Some unreliable predictions for 2015

Posted Jan 8, 2015 7:09 UTC (Thu) by alison (subscriber, #63752)
Parent article: Some unreliable predictions for 2015

Jonathan writes: 'For larger "things" like cars and major appliances, Linux is the obvious system to use.'

It may be obvious to LWN readers that Linux is the best choice for automotive, but unfortunately it wasn't obvious to Ford Motor Company or VW Group, who have chosen to go with the incumbent leader, QNX. These choices occurred even though QNX is closed-source and available only from a single vendor. Ford notably ditched Windows but chose QNX. Contributors to Linux should not be so smug as to believe that its triumph everywhere is inevitable. We have to win our position as market leader by continuing to improve.

Some unreliable predictions for 2015

Posted Jan 8, 2015 9:42 UTC (Thu) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (1 responses)

QNX is 'traditional' for In-Vehicle systems. It's often used as a real-time OS in the ECU and other auxiliary systems.

It's understandable that Ford doesn't want to experiment anymore after years of failure with Sync, lots of which were caused by outdated WinCE-based software stack.

Some unreliable predictions for 2015

Posted Jan 8, 2015 22:16 UTC (Thu) by alison (subscriber, #63752) [Link]

> It's often used as a real-time OS in the ECU and other auxiliary systems.

QNX is the market leader in the large-touchscreen head units that provide "infotainment" (maps, music, traffic data, etc.) as well as Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) that will eventually evolve into autonomous driving controllers. In other words, QNX is competing head-on with Linux and often winning straight-up battles. Automotive Grade Linux and the Linux-based GENIVI Consortium are also thriving, but the Linux community cannot take a win in automotive for granted by any means.

Some unreliable predictions for 2015

Posted Jan 8, 2015 21:32 UTC (Thu) by mm7323 (subscriber, #87386) [Link]

On the plus side, QNX userspace is somewhat Unix-like to program for and has excellent POSIX compatibility. While I've only ever had experience in porting from Linux user-space to QNX (which was really very easy for most code I needed), going the other way might also be not be too difficult either; it could eventually be an advantage for Linux.

Obviously if you are taking device drivers, realtime or any of the advanced QNX features, any porting from QNX to Linux is going to be difficult, and you might be needing the QNX features anyway.