Submitted By

P. ManojKumar
II D.C.E
Sri Durga Devi Polytechnic College
Chennai
Definition- Real Time Operating System

• A real-time operating system (RTOS) is an

operating system that guarantees a certain
capability within a specified time constraint.
• It is a multitasking operating system intended
for real-time applications. Such applications
include embedded systems (programmable
thermostats, household appliance
controllers), industrial robots, spacecraft,
industrial control (see SCADA), and scientific
research equipment.
• An RTOS must respond in a timely manner to
changes, but that does not necessarily mean that an
RTOS can handle a large throughput of data.
• Sometimes an RTOS will even need to drop data to
ensure that it meets its strict deadlines.
• An RTOS may be either event-driven or time-sharing.
• An event-driven RTOS is a system that changes
state only in response to an incoming event. A time-
sharing RTOS is a system that changes state as a
function of time
Architecture of Real Time Operating
System
• Two basic designs exist:
• Event-driven (priority scheduling) designs switch
tasks only when an event of higher priority needs
service, called pre-emptive priority.
• Time-sharing designs switch tasks on a clock
interrupt, and on events, called round robin.
• Time-sharing designs switch tasks more often than is
strictly needed, but give smoother, more
deterministic multitasking, giving the illusion that a
process or user has sole use of a machine.
• Early CPU designs needed many cycles to switch
tasks, during which the CPU could do nothing useful,
so early OSes tried to minimize wasting CPU time by
maximally avoiding unnecessary task-switches.
Scheduling
• In typical designs, a task has three states:
1) running, 2) ready, 3) blocked. Most tasks are
blocked, most of the time. Only one task per CPU is
running. In simpler systems, the ready list is usually
short, two or three tasks at most.
• The real key is designing the scheduler. Usually the
data structure of the ready list in the scheduler is
designed to minimize the worst-case length of time
spent in the scheduler's critical section, during which
preemption is inhibited, and, in some cases, all
interrupts are disabled. But, the choice of data
structure depends also on the maximum number of
tasks that can be on the ready list.
Algorithms Used in RTOS
• Some commonly used RTOS scheduling
algorithms are:
• Cooperative scheduling
– Round-robin scheduling
• Preemptive scheduling
– Fixed priority pre-emptive scheduling, an
implementation of preemptive time slicing
– Fixed-Priority Scheduling with Deferred
Preemption
– Fixed-Priority Non-preemptive Scheduling
– Critical section preemptive scheduling
– Static time scheduling
Interrupt handlers and the scheduler
• 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 as long as possible;
• The interrupt handler then queues work to be done
at a lower priority level, often by unblocking a driver
task (through releasing a semaphore or sending a
message).
• The scheduler often provides the ability to unblock a
task from interrupt handler context.
Examples for Real Time Operating System

These are the best known, most widely

deployed real-time operating systems.
• QNX
• RTLinux
• VxWorks
• Windows CE
Background
• Real-time systems are not necessarily fast
(fast is a relative term), however there is a
bounded latency on the time required to
complete certain tasks.
• In general, real-time systems must be able to
respond predictably to unpredictable events,
meet completion deadlines of particular tasks,
and process multiple tasks at once.
• There are two flavors of real-time systems,
depending on the degree of failure if the
system does not meet a deadline.
Overview Of Real Time System
• A real-time operating system (RTOS) may be a
stripped-down version of an operating system that is
common on desktop PCs, with a few special
characteristics.
• RTOSs are generally preemptible (a process that has
control of the processor must yield to an arriving
process with higher priority, allowing the higher
priority process to run) and able to support multi-
threaded processes (the ability of separate sections
of a process to run concurrently).
• Determinism is the ability of the operating system to
perform a task in a determined amount of time. This
attribute is probably most affected by the time
required to acknowledge that an interrupt has
occurred (i.e. interrupt latency).
Description Of Real Time Operating System

• There are additional fundamental aspects of

RTOS design.
• One is the ability of a particular process to
communicate with another process (formally
called interprocess communication or IPC).
• This allows separate applications to interact
with each other and share the same data.
• The concept of IPC introduces another
important operating system aspect,
preventing a process from changing data
while another process is using the data.
Features Of Real Time Operating System

• Real-time systems are typically embedded

systems. The use of a commercial real-time
operating system liberates the embedded
applications programmer, saving the time and
cost developing a hardware interface.
• The principle is the same as using a high-level
language to write software, instead of
assembly language.
• A possible tradeoff is some overhead in return
for low development cost and effectiveness.
Advantages:-
• Simple implementation
• Low overhead
• Very predictable

Disadvantages:-
• Can’t handle sporadic events
• Everything must operate in lockstep
• Code must be scheduled manually
References

• http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Embedded
_Systems/Real-
Time_Operating_Systems
• www.onesmartclick.com/rtos/rtos.html
• http://searchdatacenter.techtarget.com
/sDefinition/0,,sid80_gci213667,00.html