Alpha: a nonproprietary OS for large, complex, distributed real-time systems

Alpha is a novel nonproprietary operating system for large, complex, distributed real-time systems. Examples include combat platform and battle management, factory automation, and telecommunications. Such systems run distributed applications and need global (transnode) resource management. They are inherently asynchronous, dynamic, and stochastic, and yet must be highly dependable. Alpha includes support for maintaining application-specific correctness, of distributed execution and consistency of distributed data, and best-effort management of all resources directly with actual application time constraints. Certain features of Alpha are briefly described. First the distribution and real-time characteristics of Alpha´s application context are summarized; some of Alpha´s approaches to dealing with distribution are discussed. An overview of the project history and status is provided