Patent ID: 7589735

Claim:
In an aircraft instrument display system for imaging, on a bit-mapped display formed of a multiplicity of individually addressable pixels at locations throughout the bit-mapped display and actuatable to create images on the bit-mapped display, aircraft flight information based on a common set of aircraft and environmental sensor data that is entered via a display system input to the display system, said aircraft instrument display system including a video graphics processor; the improvement comprising a common processor operatively connected between said video graphics processor and said display system input, said common processor incorporating means for providing both an integrity checking function and a graphics rendering function, said integrity checking function verifying proper functionality of said video graphics processor, said graphics rendering function using said common set of aircraft and environmental sensor data provided to said common processor for generating display output information for creating said bit-mapped display via said video graphics processor, said integrity checking function using said sensor data for generating a pixel verification map for said bit-mapped display, said pixel verification map comprising at least one check pixel, said graphics rendering function generating rendering calls to said video graphics processor, said video graphics processor generating said bit-mapped display as a graphical display of said aircraft flight information for use by flight crew of the aircraft in operating the aircraft, said integrity checking function using said pixel verification map for detecting a mismatch betweeen said check pixel of the pixel verification map against a corresponding rendered pixel of the multiplicity of individually addressable pixels of the bit-mapped display.