A Hardware Time Manager Implementation for the Xenomai Real-Time Kernel of Embedded Linux - Université de Bretagne Occidentale Access content directly
Journal Articles ACM SIGBED Review Year : 2012

A Hardware Time Manager Implementation for the Xenomai Real-Time Kernel of Embedded Linux

Pierre Olivier
  • Function : Author
  • PersonId : 905154

Abstract

Nowadays, the use of embedded operating systems in different embedded projects is subject to a tremendous growth. Embedded Linux is becoming one of those most popular EOSs due to its modularity, efficiency, reliability, and cost. One way to make it hard real-time is to include a real-time kernel like Xenomai. One of the key characteristics of a Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) is its ability to meet execution time deadlines deterministically. So, the more precise and flexible the time management can be, the better it can handle efficiently the determinism for different embedded applications. RTOS time precision is characterized by a specific periodic interrupt service controlled by a software time manager. The smaller the period of the interrupt, the better the precision of the RTOS, the more it overloads the CPU, and though reduces the overall efficiency of the RTOS. In this paper, we propose to drastically reduce these overheads by migrating the time management service of Xenomai into a configurable hardware component to relieve the CPU. The hardware component is implemented in a Field Programmable Gate Array coupled to the CPU. This work was achieved in a Master degree project where students could apprehend many fields of embedded systems: RTOS programming, hardware design, performance evaluation, etc.
Fichier principal
Vignette du fichier
0_papier.pdf (540.15 Ko) Télécharger le fichier
Origin : Files produced by the author(s)
Loading...

Dates and versions

hal-00725015 , version 1 (31-08-2012)

Identifiers

Cite

Pierre Olivier, Jalil Boukhobza. A Hardware Time Manager Implementation for the Xenomai Real-Time Kernel of Embedded Linux. ACM SIGBED Review, 2012, 9 (2), pp.38-42. ⟨hal-00725015⟩
358 View
325 Download

Altmetric

Share

Gmail Facebook X LinkedIn More