A Real-time Embedded FPGA Interface For An Ethernet Based Line Laser

Abstract

Profile measurement systems developed at the Transportation Instrumentation and Embedded systems Lab (TIL) at the University of Texas at Arlington are used by Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) to compute the profile of the road. The systems use certain basic sensors such as a laser, start sensor, distance encoder and accelerometer. The data samples from these sensors are acquired and stored for further processing. The data is processed in real-time using a road profiling algorithm to calculate the profile. This research effort investigates the feasibility of implementing the existing system using FPGA components and specifically for interfacing the laser to FPGA components. The laser outputs raw data samples in the form of Ethernet packets using the TCP-IP protocol. The laser operates using a client - server model. Hence, the FPGA design needs to include in the interface Client-Server based system. The objective of the thesis is to interface the laser to an Altera DE2-115 FPGA board using a client - server model. The research effort shows that it is feasible to interface the laser to the Altera FPGA board. It also proposes the interface and time complexity analysis of the real time system.