Open Hardware

What Why How

Akshai M

Outline

• What is Open Source Hardware (OSHW)?
• Why do we do it?
• How do we design it?
• IoT and OSHW
• Relevant Devices

Free

• "Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of free as in free speech, not as in free beer." — Richard Stallman
• We'll refer to the “free beer” example as “gratis” and the “free speech” example as “libre”

Open Source Hardware Official Definition

Closed >> Open

• Closed Hardware
• Open hardware, closed format files, closed tools
• Open hardware, open format files, closed tools
• Open everything

Comparison

• Closed Hardware - – like having object code/executable only
• Open hardware, closed format files, closed tools – Like having an encrypted library
• Open hardware, open format files, closed tools – Like having all the necessary library with a expensive, closed compiler (i.e. not GCC)
• Open everything – Like having source code and using GCC or similar.

Comparison

The Test

• Can one other person in the world build what you have built?
• What about 10 people?100? 1000?
• How much above BOM did it cost them?

Why OSHW ?

• Sharing
• Caring
• Support
• Community
• Marketing

Why is OSHW Mainstream?

• Cheap product development process
• Accelerated product development
• Lesser failure rate
• Can be applied to wide range of products
• Highly customize-able and configurable
• Reduces distribution and inventory costs
• Can be used for social causes

For a student /Teacher

• Cheaper and easier way of getting into new areas
• Useful DIY projects
• Educational projects
• Easy and cheap prototyping and testing
• Community welfare
• Career advancement
• Sense of satisfaction

Thinking Process

Traditional Process

OSHW Process

Think Inside The Box

HOW

Design = Documentation

Levels of Compression

• Schematic to PDF
• Layout to gerbers
• Mechanical designs to STL

Open Tools ? Maybe Not

Designed and propogated using non open tools

Tools

Tradeoff

Gratis / Freeware

Freemium

Non Gratis Non Libre but open standards

Gratis and Libre

Few Worth Noting - Electrical

• KiCad
• GEDA
• Berkely SPICE
• Octave

Few Worth Noting - Mechanical

CAD

CAM

Machine Control

Choosing the right hardware platform

Reasons

• Scale
• Purpose
• Community

Raspberry Pi

• Scale - 7
• Purpose - 6
• Community - 9

Beagle Board

• Scale - 5
• Purpose - 8
• Community - 6

Olimex OLinuXino

• Scale - 7
• Purpose - 8
• Community - 3

Arduino

• Scale - 6
• Purpose - 8
• Community - 10

Thats it !

- Akshai M - akshai.m@ieee.org