Green Hills Software commemorates 10-Year anniversary of INTEGRITY-178B Operating System with introduction of new Rapid-Prototype software development platform

INTEGRITY-178B is the only operating system in the world that has been proven to simultaneously meet the software safety requirements of RTCA/DO-178B Level A for safety and total reliability, and the information assurance requirements of the U.S. Government’s EAL6+ Separation Kernel Protection Profile (SKPP) for absolute security.

To commemorate INTEGRITY-178B’s 10-year service history and certification pedigree in critical airborne avionics, communications and flight control systems, Green Hills Software is offering for the first time its premier high assurance INTEGRITY-178B operating system as a prototyping license. The field-proven INTEGRITY-178B operating system will be available as part of a complete Rapid Prototyping kit that includes the MULTI® integrated development environment (including optimizing C and C++ compilers), a Green Hills JTAG debug probe, and an INTEGRITY-178B operating system licence, targeted for a third-party processor board, which can be used for rapid and cost-effective development of safety- and security-critical applications. Software developers and system integrators may choose a Rapid Prototyping kit for a specific processor by selecting from a list of supported boards that includes PowerPC, QorIQ, MIPS, ARM and Intel-based microprocessor support.

More on INTEGRITY-178B

In 2001, following four calendar years of DO-178B Level A-compliant software planning, development, verification, analysis and documentation work by Green Hills Software’s dedicated team of high assurance software experts, INTEGRITY-178B was delivered to its launch customer, Rockwell Collins. Rockwell Collins became the first airborne equipment manufacturer to integrate INTEGRITY-178B into a flight-critical system that required compliance with RTCA/DO-178B Level A. INTEGRITY-178B was used on Rockwell Collins’ Avionics Management and Display System aboard the Sikorsky S-92 helicopter. Following this initial customer delivery, Green Hills Software has since completed over fifty-seven RTCA/DO-178B Level A and/or EAL6+/SKPP-compliant deliveries of its multi-level secure, partitioned operating system for more than 30 different microprocessors.

In the last ten years, INTEGRITY-178B has been adopted and deployed by critical U.S. defence systems and commercial avionics. Modern aircraft systems and communication systems that depend on INTEGRITY-178B’s absolute security and total reliability include Lockheed Martin’s F-22, F-35, C-130J, Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle, and GPS III satellites; Boeing’s 787 (including both the Flight Control System and Integrated Surveillance System), 737, 757, 767 and C-17; Airbus’ A380 and A400M; Sikorsky’s S-92 and CH-148; Northrop Grumman’s B-2.

INTEGRITY-178B has continued to evolve over the last ten years with new features and layered product options and extensions without impacting its proven pedigree. Green Hills has expanded its high assurance multi-level secure RTOS product offering over the years with the following RTCA/DO-178B Level A-compliant optional features for INTEGRITY-178B: ARINC-653 APEX and file system support, Embedded C++ support, two different Ada language profiles (GMART and GSTART), a Journaling File System, the UDP/IP IPFLITE network stack, and TFTP support. System integrators that require additional capabilities without detailed certification evidence for specific functionality within their system may also incorporate other INTEGRITY-178B layered options including full C/C++ language support, full Ada95 language support, and a TCP/IP IPv4/IPv6 networking option that includes the host stack, advanced router stack, Net-SNMP stack and other advanced networking capabilities.

Continuing its trademark of being the world’s most reliable and trusted real-time operating system, Version 4 of INTEGRITY-178B was recently certified by the National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP), a U.S. government initiative operated by the National Security Agency (NSA), to Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 6+, High Robustness. This is the second time that NIAP and the NSA have rigorously evaluated and certified INTEGRITY-178B according to the requirements defined in the U.S. Government’s Separation Kernel Protection Profile. While other RTOS vendors continue to make safety and security certification promises or claim having a “certifiable” product, Green Hills Software continues its proven and verifiable track record of actually delivering DO-178B Level A and EAL6+/SKPP-compliant operating systems and components to customers and certification authorities using its own dedicated organisation of high assurance software experts.