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Safety is the first concern for every phase of production when building commercial or military airplanes. There is no margin of error; precision is critical.
The guidance for the development cycle of any software embedded in airborne equipment are among the most stringent for software development in the world. Every line of code embedded in any airborne system must be tested and verified and must conform to rigorous guidelines of accuracy, consistency, verifiability, and compatibility.
Streamlining Avionics Certification
As a result, the certification processes associated with embedded code production caused tremendous overhead for avionics developers.
Our certification kits drastically reduce the effort necessary to achieve DO-178 certification in safety-critical applications such as cockpit graphics.
They eliminate time-consuming tasks representing hundreds of person-years effort and more than 35 thousand files. System engineers can focus on system behavior and testing, while the kit includes the evidence needed for much lower-level detail.
Available for both conventional and ARINC 661-based systems.
Benefits of
Qualifiable Tools
DO-178C Development ProcessTools for DO-178C/ED-12C certification can be categorized as either development tools that will produce code that will fly in the aircraft or Verification tools that will be used as part of the certification process to verify or check steps but will not produce code that will fly in the aircraft.
DO-178C/ED-12C
DO-178C/ED-12C states that the qualification of a tool is necessary when processes of DO-178C/ED-12C certification are eliminated, reduced, or automated. Tool qualification requires demonstrating a tool’s conformance with DO-178C/ED-12C in the same way that the developer’s end product is to be certified.
Concerning the qualification of software development tools, DO-178C/ED-12C goes further to state that the development processes for such tools should satisfy the same objectives as the software development processes for airborne software. As a result, the software level assigned to the tool should be the same as the level for the airborne software that it produces.
The main advantage of using a qualified tool is that you can automate or reduce the level of effort spent on certification, and these reductions can be achieved only by using “qualifiable” development tools. Using non-qualifiable tools will not reduce the effort of final certification because you will be forced to undertake all of the documentation and testing as if no tool had been used, a process that is both time consuming and costly.
The benefits of VAPS XT-178
& VAPS QCG:
- Rapid prototyping with VAPS XT allows you to easily model graphics and generate executables.
- Iterate HMI designs with ease as you send multiple HMIs and revisions to suppliers
- Reduces the complexity of code generation
- Automation means fewer specialized skills
- Create once and then reuse VAPS XT-178 and VAPS QCG to port across multiple HMIs
DO-330
VAPS XT-178 certification product suite consists of automated tools; such tools eliminate, reduce, or automate a certification process or activity that otherwise would have to be performed by a human.
They are categorized as either: Development tools that produce code that will fly in the aircraft, or verification tools that will be used as part of the verification process to check behavior, but which do not produce code that will fly in the aircraft.
Tools used in this way must be qualified under DO-330 (a supplemental standard dealing specifically with Tool Qualification that was added at the time DO-178C/ED-12C was ratified).
DO-330 introduced Tool Qualification levels (TQL-1 through TQL-5), where TQL-1 corresponds to a DO-178/ED-12 DAL A level, and TQL-5 corresponds to tool qualification for a verification tool.
Tool qualification requires demonstrating a tool’s conformance with DO-178/ED-12 in the same general way that the flight software is to be certified.
A qualified tool permits the user to automate or reduce the level of effort spent on an aspect of the certification process. Such reductions can only be achieved by using “qualifiable” development tools.
Non-qualifiable tools do not reduce the effort of final certification because the user is forced to perform additional tasks to ensure the results of using such a tool are correct. This process is both time-consuming and costly.
The table summarizes what type of credit may be claimed for final certification when using VAPS XT-178 certification product suite.
Software
Tools
VAPS XT-178 & VAPS QCG and compliance with DO-178/ED-12
Both VAPS XT-178 for C++ coded applications and VAPS QCG for C-coded applications from PACE have been developed to conform to DO-178/ED-12 as a development tool and are thus qualifiable.
DO-178/ED-12 stipulates that tools can only be qualified on a given project, and VAPS QCG has been qualified on a number of projects using the VAPS QCG Certification Kit, while VAPS XT-178 was qualified on programs using the VAPS XT-178 Certification kit.
With VAPS XT-178 and VAPS QCG, a user can automate a number of processes and reduce the level of effort spent on certification. Some of our customers gave us feedback that they were able to achieve time savings of up to 70-80% across an entire project. The time savings included factors such as, the number of engineers working on the project, developer experience, and the complexity of the actual application being built.
Turn-key
Solutions
Our technical services can provide you with turn-key solutions for your Certification needs.
Optimizing Graphics Performance
in Embedded Systems
Issues related to graphics performance and optimization could be difficult to pinpoint and resolve, particularly when it involved the collaboration of several components from different vendors. Systems integrators require rapid response and timely fixes for any issues they may face when developing their next generation embedded platforms.
VAPS offers HMI modeling tool and software that integrates effectively with graphic drivers, operating systems, CPUs and many different types of GPUs, including those provided by Intel, S3 Graphics and NVIDIA. Furthermore, PACE offers you turnkey solutions that perform the integration for you.
Advantages of our solutions
- Ease of integration. Integration of the graphics stack is tricky and subject to a myriad of possible problems
- Efficiency. A well-thought out integrated stack uses resources, including CPU, GPU and memory more efficiently than discrete components that are developed and integrated separately.
- Ease of certification. When you let PACE & VAPS perform the integration, there is a lower chance that issues encountered during certification will include a mismatch of requirements between the HMI and drivers.
- Provide the test evidence on your hardware platform.
