LinuxDevices: Wind River’s Fiddler on the Advantages–And Disadvantages–of Linux

“Wind River’s chairman and cofounder Jerry Fiddler has written a
whitepaper about the strengths and weaknesses of Linux relative to
use in embedded systems and devices. Not surprisingly, Fiddler
concludes that although there are some attractive attributes
associated with Linux, embedded system and device developers would
be much better off using one of Wind River’s products–either
VxWorks or BSD/OS. Here are a few quotes from Fiddler’s whitepaper,
entitled Linux In Embedded Systems: Where Are The Benefits?

“‘If GPL issues are somehow manageable, device makers might
still figure they can reduce software costs with linux by relying
on the linux community for support. Unfortunately,that appears
unlikely at this point.This is not due to a lack of interest or
passion on the part of the linux community, but because there is no
common platform to rally around…’

“‘Due to the structural differences in the two fields, linux is
not likely to simply transfer its server success into the embedded
device arena. Instead we have to assess linux on its own merits
relative to the advantages that device makers are looking
for…'”

Complete Story
(with link to whitepaper)

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