Task: Estimate values for time budget influencing properties
The task Estimate values for time budget influencing properties fills the remaining blanks (or rather unbound variables in symbolic expressions) with concrete values.
Disciplines: Specify time budgets
Relationships
Main Description

The task Estimate values for time budget influencing properties fills the remaining blanks (or rather unbound variables in symbolic expressions) with concrete values. There are at least two different strategies on how to do this:

1.    Analyze the solution, its requirements and time budget influencing properties

2.    Extrapolate values based on rapid prototyping/sneak-peak on lower abstraction levels.

The first strategy analyses the solution and its requirements for time budget properties that are a direct implication of the solution and the requirements at the current abstraction level. Typical techniques for obtaining such properties are formal analysis and simulation. At operational level, the task performs measurements on a physical running system, which a higher abstraction level may transform and apply to its models in the task Annotate time budget influencing properties with known or assigned values of that abstraction level.

The second strategy addresses a problem that occurs in particular at high abstraction levels. The information needed for finding the sought time budget properties is not present at that level, and it is not found among the transformed properties. It is thus not feasible to apply strategy 1. In such cases, it might be necessary to conduct rapid prototyping to quickly obtain a temporary extrapolation of the system models that will be developed in later development phases at lower abstraction levels. The analysis is then performed on these lower-level temporary models in the same way as suggested in strategy 1. The result is then transformed back to the model at the original abstraction level and the temporary models are discarded. Naturally, such an approach will not give 100% accurate results, but will still give a hint on which values are reasonable. In order to make this strategy feasible and efficient, it is important that all steps, including the extrapolation, are automatic.

 

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