Boeing zeros in on Linux for military aircraft

Boeing has awarded Wind River Systems a contract to embed its version of Linux into a new military aircraft, the company plans to announce Monday along with a new batch of products built around the open source operating system.

Boeing will use Wind River's Linux to run surveillance and other mission computing tasks in the P-8A Multi-Mission Maritime Aircraft, a 737 modified for US Navy uses such as finding submarines and other tasks, said Chip Downing, senior aerospace and defence marketing manager at Wind River. Linux won't be used for navigation or aircraft control systems.

Linux has made inroads into embedded computing systems such as networking equipment and mobile phones but Wind River is trying to expand its presence in other embedded computing markets such as aerospace and military applications. The strategy is a turnaround for the company, which until 2003 disparaged Linux in favour of its own proprietary operating system, VxWorks.

It is bridging the divide between the operating systems with its Workbench programming tool software. The company charges a company $4,000 to $11,000 for each developer's copy of the software. However, where Wind River charges a royalty fee for devices using VxWorks, it doesn't with Linux, said Glenn Seiler, senior manager for Linux Platforms at Wind River.

Also on Monday, Wind River plans to announce it's released 300,000 lines of open source code to Eclipse Foundation, a project for programming tools. The software should improve features for programming with the C or C++ languages, debugging, and running software on embedded computing systems.

Wind River is also releasing version 1.3 of several products, including its Platform for Consumer Devices, Linux Edition. That version is specifically designed for smart phones.

Seiler said: "You can get a complete Linux distribution - kernel, driver, networking, file system - in about 4MB of memory."

The new version, based on version 2.6.14 of the Linux kernel, is a significant improvement over the first that was introduced in late 2005, he said. Specifically, it includes an update with many more "mutexes" - interruption points where the operating system can quickly be redirected to service a high-priority task.

Stephen Shankland writes for CNET News.com