The Genivi Alliance says the Linux Foundation's MeeGo In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) project is the fifth Linux distro that has been confirmed as Genivi compliant. Earlier this month, the open source automotive consortium announced a Genivi Compliance Program, listing Canonical's Ubuntu IVI Remix and Mentor Graphics' Embedded IVI Base Platform as compliant along with the more established MontaVista and Wind River IVI distributions.

In July 2010, when the Genivi Alliance announced it had chosen the Linux Foundation's MeeGo operating system as the basis of its next "Apollo" reference release for In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) systems, we assumed that MeeGo would underlie all Intel Atom-based Genivi reference platforms. After all, the original Genivi reference platform unveiled in 2009 was based on Moblin, the foundational technology for MeeGo, by way of a distribution provided by Wind River.

As it turns out, however, MeeGo will be available as one of five compliant Linux distributions that have been optimized for the open source Genivi middleware spec, says the open source Linux consortium.

MeeGo 1.2 IVI UX home page

MeeGo IVI, which was further polished in MeeGo 1.2 as one of several MeeGo User eXperience (UX) platforms, is the only Atom-only distro of the quintet, although the other platforms support the Atom as well as various emerging ARM processors. The Genivi Alliance announcement suggests, however, that an ARM version of MeeGo IVI is also in the works.
MeeGo 1.2 IVI UX home page with application icons

The Compliance Program, which was announced Aug. 2, mentioned the Linux Foundation alongside Canonical, Mentor Graphics, MontaVista, and Wind River as being Genivi-compliant, but only on Aug. 17 did Genivi announce specific support for MeeGo IVI. All five distributions can now qualify for OEM request for proposals requiring Genivi compliant products, says the organization.

The five Linux distributions listed on the Genivi Compliance page, with links to each vendor's IVI site in the titles, include:

• Canonical Ubuntu IVI Remix — In May, Canonical announced it was getting into the IVI game with an Ubuntu IVI Remix distro based on its embedded-oriented Ubuntu Core subset of Ubuntu. Ubuntu IVI Remix supports both Intel and ARM Cortex-A8 architectures, and Freescale said it was collaborating on a project.

  The distribution is said to support the Ubuntu One personal cloud service for streaming media. Whereas the other Linux distros are supported with public web pages for their IVI versions, the above link goes only to the Ubuntu Core page.

  

• Linux Foundation MeeGo IVI Project — As noted, the Linux Foundation's MeeGo project is already on its second version of its IVI UX, following up on the initial MeeGo 1.1 IVI offering last October. This tailored, touchscreen-enabled version of MeeGo is billed as offering fast boot, power efficiency, and a small footprint. It features networking and telephony stacks, as well as a navigation interface (pictured at right). In addition, it supplies Linux technologies such as SystemD, BTRFS, and Wayland, says the MeeGo project.

  The 1.2 version added speech recognition capabilities enabled via an application launcher built with QML, says the project. It also supplies an expanded collection of commonly used applications.

• Mentor Embedded IVI Base Platform — Mentor Graphics' entry into the IVI market appears to be based on technologies found in the company's Mentor Embedded Linux development software. The IVI Base Platform is said to integrate graphics, communication, and multimedia middleware with libraries, system infrastructure, and management components on top of Linux and relevant drivers, says Mentor Graphics. The platform supports the Intel Atom, as well as ARM Cortex-A8 and Cortex-A9 processors, says the company.
  
  Mentor IVI Base Platform architecture
  The IVI Base Platform is based on System Builder, which appears to be the same build engine used in Mentor Embedded Linux. It also integrates Sourcery CodeBench, acquired when the company bought CodeSourcery last December. The company's Inflexion UI tool is also provided along with Mentor Embedded Professional Services, says the company.

• MontaVista Automotive Technology Platform (ATP) — Cavium's MontaVista Software subsidiary was the second embedded Linux software vendor to join the Genivi Alliance. The company announced its first Genivi-ready IVI design win in June 2010 with a multi-year partnership with Robert Bosch Car Multimedia for developing IVI systems. In June of this year, MontaVista announced a Genivi-based IVI reference platform collaboration with Rightware Oy', featuring the latter's Kanzi UI Solution.

  Based on the mature MontaVista Linux , the MontaVista ATP contains hardened frameworks for graphics, video, sound, USB, Bluetooth, location based services (LBS), security, and customizable UI, says MontaVista. The MontaVista ATP is optimized for performance, fast boot, and power management, says the company. Although MontaVista says the platform supports the Intel Atom as well, it is currently listed with specific support only for Freescale's Cortex-A8-based i.MX53, specifically adopting Freescale's SABRE tablet design for the processor. It is also said to support the Cortex-A9-based Renesas R-Car M1 reference platform.

• Wind River Platform for Infotainment — The software behind the original Genivi IVI reference platform was updated earlier this month in a version that adds support for ARM processors, as well as Apple iPhone and iPod integration, Wind River Hypervisor support for multi-OS virtualization, and a new application and GUI framework. In addition to supporting ARM Cortex-A8 processors, Wind River's IVI platform supports the Atom processors from its owner, Intel Corp. (For more information on Wind River Platform for Infotainment, as well as further Genivi background, see our earlier Wind River IVI coverage, here.)

Wind River Platform for Infotainment architecture
(Click to enlarge)

Stated Steve Crumb, executive director of the Genivi Alliance, "Genivi members have a productive history leveraging the MeeGo platform in various ways. Genivi members can now have the confidence that this platform, along with the other four Genivi compliant platforms, has met the criteria of the Genivi compliance program."

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