=====================================
 Genode Labs Newsletter - January 2011
 =====================================

 Content

 1. Genode OS walk-through as screencast on YouTube
 2. Milkymist platform featuring the Genode FX GUI stack
 3. Genode OS reaches for further base platforms


 1. Genode OS walk-through as screencast on YouTube
 --------------------------------------------------

 We consider the bootable Live CD released in November as the most
 significant milestone of the Genode OS project so far. Prior the Live
 CD, the project was mainly geared to people with a profound technical
 understanding of operating systems and microkernels. Now, that has
 changed. The Live CD makes the unique capabilities of our architecture
 tangible to a much wider audience. To further lower the burden to get
 involved with Genode's concepts, we have now supplemented the Live CD
 with a screencast showing a guided walk-through of the Live CD:

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJdWOmajo_8


 2. Milkymist platform featuring the Genode FX GUI stack
 -------------------------------------------------------

 Milkymist is currently one of the worlds most ambitious open-source
 hardware-software co-design efforts. The FPGA-based platform is
 built around a unique SoC design consisting of a LM32 softcore CPU
 and a rich set of IP cores such as a high-performance memory
 controller, controllers for various peripherals, and special-
 purpose functions, in particular for hardware-accelerated graphics.
 In contrast to commonly used FPGA-based SoCs, Milkymist does not
 depend on proprietary IP cores and tools other than a synthesis
 compiler.

 The hardware design is complemented with a software stack consisting
 of the RTEMS real-time operating system, device drivers interfacing
 the OS with the SoC hardware, and a custom firmware called Flicker-
 noise. We are excited that the Milkymist project selected the software
 stack of our Genode FPGA Graphics project as foundation for the
 Flickernoise GUI.

 In addition to the SoC and software developments, the project has now
 finished the work on a custom hardware called Milkymist One. In the
 spirit of Milkymist, the PCB layout was released under an open-source
 license as well. Milkymist One has now become ready to order. Please
 find more information on the project's website:

   http://www.milkymist.org/index.html

 So if you like to see a fully integrated open-source hardware-
 software platform in action or run the Genode FX software stack on
 an easily customizable platform, Milkymist One provides you with a
 perfect starting point.


 3. Genode OS reaches for further base platforms
 -----------------------------------------------

 The most unique property of the Genode OS Framework is its ability to
 run on different kernels while maintaining software compatibility.
 This way, we can easily combine the highly varying feature sets of
 different kernels with the steadily growing functionality of the
 software running on top of Genode.

 Within Genode Labs, we are currently busy with extending the platform
 support of the framework beyond the six kernels that are currently
 supported.

 On the one hand, with our stated goal to develop Genode towards a
 general-purpose OS platform, we reach for modern microkernel features
 such as capability-based security, hardware-assisted virtualization,
 and protected I/O access. But we are also looking at moving the
 framework to the space of devices with tight resource constrains, in
 particular FPGA-based SoCs. For pursuing the latter endeavour, we are
 extending our activities to kernel land and experiment with a novel
 interface between kernel and user mode.

 We plan to make first results of these activities available with
 the upcoming Genode version 11.02 to be released end of February.


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 --------------------

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 Best regards
 -- 
 Dr.-Ing. Norman Feske
 Genode Labs

 http://www.genode-labs.com · http://genode.org

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