecycles without adverse effects on interfaces, assumptions, change management and quality requirements.  [This is the same problem faced when incorporating 3rd-party components. There's a reason that such a high proportion of defects are in the interfaces].

The more conservative approach (taking into account possible changes, and mistakes in understanding whether a component or its interface is safety-relevant or not, under given circumstances, is to develop all software components (in tightly-coupled products typical of automotive) to the highest-applicable integrity level.

The benefit you get (in my opinion) is reduced risk due to unexpected interference between modules, reduce risk due to systematic defects, reduced risk due to human-factors effects from the developers, reduced cost due to consistency, and better/faster impact analysis on change.

The flip side is increased cost and effort for all components (and their integration ?) that could otherwise have been considered "non-safety-relevant".  This really is a serious disadvantage of the approach.  Ignacio mentioned that this may be practical only for small teams and "small software".  Does anyone know of any research in this area ?

Best Regards,

Mal.
Mal Watts
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Functional Safety Manager (AE/ENG11-AU)
Robert Bosch (Australia) Pty. Ltd.
Automotive Energy and Body Systems,
Locked Bag 66  - Clayton South, VIC 3169  -  AUSTRALIA
Tel: +61 3 9541-7877            Fax: +61 3 9541-3935
Malcolm.Watts at au.bosch.com      www.bosch.com.au

From: systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de [mailto:systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de] On Behalf Of José Faria
Sent: Tuesday, 23 July 2013 7:58 PM
To: M Mencke
Cc: systemsafety at techfak.uni-bielefeld.de
Subject: Re: [SystemSafety] Separating critical software modules from non-critical software modules

Myriam,

Yes, it is a valid approach. Valid meaning both technically feasible and acceptable by certification authorities. As Gerry said, the fundamental issue is to demonstrate that the lower SIL level part cannot compromise the higher level part.

In the systems I've worked the basic architecture solution was to have 2 separate board groups for the SIL4 and SIL0 software. In such a solution, you can find the guidance for the safety analysis of the communication protocol between the two boards in EN 50159 Annex A.

Best,
José

On Tue, Jul 23, 2013 at 9:21 AM, M Mencke <menckem at gmail.com<mailto:menckem at gmail.com>> wrote:

Dear All,

For any software development project, many software modules are involved, where some are defined as safety critical, others are not. For example, in railway signaling, communications modules are likely to be defined as critical, whereas other modules such as those involving data storage or other basic functions are not. An analysis may be performed with the objective of demonstrating that the safety critical modules are entirely independent from the non critical modules, leading to the conclusion that the application of a programming standard for safety critical software is only required for those modules defined as safety critical (note the phrase "with the objective of demonstrating..."; I would hesitate before drawing the conclusion that the analysis really demonstrates what it is supposed to demonstrate).

In my field the EN 50128 would be applied, however, it could be any standard for safety critical software. Thus, the software is developed applying the standard only to the modules which have been defined as "safety critical". In order to supposedly save time/money, etc., the rest of the modules are developed as non-critical software, either as SIL 0 functions or according to a standard programming standard. My question is whether such an approach is really valid, given that the application of a safety critical standard does not only involve the application of specific language features, it involves an entire development life cycle, and I find it difficult to see how the modules defined as "non-critical" then do not form part of that life cycle. I'm not saying it is not valid, but I would like to know how others see this.

Additionally, if the same programmers are involved in the programming of both critical and non-critical modules, does it really make sense that they only pay attention to the features required for safety critical software when programming the critical modules, and modify their programming style for the rest of the modules (or revert back to their "usual" style)? These questions also depend on what you consider as critical, for example, for a control system with a HMI, you could only consider communication modules critical, however, you need a GUI to display the status of the elements an operator has to control correctly. Some operations performed by the operator may not have the potential to generate a hazard with a high severity level, because there are mitigations in place. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that the software responsible for displaying the information should not be programmed according to a safety critical standard. I am aware that these questions don't have an "easy" answer; any opinions would be appreciated.

Kind Regards,

Myriam.

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