RTOS Vendors Roll Out Net-Centric Offerings

By Bernard Cole
iApplianceWeb
(03/27/02, 12:40:49 AM EDT)

In the few weeks since the Embedded Systems Conference in early March, suppliers of operating systems for small footprint iAppliance and embedded systems, including Lineo, MontaVista, OSE, and Symbian have begun roll out of new implementations of their kernels and tools optimized for hardware platforms and processors important in many net-centric designs. OSE Adds Eonic DSP To Wireless Device Support

OSE Systems, Inc. (San Jose, Ca.) has added support for the Atlas scalable DSP system from Eonic Solutions GmbH into its message-based architecture RTOS for use in 3G wireless handset with Internet access.

The Atlas3-G4 universal digital signal computer was specifically designed for rapid prototyping, development and deployment of scalable high-reliability DSP systems. Targeted at the wireless base station, the CompactPCI (cPCI) based system consists of one or several boards, each with one G4-Altivec processor and a PMC mezzanine card for I/O.

The typical telecommunications design model, based on processes and signals, is composed of multiple boards requiring dynamic reconfiguration of the signal flow while running. The use of a message-based RTOS, such as OSE, makes possible reliable process management in a dynamic runtime environment. This allows detection of board failures and allows redirection of the communication in milliseconds, eliminating the need to reboot the system or board because of runtime errors.

The RTOS will be the kernel used in Eonic's Atlas Signal Processing Computer system, which features its Communicating Signal Processing Architecture, a key component of which is an on-board FPGA as the active communication backbone. The OSE development license for the Atlas3-G4 is available starting at $8,000. For more information, go to http://www.ose.com.

MontaVista Adds IBM 466GP Linux Support

Targeting high end iAppliance devices requiring a rich mix of embedded peripherals and software functionality, MontaVista Software Inc. (Sunnyvale, Ca.) has ported its embedded Linux OS to IBM's new 440GP PowerPC microprocessor.

Providing an upgrade path for users of the 405GP, the IBM processor is the first true Book E compliant integrated processor within the PowerPC family that will be available to customers, while maintaining user application software compatibility.

MontaVista Linux Professional Edition 2.1 including support for IBM 440GP will be available in Q3, 2002, direct from MontaVista and MontaVista distribution channels worldwide as part of a product subscription, providing the MontaVista Linux kernel, software updates, utilities, development tools and one year of technical support. For more information, go to http://www.mvista.com.

CodeWarrior Tools Ported to Symbian OS

Hoping to provide a viable alternative to traditional RTOS vendors who also provide sophisticated Integrated Development Environments, Symbian Ltd. (Cambridge, U.K.) has worked with Metrowerks Inc., (Austin, Tx) to port the latter's CodeWarrior IDE to the newest version of the company's wireless phone and iAppliance optimized operating system, Symbian OS Version 7.

The new CodeWarrior Development Tools for Symbian OS, Professional Edition, Version 1.0 toolset incorporates all the features to allow enables wireless iAppliance developers to develop, build and debug C++ and PersonalJava operating system components and applications, all within the same Integrated Development Environment (IDE). pJava allows developers to create J2ME applications for Symbian OS phones.

It also allows developers to easily plug in device specific SDKs to support multiple Symbian OS configurations including phone designs from different Symbian OS licensees.

C++ support includes Symbian OS project control, source-level interoperation with legacy tool chains, as well as batch build, software build and debug on host-based Symbian OS emulators and ARM-based Symbian OS devices and reference boards. PersonalJava support is also included.

Future releases of CodeWarrior Development Tools for Symbian OS will deliver tighter integration with Symbian OS features, integration of Metrowerks'debugger for target device code, kernel debugging, support for the J2ME Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP), and further elimination of command line tasks.

CodeWarrior Development Tools for Symbian OS, Professional Edition, Version 1.0 is available direct from Metrowerks at http://www.metrowerks.com/buy/ and from Metrowerks authorized distributors for $995 per license.

Lineo Supports IBM Set-Top Box Chips

Lineo, Inc. (Linden, Utah), which targets open source implementations of the Linux operating system for vertical markets, has turned its attention to digital settop boxes. It has developed a version of its Embedix SDK and board support package for systems built using the IBM PowerPC-based STB03XX Evaluation kit.

The Embedix BSP for the IBM evaluation kit includes unique packaging features that enable developers to quickly integrate IBM's device drivers. For net-centric applications requiring Web access it also includes a prepackaged browser and GUI. The SDK provides advanced tools for conflict and dependency checking as well as debug capabilities for both target and host.

For more information about the IBM evaluation kit hardware go to http://www.ibm.com/chips. For information about Lineo's Embedix SDK go to http://www.lineo.com.