Dr.-Ing. Steffen Köhler

E-mail

Phone

Fax

Visitor's Address

steffen.koehler@tu-dresden.de

+49 (0)351 463 38452

+49 (0)351 463 39995

Chair for Compiler Construction
Helmholtzstrasse 18
3rd floor, Room BAR III67
01069 Dresden
Germany

 

Curriculum Vitae

Steffen Köhler is a research and teaching staff member of the Department of Computer Science at the Technische Universität Dresden. He received his Diploma (Dipl.-Inform.) in Computer Science and his Doctoral degree (Dr.-Ing.) in Computer Engineering in 1992 and 2009 respectively. His research interests include the analysis and optimization of data and instruction streams in embedded processors as well as trace data reconstruction and simulation.

Student Thesis Topics

Make embedded systems resilient to supply chain disruptions

Europe is leading in the field of embedded systems. However, the embedded software running the systems is highly specific with respect to the controller used. Transferring the embedded software from one controller to another or developing the embedded software for two interchangeable controllers in parallel, is a hefty effort as it requires two distinct embedded software projects. To reduce development costs, most embedded systems are designed only for one specific controller (single source). Consequently, the producer of the embedded system is solely reliant on the continuous long-term availability and affordability of the controller used. In order to ensure continuous availability, affordability and to boost the resilience through their complete life-span embedded systems must be designed for multiple controllers, what in turn enables an efficient multi-source software development with no vendor lock-in.

Want to shake up the embedded systems market?

Automatic interface matching for multi-source programming of embedded controllers

The heart of a multi-source system is an intelligent process of matching the software interfaces of different semiconductor manufacturers. As a member of the team, your task is to compare the software development kits (SDKs) from two semiconductor manufacturers with each other and to develop a generalizable matching methodology between the software interfaces. As a result, the application code developed on platform A can be ported unchanged to platform B, while ensuring correct execution with low overhead.

You can find more details in the task description.

Compatibility analysis methodology for multi-source programming of embedded controllers

The basis of a multi-source system is the compatibility of the target systems under consideration. As a member of the team, your job is to develop a fully automated tool that checks the given hardware and software of the target systems for compatibility. The result is to create a first database that shows the compatibility of at least 5 different microcontrollers with each other analyzed and evaluated.

You can find more details in the task description.

Publications

  • 2010

  • Steffen Köhler, Jan Schirok, Rainer G Spallek, "COMMUNICATION EFFICIENCY AND PATTERN OPTIMIZATION IN FPGA ACCELERATED RTL SIMULATION", 2010. [Bibtex & Downloads]