Towards Model Synchronization for Consistency Management of Mechatronic Systems

Abstract

The development of a mechatronic system involves different designers having various viewpoints on the overall system to handle its complexity. Consequently, multiple models are created from a variety of domains such as mechanical, electronic, and software engineering. These models use different formalisms, modeling languages, and tools to address specific concerns. The major challenge of this approach is to identify and solve any potential inconsistency between models in order to minimize costs and development time before the verification and validation phases. This paper proposes a new collaborative methodology to maintain consistency between different engineering disciplines at an early stage of the development cycle of mechatronic systems based on Model-Based Engineering (MBE). We apply a model synchronization approach to actively check for model consistency in a continuous way during the multidisciplinary design process. As a novel contribution of this paper, we demonstrate how model transformation techniques can be employed; firstly, to abstract various engineering models in a common formalism based on graph theory and, secondly, to update models with appropriate changes evaluated by a project manager. We also show how to detect the differences automatically, and we discuss where designer decisions are essential.