A GSPN based methodology for the evaluation of concurrent applications in distributed plant automation systems

Abstract This work is part of an investigation aiming at setting up a methodology based on Generalized Stochastic Petri Nets (GSPN) to model and to evaluate concurrent applications regarding their target parallel and distributed architectures. Experimentation concerning real case studies pointed out the need to deepen and to integrate some specific steps of model construction and analysis: (1) the choice of a suitable abstraction level in the modular modelling technique; (2) the adoption of proper parameter assignment criteria; and (3) the congruent definition of a set of quantification indices, covering the basic metrics of parallel computing, suitable to characterize an application in terms of its performance and to support its mapping over a parallel architecture.