A Python Based Testbed for Real-Time Testing and Visualization using TI's 77 GHz Automotive Radars

Abstract

In the paper, we introduce a Python based software library and a testbed based for TI's 77 GHz automotive radars using the FPGA based hi-speed ethernet link. The main design objective is to be able to test high level algorithms in real-time, show live results with minimal effort, avoid using low speed serial ports, and build the whole system on FPGA based hi-speed communication. All of these are possible using TI's C/C++ toolchain, but may require much more effort, especially for testing high DSP level algorithms. This is true even if all advanced MATLAB and Python DSP libraries are made available in TI's framework. To be able to test different high level algorithms with less effort, TI is providing a closed source Windows application to record raw ADC data for offline analysis in MATLAB. This setup requires a companion Lattice FPGA board, DCA1000, which sends raw ADC data from all receive antennas as UDP packets. However, this setup is useful only for offline analysis. That's why we have implemented a Python based software library and a testbed for real-time testing and visualization using this raw ADC data. Implemented library does all UDP processing, parsing, and returns numpy arrays representing raw ADC data for each receive antenna. A couple of code samples, including a real-time direction of arrival estimation program, are presented to demonstrate the simplicity and usefulness of the developed system.