Lineo, a prominent provider of Linux software for smart devices and embedded systems, announced the acquisition of Embedded Power Corporation, a small software company that specializes in real-time operating systems (RTOS) for microprocessors (µPs) and digital signal processors (DSPs). Coincidentally, Lineo's announcement follows by one day Red Hat's announcement of an equity investment in chip-maker Cradle Technologies in a move that also targets real-time digital signal processing technology.

What's digital signal processing?

Using digital signal processors, device developers can implement complex, high-performance real-time processing capabilities through software, rather than specialized hardware. This capability has become increasingly important with the arrival of streaming audio and video in intelligent consumer appliances — especially in light of the lightening pace of multimedia standards evolution. Both device manufacturers and consumers have lately grown weary of rapid product obsolescence due to evolving multimedia standards. Clearly, the prospect of upgrading products by updating DSP software is attractive.

Over the last several years, multimedia technologies in PCs have begun to be implemented in software rather than hardware. Intel's MMX instructions for the Pentium are a good example. Modems are now commonly implemented using DSPs instead of dedicated chips. In both cases, the goals are similar: provide high-speed multimedia support at least equivalent to dedicated hardware — but in a manner that allows systems to later be upgraded as standards evolve.

Mixing DSPs with µPs

As dedicated chips are replaced with programmable DSPs, smart systems end up with two distinctly different kinds of internal processors — DSPs and µPs. Satish Gupta, CEO of Cradle Technology, puts it this way: “Serving the needs of emerging ultra-high-speed streaming media requires vast amounts of data to be handled in real time, resulting in insatiable performance demands — which is driving the complexity of chips exponentially!” Cradle's solution to this dilemma is a unique multiprocessor architecture called the “universal micro system” (UMS), in which dozens of processors — including both RISC microprocessors and DSPs — can be included on a single die. Most systems, however, implement the two types of processors with completely separate chips.

Either way, however, the growing DSP+µP trend leaves OS vendors scrambling to add DSP support to their OS portfolios. In the Linux space, Red Hat recently announced a port of it's low-end open-source OS, eCos, to Cradle's UMS. Lineo's acquisition of Embedded Power adds Motorola and TI DSP support to Lineo's OS portfolio, through the addition of the RTXC RTOS. Other embedded Linux providers are likely to follow suit.

Growth by acquisition

Tom Barrett, CEO and cofounder of Embedded Power, says Lineo's primary objective in acquiring his company was for the addition of DSP software support. However, RTXC also represents a full spectrum “hard real-time” OS for microprocessors — one that supports over twenty-five 8-bit through 32-bit microprocessors. “Our core competency is operating system environments for hard real time systems — fast and small,” points out Barrett.

Last year, Lineo acquired Zentropix, a leader in the area of open-source real-time Linux, as well as Rt-Control, the creator of uClinux, a popular open-source version of the Linux kernel for limited-resource “deeply embedded” systems. In contrast, RTXC spans the full spectrum of both processors and performance — but in the body of a proprietary OS. Adding it all up, Lineo ends up with a much broader spectrum of support for its customers. “Our goal,” says Bryan Sparks, Lineo's CEO and founder, “is to provide developers with the tools they need to develop their embedded OS on their processor of choice.”

Lineo gains 27 employees through this acquisition, most of whom are programmers. Prior to the acquisition, Lineo's world-wide staff had swelled to around three hundred — mostly through its six previous acquisitions. Last week, Lineo announced that it had withdrawn its planned IPO, citing “current market conditions” as the reason.

 
This article was originally published on LinuxDevices.com and has been donated to the open source community by QuinStreet Inc. Please visit LinuxToday.com for up-to-date news and articles about Linux and open source.