6 min read

On reference architectures

By LYNX Software Technologies on Jan 8, 2021 11:57:36 AM

What is a reference architecture?

The term “architecture” seems to be in ever increasing use in its technological context. As an extrapolation from the construction term that Frank Lloyd Wright would have been familiar with, its definition as the “overall design of a computing system and the logical and physical interrelationships between its components” is intuitively obvious. The fact that the architecture specifies the hardware, software, access methods and protocols used throughout the system comes as a surprise to no-one.

Topics: Multicore Systems Architecture architecture CVEs embedded systems development Open Group Open Standards separation kernel hypervisors virtualization Reference Architecture
4 min read

Intel’s first DO-254 hardware certification evidence – it’s on a MultiCore

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Dec 18, 2020 10:52:15 AM

WELL DONE, INTEL®!

Over the years I’ve read lots of datasheets. They can sometimes be heavy on marketing buzzwords and prone to sweeping statements that oversell their solutions and gloss over gaps. I read this new Solution Brief from Intel and it stopped me in my tracks. This is the best datasheet I have seen in years. This document lays out the flight safety evidence pack (FSEP) that Intel has created for their Denverton processor. They explain in plain language why the pack was created, for whom and the exact safety standard it applies to. For years Intel have closely guarded their intellectual property which has hampered the use of their processors in aviation. This FSEP overturns that reputation. But there is more: Intel goes further and targets this evidence pack at achieving safety certification of a multi-core processor. Multicore certification is the Holy Grail of the aviation safety industry—a goal everyone is working toward, but at the time of writing, remains unachieved.

5 min read

Conformance vs Compliance – What's in a Word?

By LYNX Software Technologies on Dec 2, 2020 9:03:01 AM

Anyone who travels with a laptop soon develops a bittersweet relationship with international power adaptor plugs. Sure, they turn your homeland plug into something that approximates to what’s needed. But we’re all too familiar with the questionable connections, the weight that pulls away from the wall, and the bulk that baulks adjacent sockets. Adaptor plugs do a job, but they’re compromised. Compromise is also a familiar bedfellow for safety critical software development lifecycle is littered with similar compromises. But not all of them are quite so obvious.

15 min read

What is the Cost of a Real-time Operating System (RTOS)?

By Tim Loveless & Lynnette Reese on Jul 7, 2020 2:38:44 PM

Choosing an RTOS, regardless of the cost, involves many considerations, including accommodating your specific hardware architecture, the scalability of the RTOS, response requirements, peripheral support, scheduler, services, libraries, middleware, graphical tools, and technical support. No RTOS can offer every option, nor does every combination of technology fit together. When considering a purchase, be aware that buying a commercial real-time operating system (RTOS) is complicated and a long-term investment. There are different architectures and project definitions, licensing, maintenance, and subscription models, and more that all need to be considered when making your decision. Generally speaking, purchasing a commercial RTOS will cost about $10K – $20K for the RTOS and one seat of development tools, but the impact on your project may be quite different.

23 min read

Challenges Building Safe Multicore Systems

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Jun 15, 2020 8:12:09 AM

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At the time of writing, no multicore safety critical software systems exist. That is, no system that utilizes a multi-core processor to execute multiple applications in parallel has been certified for flight by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in the US or by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). As such, safety critical avionics systems are missing out on the advances in compute performance, power consumption, and miniaturization enjoyed by laptop, smartphone, and internet users worldwide.

Topics: Multicore Safety TC-16/51 CAST-32A Certification MCP embedded systems hardware development hardware interference software certifications DO-178
3 min read

Best Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) Vendors (2020)

By James Deutch | Principal Field Applications Engineer on May 8, 2020 2:16:17 PM

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Lynx Software Technologies has built and supported real-time operating systems (RTOSes) since 1988. We have witnessed hardware and embedded software technologies evolve and have supported our customers through the design, development, integration, certification, deployment, and support of software systems across mission-critical applications in avionics, industrial, automotive, medical, and other markets. We talk with many different companies across these markets every year. Over time, we have learned that— depending on the type of system being built—our technologies and products may not always provide the best fit. And that’s OK.

We want you to choose Lynx products because they make the most sense for your project and understanding your options is critical to that process.

It is not uncommon for companies to ask us, "If we were to not use your products, who would you recommend?" Therefore,  with our customers in mind—and with a sincere respect to the companies listed below—here is a list of who we regard as our most solid competitors in the safety-critical embedded systems space, in alphabetical order.

Topics: Safety Certification rtos embedded systems real-time Technical Blog
19 min read

What Is A Separation Kernel?

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Mar 22, 2020 12:02:33 PM

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Having built both separation kernels and real-time operating systems—and supported customers using both across a wide range of industries—we are familiar with the pros and cons of each software technology, as well as their security, safety, reliability, and adaptability impact on complex system designs. Yet despite providing strong security and safety benefits and being the foundation of some of the world’s largest mission-critical systems, separation kernels remain largely unknown and poorly understood. In this article, we hope to:

  1. Bring some clarity to the topic of separation kernels vs. real-time operating systems (RTOSes) and embedded hypervisors
  2. Discuss the benefits and drawbacks of using a separation kernel as the software foundation of your embedded systems design
  3. Introduce LynxSecure®, our own separation kernel
Topics: Safety Certification MCP Least Privilege Systems Architecture Security Trusted Codebase architecture linux rtos embedded systems hardware vulnerabilities development real-time LynxSecure separation kernel hypervisors virtualization
3 min read

Field Notes: Safety-Critical Systems Symposium 2020

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Feb 24, 2020 12:34:50 PM

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Topics: Multi-core Avionics Demo Cache-partitioning Lynx MOSA.ic™ Events FAA Safety TC-16/51 CAST-32A Certification MCP Systems Architecture Cache Allocation Technology embedded systems hardware development Technical Blog Standards
4 min read

TC-16/51: Adding Bottom Up Interference Analysis for MCPs

By Mark Brown | Systems Architect on Jan 28, 2020 2:20:00 PM

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I hadn't heard of "bottom up" avionics certification before I read FAA's TC-16/51.  But now, looking back at it, I think the authors from Thales Avionics, including Xavier Jean, PhD, proposed a big change in perspective.  In their own words, here's their proposal to add "bottom up" analysis to aircraft safety certifications on Multi-Core Processors (MCP):

Topics: Multi-core Avionics FAA Safety TC-16/51 CAST-32A Certification MCP Systems Architecture rtos embedded systems partitioning hardware development real-time Technical Blog
18 min read

What Are the Problems with Embedded Linux?

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Jan 13, 2020 10:24:00 AM

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Topics: linux embedded linux rtos embedded systems development
5 min read

Lynx & ENSCO Demonstrate Avionics Solutions at DSEI JAPAN 2019

By Dan Westerberg | Senior Systems Engineer on Nov 18, 2019 2:29:00 PM

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The most formidable challenges of modern avionics development programs are often centered around the safety certification process and the corresponding requirements and costs. Equally as challenging to any large development program are the design and implementation phases where the software application comes to life as it is realized on the target system environment. These phases can be compromised by:

Topics: Multi-core Avionics Demo Lynx MOSA.ic™ FAA Safety Certification MCP Systems Architecture embedded systems development real-time
7 min read

Overarching Properties: An Alternative to DO-178

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Nov 16, 2019 10:20:00 AM

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Overarching Properties—an alternative design assurance approach to DO-178C—marks the biggest change in airborne software safety certification since DO-178B was unveiled in 1992. Intended to be more efficient and flexible than DO-178C, the approach was introduced as DO-178C and the Overarching Properties Initiative during FAA Chief Scientist George Romanski’s keynote address at the High Integrity Software Conference in Bristol, United Kingdom (UK).

Topics: Avionics FAA Safety Certification
23 min read

What Are the Most Popular Real-Time Operating Systems?

By Ian Ferguson | VP Marketing on Nov 14, 2019 10:49:00 AM

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Lynx Software Technologies has built and supported real-time operating systems (RTOSes) since 1988. We have witnessed hardware and embedded software technologies evolve and have supported our customers through the design, development, integration, certification, deployment, and support of software systems across mission-critical applications in avionics, industrial, automotive, medical, and other markets.

Topics: Multicore linux rtos embedded systems development real-time
18 min read

Do You Need a Real-Time Operating System?

By Chris Barlow | Technical Product Manager on Nov 11, 2019 10:29:00 AM

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Do Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOSes) consistently provide the most effective platform for realizing your embedded software system design?  Most RTOS vendors seem to think so, frequently citing RTOS benefits while rarely discussing the disadvantages.  Too often, the question "Do You Need an RTOS?" is interpreted, "Which RTOS Do You Need?"

Topics: Multicore Systems Architecture rtos embedded systems development real-time
9 min read

Embedded Best Practices at Arm Tech-con

By James Deutch | Principal Field Applications Engineer on Oct 17, 2019 2:13:00 PM

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Lynx participated in this year’s Arm TechCon with a booth in the expo hall, where we demoed Lynx MOSA.ic and its components — LynxSecure®, Buildroot Linux, LynxOS-178®, and Lynx Simple Applications (which are bare-metal apps).  It was great to see people walk down the hallways and stop in the aisle to examine the Automotive demo and Industrial demos.

The concepts behind the demos apply across multiple industries and use cases; we simply chose to highlight these concepts in the context of these two markets for the purpose of putting together the demos.  For more information on the Automotive demo, you can read Chris Barlow's blog post.  Below you can see a close-up of the architectural graphic shown on the notebook’s screen:

Topics: Demo Multicore Safety MCP Least Privilege Systems Architecture Arm Tech Con Security Trusted Codebase embedded systems partitioning privilege escalation development real-time Technical Blog
16 min read

How to Choose a Real-Time Operating System

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Oct 14, 2019 10:32:00 AM

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Choosing an RTOS is not as simple as choosing a car.  We know about cars; we know their strengths and weaknesses and we intuitively understand compromises like performance vs practicality or luxury vs price.  We see all kinds of vehicles on the road, so the range of available cars is obvious. When choosing an RTOS, the middle ground is crowded—dozens of general-purpose RTOSes with broadly similar characteristics compete.  They all have a scheduler, services, libraries, middleware, technical support, and graphical tools. Any one of them could genuinely do a good job and so choosing between them is a mixture of quantitative metrics (like features and price) and qualitative measures (like past-experience, personal-preference, and reputation). 

Topics: Multi-core Avionics Lynx MOSA.ic™ Multicore Safety MCP Systems Architecture Security linux embedded linux rtos embedded systems development real-time
11 min read

What Are POSIX Processes and Virtual Memory?

By James Deutch | Principal Field Applications Engineer on Oct 11, 2019 10:31:00 AM

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In POSIX, an executing instance of a program is called a process.  To be conformant with the POSIX standard, processes must be kept separate through the use of memory protection.  An operating system (OS) that supports multiple processes is referred to as a “multiprocessing” OS.

Topics: embedded systems development POSIX®
6 min read

Realizing modern Automotive Software Environments

By Chris Barlow | Technical Product Manager on Oct 9, 2019 2:17:00 PM

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The complexity of today’s automobiles is increasing with every new model on the market.  A modern car can contain hundreds of electronic control units and with connectivity and autonomy becoming commonplace, this is increasing dramatically as we enter the 2020s.  Many of these systems up until a few years ago have safely run on microcontrollers on an unsecured vehicle network, and this has been fine; the networks were ‘air-gapped’ from the rest of the world, and the risk of a malicious attacker causing any kind of danger to a car’s occupants by directly plugging in a new device was as likely as someone cutting the brake lines.  The automotive industry on the whole were happy with this risk.

Topics: Multi-core Demo Lynx MOSA.ic™ Safety Certification MCP Systems Architecture rtos embedded systems partitioning development real-time Technical Blog Automotive
5 min read

What is SR-IOV and Why is It Important for embedded devices?

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Oct 7, 2019 2:09:00 PM

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Topics: Multi-core Demo Safety MCP Systems Architecture embedded systems hardware development Single-root IO Virtualization SR-IOV PCI-E
3 min read

Multi-core cache allocation technology (CAT) demo

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Oct 3, 2019 2:04:00 PM

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This week saw LYNX’s cache partitioning feature for Lynx MOSA.ic™ demonstrated for the first time at the Collins Aerospace Embedded Computing Conference in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Cache partitioning is a new feature of Lynx MOSA.ic™ released in September 2019 and based on Intel’s Cache Allocation Technology (CAT) CPU hardware feature.

Topics: Multi-core Avionics Demo Cache-partitioning Lynx MOSA.ic™ Cache Allocation Technology embedded systems partitioning development Technical Blog
12 min read

What is the Cost of a Board Support Package?

By Tim Loveless | Principal Solutions Architect on Oct 1, 2019 10:35:00 AM

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Topics: Multicore Certification MCP embedded systems TCO hardware development BSPs board support costs
4 min read

Field Notes: Sept 2019 Face™ TIM

By James Deutch | Principal Field Applications Engineer on Sep 24, 2019 2:24:00 PM

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Last week I was able to spend several days at the Open Group Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE™) Technical Interchange Meeting (TIM) and consortium meetings.  For those who are not familiar with either the Open Group or FACE™, the Open Group is a global consortium of hundreds of tool vendors, systems integrators, academics, researchers, and consultants aimed at developing open, vendor-neutral technology standards and certifications for various industries, including Defense & Aerospace.

Topics: Multi-core Avionics Future Airborne Capabilities Environment (FACE™) FACE TIM Technical Blog Open Group Open Systems Open Standards Standards
9 min read

What Are the Benefits of POSIX for Embedded Systems?

By James Deutch | Principal Field Applications Engineer on Sep 20, 2019 10:33:00 AM

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Topics: embedded systems TCO TTM development POSIX®
4 min read

What is a Reusable Software Component?

By Whitfield Thomas | Content Manager on Mar 11, 2019 10:45:00 AM

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A DO-178B/C Reusable Software Component (RSC) is a software collection that is recognized as meeting the requirements of RTCA/DO-178B/C and that may be used on more than one project without having to regenerate certification artifacts.

The FAA grants RSC acceptance as part of a normal certification process, provided that the applicant complies with the guidance policy defined in FAA Advisory Circular AC 20-148. The acceptance allows future users of the DO-178B/C RSC to deploy the software without the added cost and risk of re-certification. This applies to components such as operating systems and networking protocols, that can then be reused (in unadulterated form) across hardware platforms. 

Topics: Avionics Multicore FAA Safety Certification MCP Trusted Codebase architecture rtos embedded systems TCO TTM partitioning development real-time POSIX® costs rsc reusable software
8 min read

CAST-32A: Significance and Implications

By Mark Brown | Systems Architect on Nov 15, 2018 10:36:00 AM

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CAST-32A presents the coordinated position of avionics certification authorities regarding Multi-Core Processors (MCPs).  While today’s aerospace ecosystem could benefit from the use of MCPs, before CAST-32A was published, FAA/EASA had not yet devised a means to obtain certification credit for safety-critical software deployed to an MCP.  Toward that end, the CAST-32A position paper identifies topics of concern that could impact the safety, performance, and integrity of DO-178C aviation software deployed to MCP(s). For each topic, the paper provides a rationale that explains why these topics are of concern and proposes objectives to address the concern. (CAST-32A, “Purpose”, p. 3)

Topics: Avionics Multicore FAA Safety TC-16/51 CAST-32A Certification MCP embedded systems development real-time
3 min read

Design Prevails: Protecting Systems from Meltdown and Spectre

By Will Keegan | CTO on Feb 19, 2018 10:21:00 AM

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Topics: Press Release Least Privilege Systems Architecture Security spectre CVEs hardware side channels privilege escalation meltdown vulnerabilities