newbie -- general question

steven james pyro at linuxlabs.com
Thu Apr 3 08:16:01 CEST 2003


Greetings,

Depending on the requirements of the device, you could consider running
your app as init from the linux kernel. Possibly setting SCHED_FIFO or
SCHED_RR will be needed for more responsiveness.

LinuxBIOS will certainly improve the boot time and reliability.

G'day,
sjames



On Wed, 2 Apr 2003, Fery wrote:

> Hi all!
> 
> I am sorry if I am asking stupid, I have just falled into an embedded
> software project. So far I have only developed desktop applications, but
> I have a strong affection to embedded systems. :)
> 
> So, the task I want to get through is as follows: 
> 
> We have an existing product (a medical bedside monitor) working on a
> x86-based system, the "kernel" is dos/dpmi, which, in fact, is used only
> to switch the processor to protected mode (no task management, (almost)
> no memory management, etc.). Now, we have to rewrite the program, as the
> hardware is changing, the code is unmanageable (it was not me, I am a
> fresh employee at the company :), and anyway.
> 
> The new hardware's core will be the geode gx1 processor with the CS5530
> companion chip, and we have an Advantech PCM-5820 mainboard with these
> chips to start developing and play with, and possibly use in the final
> system (if the self-made mainboard developing is too slow / too much
> money).
> 
> I proposed to use a kernel under our new program, as we do not need to
> implement many low- and middle-level protocols (such as the tcp/ip
> stack, ethernet driver, etc.), maybe(?) task management, etc. As nobody
> used this approach at the company yet (me neither), there are no
> experiences how hard to port a kernel to a custom hardware, and what
> constraints place the kernel upon our program.
> 
> I have a few years linux experience (but not hardware or kernel module
> programming), so naturally my first idea was linux or rtlinux. I have
> also found the linux4.tv project, which use quite similar hardware,
> downloaded the source, but I didn't get the point except that possibly
> we can get out the fb video driver source code for gx1.
> 
> As currently this motherboard has quite slow bios boot-up, and my idea
> to use linux, I have found the linuxbios project. And, because there are
> many smart people here, I have some questions to you:
> 
> 1. Can I use linuxbios to boot a single executable, which is analog to
> the current use of dpmi? E.g., I use linuxbios (beside that it boots up
> the hardware) to switch into protected mode, and I have a single binary
> what somehow gets some parameters (e.g., memory size), and runs in
> privilege level 0 (no kernel)? Can I use standard tools (like gcc) to
> compile and link such a beast?
> 
> 2. Can I use linuxbios to boot RTLinux?
> 
> 3. Can I use linux/rtlinux only as a "big lib" of device drivers and
> other stuff? I.e. the scheduler is at my hand, and rtlinux is only a
> process which runs when I let him run, and not too long either. :)
> 
> 3. Do you know a good mailing list about rtlinux and embedded systems
> programming for a newbie?
> 
> 4. Maybe are there other (possibly non-free) kernels which come into
> question?
> 
> Sorry about the long and slightly offtopic post.
> 
> Thanks:
> Circum
> _______________________________________________
> Linuxbios mailing list
> Linuxbios at clustermatic.org
> http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
> 

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