RTnet - a flexible hard real-time networking framework

In this paper, the open source project RTnet is presented. RTnet provides a customisable and extensible framework for hard real-time communication over Ethernet and other transport media. The paper describes architecture, core components, and protocols of RTnet. FireWire is introduced as a powerful alternative to Ethernet, and its integration into RTnet is presented. Moreover, an overview of available and future application protocols for this networking framework is given.