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03 Embedded Systems RTOS Notes

The document provides a quick-study guide on embedded systems and real-time operating systems (RTOS), covering essential concepts such as system architecture, communication interfaces, and synchronization mechanisms. It highlights the importance of timing, memory, and reliability in embedded systems, as well as various scheduling techniques and the use of Raspberry Pi with Linux for prototyping. Key topics include UART, I2C, SPI, and common RTOS features like task scheduling and inter-process communication.

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4 views2 pages

03 Embedded Systems RTOS Notes

The document provides a quick-study guide on embedded systems and real-time operating systems (RTOS), covering essential concepts such as system architecture, communication interfaces, and synchronization mechanisms. It highlights the importance of timing, memory, and reliability in embedded systems, as well as various scheduling techniques and the use of Raspberry Pi with Linux for prototyping. Key topics include UART, I2C, SPI, and common RTOS features like task scheduling and inter-process communication.

Uploaded by

yashaswani.ai
Copyright
© All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Embedded Systems & RTOS – Exam and Interview

Notes
Quick-study edition • Prepared for exam and placement revision

Embedded Systems Basics


• An embedded system is a computing system designed for a dedicated function within a larger product.

• Typical blocks: processor/controller, memory, sensors/inputs, communication interfaces, actuators/outputs and power
supply.

• Important constraints include timing, memory, power, reliability, cost and hardware/software interaction.

• Firmware is software stored in non-volatile memory and designed to control embedded hardware.

Communication Interfaces
• UART is asynchronous serial communication using TX/RX.

• I2C is a two-wire synchronous bus using SDA and SCL; it supports addressed devices.

• SPI is synchronous and commonly uses SCLK, MOSI, MISO and chip select.

• CAN is robust and widely used in automotive and industrial systems.

• I2C is generally multi-device with addressing; SPI commonly uses separate chip-select lines for slaves.

RTOS Concepts
• RTOS means Real-Time Operating System. It is designed to provide predictable timing behavior for tasks.

• A task/thread is an independently schedulable unit of execution.

• Preemptive scheduling allows a higher-priority ready task to interrupt a lower-priority running task.

• Priority inversion occurs when a high-priority task waits indirectly for a resource held by a low-priority task.

• Mutexes, semaphores, queues and event flags are common RTOS synchronization/communication mechanisms.

Scheduling
• Rate-monotonic scheduling assigns higher priority to tasks with shorter periods.

• Round-robin scheduling gives runnable tasks time slices, often among tasks of the same priority.

• Context switching saves the current task context and restores another task's context.

• Deadline is the latest acceptable completion time for a real-time job.

Synchronization & IPC


• Binary semaphore is useful for signaling. Counting semaphore represents multiple available units/events.

• Mutex provides mutual exclusion and typically has ownership semantics.

• Message queues allow tasks to exchange discrete messages safely.

• Critical sections temporarily prevent interruption/preemption to protect very short sensitive operations.

Raspberry Pi & Embedded Linux


• Raspberry Pi is a single-board computer commonly used with Linux and GPIO interfaces.

• GPIO pins can interface with LEDs, buttons and sensors, subject to voltage/current limits.

• Python is commonly used for Raspberry Pi prototyping; C/C++ are also widely used.

• Unlike a typical bare-metal MCU, a Linux-based Raspberry Pi runs a full operating system with processes and drivers.

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