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WEBINAR
Watch as we discuss SDV technology, the business impact on consumers, OEMs and watch a demo on one of our flagship solutions for embedded software, C/C++test with DTP’s reporting and analytics dashboard.
The automotive industry has been transforming from internal combustion engines (ICE) to autonomous driving assistance systems (ADAS) and electric vehicles (EV). It has now entered into a new era of software-defined vehicles (SDV).
SDVs bring technological changes to the automotive architecture by introducing zonal gateways, high-speed Ethernet links, Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) technology, and more. The gains include faster processing speeds, large storage capacities, better data security, and scalability. With the new development of a safety- and security-critical SDV platform for the future in automotive comes new challenges in software testing. Challenges that the Parasoft Continuous Quality Testing Platform supports for every testing need include static code analysis, web UI testing, code coverage, unit testing, API testing, service virtualization, and more.
Think about your smartphone. Remember when they were just for calls? Now, they’re powerful computers handling everything from video conferencing to banking. A Software-Defined Vehicle is similar. Its features and capabilities are primarily driven by software, much like how your phone’s functionality has expanded over time. This transformation involves significant architectural changes, moving towards a service-oriented architecture with components like zonal gateways, high-speed Ethernet, and Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN). These advancements lead to faster processing, better data security, and greater scalability.
This shift impacts everyone. For consumers, it means cars that can be updated over the air, potentially unlocking new features or improving existing ones through subscriptions, similar to how you might subscribe to a streaming service. For manufacturers, it simplifies production by allowing a single hardware platform to support various features, which can then be enabled via software. This also paves the way for connected cars that can communicate with each other, infrastructure, and even your phone, enhancing safety and convenience.
Traditionally, cars had many individual Electronic Control Units (ECUs), each handling a specific function. As features like Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) became more common, these ECUs were grouped into domains. The move to SDVs introduces a zonal architecture. Here, ECUs, sensors, and actuators are organized by their location in the vehicle (zones). Zonal gateways act as hubs, relaying data through high-speed Ethernet links. TSN technology ensures reliable, real-time communication, crucial for safety-critical functions. This new architecture also significantly reduces the amount of complex and heavy cabling, leading to cost savings.
With these complex changes, the industry needs standardized approaches. Organizations like the Eclipse Foundation are forming working groups with major players like Mercedes-Benz, Bosch, and Microsoft to create open-source software platforms for SDVs. Standardization will speed up development, improve quality, and enhance scalability. However, this software-centric approach also brings new challenges, particularly in testing. Ensuring the safety, security, and reliability of this complex software is paramount.
Parasoft provides automated software testing solutions that support every phase of the SDV development lifecycle. Whether it’s static code analysis, unit testing, API testing, or service virtualization, Parasoft’s tools are designed to integrate into CI/CD pipelines for continuous testing. For automotive components often developed in C and C++, Parasoft’s C/C++test is particularly relevant. It helps ensure compliance with standards like ISO 26262 and ISO 21434, and coding standards like MISRA C/C++. Other languages like Java, C#, and VB.NET are supported.
Parasoft’s DTP provides a centralized view of quality through customizable dashboards and widgets. Parasoft C/C++test help assess code quality and security by analyzing metrics like maintainability index and cyclomatic complexity. They also aid in achieving compliance with standards like SEI CERT, CWE, and MISRA, providing detailed reports for auditors. The system can drill down into specific violations, offering documentation and examples for remediation. Furthermore, Parasoft C/C++test measures code coverage, highlighting areas of the code that have been executed and those that haven’t, which is vital for identifying gaps in testing. It can also automatically generate unit tests, significantly improving code coverage and creating a regression suite to catch future issues. The tool also performs memory monitoring, identifying potential issues like out-of-bounds reads or freeing invalid pointers.
Beyond C/C++, Parasoft’s SOAtest automates API testing, using AI and machine learning to process service definitions and recorded traffic. This enables continuous functional and load testing, with broad support for over 120 message formats and protocols. SOAtest also integrates with Parasoft Virtualize, allowing teams to create virtual instances of services. This combination streamlines testing by enabling virtual services and API tests to share message formats and produce reusable test assets, making testing more efficient and portable across different environments.
