Hi folks,
I am about to emabark on a new development using a COTS PC104 single board computer (probably Arcom Viper) for use in an industrial control system. The PC104 will perform the role of an autonomous serial data acquisition hub with some basic control functions. The PC104 will be installed in a remote location with proprietary ethernet or serial protocols revovering data from the PC104. I expect within 2 years we will be forced down the Modbus TCP/IP and OPC route for ethernet communications. There will be no user interface (except for debugging) and the only soft realtime requirements are related to the management and efficiency of the serial interfaces.We expect a volume of 400 units/year and will be developing in accordance with SIL2 (IEC 61508). My team currently has a skillset in similair applications on QNX 4.
We are currently considering which OS to use and are currently on a shortlist (not exclusive) of:
Win CE 5.0 QNX 6 VxWorks RTLinux
The evaluation is based on the following criteria (ranked in order of priority):
1) Availability (>95% over 20 years) 2) Available skillset (Transferrable skills or Contractors in the UK) 3) License cost (per unit) 4) Training (Classroom based in the UK) 5) Portability (To other PC104 manufacturers) 6) Additional IT infrastructure for development environment.(Windows company network) 7) BSP availability 8) Up front toolkit/license cost 9) Features 10) OS Vendor SupportWe are very pleased with QNX 4 over the years but we have struggled with 2,3,5,6,10 and it is has no BSP for our expected target. Any advice or pointers to other resources would be appreciated.