Adaptive middleware design for CPS: Considerations on the OS, resource managers, and the network run-time

Timely operation is a key factor in CPS that is challenged by their inherent distributed nature. The variability intro- duced by the network and its unpredictable effects have to be handled. Thus, a vertical understanding of the involved software layers is needed at the levels of the operating sys- tem, the networking software and the middleware. Typi- cally, middleware has been described in a quite independent way from the underlying operating system kernel and the network software. That is not appropriate in a CPS as some degree of control over the resource assignment is expected as a means to ensure timeliness. In this paper, we look into the details of middleware in relation to its sorround- ing software layers to provide a middleware design, namely OMA-Cy, suiting the needs of CPS. We target subsystems where timing deadlines are not hard nor safety critical, but require quality of service guarantees such that resource man- agement techniques are applied both at the individual nodes as well as in the distributed communication.