Abstract
Embedded systems for critical applications are often based on resource-constrained devices to meet the requirements like performance predictability and energy consumption. To deal with the increased software complexity, many of these systems have adopted reliable RTOSes (Real-Time Operating Systems) with advanced protection functionalities. Meanwhile, the concept of IoT (Internet of Things) is gaining momentum. Many IoT OSes, specialized to provide the large software stack required by IoT applications, have been released. Nevertheless, neither reliable RTOS nor IoT OS can satisfy all the requirements of IoT-enabled reliable systems. Dual-OS configuration (i.e. the coexistence of reliable RTOS and IoT OS) is a promising approach to achieve high reliability and productivity simultaneously. Existing dual-OS solutions, however, depend on additional hardware features (e.g. virtualization extensions, ARM TrustZone), which are unavailable in most resource-constrained devices. This paper presents iSotEE (iSolated Execution Environment), a middleware allowing IoT OS to run inside an isolated environment on top of a reliable RTOS without special hardware. Open-source implementations of iSotEE for Renesas RX (with TOPPERS/HRP3 as reliable RTOS, Amazon FreeRTOS as IoT OS) and ARMv7-M (with two configurations of Zephyr as reliable RTOS and IoT OS) architectures are provided and evaluated. The results show that iSotEE can create reliable systems with a small footprint for resource-constrained devices, high real-time performance for critical applications, and high productivity and throughput for IoT applications.
Highlights
Embedded systems have been widely used to support critical applications such as industrial control [1], medical devices [2] and national infrastructures [3]
The RX target uses TOPPERS/HRP3 as reliable RTOS and Amazon FreeRTOS as IoT OS
The critical applications are developed and natively executed on a reliable RTOS with guarenteed real-time performance. iSotEE runs the IoT OS in an unprivileged environment, and the critical services, which may interact with the physical world, can be protected against the potential security risk of the IoT service
Summary
Embedded systems have been widely used to support critical applications such as industrial control [1], medical devices [2] and national infrastructures [3]. Takada: iSotEE: Hypervisor Middleware for IoT-Enabled Resource-Constrained Reliable Systems typically requires the software to be sufficiently verified before releasing the products [8]. Building an IoT application typically needs a lot of components (e.g. middleware, device drivers) for common features like connectivity and secure communication. These necessary components are very complex, and developing them from scratch could be expensive and time-consuming. Low-level components are typically designed to run in the kernel space to provide system services Their large size can significantly bloat the TCB. Takada: iSotEE: Hypervisor Middleware for IoT-Enabled Resource-Constrained Reliable Systems TABLE 1.
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