A developer's review of REDSonic's Embedded Linux toolkit (Part 4)

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Flexibility and extensibility

On the whole, RED-Builder's facilities are remarkably flexible and extensible. I've already mentioned the well-documented means to add RKAs and RKMs. You can also add new modules or modify existing ones using the Module Editor. The module categories can also be manipulated, providing a means to add new categories are rearrange those already provided if you find them unhelpful. One cannot argue with these capabilities; I found them all well thought out and well implemented.

RED-Builder provides support for building and deploying custom kernels; though these facilities are fairly primitive, requiring the manual editing of some configuration files. The process can hardly be considered an improvement over the standard Linux kernel configuration and build process; but it is at least well documented, and when complete provides some integration with the RED-Builder GUI.

For integrating platform specific functionality into RED-Builder, REDSonic provides a plugin framework. This process is fairly powerful and flexible, providing integrated support for alternative means of downloading images, special bootloader preparation steps, and arbitrary tools you wish integrated with the GUI. For example, if you have some means of downloading to your target other than via serial port or Ethernet, you can implement that method and integrate it with the GUI. Or if the target image requires some special header to be recognizable by the bootloader, this step can also be automated using the plugin framework.

Parting thoughts

I found RED-Builder to be a remarkably feature-filled, stable, well-designed, and easy-to-use product -- perhaps second only to Lineo's Embedix SDK in these respects, and superior to it in the transparency and extensibility of its operations. This may come as a surprise to many, given REDSonic's relatively low profile in the market. If they get rid of that annoying and offensive dongle, REDSonic may well have one of the most attractive Embedded Linux toolkits available.

--- The end ---

Note: Subsequent to (and in response to) this review, REDSonic has eliminated the "dongle" discussed in the first portion of this review. See this announcement for futher details.

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Be sure to read all the articles in this series . . .

About the author: Jerry Epplin has written embedded software for the past fifteen years, primarily for medical devices. He can be reached at jerry@linuxdevices.com

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