Blackhawk TALON 2000 POSIX RTOS for TI DSP features and specifications page

Talon 2000 Evaluation Version [Download]

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Overview of the Talon Operating System

Realtime System	Uniprocessor System	Multiprogrammed System	Multithreaded System
It is assumed that the target system will have a C2xxx DSP, Program ROM, where programs are stored and executed from, Data RAM where run-time data is stored and retrieved, and a set of peripheral devices, through which the system interacts with the real world and fulfills its functions.	TALON 2000 is a uniprocessor operating system supporting one DSP executing operating system and application code. It is assumed that the target system consists of one TMS320C2000 DSP, Program ROM, External Data RAM and optional Data ROM.	TALON 2000 is a multiprogrammed operating system that supports loading and execution of parallel POSIX processes, which are separate program modules allowing the application to be split to a group of relatively independent tasks executing concurrently and using the operating system services to synchronize their activities.	TALON 2000 is a multithreaded operating system which supports multiple threads of control within a single process, allowing the programmer to exploit the inherent parallelism in the application and to divide it into a set of activities executing in parallel in a tightly coupled manner. The supported thread model are the POSIX threads.

Operating System Capabilities

System ROM Image	Shared Libraries	Device Drivers	File Systems
The concept of embedded system requires that the operating system and application processes may be placed in a non-volatile storage - ROM or Flash ROM. At every system startup the operating system is activated and application processes are executed as specified in their design. The System ROM Image file is created using the dedicated System Builder Tool.	TALON 2000 operating system provides facilities for sharing program code and data between program modules by means of Shared Libraries. The shared library mechanism offers a significant saving in program memory as compared with the regular linkable libraries. Shared libraries are automatically loaded when a process module or another shared library module that needs them is loaded.	TALON 2000 operating system provides a mechanism to dynamically attach loadable Device Drivers modules. Support for generic character and block device drivers is provided by the device driver interface. In addition, a dedicated interface and supporting line discipline shared libraries are provided for TTY Device Drivers.	TALON 2000 operating system provides a mechanism to access files stored in the ROM Image as well as device files, named pipes and shared memory objects. The file name space is 'flat', that is, no directories and slash delimiters are supported.

Operating System Kernel

Design Limits

Unbounded Kernel Limits

Compilation Limits

Build Configuration Parameters

.	Support for 64KW Program and 64KW Data memory space.
.	Minimum 13KW and maximum 49KW kernel code size.
.	Nearly 150 system calls.
.	More than 220 library functions.
.	32 priority levels for threads and messages.
.	32 different signals (from these 12 are real-time signals).
.	14 characters name length for named kernel objects.

.	Number of threads per process.
.	Number of timers per process.
.	Number of queued signals per process.
.	Number of semaphores in the system.
.	Number of message queues in the system.
.	Number of mutexes in the system.
.	Number of condition variables in the system.
.	Number of reader-writer locks in the system.
.	Number of barriers in the system.
.	Number of spin locks in the system.
.	Number of ISR connected to an interrupt.

.	32 open files per process.
.	32 open message queues per process.
.	32 priority levels for threads and messages.
.	32 thread-specific data keys per process.
.	16 cleanup levels per thread.

.	Max number of active processes in the system (4 to 32).
.	Interrupt stack size and location.
.	Available system memory layout.
.	System clock period.
.	Round-robin scheduling period.

C Language Run Time Library

A POSIX-compliant implementation of the C language run-time library is provided which excludes mathematical functions and character handling, available in the Texas Instruments C language run-time library. The run-time library is completely Thread Safe, that is, can be used in a multithreaded process without fear of interference between threads executing in parallel.

POSIX Extensions

The following extensions to the POSIX standard are provided to support specific features of TMS320C2000 DSP family.

Support for Program ROM.
Support for Data RAM.
Support for optional Data ROM.
Modified COFF format for tuning program modules to the DSP architecture and memory saving.

Development Support

The operating system package comes with a set of tools for system building and utility programs to be used at run-time.

Building Tools

The process of system configuration and building is largely automated by the following system building tools, running under versions of the Microsoft Windows operating system.

System Configurator. A toolset to configure the operating system kernel services and features and to optimize kernel code with respect to program memory usage.
System Builder. A tool to build the system ROM image file.
Module Dumper. A tool for dumping the contents of a regular COFF file, a module COFF file or a ROM Image file.

Customization

The system customization process is reduced to the customizing of a single source file, which is then linked with the operating system kernel to produce the executable kernel image. The rest of the customization is supported by the System Builder tool at system generation time.

Documentation

The documentation is in HTML format for easy browsing and searching. The following entry documents are provided:

Installation and Release Notes
Thematic Index
Alphabetic Index
Thematic Index (Frame-Based)
Alphabetic Index (Frame-Based)