Using DDS middleware in distributed partitioned systems

Communication middleware technologies are slowly being integrated also into critical domains that are also progresively transitioning to partitioned systems. Especially, avionics systems have transitioned from federated architectures to IMA (Integrated Modular Avionics) standard that targets partitioned systems to comply with the requirements of cost, safety, and weight. In the future developments, it is fully considered the integration of middleware to support data communication and application interoperability. As specified in FACE (Future Airborne Capability Environment), middleware will be integrated into mixed criticality systems to ease the development of portable components that can interoperate effectively. Still nowadays, in realtime environments, communication middleware is perceived as a source of unpredictability; and still there are very few contributions that present real applications of the integration of communication middleware into partitioned systems to support distribution. This paper describes the usage of a publish-subscribe middleware (precisely, DDS -Data Distribution Service for real-time systems-) into a fully distributed partitioned system. We explain the design of a reliable communication setting enabled by the middleware, and we exemplify it using a distributed monitoring application for an emulated partitioned system with the goal of obtaining the middleware communication overhead. Implementation results show stable communication times that can be integrated in the resource assignment to partitions.