Let's take a look at the next generation of HW-RTOS.

Our next generation of HW-RTOS technology is still under planning. The next generation will inherit all of the strengths of the current generation. We are also adding support for tightly coupled, cyclic handler, and multi-core RTOS features .With these, we plan to provide RTOS with even higher functionality and performance.

1. Tightly coupled HW-RTOS

We'll start with tightly coupled HW-RTOS. The current generation of HW-RTOS is what we call "loosely coupled." The biggest difference between the loosely and tightly coupled versions in terms of hardware is that, in the loosely coupled version the CPU, the HW-RTOS, and the CPU register save memory are all connected through the system bus. However, the tightly coupled version connects these three modules with a dedicated interface. This architecture allows improvements in system call performance, including dispatches, as well as making interrupt response performance, we can achieve over ten times the performance of conventional software RTOS. And of course, there is almost no fluctuation. This allows systems with even higher levels of real-time performance to be built.

2. Cyclic handler

The second new function in the next-generation HW-RTOS is cyclic handler. The first unique feature of the cyclic handler in the HW-RTOS is extremely fast startup achieved by implementing the cyclic handler in hardware. As a result, we will be able to shorten the handler interval. The cyclic handler interval will depend on the handler process, but intervals on the order of microseconds should be possible. This will allow its use for cyclic control in even high-precision motor control. The second unique feature of our next-generation HW-RTOS cyclic handler is that start-up time can be set to absolute time. This will allow precise synchronization between stations connected by network.

3. Multi-core support

The third new function in the next-generation HW-RTOS is multi-core support. All the functions and advantages of a single-core HW-RTOS carry over to multi-core HW-RTOS. As a result, it offers a high level of real-time performance as an RTOS. What's more, inter-CPU processing, meaning inter-CPU synchronization, and inter-CPU communication are extremely fast, and execution time fluctuation is greatly reduced. The benefit of these features is that it is easy to implement a real-time application system on a multi-core system. More specifically, it offers:

  • Improved system processing performance
  • A high level of real-time performance
  • Definable worst case execution time
  • Low power consumption through a low operational clock

As a benefit of using multi-core HW-RTOS, we can offer a solution to the problem of inter-CPU synchronizations and communications in conventional software RTOS through high speed, high precision synchronization. Since we can achieve inter-CPU synchronization speeds of less than 1 microsecond by using multi-core HW-RTOS, precise timing control between CPUs is possible. Even if tasks are performed by different CPUs, they are defined over a common RTOS. Therefore, the software developer does not have to worry about over which CPU the task is running — software can be written as if the tasks run on the same CPU. And so, not only can using multi-core HW-RTOS offer high-precision control, but due to the low system clock rate, it's also possible to keep power consumption down.