Rapid Evaluation of Instantiations of Embedded Systems Architectures: a Case Study

Modern signal processing and multimedia embedded systems increasingly have heterogeneous system architectures. In these systems, programmable processors provide flexibility to support multiple applications, while dedicated hardware blocks provide high performance for time-critical application tasks. The heterogeneity of these embedded systems and the varying demands of their growing number of target applications greatly complicate the system design. For this reason, the design of these embedded systems should be supported by tools which facilitate efficient design space exploration. As part of the Artemis project, we are developing the Sesame modeling and simulation environment which addresses the design space exploration of heterogeneous embedded systems architectures. Sesame aims at supporting the rapid evaluation of instantiations of embedded systems architectures at multiple levels of abstraction. In this paper, we present an overview of the current status of Sesame by using an illustrative case study of a modified M-JPEG application. Keywords—Media and signal processing, system architecture design, design space exploration, computer architecture modeling and simulation