Concurrent Computer Corp. is shipping a new simulation tool for its iHawk real-time Linux platforms. The SIMulation Workbench modeling environment is intended to help engineers develop and execute real-time “hardware-in-loop” and “man-in-loop” simulations for applications such as automotive manufacturing, according… to the company.

Concurrent, a vendor of high-performance systems and real-time Linux software aimed primarily at military and aerospace applications, claims that its fully-integrated GUI test platform improves test quality and reduces development costs. The core technology behind SIMulation Workbench was recently used by Airbus to simulate the design of its A400M military transport plane.

Concurrent's SIMulation Workbench
(Click image to enlarge)
SIMulation Workbench was developed in MathWorks's MATLAB/Simulink, and requires Concurrent's RedHawk Linux real-time operating system for the x86 platform. According to the company, the Red Hat-based OS offers “guaranteed performance determinism” due to offloading OS overhead onto a subset of CPUs in the system. This processor shielding technology is a form of asymmetric multiprocessing designed to guarantee sub-millisecond response times on multi-core Opteron and Xeon processors.

iHawk Real-Time Simulation Architecture
(Click image to enlarge)
SIMulation Workbench provides the following key features, says Concurrent:

• Real-time database offering memory-resident access to model parameters and signals
• Scripting language
• Real-time debugger (using Concurrent NightStar toolset)
• Capability to integrate hand-written Fortran, C/C++, or Ada code
  based models
• Extensive I/O support controlling thousands of I/O points
• GUI-based configuration, start, stop, record, and playback of simulation runs

Concurrent's iHawk system

Last year, Concurrent ported RedHawk to SuSE, resulting in a product that Novell markets as “SUSE Linux Enterprise Real-Time” (SLERT). Concurrent's own iHawk systems (depicted at right), running RedHawk Linux, were recently used by Toshiba to simulate toner motion in printer design. Designed for simulation, data acquisition, process control, and other time-critical applications, the PCI-based iHawk systems are equipped with up to eight Xeon or Opteron sockets and up to 64GB of memory.

According to Ken Jackson, Concurrent's VP of special systems, “The industry has a strong need for powerful real-time simulation and testing tools that use COTS and real-time Linux technologies.”

Availability

Concurrent said SIMulation Workbench is “generally available,” but it did not disclose pricing.

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