SPRAD97 may   2023 AM62A3 , AM62A3-Q1 , AM62A7 , AM62A7-Q1

 

  1.   1
  2.   Abstract
  3.   Trademarks
  4. 1 What is a DMS and Why Does it Have to be Safe?
  5. 2Hardware Platform for Vision Computing
  6. 3Targeting Safety-Critical Applications
  7. 4Safety OS as a Foundation for Safe Software
  8. 5Freedom from Interference
  9. 6Enabling Safe Symmetric Multi-Processing (SMP)
  10. 7Safety BSP – Bridging the Gap Between Hardware and Software
  11. 8Summary
  12. 9Reference

1 What is a DMS and Why Does it Have to be Safe?

Driver Monitoring Systems (DMS) are subset of so-called interior sensing systems which can use one of several sensor types to gather information about what is going on inside a vehicle. While in most cases infrared cameras are used, there are companies using other methods, for example, radar sensors or even simpler technologies like resistor-mats (to detect whether the passenger seat is occupied by a person or a bag). DMS were first introduced around 2006 and are defined by the European Union (regulation 2019/2144) which states: Driver drowsiness and attention warning means a system that assesses the driver’s alertness through vehicle systems analysis and warns the driver if needed.

Since then, predominantly driven by the industry trend of driver assisted and autonomous driving, a lot of effort has been put into DMS to not only detect and monitor driver distraction (and or drowsiness), but also cover aspects like eye-gaze and even driver emotions to make sure the driver is ready to take over vehicle controls when necessary. Therefore, specifically for higher levels of automated driving – referring to SAE Level 3 and higher – knowing the state the driver is in, is vital for the safety of the vehicle.

Suppliers of DMS have to tackle various problems to make sure the product meets both regulations and market expectations:

  • Optics: the optical system has to work under various lighting conditions, with high dynamic range
  • Hardware: the processing platform needs to provide sufficient compute power while at the same time fulfilling secondary requirements like functional safety and power efficiency
  • Software: the software stack needs to fulfill real-time requirements by efficiently using the hardware resources and complement them for functional safety measures.
  • Economics: the overall system needs to meet stringent automotive cost requirements and at the same time must be highly adaptable and scalable to cover various vehicle platforms

With the obvious interdependencies between these areas choosing the correct hardware and software platform can be a challenging task.