Open source RTOS kit includes embedded database

Edited by the Electronicstalk editorial team Apr 23, 2008

McObject's eXtremeDB in-memory embedded database system now comes bundled with the eCosPro Developer's Kit.

eCosCentric is extending its eCosPro Developer's Kit to help developers break the "home-grown" database habit.

The kit will include a royalty-free version of McObject's eXtremeDB in-memory embedded database system, so that users can move beyond coding their own data management and gain the reliability, scalability, and development ease of a full-featured, tiny-footprint embedded database.

eCosCentric will bundle eXtremeDB starting with ARM9 processor versions of the eCosPro Developer's Kit.

The combination results in a complete and highly cost-effective toolset for developing embedded database enabled products.

The bundled eXtremeDB database system is limited only by the number of classes (tables) that it supports.

If data management needs expand, an upgrade is available to an eXtremeDB system with unlimited classes, and specialised editions such as eXtremeDB High Availability and eXtremeDB Fusion (McObject's hybrid embedded database that combines in-memory and on-disk data storage).

eCosCentric Chairman Paul Beskeen emphasises the stability and simplified development gained by using eXtremeDB with eCos: "eCosPro gives developers impressive stability, features and support".

"But database algorithms are notoriously difficult to code, and increasingly vital in today's data-intensive embedded systems".

"Why should developers have to build this piece from 'scratch'?".

"eXtremeDB significantly boosts end-product stability, and it reduces development and QA cycles, often by months", says McObject CEO Steve Graves.

"Our customers tell us repeatedly that integrating eXtremeDB has paid for itself many times over".

"Now eCosPro users can have these benefits at no cost, for both development and run-time eXtremeDB licenses", adds Graves.

The eCosPro Developer's Kit and its eCos RTOS release benefit from eCosCentric's rigorous testing and quality assurance.

A comprehensive automated test infrastructure typically runs over 21000 tests for each eCosPro release.

Full support is available from the company, and developers can count on reliability that equals or exceeds any commercial RTOS - but with licensing that allows unlimited, royalty-free operating system distribution.

"The royalty-free eXtremeDB embedded database software bundled with eCosPro perfectly complements the reliability and cost-effectiveness of eCos and the eCosPro Developer's Kit".

"We look forward to this technology combination's rapid adoption within the embedded systems developer community, and to its emergence as the foundation of new state-of-the-art consumer electronics, industrial control systems, telecommunications and network communications equipment, and other advanced embedded devices", says Beskeen.

The eCosPro Developer's Kit brings to the joint product offering all the necessary elements for eCos application development, including Eclipse-based IDE, GNU compiler toolset and utilities, GUI based configuration tool, RedBoot debug and bootstrap firmware - and eCos, the open source RTOS found repeatedly by surveys to be among the most widely used embedded operating systems.

In addition to certifying eXtremeDB on the latest version of eCos, McObject has integrated eXtremeDB with the eCosPro configuration tool.

The database system becomes one of the many "building blocks" that can be specified for inclusion at design time, when developers select the required RTOS functionality and characteristics, and create an application-specific version of the operating system that is ideally suited to the requirements of a particular device.