RTEMS 4.8.1 On-Line Library

Key Concepts Object Names

RTEMS C User's Guide

2.2.1: Object Names

An object name is an unsigned thirty-two bit entity associated with the object by the user. The data type rtems_name is used to store object names.

Although not required by RTEMS, object names are often composed of four ASCII characters which help identify that object. For example, a task which causes a light to blink might be called "LITE". The rtems_build_name routine is provided to build an object name from four ASCII characters. The following example illustrates this:

rtems_object_name my_name;

my_name = rtems_build_name( 'L', 'I', 'T', 'E' );

However, it is not required that the application use ASCII characters to build object names. For example, if an application requires one-hundred tasks, it would be difficult to assign meaningful ASCII names to each task. A more convenient approach would be to name them the binary values one through one-hundred, respectively.

RTEMS provides a helper routine, rtems_get_object_name, which can be used to obtain the name of any RTEMS object using just its ID. This routine attempts to convert the name into a printable string.

The following example illustrates the use of this method to print an object name:

#include <rtems.h>
#include <rtems/bspIo.h>

void print_name(rtems_id the_object)
{
  char  buffer[10];   /* name assumed to be 10 characters or less */
  char *result;

  result = rtems_get_object_name( id, sizeof(buffer), buffer );
  printk( "ID=0x%08x name=%s\n", id, ((result) ? result : "no name") );
}

RTEMS C User's Guide