Eclipse Real-Time Software Components

The Eclipse RTSC project is focused on developing Eclipse tools for the development and configuration of C/C++ applications from components for highly constrained devices such as Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) and micro-controllers. RTSC supports a C-based programming model for developing, delivering, and deploying embedded real-time software components targeted for diverse highly resource-constrained hardware platforms. To meet the size and performance constraints of DSPs and 16-bit micro-controllers, RTSC focuses on development-time and configuration-time tooling to generate highly-optimized C/C++ applications. Unlike typical Java runtimes, there is little to no infrastructure that needs to be pre-deployed onto a device for RTSC to work. In addition to a component's C/C++ runtime code, each component includes code - written in JavaScript - that runs both in the component's development environment during application assembly and in rich client platforms to monitor the execution of the C/C++ code within a deployed application.

Component developers use a set of Eclipse-based tools to specify components using an ANTLR-based IDL, implement the components using both C/C++ and JavaScript. The JavaScript implementation part of a component runs on top of Rhino and enables the component to actively participate in all stages of its lifecycle, from its initial assembly into an application to the real-time monitoring of its execution within deployed end-equipment.

Because each RTSC component contains an element that runs on rich client platforms, these components can participate in and leverage "traditional" Java-based component environments while still satisfying the resource constraints of its embedded C/C++ element running within the embedded device. Beyond the obvious CDT integration possibilities, this dual existence for RTSC components opens the possibility to leverage and extend other Eclipse projects including

• integration with TPTP to enable the test of deeply the embedded C content;
• use of the Device Kit portion of the SODA project (which has similar needs for monitoring);
• the monitoring and data collection components of COSMOS; and
• use of EMF to enable specification of components using existing UML tools but generating RTSC components that run in highly-resource constrained environments.