In the last several years, real-time extensions for Linux have provided many significant improvements. Recently there has been much attention on “Linux User Space” solutions for multicore devices that enable direct access from user space to underlying hardware often called “bare metal” implementations.
But that is a special use case. Can there be any other general real-time improvements?
Multi-threading via “pthreads” in Linux is a time tested method for achieving better real-time performance within the context of a Linux process. Enea has prototyped a new Light-weight Threading model for Linux that unlike pthreads, operates entirely in user space, and offers greater than 10x performance over pthreads in scheduling behavior and inter-thread communications. This solution, called Light-weight Run-time Threading (LWRT) offers the next true advancement in Linux real-time behavior.
At the Freescale Technology Forum 2012 in Shanghai, PRC, our Product Marketing Director Michael Christoffersson held a popular seminar on the topic, which you can take part of below:
