While assembly-level information for COTS systems is integral in managing obsolescence, this kind of insight was not available before the VITA 53 (Commercial Technology Market Surveillance) standard was born.
When developing safety-critical software, the language chosen is vital. However, common candidates such as C, C++, Java, and Ada are too complex in their entirety. Thus, language subsets are meeting the challenge.
Safety- and security-critical system functions are evolving simultaneously. However, the two system types have different yet similar requirements. Thankfully, modern RTOSs are stepping up to meet their respective needs.
Safety-critical RTOSs often utilize time partitioning so that adequate resources are available for time-critical tasks. This can be a very inexact practice, however, when tasks take only a fraction of the reserved CPU time. Slack scheduling is now coming to the rescue, though, offering a more efficient alternative to traditional time-partitioned scheduling.
An interview with Elma Electronic president and founder Fred Ruegg, who comments on everything from Elma's recent switch from its VITA-only stance to its new role on OpenVPX’s Steering Committee. Meanwhile, Ruegg is an aficionado of MicroTCA, but also threw us the VME64x “curveball.”
A Q&A with Kontron's Thomas Sparrvik, who says the prudent should watch out for upgrade programs, labeling them "true growth opportunities." Meanwhile, he praises the Atom but admits it has its limits, especially in regard to VPX.
A Q&A with Curtiss-Wright Controls Embedded Computing's Lynn Patterson, who tells us what SECDEF Gates' recent proposed budget shifts mean to CWCEC and to the COTS industry. Meanwhile, she tells us a thing or two about OpenVPX and admits VITA has room for improvement.
Software developers can alleviate the frustration that results when multicore algorithm multithreading yields performance only barely superior to single core. How? By implementing data flow and cache usage analysis facilitated by using a cache analysis software library.
VMEbus-based systems are used on the front end of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), located at CERN near Geneva (Switzerland), where a selection of on-the-fly data from relevant events is collected.
All good things come to those who wait. Or so it might be in the realm of rugged, deployable DSP boards. When Curtiss-Wright announced their conduction-cooled CHAMP-FX board, we were surprised that they didn’t have such a version all along. We were told that the company wanted to wait...
Deployed military systems aren’t all bombs and battles. There remains a fundamental need for comms networks, including Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) with T1 data lines. If VME’s your platform of choice for a conduction-cooled telephone or line card system, then Extreme Engi...
There is no denying that many VME applications have a tremendous need for processing and I/0 performance. Packing in all the performance possible has been a design challenge since the dawn of VME. Adding interconnect capability such as Serial Rapaid0 and FPDP only adds to the challenge....
It used to be that MIL-STD-1553 chips were based upon ASICs. That’s still the case, but with those digital logic caverns commonly known as FPGAs, it’s now possible to implement full 1553 functionality inside of one. Condor Engineering’s FlightCORE-1553 implements the company...
Developing multiprocessor systems ain’t easy – just ask Mercury Computer, a company best known for commercial and military image processing systems. That’s why the company plans to offer a series of COTS-based system starter kits, starting with a RapidIO-based VXS Starter Ki...
Flash drives are all the rage in embedded systems because the price of the solid-state memory chips has come way down. But on a cost-per-gigabyte basis, no storage media besides paper beats a rotating hard drive. GE Fanuc Embedded Systems knows this and has introduced the PMC-0247 line of...
Here’s a new one to us: Cornet Technology Communications, a division of Cornet Technology, has been in the systems integration business for some time, but they’re new to the embedded VME market. Based upon their experience with customer systems, they’re making available the...
Among all the ink we journalists spill writing about PCI Express (PCIe) and RapidIO, sometimes we forget about other serial fabrics such as InfiniBand. This heavyweight serial scheme is ideal for cluster computers, managed infrastructure applications, and systems such as enterprise class s...
The DoD’s Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) is a huge program that has boatloads of software at its core. Of primary importance are the SCA core framework and the portable waveforms that must work on myriad equipment while interoperating with older, hard-wired radios. Therefore, wri...
The gazillion gate highly integrated FPGAs from companies ranging from A to X offer performance to spare but come with a heavy power penalty. Although VME boards have ample power budgets of up to 100 W these days, that power has to be dumped into the system somehow. If you can save power,...
Used to be that rugged VME systems mounted their Power Supply Units (PSUs) in the chassis someplace. But with myriad onboard voltage requirements for higher-draw components, it makes more sense to mount the PSU in a VME slot, directly feeding the backplane. That’s the intention behind...
The argument rages on: Will the FPGA kill the dedicated DSP processor? Or will DSP-equipped Application-Specific Standard Products (ASSPs) like those found in cell phones keep expensive and power-hungry FPGAs out of the mainstream? Who cares! FPGAs can throw gate-level hardware paralleli...
Like all ZTEC oscilloscopes, the ZT4610 family offers traditional oscilloscope features, such as flexible signal conditioning and advanced triggering. Features such as auto-configuration and self-calibration provide quick and easy instrument setup. Powered by a 64-bit processors, the com...
Now that we have your attention turned to deep space, ever wonder if VME is used in space? Sure is: It has 100 percent market share on Mars. And in satellites? Yes running standard interfaces and some that are designed for the rigors of space. One of these is the European Space Agency...
It seems that COTS suppliers are pretty close on the heels of the latest desktop PC trend: dual-core processors with mammoth amounts of memory. The SVME/DMV-1901 from Curtiss-Wright Controls Embedded Computing (“CWCEC” is so much easier to type!) resembles the latest desktop PC a...
All good things come to those who wait. Or so it might be in the realm of rugged, deployable DSP boards. When Curtiss-Wright announced their conduction-cooled CHAMP-FX board, we were surprised that they didn’t have such a version all along. We were told that the company wanted to wait...
Deployed military systems aren’t all bombs and battles. There remains a fundamental need for comms networks, including Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) with T1 data lines. If VME’s your platform of choice for a conduction-cooled telephone or line card system, then Extreme Engi...
There is no denying that many VME applications have a tremendous need for processing and I/0 performance. Packing in all the performance possible has been a design challenge since the dawn of VME. Adding interconnect capability such as Serial Rapaid0 and FPDP only adds to the challenge....
It used to be that MIL-STD-1553 chips were based upon ASICs. That’s still the case, but with those digital logic caverns commonly known as FPGAs, it’s now possible to implement full 1553 functionality inside of one. Condor Engineering’s FlightCORE-1553 implements the company...
Developing multiprocessor systems ain’t easy – just ask Mercury Computer, a company best known for commercial and military image processing systems. That’s why the company plans to offer a series of COTS-based system starter kits, starting with a RapidIO-based VXS Starter Ki...
Flash drives are all the rage in embedded systems because the price of the solid-state memory chips has come way down. But on a cost-per-gigabyte basis, no storage media besides paper beats a rotating hard drive. GE Fanuc Embedded Systems knows this and has introduced the PMC-0247 line of...
Here’s a new one to us: Cornet Technology Communications, a division of Cornet Technology, has been in the systems integration business for some time, but they’re new to the embedded VME market. Based upon their experience with customer systems, they’re making available the...
Among all the ink we journalists spill writing about PCI Express (PCIe) and RapidIO, sometimes we forget about other serial fabrics such as InfiniBand. This heavyweight serial scheme is ideal for cluster computers, managed infrastructure applications, and systems such as enterprise class s...
The DoD’s Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) is a huge program that has boatloads of software at its core. Of primary importance are the SCA core framework and the portable waveforms that must work on myriad equipment while interoperating with older, hard-wired radios. Therefore, wri...
The gazillion gate highly integrated FPGAs from companies ranging from A to X offer performance to spare but come with a heavy power penalty. Although VME boards have ample power budgets of up to 100 W these days, that power has to be dumped into the system somehow. If you can save power,...
Used to be that rugged VME systems mounted their Power Supply Units (PSUs) in the chassis someplace. But with myriad onboard voltage requirements for higher-draw components, it makes more sense to mount the PSU in a VME slot, directly feeding the backplane. That’s the intention behind...
The argument rages on: Will the FPGA kill the dedicated DSP processor? Or will DSP-equipped Application-Specific Standard Products (ASSPs) like those found in cell phones keep expensive and power-hungry FPGAs out of the mainstream? Who cares! FPGAs can throw gate-level hardware paralleli...
Like all ZTEC oscilloscopes, the ZT4610 family offers traditional oscilloscope features, such as flexible signal conditioning and advanced triggering. Features such as auto-configuration and self-calibration provide quick and easy instrument setup. Powered by a 64-bit processors, the com...
Now that we have your attention turned to deep space, ever wonder if VME is used in space? Sure is: It has 100 percent market share on Mars. And in satellites? Yes running standard interfaces and some that are designed for the rigors of space. One of these is the European Space Agency...
It seems that COTS suppliers are pretty close on the heels of the latest desktop PC trend: dual-core processors with mammoth amounts of memory. The SVME/DMV-1901 from Curtiss-Wright Controls Embedded Computing (“CWCEC” is so much easier to type!) resembles the latest desktop PC a...
