Bruce Powel Douglass is a highly-visible and well-known expert in the field of software development with over 30 years experience. Bruce is the “face” of UML for real-time and embedded systems and is easily the one of the most visible members of IBM to that industry. He is an industry-wide recognized expert in structured and object-oriented methodologies, C/C++/Visual Basic/Pascal/Ada, real-time embedded systems development, safety critical systems, C4ISR/DODAF with UML, and complex systems design. He speaks at conferences all over the world and his numerous books are published in several languages, including Chinese and Japanese.


Standards Contributions

He is a contributor to UML both the original and the UML 2.0 specification, and former cochair of the OMG Real-Time Analysis and Design Working Group (RTAD-WP). He has contributed to a number of other standards including the UML Profile for Schedulability, Performance and Time (UML SPT), SysML, UPDM, CORBA Enhanced View of Time, and others.

Methodology Contributions

He is the author of the Rapid Object-oriented Process for Embedded Systems (ROPES) – at use in many companies including Saab Aerospace – which has been more recently recast as the Harmony for Embedded RealTime (Harmony/ERT). He and Peter Hoffmann developed the original Harmony process that combined systems and software engineering with a well-specified hand-off for a smooth, integrated workflow. Working with Peter and others, he as defed the Harmony family of processes using the Rational Method Compoer.

Product Contributions

Bruce has provided product vision from a customer/developer standpoint for Rhapsody, since he understands the needs, motivations, and constraints of the real-time and embedded and other software markets. He developed the Rhapsody DoDAF profile that is currently shipped with the product as well as a Safety Analysis Profile that allows engineers to include Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) diagrams, Fault Means and Effect Analysis (FMEA) and hazard analysis in their models.

Publication Contributions

He has written over a hundred magazine articles and is a well-known author of technical books, enhancing both the reputation and visibility of IBM/Rational in the marketplace. He has written:

• Real-Time Agility: Agile Methods for Real-Time and Embedded Systems (Addison-Wesley, 2009)
• Real-Time UML Workshop for Embedded Systems (Elsevier Press, 2006),
• Real-Time UML 3rd Edition: Advances in the UML for Real-Time Systems (Addison-Wesley 2004),
• Doing Hard Time: Developing Real-Time Systems with UML, Objects, Frameworks, and Patterns(Addison-Wesley, 1999), and Real-Time Design Patterns: Robust Scalable Architecture for Real-Time Systems (Addison-Wesley, 2002)

as well previous editions of Real-Time UML and earlier books on programming in Pascal and Basic, and on numerical analysis

IBM/Rational Role

Bruce’s role at IBM Rational is as the Chief Evangelist/Chief Methodologist for real-time and embedded software. Bruce has been with I-Logix (acquired by Telelogic and now by IBM) since 1996. In his role at IBM, he provides guidance (both consulting and advanced training) in the application of UML, SysML, and DoDAF to not only IBM Rational customers, but also to IBM’s own professional service engineers and application engineers, R&D, and marketing.Bruce’s role at IBM Rational is as the Chief Evangelist/Chief Methodologist for real-time and embedded software. Bruce has been with I-Logix (acquired by Telelogic and now by IBM) since 1996. In his role at IBM, he provides guidance (both consulting and advanced training) in the application of UML, SysML, and DoDAF to not only IBM Rational customers, but also to IBM’s own professional service engineers and application engineers, R&D, and marketing.

Previous Roles

Bruce has held previous roles in the real-time and embedded industry, including hand-held industrial systems, medical (patient ventilators, anesthesia equipment, cardiac pacemakers, etc) and aerospace (helicopter avionics, fire control, C4ISR, communications, etc). His role at prior to I-Logix was as Ohmeda, where he was a Senior Staff engineer, equivalent to a vice president in a technical track or an IBM Fellow.

Keynote Topic: Agile Model-Driven Development for Embedded Systems

Agile Model-Driven Development for Embedded Systems Current software development practices are suboptimal in that projects both take too long and result in products with insufficient quality. Agile methods are a cohesive set of concepts, principles and practices to address what most consider the banes of software development: poor and changing requirements, short development cycles, long working hours, and burgeoning system complexity. Contrary to what some believe Agile can be, and is being, applied to the development of real-time and embedded systems. From a different direction, model-based development approaches have proven themselves to be extremely effective in the real-time and embedded space.

The proper application of MDD enables the development of superior architectures, particularly for large and complex embedded systems. But can agile methods be successfully merged with model-driven development?