SUNNYVALE, Calif.—October 3, 2001—Continuing its support for open systems and real-time communications development, Real-Time Innovations (RTI) today announced its sponsorship of two standards initiatives that will remove barriers inhibiting the growth of distributed, real-time networking systems. The first initiative, a Request for Proposal (RFP) issued by the Object Management Group (OMG), defines a set of data distribution services that complement current real-time CORBA efforts. The second initiative defines an open, publish-subscribe wire protocol that allows developers to use standard Ethernet and the Internet Protocols (IP) for communications between real-time applications. This month, RTI will publish the real-time publish-subscribe (RTPS) protocol as an Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) Informational Request for Comment and release a new version of its NDDS messaging software that implements the RTPS protocol.
"The current CORBA standards work fine for enterprise applications in which services can be logically separated into clients and servers. However, the distributed object model does not serve real-time, data centric applications well. "In the real-time, data centric model, applications need to distribute data, from simple structures to individual variables within complex structures, among nodes with low latency, minimal network load, and fast fail-over. The CORBA distributed object model and services impose too much overhead for embedded systems and are missing essential services for determinism and fault-tolerance," states Dr Gerardo Pardo-Castellote, chief technology officer at RTI. "The OMG Real Time Special Interest Group (RT SIG) produced the Data Distribution Services for Real Time Applications RFP so that application developers can have a standard set of services across products from multiple vendors. These services will be based on a publish-subscribe, rather than CORBA's client-server model, that eliminates network programming, gives programmers object properties to control message time limits and automatic hot-swap hierarchies, and reduces memory overhead." The full RFP is available on the OMG web site as ORBOS/01-09-11.
The OMG RFP addresses the application developer's service needs. Equally important is the wire protocol that establishes how the different nodes talk to each other. Standard protocols, such as UDP/IP, can be used but require higher-level protocols to manage object and distribute data. Historically, real-time system vendors have developed their own protocols that only their own nodes understood. RTI developed the RTPS wire protocol for its NDDS real-time messaging middleware because its customers want to build distributed systems using a mix of products from multiple vendors.
"Standard protocols that sustain extensibility, backwards compatibility, and interoperability among products from multiple vendors are the foundation for rapid growth in distributed applications. The markets for distributed real-time systems are constrained right now because users are reluctant to invest in proprietary architectures that lock them into a single vendor," states Stan Schneider, president and CEO of RTI. "We designed the RTPS protocol around a modular format in which messages are composed of multiple submessages. Interoperability, extensibility and backwards compatibility result because each node can process the submessages it supports and skip over the submessages it does not support; for example, services provided in subsequent versions of the protocol."
The RTPS protocol provides publish-subscribe services over the industry-standard User Datagram Protocol (UDP) provided with Internet Protocol (IP) stacks. Data is distributed based on named topics rather than IP addresses to eliminate network programming. In addition, the model simplifies application design because it removes channel management chores. For example, the programmer simply sends and receives new topic issues without concern for the number or location of all the topic publishers and subscribers. The basic publish-subscribe functionality is extended so that real-time application programmers can set deadlines for new topic issues, perform automatic hot-swap for redundant publishers, and control the data flow rate. The protocol also allows the developer to use multicast to make the most efficient use of the network bandwidth.
RTI is making the RTPS protocol specification available to software developers through the IETF as an Informational RFC and the Interface for Distributed Automation Group, a consortium of vendors organized to produce an open standard for vertical and horizontal integration of industrial automation systems based on distributed intelligence, as an integral part of its communications services. The specification is planned for release to both organizations in October.
The October release of the WaveWorks family of products features NDDS 3.0, real-time middleware that implements the RTPS protocol, and two tools, WaveSurf and WaveScope, that help distributed real-time software developers isolate and fix problems without getting bogged down by the network complexities.
Real-Time Innovations, Inc. (RTI) is a leading developer of new tools and architectures for the growing real-time software market. The company's products help real-time developers analyze and understand embedded systems, speed development of distributed real-time systems, and coordinate the work of teams of programmers developing large projects. RTI products power applications ranging from network monitoring to the Space Shuttle launch-control system. RTI has thousands of customers, including leading companies in aerospace, semiconductor equipment, telecommunications, robotics, and industrial automation. Together with our customers, we are 'Shaping the Future of Real Time.'
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