Advanced embedded systems can consist of many sensors, actuators and processors that are deployed on one or several boards, while having a demand of interacting with each other and sharing resources. Communication between different components usually has strict timing constraints. There is thus a strong need to provide solutions for time critical communication. This work focuses on both supporting real-time communication protocols over standard switched Ethernet networks and improving the real- time characteristics of distributed real-time systems, such as reducing delay and jitter. Software control systems may be subject to high interference caused by concurrency and resource sharing. Reducing delay and jitter in such systems is crucial for guaranteeing high performance and predictability.