Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!samsung!gca!beaulieu
From: beaulieu@gca.UUCP (Larry Beaulieu)
Newsgroups: comp.realtime
Subject: Re: VxWorks(?)
Summary: its an OS, sort of...
Message-ID: <305@gca.UUCP>
Date: 28 Feb 90 17:40:00 GMT
References: <2573@uwm.edu>
Organization: GCA Corporation, Andover Mass
Lines: 29

> I have seen many postings regarding VxWorks here.  I was wondering (in my 
> ignorance) what VxWorks actually does in the realm of real-time computing.
> Is this an operating system or a programming language?

	To quote from the VxWorks overview:

	"VxWorks is a high performance real-time operating system...for
	real-time applications."	

	It is effectively a real time kernel which has UNIX-like extensions
	added to it which allow it to interact well with UNIX systems, where
	the UNIX box is used for s/w development, etc. and the VxWorks SBC
	(typicially on a VME bus) is used for real time applications.  
	It supports many of the features commonly available with UNIX systems, 
	including support for TCP-IP and NFS. 
	
	At one point, you had a choice of either using Wind River Systems's own
	kernel or Ready Systems' VRTX; I don't know if that's still true. 

	If using Wind River's own kernel, one can purchase the kernel already 
	ported and available in PROM for many popular CPU boards; buy the 
	board, by the PROMS, load the development software on your UNIX box 
	(you have a choice of several, as well as VMS) and *POOF* you're up 
	and running.  
-- 
Larry Beaulieu 				...uunet!gca!beaulieu	
SMTS/Software Engineer
GCA Corporation, 			"Live to step, step to live..."	
Andover, MA