Embedded Controllers for Solving Complex Industry Applications

Abstract

Complex industry automation as well as complex compute nodes like high-end servers require an infrastructure for maintenance and control. An off-the-shelf embedded controller is usually the first choice for such purposes. This approach is challenged for complex applications by the fact that a large amount of distributed industry standard interfaces has to be controlled and realtime responses have to be provided. In our paper we show a concept solving the above challenges. Our solution is based on an embedded PowerPC 440* controller that allows for flexible attachment and control of hundreds of industry standard interfaces like digital I/O, I2C, JTAG, RS232/422 etc. The solution further allows a redundant implementation of controllers for fail save applications. This approach was implemented first in a set of IBM servers and can be generalized to other application areas like compute clusters or industry automation. We describe the challenges in complex applications for system control, show our solutions on a system level and finally describe how a concrete SoC chip is realized in PowerPC* CoreConnect* technology.