Operating Systems Used in Modern Aircraft: VxWorks, Integrity‑178B, and C++ in the F‑35

Recent Boeing 737 MAX accidents have raised concerns about aviation safety, and the FAA’s delegation of safety assessments to Boeing sparked curiosity about the operating systems used in aircraft.

Aviation software is not fundamentally different from ordinary computer systems; it consists of processors, buses, I/O devices, storage, networking, operating systems, and applications, but must meet far stricter reliability, robustness, and real‑time requirements.

1. VxWorks – The real‑time operating system employed in the Boeing 787 and the AH‑64 helicopter.

2. Integrity‑178B – The DO‑178B‑certified OS used in aircraft such as the B‑2, F‑16, F‑22, F‑35, and the Airbus A380.

These platforms interconnect their internal devices via a specialized Ethernet variant called AFDX, which functions like standard Ethernet at the application layer.

Historically, many of these safety‑critical systems were programmed in the ADA language; however, to reduce costs, the F‑35 program has transitioned to C++.

The F‑35’s processors are based on the PowerPC instruction set, and to guarantee reliability, the project often uses the CompCert compiler (which compiles C99) to avoid compiler‑induced bugs and ensure that compiled code matches the source exactly.

For readers interested in advancing their knowledge of system architecture, the article encourages sharing and joining a technical community for further discussion.