This work presents a position monitoring system to generate displays showing the position of trains, time between trains, seconds early/late for each train, and alarms. Alarms will be generated when trains are too close, unexpected events are received, or trains do not cross subsequent sensors when expected. (more…)

Traditionally, safety critical systems have been constructed from low volume hardware and software components specifically designed for safety critical systems. Almost all are closed systems, and the exact designs and source code are not available for analysis or comparison; we can only evaluate the reliability based on published reports of accidents attributed to the control systems. (more…)

This paper describes a real-time extension to Linux called LITMUSRT, which is being designed to support real-time workloads on multiprocessor and multicore platforms. The recent shift by chip makers to multicore designs, combined with building interest within the open-source community in supporting real-time features in Linux, makes this research quite timely. (more…)

In the framework of our research on high-gain observers for nonlinear systems we have reached the final development step consisting of a real-time implementation in Linux. The results presented in this paper were obtained using RTAI-lab and the Scilab/Scicos CACSD environment on a series-connected DC motor. (more…)

Using the IA-32 architecture for time-critical tasks allows highest computing performance at reason- able hardware cost. Because many open source real-time operating systems are based on Linux, the comparatively high resource requirements of Linux also apply to these systems. (more…)

With the stepwise integration of the Real-time Preemption Patches (RT-Preempt) into the Mainline Linux kernel and their support for architectures other than Intel and AMD, there are now a number of choices which board to use for a particular embedded real-time project running Mainline Linux. (more…)

A FIFO is a First In First Out data queue for sharing data between multiple tasks or threads. Fifos are one of the most basic communication mechanisms used in real-time operating systems. Especially for two real-time tasks or between a real-time task and non-real-time process, it is effective because it allows non-blocking as well as blocking semantics, which is mandatory to avert priority inversion… (more…)

Today's trends in Control Engineering and Computer Engineering are blending gradually into a slightly challenging area, the improvement of Real-Time implementations. Applications should timely deliver synchronized data-sets, minimize latency and jitter in their response and by using an efficient scheduling algorithm to be able to determine various system resources to meet optimal allocation and their… (more…)

Resource reservations have been proven to be an effective technique to support hard and soft real-time applications in open systems, and some implementations for Linux have already been proposed in the past. However, such implementations generally focus on providing guarantees to real-time applications, disregarding the performance of non real-time activities. (more…)

The LinuxDevices.com “Embedded Linux GUI/Windowing Quick Reference Guide” is a comprehensive guide to support for the graphics requirements of Embedded Linux based systems and devices. The guide covers the full range of embedded system alternatives to standard desktop software components, including low-level drivers, graphics servers, windowing enviroments, GUI toolkits, and browsers . (more…)

West Des Moines, IA — (press release excerpt) — Icon Laboratories today announced the expansion of its embedded Linux software development services. The company has been involved with Linux-based embedded projects for the past 18 months, including telecommunications, broadband wireless networking, and set-top box projects, and has been successful in reducing time-to-market while allowing the client to… (more…)

Gateway's new Linux-based Connected Touch Pad was the recipient of this year's “Best of Comdex” (Fall, 2000) award in the Consumer Product division. The winners are chosen by a team of editors from CNET and ZDNet. Here's what the editors said about the product . . . (more…)

A brand new embedded Linux software company has just joined the growing number of Asian companies that are embedding Linux within consumer Internet and information appliances. Timed to coincide with last week's Comdex extravaganza, Taiwan-based Esfia unleashed a volley of product and technology announcements and launched its new website. (more…)

Cyclades has announced a new terminal and console access server in a 1U rackmount form-factor that uses MontaVista Software's Hard Hat Linux as its embedded operating system. The TS2000 can be used by ISPs, ASPs, and e-retailers to manage, remotely and securely, serial console ports in server farms. (more…)

Pittsburgh, PA — (press release excerpt) — TimeSys Corp. and GoAhead Software today announced a software solution enabling advanced reliability for complex telecom and Internet systems. As part of this agreement, TimeSys will also be joining the GoAhead Integration Alliance (GIA), becoming part of a network of companies banding together to develop new levels of service availability for Internet… (more…)