Modeling and early performance estimation for network processor applications

The design of modern embedded systems has to cope with quite challenging requirements in terms of flexibility, performance, and domain space exploration. To this purpose, we present a general methodology joining the principles of Platform Based Design and Model Driven Engineering. The former was especially conceived for embedded systems design, the latter focuses on models as the primary design artifacts. From their combination, we can to introduce a methodology for the design of Network Processor Applications. Starting from models described using the UML notation, we provide an early estimation of performance related parameters and compare in advance possible alternative implementations. In particular, the system behavior is specified by a collection of Sequence Diagrams describing the various usage scenarios, merged into an internal representation calledMessage Sequence Net. To prove the effectiveness of the proposed methodology, a case study on the design of an SCTP client is presented.