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Simple Real Time Operating System: A Kernel Inside View for a Beginner - A Step-by-Step Guide to RTO



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A real-time operating system (RTOS) is an operating system (OS) for real-time computing applications that processes data and events that have critically defined time constraints. An RTOS is distinct from a time-sharing operating system, such as GNU, which manages the sharing of system resources with a scheduler, data buffers, or fixed task prioritization in a multitasking or multiprogramming environment. Processing time requirements need to be fully understood and bound rather than just kept as a minimum. All processing must occur within the defined constraints. Real-time operating systems are event-driven and preemptive, meaning the OS can monitor the relevant priority of competing tasks, and make changes to the task priority. Event-driven systems switch between tasks based on their priorities, while time-sharing systems switch the task based on clock interrupts.




simple real time operating system a kernel inside view for a beginner



A key characteristic of an RTOS is the level of its consistency concerning the amount of time it takes to accept and complete an application's task; the variability is 'jitter'.[1] A 'hard' real-time operating system (hard RTOS) has less jitter than a 'soft' real-time operating system (soft RTOS). A late answer is a wrong answer in a hard RTOS while a late answer is acceptable in a soft RTOS. The chief design goal is not high throughput, but rather a guarantee of a soft or hard performance category. An RTOS that can usually or generally meet a deadline is a soft real-time OS, but if it can meet a deadline deterministically it is a hard real-time OS.[2]


A multitasking operating system like Unix is poor at real-time tasks. The scheduler gives the highest priority to jobs with the lowest demand on the computer, so there is no way to ensure that a time-critical job will have access to enough resources. Multitasking systems must manage sharing data and hardware resources among multiple tasks. It is usually unsafe for two tasks to access the same specific data or hardware resource simultaneously.[4] There are three common approaches to resolve this problem:


The other approach to resource sharing is for tasks to send messages in an organized message passing scheme. In this paradigm, the resource is managed directly by only one task. When another task wants to interrogate or manipulate the resource, it sends a message to the managing task. Although their real-time behavior is less crisp than semaphore systems, simple message-based systems avoid most protocol deadlock hazards, and are generally better-behaved than semaphore systems. However, problems like those of semaphores are possible. Priority inversion can occur when a task is working on a low-priority message and ignores a higher-priority message (or a message originating indirectly from a high priority task) in its incoming message queue. Protocol deadlocks can occur when two or more tasks wait for each other to send response messages.


Since an interrupt handler blocks the highest priority task from running, and since real-time operating systems are designed to keep thread latency to a minimum, interrupt handlers are typically kept as short as possible. The interrupt handler defers all interaction with the hardware if possible; typically all that is necessary is to acknowledge or disable the interrupt (so that it won't occur again when the interrupt handler returns) and notify a task that work needs to be done. This can be done by unblocking a driver task through releasing a semaphore, setting a flag or sending a message. A scheduler often provides the ability to unblock a task from interrupt handler context.


FreeRTOS is an open-source, cloud-neutral real-time operating system that offers a fast, dependable, and responsive kernel. FreeRTOS is freely distributed under the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) open-source license and implemented in over 40 architectures, providing developers with a broad choice of hardware along with a set of prepackaged software libraries.


TI-RTOS accelerates development schedules by eliminating the need to create basic system software functions from scratch. TI-RTOS scales from a real-time multitasking kernel - TI-RTOS Kernel - to a complete RTOS solution including additional middleware components, device drivers and power management. TI-RTOS and TI's ultra low-power MCUs combine to enable developers to design applications with much longer battery life. By providing essential system software components pre-tested and pre-integrated, TI-RTOS enables developers to focus on differentiating their application.


TI-RTOS Kernel is a deterministic, preemptive, multitasking kernel that enables developers to create sophisticated applications without compromising real-time deadlines. The kernel services are summarized in the table below:


All INTEGRITY kernel services have been carefully optimized to minimize the overhead of system calls so they can be suspended to allow other calls to execute. INTEGRITY uses a real-time scheduler that supports multiple priority levels and enables complete control over CPU percentage allocation. In addition, INTEGRITY always services the highest priority interrupt with absolute minimum latency.


Real Time Operating System (RTOS) is an operating system that is used for real-time applications i.e., for those applications where data processing should be done in a fixed and small measure of time. It performs much better on tasks that are needed to be executed within a short time. It also takes care of execution, monitoring, and all-controlling processes. It also occupies less memory and consumes fewer resources.


Let us start our discussion with a real-life scenario. Suppose a driver is driving a car and the car meets with an accident. Now we want the airbags of the car to immediately open up. Even if there is a slight delay, the driver could get injured and the whole purpose of airbags gets destroyed.A real-time operating system (RTOS) is an operating system that is used in computing systems that needs strict completion deadlines for all the tasks that need to be performed on it.Here the system is connected to an external event, whenever that event is completed a signal is sent to the system with the help of a sensor. Now that signal is communicated to the system as an interrupt. After the operating system receives an interrupt, it initiates a process that is associated with it. Once the interrupt is completed, the operating system handles the power back to the CPU. Now since all this is happening in real-time and there's a need for a quick response from the system thus speed is very important here.


There are certain fields like flight control, telephone switching equipment, and real-time simulations that require a large number of external events to be processed in a short period of time. In these cases we use RTOS.These processes are connected to the real time operating system, these operating system executes these tasks quickly.Some examples of these fields are Airline traffic control systems, Command Control Systems, airline reservation systems, Heart Pacemaker, Network Multimedia Systems, etc.


For example, the pacemaker. A pacemaker has flexible, insulated wires (leads) that are placed in one or more chambers of the heart. These wires deliver the electrical pulses to adjust the heart rate. And these wires require a hard real-time operating system.


A soft real-time operating system is used where few delays in time duration are acceptable. That is if the given task is taking a few seconds more than the specified time then also no critical damage takes place.


Easy to use:It is easy to develop and execute real-time applications in real-time operating systems. Since it allows to break complex problems into multiple simple tasks that are easy to define and process.


The top command in Linux Terminal will display all the running processes and a dynamic real-time view of the current system. It sums up the resource utilization, from CPU to memory usage.


The hard real-time OS is the operating system for mainly the applications in which the slightest delay is also unacceptable. The time constraints of such applications are very strict. Such systems are built for life-saving equipment like parachutes and airbags, which immediately need to be in action if an accident happens.


The FreeRTOS kernel never performs non-deterministic operations, such as walking a linked list, inside a critical section or interrupt. The FreeRTOS kernel includes an efficient software timer implementation that does not use any CPU time unless a timer needs servicing. Blocked tasks do not require time-consuming periodic servicing. Direct-to-task notifications allow fast task signaling, with practically no RAM overhead. They can be used in most intertask and interrupt-to-task signaling scenarios.


For these reasons, FreeRTOS keeps the memory allocation API in its portable layer. The portable layer is outside of the source files that implement the core RTOS functionality, so you can provide an application-specific implementation appropriate for the real-time system you're developing. When the RTOS kernel requires RAM, it calls pvPortMalloc() instead of malloc()(). When RAM is being freed, the RTOS kernel calls vPortFree() instead of free(). 2ff7e9595c


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