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ESE Magazine Jan/Feb 06
A Standard individual:
Engineering Standard,
Marketing Release or both?
Chris Hills
Integrated
Development
Environments
T
Optimising
Compilers
Debugging &
Performance
Analysis
HIS MONTH I am going back to the root of the column:
Standards. First a quick round up of where MISRA
is at. The MISRA-C group has started on the example
test suite. It is progressing well and we hope to have it
finished for the end of 06. Maybe for ESS06. We are also working
on the Technical Corrigendum and by implication MISRA-C.
I think we suggested we should have MISRA-C:2009.
The MISRA-C++ team is having fun. They have assembled
a team and are sorting out terms of reference in parallel with
gathering source material and there is a lot of source material.
Interestingly they tell me that most of the C++ subsets and
coding standards they have seen have a lot in common. There
is also the C++ coding standard from the Joint Strike Fighter
project in the US called JSF++, which is “secret” and can only
be seen by Security Cleared US Nationals.
The MISRA Autocode is progressing well. The effort is
being well supported with a good number of European OEMs
and Tier 1s along with a smaller involvement from the USA.
The European support is quite wide and not just the German
automotive industry as was feared by some. I did enquire
about first drafts for review and “mid 06” was vaguely suggested
which means it will probably be Christmas 06.
A less well-known MISRA standard is the Software
Readiness for Production guide. Sources in MIRA say this
document will be published in February 2006.
MISRA Safety Analysis - this gives guidance on the management
of functional safety for IEC 61508 lifecycle will be
published mid 2006. So MISRA is doing a lot.
New versions of C?
Having covered the MISRA guides it is time to look at the other
standards. Now things get vague. For some reason the C panels
seem to have veered away from the industry. The industry,
compiler writers and others like MISRA have stopped at C 1990
with the amendments up to 1993/4. A part of the standards
development process is the publication of Technical Reports.
These are exactly what they say and are NOT part of the
Real-Time
Operating
Systems
Hardware
Debug
Probes
All
Royalty
Free!
Standard though often they form the basis of work that does
get into the next version where appropriate. Two that have
come through are the Microsoft C and C++ “Safe” Libraries and
these may have long term consequences for the future of C.
There is also provision for ECMA the European Computer
Manufacturers Association to fast track completed standards
to the final stage of ISO voting. Among those that have come
through are a standard for C# and for C++/CLI (Common
Language Interface). This last actually extends C++ by adding
a couple of dozen key words and changing the way some constructs
work, which appear to be based on Microsoft implementations
and extensions to C++. If these get passed along
with the two libraries in the TRs for C, then it appears to me
as though MS C, C# & C++ will be the standard, and the
Microsoft platform will be the only one that conforms to the
ISO standards. I hope I am misunderstanding this.
Ethics
Finally I should like to bring to your attention an item from an
IEEE newsletter. It said that: Universities no longer assume that
the new engineer will learn ethical practices on the job and are
now offering instruction on the subject. The IEEE is also playing
a role in highlighting ethical practices by promoting students'
awareness of their professional responsibilities as engineers.
Find out more at http://boldfish.ieee.org:80/u/1353/41449924
I wonder if they will cover Standards in their ethics classes
or if they will run correspondence classes for busy engineers
in other parts of the country…
I had a quite a response from last months column!
Thanks to all who emailed me, I intend to revisit the subject
in a future column. I have received the first notifications of
ESS 06. I will be there. Will you? 11 & 12th October at the
NEC Birmingham. Stick it in the diary.
These are not in any way an official statement or committee view, but my own
personal views and those of my company PhaedruS SystemS. www.phaedsys.org
which is where the full version of this column resides under the Technical Papers
button. Any comments, praise or legal documents to chills@phaedsys.org.
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