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Versatile Real-Time Executive (VRTX) is areal-time operating system (RTOS) developed and marketed by the companyMentor Graphics. VRTX is suitable for both traditional board-basedembedded systems andsystem on a chip (SoC) architectures. It has been superseded by theNucleus RTOS.^[1]

The VRTXoperating system began as a product of Hunter & Ready, a company founded byJames Ready and Colin Hunter in 1980 which later becameReady Systems. This firm later merged with Microtec Research in 1993, and went public in 1994. This firm was then acquired byMentor Graphics in 1995^[2] and VRTX became a Mentor product.

The VRTX operating system was released in September 1981.^[3]

Since the 1980s, the chief rival to VRTX has beenVxWorks, aWind River Systems product. VxWorks had its start in the mid 1980s ascompiler andassembly language tools to supplement VRTX, named VRTX works, or VxWorks. Later, Wind River created their own real-time kernel offering similar to VRTX.

VRTX comes in several flavors:

• VRTX:16-bit VRTX, for Z8000, 8086, etc.
• VRTX-32:32-bit VRTX, for M68K, AMD29K, etc.
• MPV: Multiprocessor VRTX for distributed applications, such as distributed across VME backplanes.
• VRTX-mc: Micro-Controller VRTX, for small systems needing minimal memory use.
• VRTX-oc: On-chip VRTX,freeware communitysource code for personal and academic use, license required for commercial use.
• VRTX-sa: Scalable Architecture VRTX for full operating system features. Loosely based onCarnegie Mellon University'sMachmicrokernel principles.
• SPECTRA:Virtual machine (VM) implementation for running a VRTX VM onUnix-like hosts. Also includes an openintegrated development environment allowing third-party tools open access to cross-development resources.^[4]

Most companies developing software with VRTX usereduced instruction set computer (RISC)microprocessors includingARM,MIPS,PowerPC, or others.

VRTX runs theHubble Space Telescope.

VRTX runs theWide Area Augmentation System.^[5]

VRTX was the first operating system ported to theAMD Am29000.^[6]

VRTX is used as a core for theMotorola proprietaryP2K [ru] operating system, which runs on most company devices since the Motorola V60 and T280i, up to the Motorola RAZR² V9x. It runs on several hardware platforms including LTE (Motorola V300,V500, V600, E398, RAZR V3 and others featuring theARM7 processor), LTE2 (Motorola L7 and upcoming devices with 176x220 screen resolution), Rainbow POG (3G phones featuring anMCORE processor from Motorola E1000 to RAZR V3x), Argon (all new 3G phones with 532 MHzARM11 processor since Motorola RAZR MAXX V6, and V3xx), and others.

• List of telescope parts and construction
• Xenomai is a real-time developmentsoftware framework cooperating with theLinux kernel. It could be used to port the VRTX based system to Linux although not all features are supported.
• VRTX has reached end-of-life, an automated porting tool namedOS Changer is available to reuse the code on a modern OS.^[7]

• Official website, Mentor Graphics

• ARM operating systems
• Embedded operating systems
• Proprietary operating systems
• Real-time operating systems
• Microkernel-based operating systems
• Microkernels
• X86 operating systems
• MIPS operating systems

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