Open Hardware Repository - Introduction
The Open Hardware Repository ohwr.org is a place on the web for electronics designers at experimental physics facilities to collaborate on open hardware designs, much in the philosophy of the free software movement.
The Manifesto on the ohr-support project wiki page explains the numerous advantages to working in a completely open environment, while on these same ohr-support wiki pages you can find how you can set up your own project. Note that all information on this site is accessible to anyone; you will not be able to access more material by registering.
The CERN Open Hardware Licence (CERN OHL) governs the use, copying, modification and distribution of hardware design documentation, and the manufacture and distribution of products. Other open licence types may be used for projects on the OHR site.
Open Hardware can be commercial
Commercial | Non-commercial | |
Open | Winnning combination. Best of both worlds. | Whole support burden falls on developers. Not scalable. |
Proprietary | Vendor lock-in. | Dedicated non-reusable projects. |
Statistics (January 2013)
There are 100 projects on ohwr:
- 52 hardware projects
- 39 HDL or Software projects
- 9 other projects
There are eleven instititutes leading the different projects: CERN,
Soleil, GSI, Brazillian Light Source, University of Bristol, Warsaw
University of Technology, University of Zurich, University of Pavia,
Rockefeller University, University of Cape Town, Heidelberg
University.
And there are 16 commercial companies are
involved who develop, produce and/or
test open hardware products.
What CERN writes about OHR
- CERN Courier: Hardware joins the open movement (June 2011)
- CERN Bulletin: Open hardware for open science (July 2011)
- CERN Press Release: CERN launches Open Hardware initiative (July 2011)
-
CERN Annual
Report 2011
- Message from the President of Council (page 4)
- Making an impact (page 32)
What others write about OHR
- Milkymist: [Milkymist-devel] OHWR - Open Hardware @ CERN (Feb 2011)
- The first CERN Press Release CERN launches Open Hardware initiative in July 2011 gave a large impact. We stopped tracking since this press coverage.
- Blog from Javier D. Garcia-Lasheras
- Introducing CERN's Open Hardware Repository - EEtimes December 2013
- Blogs on All Programmable Planet
- Technology Born @ CERN, October 2013
- Quotes
Companies using the OHR site
In December 2012 sixteen companies from eleven countries were actively using the OHR site to develop or produce open hardware, software and drivers. These companies may be paid for the open developments. Actually in July 2014 the number is the same.
Licences used for CERN Open Hardware designs
CERN uses the following licences for most Open Hardware designs:
Hardware
Software
-
GNU General Public License - GNU
GPL for Software (Python,
C, ...)
- Example of use in the OHR project PTS, Production Test Suite
Gateware
-
GNU Lesser General Public License - GNU
LGPL for Gateware,
i.e. HDL designs whose purpose is to end up as FPGA bistreams or
ASICs (VHDL, Verilog, ...)
- Example of use in an OHR project
- Note: we think that there is curently no perfect copyleft license for gateware. We are trying to contribute to remedy that situation. See Document. In the meantime we are using LGPL as many other people do, including many projects in opencores.org.
Images
See also:* Final Report of the Open Source Software Licence Task Force that formulates recommendations on which licence should be used for software developed at CERN.
Open Hardware Repository
- OHR Home page
- OHR Getting Started
- Real examples that show that being Open improves quality, generates new developments and new collaborations
See also
Open Hardware Workshops
Articles about Open Hardware
-
Open Source Hardware (OSHW) Statement of Principles and Definition
v1.0
- Note that the CERN OHL is compliant with the OSHW definition criteria.
- MakingSociety, documents the rise of open soure hardware companies
- Manuel Castells on Open Source.
- Open source business models in the P2P Foundation website.
Other Open Hardware sites
- Dangerous Prototypes, a new open source hardware project every month
- Instructables: Make, how-to and DIY
- Kickstarter Open Hardware, a funding platform
- OH&A products, wiki
- Open Hardware Facebook community (not related to ohwr.org)
- Open Hardware Hub, a place to post and contribute to open source hardware projects
- Qi, promoters of Copyleft Hardware
- Solderpad, a place to share, discover and collaborate on electronic projects
OH directories
- Commons-Based Peer Production directory, directory of many types of Commons Based Peer Productions (CBPP).
Open Source Hardware Organizations
- Open Source Hardware Organization
- OH&A - Open Source Hardware and Design Alliance: web, wiki
23 July 2014