SOVD to UDS Translator for SDV Platforms: Enabling Next-Gen Diagnostics on Legacy ECUs

C++11, QNX, REST APIs, AUTOSAR Adaptive (ara::diag), ASAM SOVD, UDS, Green Hills Compiler, NXP S32G2

The German OEM was transitioning to a Software-Defined Vehicle (SDV) platform and adopting ASAM SOVD-based diagnostics. However, many of their existing ECUs still relied on UDS protocols, and the Front Zonal Controller HPC did not have the native intelligence to convert between SOVD and UDS.

To achieve seamless diagnostics across the platform, the OEM needed a solution that would:

• Enable the HPC to act as a bridge, translating SOVD requests into UDS services for legacy ECUs.
• Ensure compatibility between SOVD clients and UDS-based ECUs without requiring ECU redesign.
• Maintain compliance with AUTOSAR Adaptive and ASAM standards.
• Deliver a production-ready, real-time implementation on the NXP S32G2 with QNX OS.

ElectRay delivered a production-ready SOVD to UDS Translator on Adaptive AUTOSAR, enabling seamless diagnostics between SOVD clients and UDS-based ECUs.

Since no reference implementation existed, the team faced both technical and integration hurdles in ensuring robust, real-time diagnostic translation.

Key challenges included:

• Response Handling: Efficiently receiving responses from UDS server ECUs and relaying them to SOVD remote clients posed synchronization and latency challenges.
• C++ RESTful Service Library Challenges: The selected library added complexities in handling timeouts, concurrent requests, and stable low-latency SOVD client communication. Debugging these consumed significant development effort.
• Achieving deterministic performance on NXP S32G2 hardware with QNX OS under compiler restrictions (Green Hills, C++11).
• Software Test Environment Creation: Creating a suitable software test environment was a unique challenge, as the concept of an SOVD to UDS translator is entirely new to the industry.

ElectRay applied its deep expertise in AUTOSAR and Diagnostics to design a modular, standards-compliant solution tailored for HPC’s.

Key elements of the solution:

• Designed and implemented SOVD to UDS Translator in AUTOSAR Adaptive ara::diag, compliant with SOVD and AUTOSAR Adaptive DM specs.
• Key submodules:
  • SOVD message parsing/translation,
  • UDS service request formatting,
  • Response correlation and transport to SOVD clients.
• External Interfaces: RESTful APIs for SOVD client communication, supporting diagnostic requests/responses via HTTP/JSON.
• Built a custom test environment to validate robustness and compliance against ASAM SOVD and AUTOSAR Adaptive standards.

The project delivered not only a technical bridge between SOVD and UDS but also a business enabler for faster SDV adoption by the OEM.

Key outcomes included: