- published: 13 Oct 2015
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VxWorks is a real-time operating system developed as proprietary software by Wind River Systems of Alameda, California, USA. First released in 1987, VxWorks is designed for use in embedded systems.
VxWorks started as a set of enhancements to a simple real-time operating system called VRTX sold by Ready Systems (later becoming a Mentor Graphics product in 1995). At the time, VRTX lacked features such as a file system or an integrated development environment. Wind River created VxWorks to turn the VRTX kernel into a full embedded operating system and development environment. The VxWorks name is believed to be a pun on VRTX ("VRTX Works").
Initially, Wind River had an agreement to sell VRTX with VxWorks. However, in 1987, anticipating the termination of its reseller contract, Wind River developed its own kernel (written by an intern) to replace VRTX within VxWorks.
Intel acquired Wind River Systems on July 17, 2009.
VxWorks is designed for use in embedded systems.
The key features of the current OS are: