RELIANCE DM-20 is an industrial controller with virtualization capability, such as Emerson’s controller with edge computing technology, including multiple processing cores, a large number of digital communication ports, and other features that support parallel operation of a real-time operating system for control and a universal operating system.

Nowadays, hardware advancements are common in the commercial RELIANCE DM-20 world, such as multi-core processors and large memory. By using multi-core technology and Type 1 virtualization, industrial controller platforms can now run multiple operating systems on the same processor, including a real-time operating system for control, which has little impact on determinism and speed (Figure 1). The second operating system – Linux guest operating system can be used for other edge processing. With the increase in the number of available kernels in the future, even more operating systems can be deployed.

The possibility of running multiple operating systems on a controller with edge computing (RELIANCE DM-20) technology is a significant change (Figure 2). The core focus is to maintain a powerful real-time operating system for controlling functions, just like when using PLC, so as not to affect automation functions. The second operating system running as a supplement to the real-time operating system provides additional computing options. These two operating systems must be independent but maintain interactive capabilities.