PrismTech

Bringing distributed real-time CORBA middleware to the real-time Java™ world

Using PrismTech’s OpenFusion RTOrb Java™ Edition, enterprises can, for the first time, use Java™ technology to integrate their most demanding real-time applications. OpenFusion RTOrb Java™ Edition is PrismTech’s real-time CORBA-compliant ORB for the Real-time Specification for Java™ (RTSJ). The architecture of OpenFusion RTOrb Java™ Edition is open, flexible and highly performant. Based on a product core that has been tried and tested in demanding applications in both the military and commercial sectors, its architecture supports full CORBA operations.

Real-time Systems

Real-time systems are those which must produce correct responses within a definite time limit. Changes in the scale, complexity and scope of real-time systems are forcing the real-time community to re-think the way in which it develops software. Elements of real-time programming are now finding their way into applications that had never previously required real-time programming expertise and as a result it is becoming increasingly difficult to view real-time developers and business application developers as members of two separate communities. Rather, ways will have to be found to build bridges between these communities to facilitate the smooth flow of information from the smallest embedded device to the largest enterprise information system, and vice versa.

Real-Time Specification for Java™ (RTSJ)

Taken together, these trends make it necessary for the real-time community to adopt real-time platforms that provide higher-level abstractions and advanced tools for functional and temporal programming. The Java™ platform is ideally suited to many of the needs facing the real-time community, but until now, has offered no support for real-time functionality. The new Real-time Specification for Java™ (RTSJ) extends the benefits of Java™ technology to the real-time community, creating an architecture in which hard real-time (HRT), soft-real-time (SRT), and non-real-time (NRT) processes can coexist and share data.

The Java™ Real-Time System is the first commercial implementation of the RTSJ created by Sun Microsystems. Its purpose is to provide a real-time implementation that meets the stringent needs of real-time developers while continuing to offer all of the other advantages of the Java™ programming language.

Real-time CORBA Middleware

Distributed middleware conforming to the Object Management Group’s (OMG’s) language-neutral CORBA specification is well established as a technology for integrating diverse systems and is used extensively for mission and business critical applications in many industry sectors.

With the publication of the Real-time CORBA Specification, the OMG extended the benefits of CORBA to the real-time domain. The standard addresses the issues of end-to-end predictability across CORBA systems and provides a solution in terms of priority control, synchronization and resource control.