Real-time Linux and microkernel software specialist Sysgo on April 5 revealed plans to support hardware virtualization features built into AMD's multi-core embedded processors. Sysgo's PikeOS microkernel for AMD processors equipped with “AMD-V” hardware will run Linux and/or Windows alongside real-time POSIX applications, the company said.

Sysgo said its first milestone will be to simply add support for multi-core AMD processors to PikeOS; after that, it will work with AMD to add support for AMD-V virtualization hardware to the microkernel. A third planned milestone is to utilize AMD's “new I/O MMU” as soon as it is available.

Sysgo claims that virtualization hardware in AMD processors will enable PikeOS to be smaller, more efficient, and more performant. Promised product capabilities include:

• Running applications with different security and safety levels
• Combining several electronic control units
• Running legacy code that's clearly separated from — but cooperates with — new technology
• Enabling several instances of Linux

AMD's marketing manager of embedded products, Jeff Chu, stated, “With SYSGO's PikeOS technology, hardware and software virtualization can be combined in hard real-time, secure, and safety-critical environments.

Detlev Schaadt, CTO at Sysgo, added, “AMD [has a] leadership role in hardware virtualization, [and] drove their AMD-V technology into the embedded domain.”

AMD's recent embedded processor roadmap additions include 32/64 bit chips and mobile 64-bit chips. The company also recently sampled its first chipsets with integrated graphics processors following its acquisition of graphics processor vendor ATI.

Sysgo added PikeOS support to its ELinOS commercial Linux distribution last October. PikeOS was described as a POSIX PSE51 microkernel capable of running single-process, multi-threaded POSIX tasks within secure partitions, alongside a non-real-time Linux operating system environment.

Another RTOS vendor, FSMLabs, last month sold its embedded real-time technology to Wind River, in order to focus on enterprise real-time applications, primarily around multi-core AMD systems. Wind River, meanwhile, plans to use the technology to enhance the real-time capabilities of its embedded Linux software platform offerings.

Availability

Currently, PikeOS supports x86, PowerPC, and MIPS. No timeframe was announced for availability of AMD-V multi-core support.

 
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