Q&A

http://www.arxi.no/faq.htm

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTONS

Why QNX? Porting from VxWorks to QNX Neutrino RTOS QNX Momentics Technology Development Kits QNX4 Supported hardware

Why QNX? Q: Why should we choose QNX RTOS for our embedded solution? A: First of all because of reliability, scalability and inherent hard realtime properties. The development tools are greatly improved since QNX v4 and the IDE (built on Eclipse) gives you a consistent look-and-feel environemnt to work in. The development can be done on a host (cross-development), or directly on the target system (selfhosted) The microkernel gives you full memory protection for all processes (both system and user) Process error don't effect the kernel Dynamic upgradeability QNX is POSIX compliant (you can re-compile Linux/Unix POSIX code on QNX) The kernel is SMP aware QNX licensing protects Intellectual Property (IP) All of this together have resulted in the use of QNX in millions of mission-critical applications all over the world.

Porting From VxWorks to QNX Neutrino RTOS Q: How can I acces the VxWorks to Neutrino Porting Guide? A: The guide, "Porting Legacy Systems from Wind River's VxWorks to the QNX Neutrino RTOS can be downloaded from the QNX website at www.qnx.com Q: What does the porting guide cover? A: The porting guide contains over 80 pages of technical content and represents the most extensive VxWorks porting guide on the market. The guide is best suited to people who are new to QNX and are wondering how they might go about migrating their legacy VxWorks system to QNX Neutrino. The guide covers: Architectual comparisons between VxWorks and QNX Neutrino Memory accessibility differences IPC differences with code examples for message queues, shared memory, and watchdog timers Exception handling Startup code Hardware input/output, including device driver discussion Networking

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Build environments Recommended porting methodologies

Q: What is the main difference between a realtime executive or single space OS architecture and a microkernel OS? A: In the realtime executive model, all software components - OS kernel, networking stacks, file systems, drivers, applications - run together in a single memory address space. While this architecture may be efficient, it has a major drawback: a memory error in any software module, no matter how trivial, can cause system-wide failure, leaving little or no trace of what went wrong. Pinpointing the location of the error can, in a complex system, become virtually impossible. VxWorks is an example of this type of architecture. By contrast, in a microkernel RTOS, applications, drivers, file systems, and networking stack all reside in separate address spaces, and are thus isolated from both the kernel and each other. With this approach, failures are easily contained: a fault in one component won't bring down the entire system. Moreover, it's easy to isolate a memory or logic error down to the component that caused it. For instance, if a memory fault occurs in a driver, the OS can identify the process responsible, at the exact instruction. Meanwhile, the rest of the system can continue to run, allowing you to isolate the problem and direct your effort towards resolving it. QNX Neutrino is an example of this type of architecture.

QNX Momentics Q: What is the difference between Momentics Professional Edition and Standard Edition? A: The main difference is that Professional Edition PE) comes with full IDE, while Standard Edition (SE) is a command-line tool. Both development suites provide identical verstions of the Neutrino Platform technologies for use during development, system development kits (e.g. headers & libraries) for application developemnt for the Neutrino Platform, and compiling and embedding tools collectively, "Tools and Kits"). I.e. they provide all the necessary component for developing applications and performing embedded development (generation of embedded images). Both developement suites also provide support for cross-hosted (Solaris, Windows, Linux to Neutrino) or self-hosted development models. The Neutrino Platform as included in Momentics includes: Neutrino OS (kernel, libraries, utilities, frameworks), Photon microGUI, Networking and File Systems. The PE product adds the Eclipse IDE workbench, Eclipse Plugin tools for "C" development (CDT), and QNX added-value Eclipse plugin tools. The Professional Edition also includes added-value tooling for Photon development: Photon application builder "PhAB" for visual design og graphical applications), and Phindows for remote display of Photon applications in the Windows environment. N.B. PhAB is only available for Windows and Neutrino host environment; PhAB for Windows is only included with PE, while self-hosted PhAB is provided with both SE and PE. Contact us for more information or pricing.

Q: What's new in QNX 6.3? A: Highlights of news and improvements in QNX 6.3 OS Performance and Reliability Optimizations: Extended memory support (beyond 4G for x86, MIPS and PPC) Resilient flash file system architecure Kernel support for in-process performance counters New implementation of POSIX message queues uses asynchronous messaging for enhanced performance HW support expands to include PPC Book E (IBM 440, Motorola PowerQUICC III) Expanded Tools Support:

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New GCC 3.3.1 compiler New code coverage tool Enhanced system builder tool automates the creation of new BSP projects within the IDE System profiler delivers improved data visualization and interpretation New Linux host Updated IDE integrates with Eclipse v2.1.2 and C/C++ Development Tools (CDT) v1.2 Network Security and Interoperability: New securety support, provided by IP Filter and Network Address Translation (NAT) protocols New support for the Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) Enhanced IPv4 protocol support now includes multilink PPP, on-demand connections, compression, Network Time Protocol (NTP), and a new poll function for interoperability with other UNIX implementations Optimized transparent distributed processing framework USB 2.0 Host Support New Mass Storage Class USB driver can be customized with the USB DRiver Development Kit (DDK), or extended to include other USB 2 devices from the following classes: HID, Printer, and Mass Storage Advanced Graphics Enhancements New embedded HTML 4 browser and QNX Voyager 2TM with ACCESS' NetFront technology 3D graphics support Multiheaded displays provide improved visualization and usability by allowing a single visual to be shown across multiple monitors simultaneously, and multiple views to be rendered to multiple monitors simultaneously from a single head unit Improved multilanguage functionality includes support for Chinese Do you need more information? Contact us, or go to qnx.com/products to find out more.

Q: What do I need to do in order to buy QNX Momentics? A: Just contact us, either by sending an email or giving us a call.

Technology Development Kits Q: What does a Technology Development License cover? A: Technology Development licenses cover all use of a given technology for the purposes of a specific Project, and are obtained through the purchase of a Momentics Technology Development Kit (TDK). The technology covered may include any combination of technology development kits (headers, libraries, etc.), runtime technology, whether as complementary products, or added-value features of existing products (e.g. SMP), and source code. Payment of the development license provides the right to use technology for a project from product development through deployment. Except as indicated as special circumstances, there are no additional runtime royalties applicable to deployment of the technology, when used in conjunction with QNX platform technologies for which royalties have been paied.

Q: What Technology Developemnt Kits are available? A: Today we can offer you the following TDK's (the links takes you to QNX web site): Critical Process Monitoring

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Extended Networking Flash File System MOST Multimedia Symmetric Multiprocessing 3D Graphics Web Browser Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.

QNX4 Q: What do I need to do to migrate from QNX4 to QNX6? A: If you already have QNX4 you will get discounted prices for the QNX Momentics development suite. Contact us for prices and information. In order to give you the discount we need the license number on your QNX4 development system. Send it to us either by fax: +47-66-90-25-41, or email qnx@arxi.no along with your order.

Q: Will QNX Software Systems (QSS) continue developing QNX4? A: QSS is focusing on QNX6. Not much work will be done for QNX4 unless many QNX4 customer wants the same thing. Both QSS and ARX Innovation can help you with custom engineering jobs. Please contact us for more information.

Supported HW Q: Where can I find out what HW that are supported for QNX4 and QNX6? A: For QNX6 please go to hardware_support/index.html For QNX4 please go to hardware_support/qnx4/index.html Q: What 3rd partner kits is available? A: QNX Software Systems works with a number of leading hardware vendors to provide the best in production-ready technology. Together with their partners, they have developed a number of evaluation kits that include all the tools, applications, and demo source code that you need to jump start your development effort, Please see qnx.com to find the list of QNX's 3rd partner kits.

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