Re: [ox-en] open hardware thread
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2002 21:56:05 +0200
Hi!
5 days ago Graham Seaman wrote:
For anyone interested in open hardware/free hardware design, there's an
interesting thread on opencores starting from:
http://www.opencores.org/forums/cores/2002/06/00004
I started to read the text the thread began with at
http://www.embedded.com/printableArticle?doc_id=OEG20020524S0078
I think the most interesting point in the article is this one:
Compilers and debuggers are a lot cheaper than oscilloscopes, logic
analyzers, and wafer probes. In a neat piece of reciprocity,
software tools are even available for free under open source. Just
about any programmer can afford the minimal start-up costs, but most
hardware engineers don't have the fiscal throw weight to buy their
own hardware development tools. You need an employer to do that, and
institutional employers tend to impose institutional thinking.
He put that issue in a number of paragraphs, and I think he has a
point there.
So thinking in terms of a GPL society it's crucial to get the means of
production closer to the homes - at least this is what made the
take-off of Free Software possible. However, FPGA's and other fabber
type things may act as a bridge or even part of the solution.
The thread looked at things rather positive :-) .
Mit Freien Grüßen
Stefan
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