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Linux Now Top Choice Of Embedded Developers
An anonymous reader writes "According to an article at LinuxDevices.com, the latest market research data from Venture Development Corp. shows that Linux is now firmly in first place as the OS of choice for smart gadgets and embedded systems. VDC's latest data indicates that Linux now accounts for 15.5% of embedded projects, beating out Microsoft's WinCE (6%) and XPe (5%), and Wind River's VxWorks (10.3%)."
Last time I checked, TRON was the most used embedded OS. Am I missing something?
My site
And yet, if I went out to try and buy a mobile phone which runs Linux for the geek value, I wouldn't be able to find one. Maybe it's in the wrong embedded marketsHowever, many are programmed in Java...Personally, I'd like to hack mine for the geek value.
...it is by invisible hand of the market. Development costs for embedded on Linux are lower, no matter what FUD about GPL are Microsoft vassals posting on Slashdot. Because embedded incarnations of Linux are very consistent with desktop ones.
.net stuff) for PocketPC using WinCE emulator in Windows XP. With a real pain, because running emulator took 98% of desktop CPU doing nothing. It was worth a new computer, two months of her work and many grey hairs to complete the task.
An example from real life:
My girlfriend wrote some custom app (database client frontend +some
I replicated her effort on the identical hardware (HP iPaq, but with Linux flashed in) in three days. The trick I used was a http server running inside iPaq (sic!), calling local python scripts to query remote database and generate html content to local browser.
Guess, from these two implementations, which one is easier and/or cheaper to support?
Can you, Microsoft drones, stuff IIS or any existing COM/DCOM components you already payed for on Win32 into some WinCE device?
There you are, staring at me again.
Just because you don't get charged with doing something illegally as you do it, that doesn't mean that you can't get prosecuted afterwards, if someone feels like going after you.
IANAL, but as I understand it this isn't true if the someone in question told you that they wouldn't ever go after you. It's called "promissory estoppel".
That doesn't totally clear up all of the questions around Linux, though, since Linus' promises not to sue only apply to the code that is his, which is a small percentage of a modern Linux kernel. However, I've read lawyers argue on Groklaw that the facts that (a) others in the community of kernel developers publicly agree with Linus' stance and (b) no kernel developers publicly disagree with Linus' stance, together provide a good argument for promissory estoppel against suits by any kernel developers, since when those developers decided to contribute, they implicitly agreed to the community consensus as to the meaning of the GPL.
Obviously, you don't want to bet your business without advice from a competent and knowledgeable attorney, but I think there is hope that you can writer userspace Linux apps without fear that you're infringing on the header file copyrights.
It's also worth considering the fact that if you did end up getting sued, you'd be in very good company, since *lots* of companies are doing it (which is the point of the article). That doesn't make a suit less painful, but it probably makes it cheaper, since you can join forces with other defendants to share the costs.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Personally, I wanted a Linux phone, as it would have meant some semblance of power, without the niggling thought in the back of my mind that it was going to crash the next time I got an incoming call. I own a Linux router, which has already had its warranty broken via third-party firmware. I had to sacrifice the Linux PDA for something better supported, but I think I might repair that in a couple of years if things improve.
We're seeing a nice insurgence in the set-top box arena, too. I bet that by the time I need to actually upgrade from my Xbox, there will be a nice, even more free solution available off the shelf. :-)
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Nokia and others ship millions of Symbian OS smartphones, yet somehow they are not showing up on the graphs..
...is that IBMs lawyers probably knows a lot more about the GPL than your lawyers, and they seem to think it is okay. That leads me to believe that both your post and your link are to people that desperately try to create ambigiuity where there really is none, at least none of significance.
For one, you should sack your lawyers if they ever claimed you under any circumstances would be forced to release any source code. In a court of law, you might be liable for damages if you violated the licence, but you will never have to open your code. Someone might offer it as a settlement offer, but that is completely voluntarily.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
So -- what OS is better suited to this kind of application?
Hate to play the role of the troll here [better say goodbye to those Karma points], but Linux has pretty lousy numbers for an embedded OS. Heck - "pretty lousy" is being generous - I've never seen Linux come in anywhere but dead last in an RTOS review.
In fact, the dirty little secret of the embedded OS marketplace is that WinCE is a rather solid, stable, and flexible platform:
What's more, full-blown x86 Linux ain't exactly the cat's meow, either. People laugh at M$FT for their problems with WinFS & Longhorn, but that rusting, archaic, monolithic kernel, called "Linux," is a disaster waiting to happen.Of course, some of the problem here may be semantics - people seem to think that if you build a SBC/PICMG platform, load it with "Linux," and call it a "firewall," then you're doing realtime work. Well, guess what - you're not. Realtime is an OS in a USAF jet, flying at Mach 3, reacting to a gazillion interrupts per second, trying to keep the pilot from both killing himself and from being killed by that SAM missile on his tail.
That's when you call in the grown-ups and the grown-up RTOSes.
Anyway, you can argue about what the words "embedded" and "realtime" mean, but, when the rubber hits the road, Linux is a very poor substitute for the real thing.