Firmware Defect Prevention for Safety-Critical Systems

This course focuses on the most important proactive implementation techniques that reduce firmware defects for safety-critical systems. Such firmware defects can result in severe – even deadly – consequences. Specifically, this course will discuss three of the most important and undervalued safety-critical firmware implementation techniques: adopting an effective coding standard, conducting meaningful code inspections, and using static analysis properly.

Many teams rely too heavily on important, but more costly, downstream approaches, such as testing/validation or even end-user feedback, to discover and remove defects. As a result, front-end activities rarely are fully embraced and often are not practiced successfully. All are necessary, together forming a type of "firmware safety net" for your embedded device. This course will teach you best practices for coding standards, code inspections, and static analysis, including coverage of the latest version of the MISRA-C Coding Guidelines. It will also provide in-depth examples of defects that are trapped and removed by these activities.

Topics covered during this course include:

• Coding Standards
• Code Inspections
• Static Analysis

This course is appropriate for:

• Engineers with any level of embedded software experience
• Technical leaders and managers

Prerequisites:  Attendees should have a working familiarity with the C programming language.