Abstract

An operating system is a special computer program that manages the relationship between
application software, the wide variety of hardware that makes up a computer system, and the
user of the system. It is the most important program that runs on every computer. It makes
other program to run on the computer. It performs basic tasks, such as recognizing input from
the keyboard, sending output to the screen, keeping track of files and directories on the disk
and controlling peripheral devices such as disk drivers, printers. . It is classified as multi user,
multi processing, multi threading, multitasking and real time.
A real time operating system is an operating system that guarantees a certain capability
within a specified time constraint. RTOS are often required in embedded system. RTOS
needs to perform very few tasks, and it needs to perform them timely. Meeting the dead lines
is one of the most important properties of any RTOS. It responds to input immediately. They
are used for such tasks as navigation, in which computer must react to a steady flow of new
information without interruption. Most general purpose operating systems are not real time
because they can take few seconds, or even minutes to react.
A real time system is one in which the correctness of the computation not only depends on
logical correctness of the computation but also on the time at which the result is produced.
The auto pilot system in the aircraft is an example of the real time operating system. In this
system the task must occur before the system to be controlled becomes unstable.
RTOS may be either event driven or time sharing. In RTOS scheduling of task are done
using a scheme called “priority based preemptive scheduling”. Most RTOS offer a message
passing mechanism for communication between tasks. The key difference between RTOS
and general purpose operating system is the need for “deterministic” timing behaviour in the
RTOS which is the known and expected time that is consumed by real-time operating system
services. ITRON, Integrity, RTX-windows, OS-9 are the examples of RTOS.
Hence real time operating system is nothing but an operating system which has real time
characteristic. These are difficult to design and verify. Real time systems are information
technologies, which provide real time access to data. The ability of a company to process its
data in real time increases the competitiveness of the company. These are new technologies
and will improve during the next decades.

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