KR20180067134A - Apparatus and method for monitoring Microcontroller Unit - Google Patents

Abstract

According to the present invention, an apparatus for monitoring a microcontroller unit comprises: a driving semiconductor including a first communication unit, a first counting unit, and a comparison unit; and a microcontroller unit including a second communication unit, a second counting unit, and a reset unit. The second counting unit counts an instruction to be transmitted when the second communication unit transmits the instruction to the first communication unit. The first counting unit receives an instruction from the second communication unit and counts the received instruction. The comparison unit may be configured to compare the number of times counted by the second counting unit or a reference number of times with the number of times counted by the first counting unit to output a reset instruction to the reset unit if the difference is higher than or equal to a threshold. Therefore, according to the present invention, whether a microcontroller unit operates normally can be monitored by a novel method. Accordingly, components in accordance with the present invention can be added to an existing watchdog to improve function safety diagnosis coverage.

Description

[0001] Apparatus and method for monitoring microcontroller unit [

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an operation monitoring of a micro-controller unit (MCU), and more particularly, to an apparatus and a method for monitoring whether a micro-controller unit operates normally.

Recently, automobiles use many electronic control devices with microcontroller unit, and their use is increasing. The in-vehicle microcontroller unit plays an important role in controlling the functions of each device of the vehicle.

However, there are cases in which the microcontroller unit occasionally malfunctions or malfunctions due to abnormal signal generation. A malfunction of the microcontroller unit can seriously affect the safety of the rider, so it must always operate normally. Therefore, it is necessary to periodically check whether the microcontroller unit is operating normally.

Generally, a watchdog is used to monitor the abnormality of the microcontroller unit. For example, there is a period watchdog to periodically check the trigger signal, a window watchdog with a time window of the trigger signal, and a Q & A watchdog to answer a given question.

On the other hand, various controllers implemented in a vehicle, such as a driving semiconductor such as a transmission, already include a number of functions such as safety protection, diagnosis, and the like. However, in the technical field of automobile electronic control devices, since the stability of the vehicle has recently been emphasized, additional monitoring techniques for increasing the safety of vehicles other than the conventional watchdog are continuously being developed.

Disclosure of Invention Technical Problem [8] Accordingly, the present invention has been made keeping in mind the above problems occurring in the prior art, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a novel monitoring apparatus and method for monitoring normal operation of a microcontroller unit in a driving semiconductor such as a transmission, There is a purpose.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus comprising: a driving semiconductor including a first communication unit, a first counting unit, and a comparison unit; And a second communication unit, a second counting unit, and a reset unit, wherein the second counting unit counts the instruction to be transmitted when the second communication unit transmits a command to the first communication unit, The counting unit receives an instruction from the second communication unit and counts the received instruction, and the comparing unit compares the number of times counted in the second counting unit or the number of times of counting in the second counting unit with the counted number in the first counting unit, And to output a reset command to the reset unit when the reset unit has the reset signal.

In this case, the driving semiconductor further includes a monitoring control unit including a comparison control module, and the second counting unit outputs a comparison instruction when the counted number of times reaches the reference number of times, and the comparison control module receives The control unit may control the comparing unit to compare the number of times counted in the second counting unit or the number of times of counting in the first counting unit.

Also, the monitoring control unit may further include a read and write control module, wherein the first counting unit includes a read counting unit and a write counting unit, and the read / write control module classifies the received command as a read command or a write command , The read command may be counted by the read counting unit, and the write command may be counted by the write counting unit.

The read and write flag reading module reads the read and write flags of the received command and outputs the received command as a read command or a write command Can be classified.

The read and write control module may include a mode filtering module and may filter the read and write flag to count only instructions in any one of a plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor and output the result to the read and write flag read module.

In addition, the plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor may include a drive preparation mode, a drive mode, and a diagnostic mode, and the mode filtering module may filter the read and write flag reading module to count only the command of the drive mode .

The driving semiconductor further includes a log storage unit, and the monitoring control unit may store the received command in the log storage unit when the received command has an error.

Further, the driving semiconductor may be a transmission driving semiconductor.

Meanwhile, a microcontroller unit monitoring method according to the present invention is a microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus including a microcontroller unit and a driving semiconductor, the method comprising: transmitting a command signal to the driving semiconductor from the microcontroller unit and counting the command signal ; Receiving the command signal from the driving semiconductor and counting the received command signal; Comparing the counted number of times or the reference count of the transmitted command signal with the counted number of times of the received command signal; And resetting the microcontroller unit based on a comparison result of the comparing step.

The microcomputer unit outputs a comparison command when the counted number of times of the transmitted instruction reaches the reference number of times, and the counted number of times or the reference number of the transmitted command signal in the driving semiconductor, And to compare the counted number of times.

Also, the received command signal is classified into a read command or a write command, and the read command and the write command can be counted, respectively.

The read command and the write command may be classified by reading the read and write flags of the received command signal.

In addition, the received command signal may be filtered to count only a command of any one of a plurality of modes of the driving semiconductor.

In addition, the plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor may include a drive preparation mode, a drive mode, and a diagnostic mode, and the received command signal may be filtered to count only the commands of the drive mode.

The method may further include storing the received command if there is an error in the received command signal.

Further, the driving semiconductor may be a transmission driving semiconductor.

According to the present invention, it is possible to monitor whether the microcontroller unit operates normally or not by a novel method. Accordingly, the functional safety diagnosis coverage can be improved by adding the configuration according to the present invention to the existing watchdog.

1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. It should be understood, however, that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments, but may be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will be thorough and complete, Is provided to fully inform the user. In addition, for convenience of explanation, components may be exaggerated or reduced in size.

However, it should be understood that the following embodiments are provided so that those skilled in the art will be able to fully understand the present invention, and that various modifications may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention. It is not.

1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

A microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a microcontroller unit 100 and a driving semiconductor 200.

The drive semiconductor 200 includes a first communication unit 210, a control unit 220, a log storage unit 230, a first counting unit 240, and a comparison unit 250. The driving semiconductor 200 is connected to the microcontroller unit 100. In this case, the driving semiconductor 200 may be, for example, a solenoid driving IC of the transmission controller. Or the driving semiconductor 200 may be a driving IC in another vehicle.

The microcontroller unit 100 includes a second communication unit 110, a second counting unit 120, and a reset unit 140 corresponding to the microcontroller unit monitoring related portion of the driving semiconductor 200.

The first communication unit 210 may receive a drive command from the microcontroller unit 100, for example, a current change of the transmission solenoid. In this case, the first communication unit 210 may be implemented by, for example, SPI (Serial Peripheral Interface) communication. In general, the SPI communication is implemented as a master and a slave. The master supplies a clock and provides an enable signal (a chip select signal) to the slave. When the enable signal is applied, Communication between slaves proceeds. A master can be connected to multiple slaves, and the master is responsible for the overall communication and slave selection.

In this embodiment, the role of the master is performed by the second communication unit 110 of the microprocessor unit 100, and the first communication unit 210 of the driving semiconductor 200 performs the role of a slave.

The supervisory control unit 220 is connected between the first communication unit 210 and the second communication unit 110 through a shared communication line 215 that shares a communication line between the first communication unit 210 and the second communication unit 110, Can be monitored.

Hereinafter, detailed operation of the monitoring control unit 220 will be described with reference to FIG.

2, the monitoring control unit 220 may include a receiving unit 222, a read / write control module 225, and a comparison control module 229.

The receiving unit 222 receives the communication between the first communication unit 210 and the second communication unit 110 via the shared communication line 215 and outputs the communication to the read / write control module 225 and the comparison control module 229 do. If there is an error in the communication, for example, a communication error is confirmed through a CRC check or the like, the receiving unit 222 can store the error in the log storage unit 230.

On the other hand, the read / write control module 225 includes a mode filtering module 226 and a read / write flag read module 227. The mode filtering module 226 may read the mode of the output communication and filter it to count only read / write data of a specific mode (e.g., drive mode).

For example, the driving semiconductor 200 can be driven in three modes. For example, the three modes are a drive preparation mode, a drive mode and a diagnostic mode. If the communication means is SPI communication, for example, 30 bits of data can be read and written. In this case, for example, the drive preparation mode reads and writes the command from address 0x00 to address 0x10, the drive mode reads address 0x11 to address 0x27, and the diagnostic mode reads data from address 0x28 to address 0x30.

At this time, the mode filtering module 226 may filter the read / write data in the drive mode so as to count and output the read / write flag to the read / write flag reading module 227.

The read / write flag reading module 227 reads a flag indicating read / write in the communication packet of the SPI and classifies the received command into the write counting section 242 or the read counting section 244 based on the flag Can be output. For example, the read / write flag reading module 227 outputs the read / write flag to the read counting unit 244 of the first counting unit 240 in the case of a read command in accordance with the read / write flag value in the communication packet, To the write counting unit 242 of the first counting unit 240.

Thereafter, the write counting section 242 counts the number of write commands, and the read counting section 244 counts the number of read commands. This counting number is output to the comparing unit 250. [

1, when the second communication unit 110 of the microcontroller unit 100 transmits a command to the first communication unit 210, the second counting unit 120 outputs a flag of a command to be transmitted The write counting module 122 in the case of a write command and the read counting module 124 in the case of a read command.

In this case, when the write counting module 122 and the read counting module 124 reach the predetermined number of times of the write or read command count, the write counting module 122 and the read counting module 124 count the number of times that the second communication unit 110 And outputs the comparison command signal to the driving semiconductor 200. [

The comparison control module 229 of the driving semiconductor 200 receives the comparison command signal through the receiving part 222 and outputs the comparison control command to the comparing part 250. [ In this case, the comparison control command may include a read / write designation instruction as to whether to compare the number of read commands of the microcontroller unit 100 or the number of write commands.

In this case, the comparison unit 250 compares the number of times counted by the read counting unit 244 or the write counting unit 242 with the number of times of reading or writing commands counted by the microcontroller unit or the above-described reference count ≪ / RTI >

In this case, when the error between the counted number by the read counting unit 244 or the write counting unit 242 and the error count from the microcontroller unit 100 is equal to or larger than the threshold value, the reset unit 130 of the microcontroller unit 100, A reset command can be transmitted to the memory device. At this time, the threshold value may be set to 0 so that a reset command is transmitted if they are not the same.

Alternatively, the number of counts counted by the read counting section 244 or the write counting section 242 may be compared with a predetermined reference count, and the reset command may be transmitted when the error is equal to or greater than the threshold value. At this time, the threshold value may be set to 0 so that a reset command is transmitted if they are not the same.

Therefore, according to the present invention, it is possible to compare the number of times of transmission and reception of communication commands and monitor whether the microcontroller unit operates normally based on the validity of the communication command. Accordingly, the functional safety diagnosis coverage can be improved by adding the configuration according to the present invention to the existing watchdog.

Hereinafter, a microcontroller unit monitoring method according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to FIG.

After the microcontroller unit 100 first starts the monitoring mode (S310), the microcontroller unit 100 counts the command signal transmission and transmits a signal to the driving semiconductor 200. [ At this time, the read command can be counted as a read command and the write command can be counted separately as a write command.

At this time, the driving semiconductor 200 can determine whether the received signal is erroneous or not (S330). In this case, for example, whether or not an error has occurred can be confirmed through an error checking method such as a CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check). In this case, if there is an error, the error signal may be stored in the log storage unit 230 (S340).

On the other hand, if there is no error, the process of counting the received signal can be performed through the mode filtering (S350).

More specifically, for example, the driving semiconductor 200 may have three modes. The three modes may be a drive preparation mode, a drive mode, and a diagnostic mode.

In this case, for example, the mode filtering module 226 may filter to count only commands in the driving mode.

The read command is classified by the read counting unit 244, the write command is output by the write counting unit 242, do. Thereafter, the read counting unit 244 and the write counting unit 242 count the read command and the write command.

On the other hand, the microcontroller unit 100 confirms whether the count value of the read command or the write command has reached the reference count (S360). When the reference number of times (set value) is reached, the microcontroller unit 100 outputs a comparison command signal to the driving semiconductor 200 (S370).

In this case, when the write counting module 122 and the read counting module 124 have reached the predetermined number of times, the write counting module 122 and the read counting module 124 may notify the second communication unit 110 And outputs a comparison command signal to the driving semiconductor 200 through the control signal line.

The comparison control module 229 of the driving semiconductor 200 receives the comparison command signal through the receiving part 222 and outputs the comparison control command to the comparing part 250. [ In this case, the comparison control command may include a read / write designation instruction as to whether to compare the number of read commands of the microcontroller unit 100 or the number of write commands.

Meanwhile, the comparison control module 229 transfers the comparison command signal to the comparison unit 250 to compare the read or write command values (S380).

In this case, the comparison unit 250 compares the number of read or write commands specified by the comparison control module with the number of times counted by the read counting unit 244 or the write counting unit 242 to determine whether there is a difference in the number of times.

Finally, if the result of the comparison operation is the same or has an error within the threshold value, the operation of the microcontroller unit 100 is normal, and the process is repeated again from the step S320 to the step S370.

However, if the number of counts counted by the read counting unit 244 or the write counting unit 242 is not equal to the number of counts transmitted from the microcontroller unit 100, A reset command can be transmitted to the controller 130.

Alternatively, the number of counts counted by the read counting unit 244 or the write counting unit 242 may be compared with a predetermined number of times, and a reset command may be transmitted when the count is not equal or has an error of a threshold value or more.

Upon receiving the reset signal from the comparator 250, the reset unit 130 can reset the microcontroller unit 100 based on the reset signal. In this case, the microcontroller unit 100 may receive a reset signal and generate an interrupt to perform a reset operation, but may be configured to perform a reset in response to the reset signal.

Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail by way of example of a transmission drive semiconductor. However, the present invention is not limited thereto.

An example of the comparison described above will be described by exemplifying the case where the SPI communicable address area of the transmission drive semiconductor is address 0x00 to 0x30 and the drive semiconductor has the drive preparation mode, drive mode and diagnostic mode. In this case, in the drive preparation mode, the setting is made for the initial drive by using addresses 0x00 to 0x10. In the drive mode, drive commands are transmitted and received using addresses 0x11 to 0x27. In the diagnostic mode, It is assumed that the condition can be diagnosed.

In this case, the mode filtering module 226 filters the driving mode, that is, the case where the command is transmitted / received through the address 0x11 to 0x27.

At this time, the microcontroller unit 100 can send the comparison command signal to the driving semiconductor 200 after performing the writing command of the driving mode by SPI communication to the driving semiconductor for the reference number of times, for example, 10 times.

In this case, if the drive semiconductor 200 receives the write command at address 0x11 through 0x27 of address 10 and address 0x00 through address 0x10 due to some error, The write counting unit 242 of the mode filtering module 226 may count the write command received only by the mode filtering module 226 nine times.

At this time, the comparison unit 250 can output a reset signal to the reset unit 130 because it is not the same as the number of counts and the reference count of the write counting unit 242, for example.

For example, the offset current measurement of the transmission solenoid must be executed in the drive ready mode. When an instruction is received through address 0x11 ~ 0x27 due to some error, a count number difference occurs, A signal can be output.

As another example, the change of the transmission solenoid current amount should be executed in the drive mode. When the error is received through the address 0x00 ~ 0x10 due to some error, the command is not counted and a difference of the counting number occurs, have.

Therefore, according to the present invention, it is possible to monitor whether the microcontroller unit is operating normally while confirming the validity of the communication. Accordingly, the functional safety diagnosis coverage can be improved by adding the configuration according to the present invention to the existing watchdog.

While the present invention has been described in connection with what is presently considered to be practical exemplary embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments, but, on the contrary, It is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments, but, on the contrary, is intended to cover various modifications and similarities. Accordingly, the scope of the present invention should be construed as being limited to the embodiments described, and it is intended that the scope of the present invention encompasses not only the following claims, but also equivalents thereto.

100: Microcontroller unit
110: second communication section
120: second counting section
130:
200: Driving semiconductor
210: first communication section
220:
230: log storage unit
240: first counting unit
250:

Claims (16)

A driving semiconductor including a first communication section, a first counting section, and a comparing section; And
A second communication unit, a second counting unit, and a reset unit as a microcontroller unit,
The second counting unit counts a command to be transmitted when the second communication unit transmits a command to the first communication unit,
The first counting unit receives an instruction from the second communication unit, counts the received instruction,
Wherein the comparison unit compares the number of times or the reference count counted by the second counting unit with the counted number of times counted by the first counting unit and outputs a reset command to the reset unit when the count has an error of more than a threshold value,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the driving semiconductor further comprises a monitoring control section including a comparison control module,
Wherein the second counting unit outputs a comparison instruction when the counted number of times reaches the reference count, and the comparison control module receives the comparison instruction and causes the comparison unit to compare the number of times or the reference count counted by the second counting unit, 1 < / RTI > counting unit < RTI ID = 0.0 >
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
3. The method of claim 2,
The monitoring control unit may further include a read and write control module,
Wherein the first counting unit includes a read counting unit and a write counting unit,
Wherein the read / write control module classifies the received command as a read command or a write command, the read command is counted by the read counting unit, and the write command is counted by the write counting unit,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
The method of claim 3,
Wherein the read and write control module includes a read and write flag reading module, the read and write flag reading module reads the read and write flags of the received command and classifies the received command as a read command or a write command ,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
5. The method of claim 4,
Wherein the read and write control module includes a mode filtering module and outputs the filtered read and write flag to the read and write flag read module so as to count only a command of any one of a plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
6. The method of claim 5,
Wherein the plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor includes a drive preparation mode, a drive mode and a diagnostic mode,
Wherein the mode filtering module outputs the read and write flag to the read and write flag reading module,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
3. The method of claim 2,
The driving semiconductor further includes a log storage unit,
Wherein the monitoring control unit stores the received command in the log storage unit when there is an error in the received command,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device. The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the drive semiconductor is a transmission drive semiconductor,
Microcontroller unit monitoring device.
In a microcontroller unit monitoring apparatus including a microcontroller unit and a driving semiconductor,
Transmitting a command signal from the microcontroller unit to the drive semiconductor and counting the command signal;
Receiving the command signal from the driving semiconductor and counting the received command signal;
Comparing the counted number of times or the reference count of the transmitted command signal with the counted number of times of the received command signal; And
And resetting the microcontroller unit based on the comparison result of the comparing step.
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
10. The method of claim 9,
And outputting a comparison command when the counted number of times of the transmitted instruction reaches the reference number of times in the microcontroller unit, and counting the counted number of times or the reference number of the transmitted instruction signal in the driving semiconductor, To control the number of times to compare,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
11. The method of claim 10,
Wherein the received command signal is classified as a read command or a write command and the read command and the write command are counted,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
12. The method of claim 11,
Wherein the read command and the write command are read by reading the read and write flags of the received command signal,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
13. The method of claim 12,
Wherein the received command signal is filtered to count only a command of any one of a plurality of modes of the driving semiconductor,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
14. The method of claim 13,
Wherein the plurality of modes of the drive semiconductor includes a drive preparation mode, a drive mode and a diagnostic mode,
Wherein the received command signal is filtered to count only commands in the driving mode,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
11. The method of claim 10,
Further comprising the step of storing the received command if there is an error in the received command signal.
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.
10. The method of claim 9,
Wherein the drive semiconductor is a transmission drive semiconductor,
Microcontroller unit monitoring method.

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