Interactive, consistency on a time-triggered real-time control network

Current and emerging safety-critical applications such as the automotive X-by-wire systems require a high degree of reliability. These dependable embedded distributed systems require an ultra-reliable communication system to exchange data between the distributed components. In addition to guaranteeing a high level of reliability, these communication, systems should facilitate the development of fault-tolerant applications. This can be achieved by providing additional communication system services such as interactive consistency. Interactive consistency on a communication system can be defined as a means to ensure that all non-faulty nodes on the communication system receive a consistent value for any message communicated. This paper describes the adoption of an explicit interactive consistency algorithm on a time-triggered broadcast communication system, using a shared communication medium. This is supported by the development of a prototype implementation of the interactive consistency algorithm. This prototype system demonstrates that interactive consistency is successfully achieved in the presence of a number of faults.