Can a product be called OSHW if it uses a chip you can't get data for? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 12:14:43 am
content: Looking at a couple of recent products, NeTV and Raspberry Pi, both of which use CPUs that you can't get data on without an NDA, can these really be regarded as being in the spirit of OSHW?I have no doubt that the datasheet for the Broadcom chip in RP will leak out eventually (or be documented by reverse engineering) due to the large user base, but I think Broadcom are losing more than they think they gain by not publishing data, as they could easily miss out on significant design-ins from people who start out by tinkering with the RP.Thoughts...?

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 12:37:34 am
content: Is the chip available to purchase at least? I presume that if you can buy or make all the required parts and use the published design to assemble a working unit yourself, then it at least qualifies somewhat as an open design.I read a comment on another forum that someone wanted to assemble and sell RPi units independently of the RP group, and they took legal action to shut him down. I haven't found the details of the story, but that seems like a bigger problem if it is truly the case.

author: firewalker
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 12:44:42 am
content: Is R-pi OSHW? Can't remember and their page is out (anti-SOPA).Alexander.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 12:51:48 am
content: Quote from: IanB on January 19, 2012, 12:37:34 amISTR Eben Upton saying in an interview they'd be more than Happy if a Chinese manufacturer wanted to churn them out. They're not in it to make a profit AFAIUI

author: gregariz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 01:02:32 am
content: I think if they give you the schematic and maybe gerbers they are having a good stab at it.Looking at the product the main competitive feature seems to be price (so they need volume)... and I'm guessing that they chose most of the components on the board with that in mind. If it were more expensive, I'd kind of look at the beagle board instead.

author: amspire
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 01:18:53 am
content: Quote from: IanB on January 19, 2012, 12:37:34 amIn a press statement, one of the Raspberry Pi founders saidQuoteIf there was a legal issue with a clone, it could easily be about misuse of trademark names or something. If you try and sell a clone as a "Raspberry Pi" without permission, that is not right.The Raspberry Pi site is down, but I think they are actually working under a Creative Commons - ShareAlike license rather the OSHW or Cern OHL. So if a clone company did not give suitable attribution to Raspberry Pi, and did not release their own design information under the CC BY-SA license, then their license to use the Raspberry Pi design is void and they cannot legally sell their clone due to copyright infrigment.Back to the original question, it is within the "spirit" of OSHW. OSHW does not even require that documentation should be free. It encourages the documentation to be available by free download, but if you require people request the data, and you charge for costs of copying and sending it, that is allowed. As long as the information is available at a reasonable price. Even if no Broadcom data was available, as long as all the Raspberry Pi documentation is available it would definitely rate as Open Hardware. If you can get the Broadcom data by signing a NDA, that is a plus.Richard

author: Spiro
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 01:21:36 am
content: Can you call it democracy if you have to vote between 2 candidates with same promises?

author: ivan747
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 01:29:09 am
content: Quote from: Spiro on January 19, 2012, 01:21:36 amPseudo-bipartidism then?

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 02:02:03 am
content: It's all a matter of how far do you take this.Taken to the extreme, should every part in an OSHW product use chips that have multiple vendors? Should full die and manufacturing info be available so you can make your own if you had a zillion dollars to use TSMC? Should the full processor register map info be available (re. latest AmpHour episode on this) etc.I think as long as you can buy the chip, then it's ok.The NDA thing is just a PITA that I avoid on principle regardless of whether it OSHW or not.Dave.

author: metalphreak
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 06:51:30 am
content: Aren't they using the Broadcom chip because one of the engineers behind the device works for, or has close ties with them?I think for what they are trying to achieve, all of the chip options were volume-only products, and it was only because of the tie with Broadcom that they were able to get small quantities.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 10:22:55 am
content: OSHW will go the same route free and open source software went. That is, many different definitions and licenses. If we are lucky, there will be some consensus about the core values for OSHW, but my guess is that things like availability of components, usage of free software tools only, NDAs, etc. is where the separation of definitions and the fighting will start.I for one don't consider a device with a proprietary or semi-proprietary component or where an NDA is required for a component to be OSHW. I haven't made my mind up if my definition of OSHW should require that only free software tools are required, but I tend to go into that direction (f**ck Eagle ...).Regarding the original question, companies like Broadcom don't care. I won't be surprised that from their point of view they think they are doing the Raspberry people a favor and everyone has to be eternally thankful for them for providing such a low-volume shipment of CPUs. Apart from that they are busy finding large volume customers now, to meet the next quarterly sales goal.What companies like Broadcom also do is they massively shit their pants about intellectual property rights. Remember the toilet in the movie Train Spotting? That is how such company's CEO toilets look like when they think about IPRs. On one hand about their own IPRs, of which not a tiny piece must become known. And on the other hand the fear that they accidentally might have violated someone else's IPRs. By not providing information they are protecting their often imaginary only IPRs, and make it harder to get caught violating someone else's IPRs. This is far more important for them than making a few, in their mind thankless, hobbyists happy.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 10:43:13 am
content: QuoteThe free tools argument seems to me to be based on confused thinking - saying a design should use free software tools is like saying it must be assembled with a free soldering iron or machine tool. The software is just a tool like any other.OK it makes a design potentially more useful, and more likely to be improved on if the tools to modify it are cheap or free, but the freeness or otherwise of tools can never be valid criterion for judging the openness or otherwise of a design.QuoteNo, No, and Yes. How far it is reasonable to take it is dictated by practicality.It's about the ability to understand, modify and adapt a design, which is the whole point of OSHW.Parts like ICs are for all practical purposes indivisible 'atomic' parts, so there is no argument for the need for internal information on how tomakethem, but any limitation on the information needed tousethem, adapt and modify the design limits the very thing that OSHW is all about.Availability is another issue, but that is something that can vary from day to day, and there will always be some way to get hold of parts, even if it's pulling them out of built consumer products.

author: ndictu
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 10:53:44 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on January 19, 2012, 12:14:43 amWell that is disappointing, just yesterday I was watching a talk about the design of that thing. Pretty cool. But I just assumed everything was freely available since he says they are running on a 100% opensource stack, from the case design to software.For those interested:High quality download:http://mirror.fem-net.de/CCC/28C3/mp4-h264-HQ/28c3-4686-en-implementation_of_mitm_attack_on_hdcp_secured_links_h264.mp4

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 11:41:50 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on January 19, 2012, 10:43:13 amThere is a big difference, the proprietary file format. A soldering iron or a screwdriver doesn't encode and store your knowledge. PCB design software does exactly this. You can fasten a screw with one brand of screwdriver and can unfasten and adjust the screw with another brand. You typically can't revise (adjust) some knowledge, encoded in a proprietary file format, with another brand of software. Screw drivers are compatible, even standardized, software isn't.QuoteThe core of your design, the essence is encoded in the file format. A key requirement of open source software is that the source code isthe preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. The PCB design is part of an OSHW "source code". But a proprietary file format holding that design is certainly not a preferred form for making modifications. I can modify real source code with any editor of my choice. I can't do that with a PCB design. Therefore a proprietary PCB file format strips me of my open source right to make modifications.And the second issue is tool availability. History shows us that screwdrivers and soldering irons won't go away tomorrow. But software does. It just takes some marketing guy having a bad day. A key property of open source software is not that it does cost nothing. A key property is availability beyond that of proprietary software.

author: amspire
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 11:59:07 am
content: In Open Hardware projects, I really hope the authors at least always export all the schematic and board artworks into image files and include these in the open source downloads. I hate it when I see that the schematic is only available as an eagle file.The thing is many commercial programs now use activation, and the moment the company stops activating, no-one can ever install that board package again. It would be a great pity that in ten years, someone who finds an interesting open source project cannot even often the schematic file. I have found lots of very interesting design ideas in circuits from the 60's - now 50 years ago. What chance is there of opening schematics done in any current PCB package (including open source) in 50 years?Where this scenario most usually happens is that one company buys another competitor, and then has to rationalize their offerings. They offer big incentives for existing commercial customers to move over to the new improved resulting package, and they want to make the retired package vanish as soon as possible. The accountants just do not want to see any money spent maintaining a dead piece of software. I have seen companies go to great lengths to make an old software package disappear. They usually not only wipe the software from their own sites, but they search the web and make sure all mirrored copies of the installer, including copies at university ftp sites, get pulled.Richard

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 12:42:06 pm
content: QuoteThe file format is not the essence of the design, it's just an implementation of it - recreating an existing PCB in another tool is not a big deal for all but the most complex designs.The bulk of the work on a PCB layout is placement, then routing. Any decent PCB package can import gerbers, if only as a guide to re-route, so the work to re-create is a small fraction of that for the original.Probably a bigger deal is compilers for firmware, as in most cases firmware is the bulk of the work.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 01:33:09 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on January 19, 2012, 12:42:06 pmIt encodes the essence of the design.QuoteThat is like suggesting it is OK with free software that one first has to print out the source code, run it through some OCR, or even worse, transcribe the code, so one can change it in another editor than the one used to write the code. Sure it can be done, but that is not the idea behind exchanging code.

author: jerry507
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 19, 2012, 10:47:11 pm
content: Tools always seem to be a big sticking point with any open source movement. IMO an open source hardware project should use open source tools, or at least freely available tools. This is the spirit of really expanding the ability of people to get their hands dirty. Saying they'll have to translate an entire schematic to change one chip is actually a very high burden, regardless of how much board layout they will also have to do. Now if the tools are freely available, as is the case with say, Eagle, it's still acceptable.The real barrier with OSHW is that us hardware guys rely on software to do our work, and that software really isn't that great. Kicad seems like the best of the bunch, and GEDA is not even close. This is why you see people that can work with other platforms (Altium is the main one I'd say) ALWAYS choose to do that. Of course, we're all hardware guys and we have little to zero desire to actually fix these tools. I feel like there is a direct analog to the git/bitkeeper situation. The only problem is that no one in this community really seems to have a strong interest in creating "git" and we're all quite happy to keep using "bitkeeper".The leadership in everything open source philosophy is really coming from the OSS movement, and they clearly have issues with proprietary software used to develop open source projects.