Intent (software)

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Tao Group's intent is a sofware platform which is licensed to third party hardware or service providers. It enables games and multimedia entertainment to be delivered on mobiles and other digital devices. It simplifies content management by delivering code in an efficient hardware independent format.

The intent platform can be run either as the native operating system or as an application under another OS. Service code is delivered in a format called Virtual Processor (VP) which is translated on the device to the particular native machine code.

The intent portfolio includes support for:

C/C++ games with openGL ES 3D rendering
A Java virtual machine which translates to native code.
An internet browser optimised for small screens
A BAFTA award winning multimedia mixer and ringtone engine

Hardware independence is important to suppliers of mobiles, PDAs, set top boxes and other devices that can run multimedia or need software updating as it both reduces the support cost of older equipment and also ensures older content can be used on new equipment.

Unlike .NET CIL and Java bytecode intent's intermediate language VP does not inherently provide security facilities. Such facilities are available under its JVM but 'native' intent code must only be run from a trusted supplier. The VP code is however more compact and has better optimisation hinting so the translator can be both small and efficient.

The intent JVM runs Java bytecode by first translating it to VP and then translating the result to native code. This results in a Java implementation which is both easy to port and very fast.

Like uCLinux systems without a memory manager are supported including support for shared libraries. The stack can be extended automatically by linking to extra space. Object-oriented methods and subclassing are integral part of the system design and the audio visual interface uses this methodology extensively.