VMEbus Systems has become VME and Critical Systems

System Definition VITA defines a critical system as: "A life-critical system or safety-critical system is a system whose failure or malfunction may result in: Death or serious injury to people, or Loss or severe damage to equipment, or Environmental harm Risks of this sort are usually managed with the methods and tools of safety engineering. A life-critical system is designed to lose less than one life per billion hours of operation. Typical design methods include probabilistic risk assessment, a method that combines failure modes and effects analysis with fault tree analysis. "The definition is further restricted to high-performance distributed computing systems, sensor-based and requiring a network fabric that use non-Personal Computer systems. For more information, refer to: www.vita.com.

After 23 years as the industry’s leading publication dedicated exclusively to “all things VME,” VMEbus Systems magazine has changed its name to VME and Critical Systems. Why? 

To my knowledge, no other open standard embedded board type has been around so long nor has been as successful as VME (not even ISA bus, which is nearly extinct, came after VME, and isn’t really considered “embedded”). But what started as a radical idea 25 years ago of creating an open standard ecosystem by bringing together competitors and collaborators is now commonplace throughout the industry. Designers have lots of form factors to choose from if they’re designing general purpose, open standard embedded systems.

But VME has survived for 25 years (and VMEbus Systems magazine for 23) because VME offers a unique combination of robust electrical and mechanical assurance in mission-critical systems, coupled with a technology road map that’s kept pace with industry innovation. Today, VME is arguably the number one preferred choice for mission-, safety-, and life-critical embedded systems. Recognizing this, VITA is evolving VME’s strategic road map to a critical embedded systems focus (see box) – and we’re evolving our magazine in lock-step.

In the future, you’ll see an increasing focus on new VITA standards such as VITA 41, 46, and 48, along with a stronger systems-level focus. We’ll feature case studies on critical systems, and software will become an increasing part of our editorial. Additionally, we’ve created an industry news and blog E-site www.VMENow.com.

But what won’t change is our partnership with VITA, nor my personal commitment to deep, technical, and topical engineering content. I include articles that intrigue and fascinate me, often about topics we all need to learn more about.

I hope you continue to enjoy the old – yet new – VME and Critical Systems magazine.  If you have any comments or suggestions, drop me a note at cciufo@opensystems-publishing.com.

Chris A. Ciufo, Editor