Software complexity and its impacts in embedded intelligent real-time systems

Applications of intelligent software systems are proliferating. As these systems proliferate, understanding and measuring their complexity becomes vital, especially in safety-critical environments. This paper proposes a model assessing the impacts of complexity for a particular type of intelligent s...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Journal of systems and software Vol. 78; no. 2; pp. 128 - 145
Main Authors Coskun, Erman, Grabowski, Martha
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York Elsevier Inc 01.11.2005
Elsevier Sequoia S.A
Subjects
Artificial intelligence
Complex systems
Decision support systems
Embedded systems
Human performance
Intelligent systems
Operator performance
Real time
Real-time systems
Safety management
Safety-critical systems
Socio-technical studies
Software
Software complexity
Software evaluation
Software performance
Studies
Technology impact
User interface
Safety-critical systems
Embedded systems
Software complexity
Human performance
Software performance
Technology impact
Real-time systems
Software evaluation
Socio-technical studies
Intelligent systems
Operator performance
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Summary:Applications of intelligent software systems are proliferating. As these systems proliferate, understanding and measuring their complexity becomes vital, especially in safety-critical environments. This paper proposes a model assessing the impacts of complexity for a particular type of intelligent software system, embedded intelligent real-time systems (EIRTS), and answers two research questions. (1) How should the complexity of embedded intelligent real-time systems be measured?, and (2) What are the impacts of differing levels of EIRTS complexity on software, operator and system performance when EIRTS are deployed in a safety-critical large-scale system? The model is tested and operationalized using an operational EIRTS in a safety-critical environment. The results suggest that users significantly prefer simple decision support and user interfaces, even when sophisticated user interfaces and complex decision support capabilities have been embedded in the system. These results have interesting implications for operators using complex EIRTS in safety-critical settings.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 23
ISSN:0164-1212
1873-1228
DOI:10.1016/j.jss.2005.01.009