VCPN tool for performance modelling of computers systems

Abstract

Petri nets (PN) are well established to support the modeling and simulation of parallel and concurrent systems and represent a well-known and widely used formalism. Coloured Petri Nets (CPN) have been introduced to allow the modeler to make more manageable descriptions of large PN models, by folding equal subnets into each other. This folding consists of representing all instances of a process type by a single subnet and distinguishing the individual processes of this type by different colours. We present the Visual Coloured Petri Nets (VCPN) software tool (C++) for modeling and verification of computer systems using timed CPN. This tool that has been developed for these purposes is illustrated with an emphasis on the modelling environment it provides and on its software architecture. Future enhancements of this tool are also discussed.