Hi

We've evaluated Nucleus Plus for a while and we also compared with other
RTOSs.
IMHO there are enough other OSs around who do the same job but are cheaper
and more compatible with the outer world.

E.g the if you want to use TCP/IP with your device you can also use Nucleus,
but if you want to use for example an open source webserver like e.g.
GoAhead you get in trouble. The TCP/IP stack of Nucleus is compatible with
nothing. They even don't have implemented a BSD compatible interface.
Some mean this is company politics cause they are also pleased to sell you
their own webserver.
Many TCP/IP functions have parameters who are until know absolutly useless,
in the description often declared as "Not used by Nucleus".

Every function they have starts with NU_, they've even redefined TRUE into
NU_TRUE and FALSE into NU_FALSE. Due of this a development environment who
supports cross references will lead you all the time into their nucleus.h,
e.g. a doubleclick on NU_CreateTask will lead to
#define NU_CreateTask    TCC_Create_Task
which then is the real name of the function which is called and so on.

The docs they have are useless listings of functions in pdf format in which
they don't even describe the structures they are using. So if you don't have
the source your are really in trouble. They are even not able to give you a
help file (hlp, chm or whatever) which could be integrated into your
development environment.

They also offer you a C++ version of the OS called Nucleus Plus C++ which is
a simple wrapper around their c functions in which they don't even made it
to create a global cout/cin stream. As i can remember you have to call some
odd cout() static memberfunction of some class to gain access to the output
stream.

Only my five cents to the thread, maybe others see it different. I don't
like it thats a fact.

If you have more time for evaluation have a look on other, even cheaper OSs
like Precise/MQX or SMX





"Daniel Navarro" <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> schrieb im
Newsbeitrag news:Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es...
> Hi all,
>
> we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be
used
> in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
> only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus
working
> in  'popular' devices/products and, since we have no experience in RTOS at
> all, our bosses doesn't trust Nucleus means against others like OSE,
> Integrity. Does anyone know any example?
>
> Also, does anyone know any site or article where an independet analisys of
> Nucleus appears??
>
> Thanks a lot,
> Daniel
>
>

Gang,

	BTW, I should have qualified myself as bias in my last
posting. I am the engineer designing and developing the
inter-processor communications scheme on the OMAP for Nucleus Plus.

Adam

On Mon, 26 Apr 2004 05:40:25 GMT, Adam Messer <amesser@mchsi.com>
wrote:

>Its funny that the processor in question, in this thread, is an
>OMAP5910. Mentor/ATI is currently working on such a port and is
>developing am inter-processor communications architecture to go with
>it. You may want to give your local sales guy a call.
>
>	Since the OMAP architecture includes both an ARM and a DSP
>core that communicate over shared memory one would need an RTOS that
>supports this wouldn't one?
>
>Adam
>
>On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 05:38:45 GMT, bastian42@yahoo.com (42Bastian
>Schick) wrote:
>
>>>
>>>we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be used
>>>in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
>>>only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus working
>>
>>Another point against: It is a share memory kernel. The top two
>>cellular phone companies use a direct message passing kernel as base
>>RTOS.
>>
>>---
>>42Bastian
>>Do not email to bastian42@yahoo.com, it's a spam-only account :-)
>>Use <same-name>@epost.de instead !

On Mon, 26 Apr 2004 05:40:25 GMT, Adam Messer <amesser@mchsi.com>
wrote:

>Its funny that the processor in question, in this thread, is an
>OMAP5910. Mentor/ATI is currently working on such a port and is
>developing am inter-processor communications architecture to go with
>it. You may want to give your local sales guy a call.
>
>	Since the OMAP architecture includes both an ARM and a DSP
>core that communicate over shared memory one would need an RTOS that
>supports this wouldn't one?

He could go for OSE, they even have full and mature package for this
OMAP stuff.
(Sciopta would have been an alternative, but we do not yet support the
DSP)


---
42Bastian
Do not email to bastian42@yahoo.com, it's a spam-only account :-)
Use <same-name>@epost.de instead !

Its funny that the processor in question, in this thread, is an
OMAP5910. Mentor/ATI is currently working on such a port and is
developing am inter-processor communications architecture to go with
it. You may want to give your local sales guy a call.

	Since the OMAP architecture includes both an ARM and a DSP
core that communicate over shared memory one would need an RTOS that
supports this wouldn't one?

Adam

On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 05:38:45 GMT, bastian42@yahoo.com (42Bastian
Schick) wrote:

>>
>>we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be used
>>in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
>>only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus working
>
>Another point against: It is a share memory kernel. The top two
>cellular phone companies use a direct message passing kernel as base
>RTOS.
>
>---
>42Bastian
>Do not email to bastian42@yahoo.com, it's a spam-only account :-)
>Use <same-name>@epost.de instead !

Mark,

I used Nucleus years ago and it worked VERY well for an embedded system in a
large medical networking project.  Support was excellent and RTK worked very
well.  I used it with CrossCode C and it was a dream brining up custom
hardware with very little trouble.

Hope your experience was as good as ours.

Jim

"Mark A. Odell" <odellmark@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:c5jsc0$2g3m8$1@ID-74514.news.uni-berlin.de...
> In article <Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es>, "Daniel
Navarro"
> <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be
used
> > in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910).
The
> > only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus
working
> > in  'popular' devices/products and, since we have no experience in RTOS
at
> > all, our bosses doesn't trust Nucleus means against others like OSE,
> > Integrity. Does anyone know any example?  Also, does anyone know any
site or
> > article where an independet analisys of Nucleus appears??
>
> Our device is "popular" but I can't talk about what it does. We've had
good
> experience with Nucleus PLUS. It's nice to have sources and the code,
although
> very simple C, is quite readable and well factored. I say, go for it.

In article <407f9f8e$0$262$edfadb0f@dread11.news.tele.dk>, 
nospamtcl@nospamphaseone.nospamdk says...
> Mark A. Odell wrote:
> > In article <Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es>, "Daniel
> > Navarro" <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to
> >> be used in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using
> >> OMAP5910). The only point against it is we don't know too many
> >> examples of Nucleus working in  'popular' devices/products and,
> >> since we have no experience in RTOS at all, our bosses doesn't trust
> >> Nucleus means against others like OSE, Integrity. Does anyone know
> >> any example?  Also, does anyone know any site or article where an
> >> independet analisys of Nucleus appears??
> >
> > Our device is "popular" but I can't talk about what it does. We've
> > had good experience with Nucleus PLUS. It's nice to have sources and
> > the code, although very simple C, is quite readable and well
> > factored. I say, go for it.
> 
> 
> Things may have changed in the past year but when I last looked there were
> some issues with Nucleus that you might be interested in:
> 
> 1) No 'C' Run-Time-Libray
> Nucleus does not come with any 'C' RTL, nor did the port we had even
> initialise ARM's run-time libray. It was pretty much a bare-bones 'C' API.
> 
> 2) Messy C++
> Because Nucleus doesn't come with a CRTL, multi-threaded or otherwise; this
> means that global and static objects don't get constructed. There is a set
> of gruesome macros that come with the PLUS package that need adding to class
> declarations and definitions... but then you end-up with something highly
> non-portable.

If you want C++, you purchase the Nucleus Plus Plus package, which is a 
well-written C++ wrapper that exports all Nucleus Plus features (tasks,
queues, semaphores, etc.) as objects.  Nucleus takes care of 
initializing its objects, your compiler is responsible for your statics.

--Gene

At my previous company, we developed GSM/GPRS chipsets and we used
Nucleus for the RTOS.

--Anthony


"Daniel Navarro" <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es...
> Hi all,
>
> we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be
used
> in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
> only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus
working
> in  'popular' devices/products and, since we have no experience in RTOS at
> all, our bosses doesn't trust Nucleus means against others like OSE,
> Integrity. Does anyone know any example?
>
> Also, does anyone know any site or article where an independet analisys of
> Nucleus appears??
>
> Thanks a lot,
> Daniel
>
>

Mark A. Odell wrote:
> In article <Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es>, "Daniel
> Navarro" <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to
>> be used in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using
>> OMAP5910). The only point against it is we don't know too many
>> examples of Nucleus working in  'popular' devices/products and,
>> since we have no experience in RTOS at all, our bosses doesn't trust
>> Nucleus means against others like OSE, Integrity. Does anyone know
>> any example?  Also, does anyone know any site or article where an
>> independet analisys of Nucleus appears??
>
> Our device is "popular" but I can't talk about what it does. We've
> had good experience with Nucleus PLUS. It's nice to have sources and
> the code, although very simple C, is quite readable and well
> factored. I say, go for it.


Things may have changed in the past year but when I last looked there were
some issues with Nucleus that you might be interested in:

1) No 'C' Run-Time-Libray
Nucleus does not come with any 'C' RTL, nor did the port we had even
initialise ARM's run-time libray. It was pretty much a bare-bones 'C' API.

2) Messy C++
Because Nucleus doesn't come with a CRTL, multi-threaded or otherwise; this
means that global and static objects don't get constructed. There is a set
of gruesome macros that come with the PLUS package that need adding to class
declarations and definitions... but then you end-up with something highly
non-portable.

3) Support
The cost of the OS is, in my opinion, very high for what you get. In
addition, the support is also expensive, although good... until the term
expires.

Overall, I found the sources to be a poor reference, making extensive use of
preprocessor conditional blocks to support different platforms, cryptically
named data and functions, macros a plenty, unsafe depeciated 'C' style
strings. ATI claim that Nucleus is highly portable, but this is actually
acheived at some cost; you will not be able to build with the highest
compiler warning level without a lot of warnings.

If you don't want to use C++, templates and standard libraries and are happy
with plain old 'C' and everything in a single global namespace, you might
like it.

On Wed, 14 Apr 2004 16:58:33 GMT, "Daniel Navarro"
<dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote:

>Hi all,
>
>we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be used
>in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
>only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus working
>in  'popular' devices/products and, since we have no experience in RTOS at
>all, our bosses doesn't trust Nucleus means against others like OSE,
>Integrity. Does anyone know any example?
>
>Also, does anyone know any site or article where an independet analisys of
>Nucleus appears??
>
>Thanks a lot,
>Daniel
>
>

We use Nucleus Plus in 3 of our products and they're medical
applications. I always found ATI (or Mentor now) very responsive &
very good after sales service.

Basically the factors that would sway your decision of using one RTOS
over another are:
1. Product Support
2. Tools support, that is how well does the RTOS work with the chosen
Compiler, emulator, simulator, database, etc.
3. Ancillary support, such as TCP/IP, Smart Card,  Filesystems --
depands what you need.
4. Company stability -- is it going to be there 1 year down the line.
Always difficult to predict -- we got bitten by pSOS just before it
was taken over by WindRiver.

Added to that with Nucleus Plus
a) Source is provided -- just in case they do go down the toilet
b) No royalties

Ken

+====================================+
I hate junk email. Please direct any 
genuine email to: kenlee at hotpop.com

In article <dc277f58.0404152038.5187d2e0@posting.google.com>, a_410_99
@indiatimes.com says...
> "Mark A. Odell" <odellmark@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<c5jsc0$2g3m8$1@ID-74514.news.uni-berlin.de>...
> > In article <Z4efc.4514197$uj6.14912938@telenews.teleline.es>, "Daniel Navarro"
> > <dani_dnm_zgzREMOVE_THIS@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > 
> > > we are on the point of taking the decision of buying Nucleus PLUS to be used
> > > in a new device (quite similar to a mobile phone and using OMAP5910). The
> > > only point against it is we don't know too many examples of Nucleus working
> > > in  'popular' devices/products and, since we have no experience in RTOS at
> > > all, our bosses doesn't trust Nucleus means against others like OSE,
> > > Integrity. Does anyone know any example?  Also, does anyone know any site or
> > > article where an independet analisys of Nucleus appears??
> > 
> > Our device is "popular" but I can't talk about what it does. We've had good
> > experience with Nucleus PLUS. It's nice to have sources and the code, although
> > very simple C, is quite readable and well factored. I say, go for it.
> 
> Are the sources of Nucleus PLUS available ? Are the APIs available.
> Basically i am trying link it with a debugger? For accomplishing this
> is it feasible to start of with Nucleus PLUS and what information are
> needed and are they readily available?

Nucleus Plus is NOT open-source.  You purchase a per-product license
(no royalties), and they give you the source.
Depending on the debugger, Accelerated Technology/Mentor Graphics,
who owns Nucleus, can supply a kernel-awareness DLL for it at
reasonable cost.

If you are a developing a debugger or other tool chain, you would likely 
have to enter into a license agreement with Accelerated for use of their 
information in your product.

--Gene