Software-based Memory Protection on OSEK/VDX

Revision with unchanged content. Electronic support functions pose the current major area of innovation in the automotive environment. The number of ECUs has reached an upper boun dary with about 80 ECUs deployed in a well-equipped car. The industry aims at consolidating the number of ECUs by shifting from a federated architec ture to an integrated architecture. The integration of multiple applications on an ECU raises the need for isolation mechanisms that allow for a safe coexistance. The embedded Multi-JVM KESO is a purely software-based ap proach to provide memory protection through the use of the type-safe Java language along with other isolation machanisms. KESO is based on an OSEK/VDX operating system, the defacto standard in the automotive indus try, and compiles Java code to C-Code ahead-of-time, which allows the use of existing compiler and analyzing tools. This work covers the Java interface to the OSEK/VDX system services and a heap management strategy featuring low-latency incremental garbage collection, but also gives a general KESO overview.