Real-time computing fundamentals and programming the high-level user interface

Mechanical engineers are increasingly expected to design systems that include computers as functional elements for control or measurement purposes. Most often, the timing of events in such applications is critical. Therefore, the computer must guarantee response within specific time constraints. A system is said to be real-time if the total correctness of an operation depends not only upon its logical correctness, but also upon the time in which it is performed (Shin and Ramanathan 1994).

In this chapter, we explore several fundamental concepts in computer science and engineering (section 1.1, section 1.2, section 1.3, section 1.4, section 1.5) and connect them to real-time computing in particular (section 1.7, section 1.8). In section 1.9, a motor control problem is proposed that will be used as a means of exploring the subject of real-time computing throughout the rest of the book.

In the lab exercises of each chapter, we will develop the computing components needed for the complete system. This chapter’s lab exercise includes the first steps toward writing a C programming language user interface (UI) for our target system. The basics of C learned in the preceding chapter are extended in section 1.10 for the programming tasks of the lab exercise.