Teaching Synchronous Dataflow Modelling with Learn-Heptagon
This is an incremental educational tool for instructors teaching synchronous dataflow modeling to engineering students.
The authors developed Learn-Heptagon, an online application for teaching Lustre synchronous dataflow programming, and present the application and associated lesson plan used with engineering students.
Lustre is a synchronous dataflow language designed to implement safety-critical embedded software. In addition to writing executable programs, the language doubles as a program logic, used for writing specification as synchronous observers or assume-guarantee contracts that specify properties of these programs. These specifications may be used during testing or proved exhaustively using model-checking tools. We taught a course on Lustre to last year engineering students. To streamline the learning experience and avoid technical issues, we developped an online application, Learn-Heptagon, which allows for writing, simulating, and proving properties of Lustre programs. This paper presents the application and the associated lesson plan.