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Changes in README. Fixes to fault handling.

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Yet to investigate why adding a printf format attribute to
stdio.h does not generate warnings for invalid arguments to printf.
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Bahadir Balban
2008-03-16 14:58:47 +00:00
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@@ -86,38 +86,55 @@ directories for their respective licenses.
Why yet another POSIX microkernel?
There are many open source POSIX operating systems with advanced features such
as *BSD and Linux. However these were originally not designed for embedded
systems. Unix itself and all the tools built upon weren't meant for using on
small devices. Accordingly, these operating systems contain a lot of historical
code. Linux is well established, and targets a broad range of platforms and
uses, but consequently embedded platforms don't always get enough emphasis. Also
such well established, mature systems tend to oppose major design overhauls,
which limits innovation to a certain extent. In addition, their code base is so
big, that it gets more and more difficult to understand how their internals
work. Usually much of the code is irrelevant to the problem, in case of embedded
systems. Codezero is written from scratch to solely target embedded systems and
as BSD versions and Linux. However, neither of these were originally designed
for embedded systems. Multiple problems arise due to this fact.
These systems are well established. They target a broad range of platforms and
uses, but consequently their user base has saturated, and embedded platforms
don't get enough emphasis.
Unix itself and all the tools built upon weren't meant for using on small
devices. Accordingly, these operating systems contain a lot of historical code.
Their code base is so big, that it gets more and more difficult to understand
how their internals work. On these systems usually much of the code is
irrelevant to a new problem, and embedded systems tend to raise new problems
often. Codezero is written from scratch to solely target embedded systems and
as such the source code is %100 relevant. It is small and free from legacy code.
Finally monolithic kernels may have issues with dependability due to much of the
code sharing the same address space. Being a microkernel design, Codezero aims
to defeat this problem and increase dependability.
Other than these modern kernels, there is systems software targeting embedded
devices. Most of them are proprietary, with their own users. Some of the open
source ones are structurally too simplistic, and lack modern features such as
paging. There are existing embedded OS'es that are well-designed, but Codezero
provides alternative that will follow the open source development principles
more closely. This will prove useful because many embedded systems still use
older development methods and the right open source methodology would prove
favorable in the fast-paced nature of development.
Finally, there are new ideas in OS literature that would improve Unix but aren't
implemented either because they have no existing users or may break compatibility
somewhat (e.g. some are presented in Plan 9). As well as practising realistic
development methodologies, Codezero project aims to keep up with the latest OS
literature and provide the opportunity to incorporate the latest ideas in OS
technology.
From a design perspective, due to these kernels having a monolithic design, they
may have issues with dependability due to much of the code sharing the same
address space. This is an important issue on embedded systems since their
operation is more sensitive to disruptions. Being a microkernel design, Codezero
aims to defeat this problem and increase dependability.
Other than these modern kernels, there are existing operating systems targeting
embedded devices. Most of them are proprietary, with their own users. Some of
them are structurally too simplistic, and lack modern features such as paging.
There ones that are well established, but Codezero will contrast them by
providing an alternative that will follow the open source development principles
more closely. Many embedded systems still use older development methods and the
right open source methodology would prove favorable in the fast-paced nature of
development.
Finally, there are new ideas in literature that would improve systems software
but aren't implemented either because they have no existing users or may break
compatibility (e.g. some are presented in Plan 9). Existing kernels tend to
oppose major design overhauls, which limits their innovation capability for this
kind of experimentation. As well as practising realistic development methods
Codezero project aims to keep up with the latest OS literature and provide the
opportunity to incorporate the latest ideas in OS technology.
Can you summarise all this? Why should I use Codezero, again?
Codezero is an operating system that targets embedded systems. It supports the
most fundamental posix system calls. Different from other posix-like systems,
it is based on a microkernel design. It supports modern features such as
demand-paging, virtual filesystem support. It has a cleanly separated set of
services, and it is small. Therefore it is a good candidate as systems software
to be used on embedded systems. Currently it has little or no users, and yet it
is about to become usable, therefore compared to systems with a saturated user
base it is possible to tailor it rapidly towards the needs of any users who want
to be the first to use it.