Technical Support | Alstom: Support intervention on test bench: BOSS

Context

 As a promoter of sustainable mobility, Alstom designs and offers systems, equipment, and services for the transportation sector.

Numerous sensors, actuators, and systems are developed within the Villeurbanne site and its development center specialized in the design and manufacturing of electronic systems.

This ranges from simple wheel sensors to more intelligent sensors such as Doppler effect radars and, in the future, inertial units.

In order to improve and ensure the measurement and management systems for odometers and beacons, the test platform team has developed the BOSS system: Beacon and Odometer Simulation System.

​The BOSS system is based on LabVIEW and LabVIEW FPGA software, a hardware architecture, NI PXI with NI FlexRIO cards.

The Test Platform team must ensure the evolution and maintenance of the system.

AIn this context, ALSTOM has called upon GEMESIS and VIVERIS to assist in the development of new functionalities on LabVIEW FPGA.

In this context, ALSTOM has called upon GEMESIS and VIVERIS to assist in the development of new functionalities on LabVIEW FPGA..

​Thanks to the flexibility of the NI platform, we were able to quickly implement the addition of temporal and amplitude jitter.

VIVERIS will ensure corrective and evolutionary maintenance of the system throughout the year and the continuation of future developments.

Company or involved individuals

  • VIVERIS : Damien LUYA, Alban EYRAUD
  • GEMESIS : Samuel GUESNE
  • ALSTOM : Philippe FOURMOND 

The challenges encountered, solutions provided, and results achieved:

The challenges encountered, solutions provided, and results achieved:

Alstom faced difficulties and had specific needs related to understanding the software environment used to develop the software part of BOSS. The goal was to easily reproduce it, quickly understand new features such as amplitude jitter and temporal jitter for simulating KVB beacon signals, and train a new team member on these issues so that they could quickly grasp the subject matter and progress towards a solution.

At the end of the intervention, a software environment configuration was defined and replicated on a virtual machine. The new product designer quickly became familiar with the subject matter, and a new version of the software part of BOSS, implementing the requested features, was delivered within the expected timeline (see screenshots extracted from the validation reports below, regarding amplitude and temporal jitters validation).

Validation of Amplitude Jitter when deactivated and activated.



Validation of Temporal Jitter when deactivated and activated.


The intervention was initiated in an urgent context as the person initially responsible for this development had completed their assignment before the completion of the solution's development and integration. Blocking issues were identified in the available version.

GEMESIS quickly and effectively communicated with the team and provided technical expertise for diagnostics, which allowed us to meet the requirement before it had a major impact on the development schedule of the product involved in this testing method.

GEMESIS also provided a solution to ensure the long-term viability of the development tool and offered support to the developer taking over the position.

​Philippe FOURMOND • Product Architect TestPlatform  Alstom

Technical Support | Alstom: Support intervention on test bench: BOSS
Samuel GUESNE 16 May 2023
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