Susan Remmert, Author at ELISA

Apr 12

ELISA Project at Linaro Connect 2023

By Susan Remmert Blog, Industry Conference

We’ve got a few more weeks to go before Linaro Connect, which takes place on April 26-28 at the Park Plaza London Riverbank in London. Once a year, engineers, developers, thought leader and software experts come together for technical sessions and hacking. Discussions focus on the future of open source software, solutions and best practices.

This year, ELISA Project is participating in the Linaro Connect 2023 event and will be presenting an update on the progress in Enabling Linux in Safety Applications (ELISA). The session, which is scheduled on Friday, April 28 from 11:20 – 11:35 am, will be presented by Philipp Ahmann, Product Manager Embedded Open Source at Bosch and Chair of the ELISA Technical Steering Committee (TSC) and Kate Stewart, Vice President of Dependable Embedded Systems at The Linux Foundation and Chair of the ELISA Medical Devices Working Group. Both speakers have extensive experience and knowledge in the fields of embedded systems, open-source software and safety-critical applications.

During the session, attendees will get an overview of the goals and technical strategy of the ELISA project. The presentation will cover the different work groups involved in the project, such as Linux Features for Safety-Critical Systems, Software Architecture, Open Source Engineering Process, Tool Investigation, and Code Improvement. The session will also explore how these work groups interact and contribute to the overall project.

The session will provide information on the methodologies and tools in use, existing challenges, and why the different puzzle pieces are all needed for enabling Linux in safety-critical applications. Attendees will leave the session with a better understanding of where the ELISA project stands today and what comes next. A discussion of how this work can complement other Linaro initiatives will be explored.

Learn more here.

Overall, the ELISA project’s attendance at Linaro Connect 2023 offers an intriguing chance to learn more about how the project is making Linux-based safety-critical applications possible as well as vertical use case working groups like Automotive, Medical, and Aerospace. These working groups are aimed at addressing specific challenges related to enabling Linux-based safety-critical applications in their respective domains.

If you’re attending Linaro Connect 2023, don’t miss the ELISA Project talk, especially if you’re interested in functional safety. The session will provide valuable insights into the project’s goals, strategies, challenges, and future plans.

To learn more or register for Linaro Connect, click on the main event website.

Mar 15

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Join ELISA @ the Safety-Critical Software Summit in June

By Susan Remmert Blog, Industry Conference

As open source is found more and more in safety-critical applications, the need to evaluate open source software that meets safety standards has increased. The Safety-Critical Software Summit, sponsored by the ELISA Project, will take place on June 27-30 in Prague, Czech Republic and virtually. The event gathers safety experts and open source developers to enable and advance the use of open source in safety-critical applications.

If you are new to the ELISA Project, here is what you need to know. ELISA members are defining and maintaining a common set of elements, processes and tools that can be incorporated into specific Linux-based, safety-critical systems amenable to safety certification. ELISA is also working with certification authorities and standardization bodies in multiple industries to establish how Linux can be used as a component in safety-critical systems. This is the first ever Safety-Critical Software event under the Embedded Open Source Summit (EOSS).

Here is a glimpse to the Summit topics:

Open Source Software Interaction with Safety Standards
Best Practices to Work with Regulatory Authorities when using Open Source
Best Practices for Security Updates to Safety-critical Systems
Safety Engineering Applied to Open Source Projects
Quality Assessments based on Data from Development
Development of Technical Features with Safety Relevance
Safety Analysis Approaches and Methodology to Apply to Systems
Case Studies of Existing use of Linux in Safety-critical Domains

To attend, register for Embedded Open Source Summit. 1 registration gives you access to ALL events featured under the Embedded Open Source Summit umbrella. In-person and virtual registration are both available. Register here.

Together with the Embedded Open Source Summit, Safety-Critical Software Summit provides a foundation for collaboration between these embedded development communities. The format will include presentations, BoFs, training, workshops and min-confs designed for real time problem solving and deep discussion.

To get an overview of the event, such as the important dates and the topics that will be covered, click here.

Stay tuned by subscribing to the ELISA Project newsletter or connect with us on Twitter or LinkedIn

Mar 01

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ELISA at FOSDEM (Video)

By Susan Remmert Ambassadors, Blog, Industry Conference

FOSDEM aka Free and Open Source Software Developers European Meeting is a non-commercial, volunteer-organized European event centered on free and open source software development that is aimed at developers. FOSDEM is held annually, usually during the first weekend of February, at the Université Libre de Bruxelles Solbosch campus in the southeast of Brussels, Belgium.

CNCF was an official sponsor and experts from various Linux Foundation projects came together to give keynotes and co-host devrooms including Embedded, Mobile & Automotive, Energy and SBOM.

In case you haven’t met the newly launched Linux Foundation Europe team, we invite you to read the latest blog “On the Road in February 2023.”

Philipp Ahmann, Chair of the ELISA Technical Steering Committee and Technical Business Development Manager at Robert Bosch GmbH, gave a presentation at FOSDEM titled, “The ELISA Project – Project insights and overview”. The lecture mainly focused on the goals and technical strategy of the project. It provided information about the different work groups, their interaction, and contributions.

ELISA members are working together to define and maintain a common set of tools and processes that can help companies demonstrate that a specific Linux-based system meets the necessary safety requirements for certification. These existing working groups focus on Linux Features for Safety-Critical Systems, Software Architecture, Open Source Engineering Process, Tool Investigation and Code Improvement. They are complemented by vertical use case working groups dealing with Automotive, Medical, and Aerospace.

During the talk, Philipp explained in detail about each working group. Safety Architecture group monitors the kernel for non safety related issues such as the watchdog kernel analysis and try to improve using tools and documentation and it is driven by use cases and demands of the products.

Linux features for safety critical systems group mainly work on the safety criticality part and not the generic features. The main goal is to look for the elements which could improve safety by doing incremental steps to make the system more dependable and robust.

While doing these processes, code quality is very important and hence the tool investigation and code improvement group. The WG uses tools and CI servers to identify the kernel issues and to make the kernel more reliable and robust.

Open Source Engineering Process WG was developed due to the challenges in Engineering. There are rigorous methods within kernel development. There is a strong demand from traditional project management when it comes to safety products. We can see that not every process compliance agrees with it directly. We need to find an equivalent to the open source development process compared to ISO 26262 requests for automotive products.

Systems work group works cross functional and cross projects and combine these elements involved in the above mentioned processes.

In order to tailor the systems accurately with these groups, ELISA Project has vertical use cases such as Aerospace, Automotive. Medical etc.

He also explains how ELISA Project is interacting with other communities such as Xen Project, Zephyr Project on safety critical topics, Automotive Grade Linux, SOAFEE and SDV on automotive use cases and Yocto project for build tooling and SBOM generation and SPDX for system SBOM data requirements.

In addition to the different work groups and their interactions Philipp also explained on the contributions of the different groups, use cases, used methodologies such as STPA and workload tracing and a status update on what to expect from ELISA Project.

As Philipp mentioned, based on George Bernard Shaw’s quote “If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas” we need to get a good understanding and bring things together.

Watch Philipp’s talk here: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/elisa/

We hope you enjoyed attending FOSDEM, met your friends👫 and colleagues and enjoyed the famous Belgium waffles🧇, fries🍟 and Beer🍻.

Dec 02

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What it takes to employ Linux in safety applications : An interview with Shuah Khan

By Susan Remmert Blog, Industry Conference, Mentorship

During the Open Source Summit Europe 2022, Shuah Khan, Linux Kernel Fellow at the Linux Foundation and previously the Chair of the ELISA Project Technical Steering Committee, met with Mike Vizard, Chief Content Officer, Techstrong TV, to discuss what it takes to employ Linux in safety applications and why the open source community is still looking to train top-notch maintainers.

This interview narrates the fundamental details that you need to know if you are new to ELISA Project and planning to contribute or get involved in the LF Project or any open source projects under Linux Foundation. The theme of the questions spanned from the need of safety programs and how Linux is involved in safety critical applications to how gender diversity and STEM education plays a role in the open source community and contribution.

ELISA Project as you know is simply defined as Enabling Linux In Safety Applications. Shuah Khan explains how ELISA is involved in many uses like automotive, medical etc and how the community is bringing together the safety experts to maintain safety critical platforms. She also explains with an example on how the project works in an automotive use case. When it comes to safety certification, she explains how ELISA Project is helping with the resources for the community that are planning to certify their safety critical platforms running in Linux. The role of safety experts and the kernel experts are like bread and butter. While safety experts look at the safety angle of the product or platform, kernel experts bridge the gap between safety and kernel.

There are sometimes concerns in people’s minds that in the future the regulators might be asking tough questions about safety when they develop medical, automotive applications. There are also lots of costs involved for these certifications. Considering the economical situation now, how the ELISA project can help the community is worthwhile.

For those who are currently studying or looking to get involved in the ELISA Project to learn more about Kernel and safety certification process, starting from this part (06:00) of the interview is a must watch.

This part explains about the talent ELISA Project is looking for, how LFX mentorship program helps the newcomers to integrate into the open source community, to help the code in and make them an expert in their preferred field.

In many cases, some are often uninformed about the possibilities of learning or don’t know where to start with the open source contribution. What we want to convey is our project has structural programs, resources to work and kernel webinars to learn. At the end of the program, there is also a virtual mentee showcase where the mentees explain about what they have done during the program to the member company representatives which is a potential opportunity for further steps like job or research programs.

The interview also discusses the outreach programs to attract talents from various parts of the world and the STEM initiatives.

We invite you to watch this video to learn more and if it helped you to learn something new, then share it with your communities: https://techstrong.tv/videos/open-source-summit-europe-2022/shuah-khan-the-linux-foundation-open-source-summit-europe-2022.

Learn more about the ELISA Project here

Nov 23

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ELISA Summit: Trusted Execution Inside Secure Enclaves (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, ELISA Summit

An estimated 185 people registered for the ELISA Summit, which took place virtually on September 7-8 to gather Linux community members and attendees from around the world. The event, which featured 15 sessions and 20 speakers, was open to anyone involved or interested in defining, using, or learning about common elements, processes, and tools that can be incorporated into Linux-based, safety-critical systems amenable to safety certification. Members of the ELISA Project community presented best practices and overviews on emerging trends and hot topics to using open source software in safety-critical applications and detailed working group updates.

We’ll be featuring event videos in blogs each week. Today, we focus on a session presented by Işıl Öz, Assistant Professor, Izmir Institute of Technology and Elana Copperman, System Architect, Mobileye. They gives an overview on the topic “Trusted Execution Inside Secure Enclaves“.

Trusted Execution Environments (TEE), which are hardware-implemented encryption technologies, ensure that applications work in an encrypted and secure way by protecting them from the operating system or other programs. While the sensitive data and code are stored inside private regions of enclave memory, unauthorized entities cannot modify them.

In this talk, the speakers will share basics about enclave memories and their usage scenarios. They will talk about open-source projects on Intel SGX technology and our experience in our ELISA mentorship program. In addition to that, the topics also include the safety issues with security aspects and mention about the impact of secure enclave implementations for safety-critical systems.

Watch the video below or check out the presentation materials here.

For more details about the ELISA Project, visit the main website here.

Nov 23

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ELISA Summit: Analysis of eBPF for Safety Use Case (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, ELISA Summit, Mentorship

We’ll be featuring event videos in blogs each week. Today, we focus on a session presented by Elana Copperman, Mobileye & Jules Irenge, Linux Foundation Mentee. They will be sharing their insights on the topic “eBPF for safety use cases”.

Jules shares his experience of working as part of the LXF/ELISA Mentorship Program. The program is focused on ebpf and xdp.

On one hand, eBPF is a kernel mechanism that provides a sandboxed runtime environment in the Linux kernel without changing kernel source code or loading kernel modules.

eBPF programs can be attached to various kernel subsystems, including networking, tracing and Linux security modules (LSM).

On the other, eXpress Data Path (xdp) is a technology that enables high performance data communication, bypassing most of the operating system networking stack using eBPF.

Elana shares an analysis of eBPF for safety, focusing on xdp, and demonstrate how these can be used for safety.

In the process she showcase eBPF /xdp tools that do and count how many packets have been accepted, rejected or redirected and how this can be used for tracing.

The goal of this presentation is to guide system administrators and programmers to consider using this technology to improve on software safety.

To learn more, watch the video below.

For more details about the ELISA Project, visit the main website here.

Nov 22

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ELISA Seminar: PREEMPT_RT – How not to break it (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, Seminar Series

In March, the ELISA Project launched the Monthly Seminar Series, which focuses on hot topics related to ELISA and its mission. Presenters are members, contributors and thought leaders from the ELISA Project and surrounding communities. You can find all of the seminar videos here.

In October, Sebastian Siewior from Linutronix presented a seminar titled, “PREEMPT_RT – how not to break it.”

The PREEMPT_RT patch set has only a handful patches left until it can be enabled on the X86 Architecture at the time of writing. The work has not finished once the patches are fully merged. A new issue is how to not break parts of PREEMPT_RT in future development by making assumption which are not compatible or lead to large latencies. Another problem is how to address limitations on PREEMPT_RT like the big softirq/ bottom halves lock which can lead to high latencies.

A short background of the RTL Collaborative Project: The Real Time Linux collaborative project was established to help coordinate the efforts around mainlining Preempt RT and ensuring that the maintainers have the ability to continue development work, long-term support and future research of RT. In coordination with the broader community, the workgroup aims to encourage broader adoption of RT, improve testing automation and documentation and better prioritize the development roadmap.

Would like to know more on how it’s all started? You can find more details here: https://wiki.linuxfoundation.org/realtime/rtl/start.

Watch the full video here:

Materials from the seminar can be found here.

Learn more about ELISA Project.

Nov 18

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ELISA Summit : Using memory access error detection (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, ELISA Summit

We’ll be featuring event videos in blogs each week. Today, we focus on a session presented by Priyanka Verma, Senior Software Quality Engineer, Red Hat GmbH and Dennis Brendel, Senior Software Quality Engineer, Red Hat on the topic “Using memory access error detection for safety argumentation”.

Kernel Electric-Fence (KFENCE) and Kernel Address Sanitizer (KASAN) are memory safety error detectors with support in the Linux kernel. This presentation explores how well KASAN and KFENCE detect different types of memory access errors with various configuration settings to assess the suitability of these memory access sanitizers to develop safety argumentation.

Watch the video below or check out the presentation materials here.

For more details about the ELISA Project, visit the main website here.

Nov 16

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ELISA Summit : AUTOSAR Adaptive Applications in Rust (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, ELISA Summit

We’ll be featuring event videos in blogs each week. Today, we focus on a session presented by Christof Petig, Advanced Software Developer, Aptiv Services Deutschland GmbH and Huzaifa Saadat, Head of Center of Excellence AUTOSAR, Alten GmbH on the topic “AUTOSAR Adaptive Applications in Rust”. The talk mainly focuses on the introduction to AUTOSAR adaptive, benefits of Rust wrt FuSa, presenting specific techniques for Rust C++ interaction within AUTOSAR adaptive, outlook towards Rust for AUTOSAR classic.

Watch the video below or check out the presentation materials here.

For more details about the ELISA Project, visit the main website here.

Nov 11

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ELISA Summit: Medical Devices Working Group Update (Video)

By Susan Remmert Blog, ELISA Summit, Working Group

We’ll be featuring event videos in blogs each week. Today, we focus on a session presented by the team members from ELISA Medical Device Working Group: Jason Smith, Jeffrey (Jefro) Osier-Mixon, Kate Stewart, Milan Lakhani,Nicole Pappler, Shefali Sharma, Shuah Khan on the topic of Medical Device Working Group update.

The main goal of this working group is to develop best practices to analyze systems and identify the components of Linux that will be participating in safety analysis, in the context of medical device safety standards. The main activities include

Analysis of open source medical device application (openAPS)
Create documentation of results of STPA analysis (system, requirements, architecture, design, …)
Comparison of results of STPA analysis to 62304 Software of Unknown Provenance (SOUP)
Create documentation on usage of tooling to support kernel analysis

In this session, the team shares progress to date, as well as some of the lessons learned and areas where they could use some help. The deliverables being worked on for the next quarter will be previewed as well.

Watch the video below or check out the presentation materials here.

For more details about the ELISA Project, visit the main website here. To learn more about the Medical Device Working Group or to join the community, click here.

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