Kondra Systems, just released a powerful virtual machine and C runtime combination that offers pre-emptive threads, virtual filesystem, floating point emulation, dynamic linker/loader, and true binary compatibility across all platforms in a 64k package.Intended as a complete SDK-in-a-box for embedded platforms, it also includes a complete SDK with full featured graphical source level debugger that runs from a browser. Downloads are available for Windows, Linux, and OS X. Other supported platforms include GameBoy Advance, Palm, and a number of embedded platforms.
Kondra Embeddable Runtime Environment and SDK Released
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Eugenia Loli
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ok, so it’s a small step done in the right direction, but quite short of a full blown vm.
This “vm” that provides a C API in 64K requires a C-lib or some equivalent under which will provide a basic file system API for it to use and convert to “vm” instructions. It also requires installed/working image libraries, installed/working gui, etc. It’s not a bad thing, it lowers the overhead compared to things like Java, but it’s nothing really revolutionary.
Sorry guys, but I’ll need more to be impressed. I see you at least worked on the size to make it smaller, I hope you didn’t have to cut down on speed to achieve it.
But would have been more impressed if they had supported the big three ( AIX, HP-UX, Solaris) and a number of smaller used os (some BSD’s) and more architecture then Apple’s G4 and i386.
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http://homepage/mac.com/softkid/Unicenter_TNG.html
i am extremely curious who their target market is.
in the embedded market, i would have assumed that the benefits are strongly in favour of native compilation, and in the desktop- and server- arena, you need a lot more than a standardised libc for cross-platform compatibility.
then again, maybe i’ll find out more once their dns propagates.
I see we are going back to the old geist of osnews, Good.
Cheers!
Rob.
I work for Kondra Systems, so forgive me if it’s bad form to post about my own product…. just wanted to see if I could clarify a few things and address a couple of the questions.
Regarding “This vm that provides a C API in 64K requires a C-lib or some equivalent…”, it’s true, we don’t offer any gui support. However, the vm will run on platforms without a native C library. If one is there, it is used, but it is not reqired. In addition, the vfs is more than a simple pass-thru to the local filesystem. We have several filesystems available, one of which is the native filesystem pass-thru.
Regarding size, on some embedded platforms, the actual native code size of the vm is about 15k. When you factor in the vm space C library (which includes the vfs and scheduler as well) the size can get closer to the 64k mark.
We do have a solaris build, but just haven’t put it up for download (I haven’t looked into how to do an install package for solaris). We’d love to do ports to platforms such as AIX and HP-UX, but simply don’t have access to the hardware to do so.
Regarding “i am extremely curious who their target market is”, the poster is correct… most embedded systems prefer the speed benefits of native code. Our objective is not to replace existing OS platforms or tools. Our target market is manufacturers who build either OEM hardware, or release products that can benefit from ‘custom applications’. In these cases, releasing and end-user SDK can be difficult and costly. For these types of applications we offer an SDK-in-a-box. By using a vm, there is no need for any native tools or libraries, so manufacturers with license restrictions on their tools and/or code have no problems. In addition, by providing a uniform development environment, we hope to allow manufacturers to provide a single SDK that works across mulitple, otherwise incompatible products. Incidentally, regarding speed, we also have JIT support in the vm, although it’s only enabled in the linux download at the moment.
Finally, for the user that is having problems with the url, try this : http://64.220.155.100
Again, I’m sorry if it’s bad form to post about my own product… I’m normally more of a reader than a poster.
-Dave
The site calls their product KVM (Kondra Virtual Machine). Too bad KVM is already the name of an embedded Java VM from Sun!