VOSySmonitoRV: a mixed criticality virtualization solution for RISC-V

A real time operating system running securely with Linux on RISC-V platforms

This demonstration showcases a mixed critical environment composed by two operating systems, Linux and RTOS (Real Time OS) running on a multicore RISC-V System-on-Chip (SoC). The mixed critical virtualization solution used to isolate and run concurrently the two operating systems is the Virtual Open Systems product VOSySmonitoRV, an adaptation of the arm and x86 based successful VOSySmonitor and VOSySmonitorX86 company products.

VOSySmonitoRV is a certifiable secure monitor firmware for RISC-V SoCs designed by Virtual Open Systems, which targets automotive, smart buildings and industrial market segments. It enables spatial and temporal isolation between multiple operating systems ensuring the highest level of security and isolation.

VOSySmonitoRV runs Linux and FreeRTOS concurrently on RISC-V SOC's - tested on HiFive Unleashed board

More in detail, VOSySmonitoRV strongly partitions physical hardware resources into multiple isolated zones, using standard RISC-V features such as Physical Memory Protection (PMP), Platform Level Interrupt Controller (PLIC) and Core Local Interrupt Controller (CLIC).

In this video demo, VOSySmonitoRV is running on a HiFive unleashed platform, allocating one hart to FreeRTOS and the other harts to Linux. In addition, the demonstration shows the following key characteristics of VOSySmonitoRV:

• Real time safety critical operating system is independent from Linux. Both computing (cpu cores - harts) and IO (UARTs) resources are isolated.
• The RTOS is booted before Linux, guaranteeing best boot time for the safety critical environment.
• A strong isolation of the execution environments is in place. Linux workloads/crashes do not have any impact on the execution of the RTOS.