Engineering a cyber-physical intersection management – an experience report

Abstract

The engineering of cyber-physical systems (CPS) imposes a huge challenge for today’s software engineering processes. Not only are CPS very closely related to real objects and processes, also their internal structures are more heterogeneous than classical information systems. In this experience report, we account on a prototypical implementation for an intersection management system on the basis of physical models in the form of robotic cars. The steps to implement the working physical prototype are described. Lessons learned during the implementation are presented and observations compared against known software processes. The insights gained are consolidated into the novel Double Twin Peaks model. The latter extends the current software engineering viewpoints, specifically taking CPS considerations into account.