Addressing Real-Time Requirements of Automatic Vehicle Guidance with MMX Technology

This paper describes a study concerning the impact of MMX technology in the field of automatic vehicle guidance. Due to the high speed a vehicle can reach, this application field requires a very precise real-time response. After a brief description of the ARGO autonomous vehicle, the paper focuses on the requirements of this kind of application: the use of only visual information, the use of low-cost hardware, and the need for real-time processing. The paper then presents the way these problems have been solved using MMX technology, discusses some optimization techniques that have been successfully employed, and compares the results with the ones of a traditional scalar code. The work described in this paper has been carried out under the financial support of the Italian Ministero dell’Università e della Ricerca Scientifica e Tecnologica (MURST) in the framework of the MOSAICO (Design Methodologies and Tools of High Performance Systems for Distributed Applications) Project and the financial support of the CNR Progetto Finalizzato Trasporti under contracts 93.01813.PF74 and 93.04759.ST74.