The Linux Foundation has posted slide presentations from this week’s Embedded Linux Conference, which featured the first ever ELC keynote by Linus Torvalds.

In case you missed this week’s North American Embedded Linux Conference and OpenIoT Summit in San Diego, you’ll be happy to know that videos of the live streamed event will be released in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, the Linux Foundation has posted slide presentations from the event, as shown in the links farther below.

This year’s event marks the first time Linux creator and kernel overseer Linus Torvalds gave a keynote at an Embedded Linux Conference (ELC). His appearance reflects the growing importance of embedded in the Linux universe, especially of the IoT variety.

Gilbarco Encore pump from 2007

As detailed in a Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols ZDNet summary of Torvalds’s keynote, the man who dreamed up Linux a quarter century ago admitted to having been surprised by the appearance of Linux in embedded devices about 15 years ago. “The first one that really caught my eye was a gas pump running Linux,” said Torvalds in an onstage conversation with Intel’s Dick Hohndel. (We’re not sure if this was this Malte Products gas pump system or an antecedent of the later Gilbarco Encore system, or yet another tuxified pump.)

Today, Torvalds sees a bright future for Linux in the Internet of Things, despite the fact that most of the sensor endpoints will not require it. “You also need smart devices,” he told the ELC audience. “The stupid devices talk different standards. Maybe you won’t see Linux on the leaf nodes, but you’ll see Linux in the hubs.”

Clearly, the rise of embedded Linux has been something of a headache for Torvalds. Much of it has arrived in a fragmented field of ARM-based devices that haven’t always stayed in sync with the mainline kernel.

Torvalds noted, however, that while the “embedded world has been hard to work with, it’s getting better.” Later, he noted: “The ARM community, in particular, is getting better, so now the kernel people can keep up with ARM embedded systems. It’s not perfect, but we’re getting better.”

As for IoT, Torvalds is concerned less with the potential security threats as he is with the likelihood that there will be multiple conflicting standards, particularly in home automation. “I’d love there to be one standard, but I don’t think we’ll see that for IoT connectivity,” he noted.

Thomas Gleixner

Other ELC keynotes were given by Bryan Che (Red Hat), Sarah Cooper (M2Mi), Mike Richmond (OCF), Mark Skarpness (Intel), Andy Stanford-Clark (IBM), Raj Talluri (Qualcomm), and Peter Virk (Jaguar Land Rover). There was also a keynote on Preempt-RT from real-time Linux guru and new Linux Foundation Fellow Thomas Gleixner.

Well over 100 technical presentations were presented at ELC, many of which are now available in posted slide shows. In addition to sessions detailing updates on traditional embedded Linux technologies such as security, memory management, real-time Linux, interfaces, cryptography, debugging, and the like, you’ll find presentations on drones, robots, Project ARA, the Chip SBC, and much more.

Below are links to the slides (in PDF format) from 50 of ELC 2016’s talks. Click each presentation’s title to download its slides.

	Introduction to Memory Management in Linux by Alan Ott
	Implementing GCC5’s Profile-based Performance Optimizations On Embedded Systems Using The Yocto Project by Alejandro Enedino Hernandez Samaniego
	Buildroot vs. OpenEmbedded/Yocto: a four hands discussion by Alexandre Belloni
	Using DT overlays to support the C.H.I.P.’s capes by Antoine Tenart
	Static code checking in the Linux kernel by Arnd Bergmann
	Modernizing the NAND framework: the big picture by Boris Brezillon
	Debugging Custom Hardware with Linux – Tools to make your hardware engineers love you by Chris Martin
	Memory Barriers in the Linux Kernel: Semantics and Practises by Davidlohr Bueso
	Cryptography basics for embedded developers by Eystein Stenberg
	Devicetree BoFs by Frank Rowand
	Devicetree Specification by Kanta Vekaria and Grant Likely
	Embedded Virtualization by Greg Ungerer
	HDMI CEC: What? Why? How? by Hans Verkuil
	I2C hacking demistified by Igor Stoppa
	Xenomai 3: An Overview of the Real-Time Framework for Linux by Jan Kiszka
	Science Standardised Embedded Data infrastructure for Drones (SSEDD) by Jane Wyngaard
	How to port Linux to a new processor architecture by Joël Porquet
	Hacking a commercial Drone to run an open source autopilot – APM on Parrot Bebop by Julien BERAUD
	SCHED_DEADLINE: a status update by Juri Lelli
	Project Artemis – Visual Navigation for Flying Robots by Kabir Mohammed
	Build Embedded Linux systems with Clang/LLVM by Khem Raj
	Debugging the Linux Kernel with GDB by Kieran Bingham
	Understand USB (in Linux) by Krzysztof Opasiak
	libiio – Access to Sensor Devices made easy by Lars-Peter Clausen
	Lessons from Ion by Laura Abbott
	Using Openembedded with Snapdragon Flight by Mark Charlebois
	Stale data, or how we (mis-)manage modern caches by Mark Rutland
	Bringing display and 3D to the C.H.I.P computer by Maxime Ripard
	Securing Embedded Linux by Michael E Anderson
	Understanding ARM HW Debug Options by Michael E Anderson
	Drone simulation with gazebo by Nicolas CARRIER
	Linux Integrated System Analysis (LISA) & Friends by Patrick Bellasi
	Google ProjectARA Power Management Challenges by Patrick Titiano
	Automated Testing Laboratory for Embedded Linux Distributions by Paweł Wieczorek
	Tizen based remote controller car using raspberry pi2 by Pintu Kumar
	OpenEmbedded in the Real World by Scott Murray
	A quick survey of OSS licenses, tools, and compliance by Sean Hudson
	Embedded Systems meets real life — The Orange Empire Railroad Museum Signal Garden by Stephen D Oualline
	Understanding a Real-Time System by Steven Rostedt
	Bluetooth on modern Linux by Szymon Janc
	IPv6 For Developers Used to IPv4 by Thiago Macieira
	OpenBMC – a customized Linux distribution running on BMC by Tian Fang
	Introduction to the Fuego test system by Tim Bird
	Why is robotics converging on embedded linux and where’s it going next? by Tully Foote
	Developing a Standard Interface for Drones by Tully Foote
	Increase test coverage in Linux based distros by Victor Rodriguez
	Swapping on Android: compression relieves the pressure? by Vitaly Wool
	Socio-Technical Aspects of Long Term Embedded Systems Maintenance by Wolfgang Mauerer
	The Latest status of CE Workgroup Shared Embedded Linux Distribution Project by Yoshitake Kobayashi
	Introduction of Civil Infrastructure Platform Project by Yoshitake Kobayashi

 
Further information

The North American Embedded Linux Conference and OpenIoT Summit slide shows are posted at this Linux Foundation events page. Videos should follow in the coming weeks.