Failure determination system

• US 8,375,243 B1
• Filed: 07/22/2011
• Issued: 02/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 04/24/2002
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: MicroPairing Technologies LLC (Micropairing Technologies Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Eagle Harbor Holdings, L.L.C.
• Inventors: Lutter, Robert Pierce
• Primary Examiner(s): LE, DIEU MINH T
• Application Number:
  US13/188,856
• Time in Patent Office: 571 Days
• Field of Search: 714/1, 714/2, 714/3, 714/10, 714/13, 718/1, 718/100, 718/101, 718/102, 718/103, 718/104, 718/106, 718/107
• US Class Current: 714/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/37 Hardware or software details of the signal processing chain
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/468 Specific access rights for resources, e.g. using capability register
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 for controlling access to devices or network resources

Abstract

A system-failure determination system fo a vehicle, made up of processors linked together that control or monitor the systems of a vehicle, that includes critical and non-critical applications that generate data. Certain data from the critical applications would be useful for the reconstruction of a system failure or for the reconstruction of an accident; and configuring an executive to monitor and store data for later recovery to determine cause.

Claims

1. A vehicle failure determination system comprising:

modular processors linked over a network for operating different vehicle applications that control or monitor associated critical and non-critical vehicle operations;

critical data associated with critical operations, wherein the critical data associated with at least one critical operation is related to at least one of sensor data, brake data, speed data, engine data and GPS data;

an executive configured to operate in at least one of the processors, wherein the executive is configured to;

identify and save into memory the critical data, wherein the critical data identified and stored into memory is saved in a lock-step mode to determine how each process thread was executed in the linked modular processors, and wherein the lock-step mode is determined by at least one of a system clock, a system watchdog timer, a message manager, a critical data manager, a security manager, and a data manager;

operate a task manager to determine at least one of a potential system failure or system failure that has occurred in at least one critical operation and how each process thread saved into the memory in the lock-step mode identifies the failure.

2. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the network is at least one of wireless and wired links.

3. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the different vehicle applications include at least one of safety critical, mission critical and non-critical applications.

4. The failure determination system of claim 3 wherein the safety critical application includes at least one of driver assistance control, vehicle maintenance and accident reconstruction.

5. The failure determination system of claim 3 wherein the mission critical applications include at least one of car braking, car airbag deployment, car sensor monitoring, object detection operations, car audio processing, system diagnostics, GPS data, and driving operations.

6. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the sensor data includes at least one of infrared, radar, and video.

7. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the executive is secure and runs in a real-time operation, wherein the real-time operation pertains to applications in which the computer must respond as rapidly as required by the user or necessitated by the process being controlled.

8. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the task manager is used to reconstruct an accident.

9. The failure determination system of claim 1 wherein the memory is non-volatile.

10. A method of determining a system failure including:

operating different vehicle applications on modular processors linked over a network that control or monitor associated critical and non-critical vehicle operations;

monitoring critical data associated with critical operations, wherein the critical data associated with at least one critical operation is related to at least one of sensor data, brake data, speed data, engine data and GPS data;

operating an executive configured in at least one of the linked processors, wherein the executive is configured to;

identify and save into memory the critical data, wherein the critical data identified and stored into memory is saved in a lock-step mode to determine how each process thread was executed in the linked modular processors, and wherein the lock-step mode is determined by at least one of a system clock, a system watchdog timer, message manager, a critical data manager, a security manager and a data manager;

operate a task manager to determine at least one of a potential system failure or system failure that has occurred in at least one critical operation and how each process thread saved into the memory in the lock-step mode identifies the failure.

11. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the network is one of wireless and wired links.

12. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the different vehicle applications include at least one of safety critical, mission critical and non-critical applications.

13. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the safety critical application includes at least one of driver assistance control, vehicle maintenance, and accident reconstruction.

14. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the sensor data includes at least one of infrared, radar, and video.

15. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the executive is secure and runs in a real-time operation, wherein the real-time operation pertains to applications in which the computer must respond as rapidly as required by the user or necessitated by the process being controlled.

16. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the task manager is used to reconstruct an accident.

17. The failure determination system of claim 10 wherein the memory is non-volatile.