Embedded operating systems specialist Chorus Systemes SA, based in Paris says that its eponymous microkernel will be ready for the PowerPC this month. The company will show customers, among them some of the largest telecommunications equipment manufacturers, a reference implementation running on a Motorola Inc-built PowerPC-based 601 board this month. However, it has yet to convert any of the various Unix-type personalities that can sit on top. Yves Penaud, the company’s head of business development for embedded systems and applications, says that Chorus is in the process of talking to customers about which personalities they want: Chorus’s usual offering is Mix Modular Unix – which provides a full Unix System V.4 personality. However, Peynaud says that some customers may decide that a Posix-compliant, or a secure personality would be more appropriate. The firm is also apparently still doing work to reduce the size of the kernel, which some reports suggest runs to 150Kb on the PowerPC. While this is all right for a telecommunications switch, the average auto manufacturer wants something a bit smaller.
