Multi-Application and Large Shared Memory in a Mechatronic System for Massive Computation

Abstract

Recent mechatronic systems, such as inspection machines or 3D imaging apparatuses, acquire and compute massive data for final results. A host in the mechatronic system is commonly composed of multiple hardware devices which interface with high-speed external signals. The host and the devices usually have large memory, so efficient data management is important due to data storage and transfer. In our software structure, each device is managed by respective application and large shared memory (LSM) is allocated in the host for the massive data. The shared memory is accessible from the device applications. Actions of the mechatronic system are driven by combining and broadcasting events through and inter-process communication (IPC). The model with LSM and IPC was applied to a 3D RF imaging system. We expect the proposed model can also be applied to machine vision with big image and engineering simulation with hardware accelerators.