Simulation signal logging and log file format decision

Abstract

The SIL team at Volvo group trucks works with creating simulations for testing, when these simulations are run, they produce log files where data is saved continuously. The current log files are of a comma-separated values (CSV) format which is slow, contains a lot of redundant information and has limitations when storing complex datatypes. The aim of this project is to create log files with a new flexible format based on how easy it is to write the file in C++, how easy it is to read the file in MATLAB and how easy it is to read the file in python. One format from the candidate formats (MAT-file, MFD4 and HDF5) is to be selected based on the criteria mentioned before. Due to the quality of documentation and the available libraries, HDF5 was selected among the candidate formats. The result of the implementation was the generation of an HDF5 log file inside the simulation that is easy to present signal data with and makes it easy to deal with the data. A visualization program for the log files was also created to visually ensure that the log files were generated correctly.