Linux on Open Source Hardware

Linux at Fermilab Quarterly meeting
Feb 24, 2016
Drew Fustini
@pdp7 | drew@pdp7.com
Embedded Systems Engineer, OSH Park
“Perfect Purple PCBs”
Linux on Open Source Hardware

Design is made
publicly available
so that anyone can
study,
modify,
distribute,
make
or sell
designs or
hardware based on that design

Documentation required for electronics:
Schematics Board Layout
Editable source files for CAD software (KiCad, EAGLE, Altium, etc)
Bill of Materials (BOM)
Best practice: all components available in low quantity distribution

Publish documentation with an
Open Source license:
●
Creative Commons Share-Alike: CC-BY-SA
●
Non-Commercial (NC) clause is NOT acceptable
http://www.oshwa.org/2014/05/21/cc-oshw/
●
Copyleft: GPLv2, GPLv3
●
Permissive: Apache, BSD, MIT
●
OSHW inspired: CERN OHL, TAPR, SolderPad

CERN Open Hardware Licence
http://www.ohwr.org/projects/cernohl/wiki
●
Originally written for CERN designs hosted in the
Open Hardware Repository
●
Can used by any designer wishing to share design
information using a license compliant with the OSHW
definition criteria.
●
CERN OHL version 1.2:
http://www.ohwr.org/documents/294
Contains the license itself and a guide to its usage

CERN Open Hardware Licence
http://www.ohwr.org/projects/cernohl/wiki
Myriam Ayass, legal adviser at CERN and author of
the CERN OHL:
●
OHL is to hardware what GPL is to software
●
Same principles as Free or Open Source software
●
Anyone should be able to see the source (the
design documentation in case of hardware), study
it, modify it and share it.

Open Hardware Repository
http://www.ohwr.org/
●
Collaborate on Open Hardware designs
●
Peer review for small teams or solo designers
●
Origins in experimental physics laboratories
●
Enable teams to work together to solve problems
●
More fun than isolation & results in better hardware

Example: White Rabbit
http://www.ohwr.org/projects/white-rabbit

Javier Serrano, Open Hardware at CERN
https://vimeo.com/127579456
●
Physicist and Electronics Engineer at CERN
●
co-author of the CERN Open Hardware License
●
creator of the Open Hardware Repository

Licenses, Copyright and Patents
can get confusing!
Review of Popular OSHW Licenses
Talk by Ari Douglas at OHS 2014

What is the spirit of Open Source?
● Publish everything that will:
enable collaborative development
● The goal is NOT to just check a box on a marketing
flyer or add keywords to a Kickstarter campaign

Open Source Hardware Association
http://www.oshwa.org
● US Federal 501(c) non-profit
● Hosts the OSHW definition: http://www.oshwa.org/definition/
● “aims to be the voice of the open hardware community,
ensuring that technological knowledge is accessible to
everyone, and encouraging the collaborative development of
technology”

● May and Must attributes
– PDF poster:
http://www.oshwa.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/OSHW-
May-and-Must.pdf
● Quick Reference Guide:
– http://www.oshwa.org/open-source-quick-reference-guide/
● Best Practices:
http://www.oshwa.org/sharing-best-practices/

Open Hardware Summit (OHS)
●
OHS 2016: http://2016.oshwa.org/
October 7th in Portland, Oregon
●
6 prior summits:
●
2010, 2011: New York Hall of Science
●
2012: Eyebeam (NYC)
●
2013: MIT (~Boston)
●
2014: Roma, Italia!
●
2015: Philadelphia

●
2015 videos: http://2015.oshwa.org/

●
2014 videos: https://vimeo.com/user14106369/videos

Achieved Critical Mass by Sharing:
Arduino
http://arduino.cc/
How did it come to be?
Arduino: The Documentary

Example: Arduino UNO Design Files
https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardUno

●
Open Source Hardware ARM Linux boards
●
Developed by BeagleBoard.org Foundation
and BeagleBoard.org Community
●
Founded by Texas Instruments engineers
Jason Kridner and Gerald Coley
●
Mascot is Boris the Beagle!
●
Manufacturers: CircuitCo, element14 & Seeed

Previous Beagles
● BeagleBoard:
–2008
–first affordable ($150) ARM
single board computer (SBC)
– Open Source Hardware!
● BeagleBone:
–2011
– $89
–256MB RAM
–720MHz, ARM Cortex A8
– fits in an Altoids-tin!

BeagleBone Black (~$50)
http://beagleboard.org/black
● Flexible open hardware and software
development platform
http://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack#Hardware_Files
● Fast and flexible
– 1-GHz Sitara ARM
– 2x 200-MHz PRUs
– 512 MB DDR3
– On-board HDMI & Ethernet
– USB 2.0 Host
– GPIO: 65 digital I/O, 7 analog inputs, UART, I2C, SPI

BeagleBone Black
● Ready to use out of the box:
– USB provides power and client network
– Built-in “bone101” tutorials in Bonescript
– Browser-based IDE (Cloud9)
– 4GB eMMC flashed with Debian
● BeagleBone Capes:
– http://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBone_Capes
– Just another word for daughter board
– up to 4 stacked depending on resources used

BeagleBone Black
● What are PRUs?
– “Programmable Real-Time Units”
– 32-bit RISC processors at 200MHz with single-
cycle pin access for hard real-time
– Optimized for packet processing/switching and
software implementation of peripherals
● Why use PRUs?
– Dedicated function, free from the running OS
– Real-time because it can't be interrupted
– Low latency from input to output
– You can't interface external MCU to DDR memory!

BeagleBone Black
● Example PRU usage:
– Tight control loops driving mobile robot,
CNC machine or 3D printer
– Custom Protocols: WS28x LED strips,
DMX512, EtherCAT, ProfiBUS, ProfiNET
● Popular projects:
– LEDscape:
https://trmm.net/Category:LEDscape
– MachineKit (fork of LinuxCNC):
http://www.machinekit.io/

MinnowBard
http://www.minnowboard.org/
● 64-bit Intel Atom “Bay Trail”
● MinnowBoard MAX:
– $139 MSRP: E3825 (dual-core, 1.33 GHz)
● MinnowBoard Turbot
– $139 MSRP: E3826 (dual-core, 1.46 GHz)
● USB 3.0, SATA, PCIe, Gigabit Ethernet, HDMI
● Integrated Intel HD Graphics
– Open Source Mainline Linux drivers!

OSHW Design Files
● Manufactured by CircuitCo (MAX) & ADI (Turbot)
● Released under Creative Commons CC-BY-SA
● Download:
http://www.elinux.org/Minnowboard:MinnowMax#Design_Files
– [x] Schematic (Orcad DSN & PDF)
– [x] Board Layout (Allegro BRD & Gerbers)
– [x] Bill of Materials

MinnowBoard I/O (MAX & Turbot)

Expansion Port Details
● Low-Speed Expansion port:
– 2×13 (26-pin) male 0.1″ pin header.
– SPI, I2C, I2S Audio, 2x UARTs, 8x GPIO, 2x PWM
● High-Speed Expansion port:
– 60-pin, high-density connector.
– 1x PCIe Gen 2.0 Lane, 1x SATA2 3Gb/sec, USB
2.0 host, I2C, GPIO, JTAG

Lures: expansion boards
● Calamari Lure: $30
– http://elinux.org/Calamari_Lu
re
– SPI Based ADC, 10K Slider
POT, RGB LED, 2 PWM
LEDS, 2 TTL UART Headers,
7-Segment Display with 595
shift register, I2C, EEPROM,
3 Buttons
● Silverjaw Lure: $50
– http://wiki.minnowboard.org/S
ilverjaw_Lure
– dual break-out board
providing both an mPCIe and
mSATA slot

EFI (Firmware)
● MinnowBoard uses a UEFI system level firmware, and
provides both the UEFI shell, and a typical BIOS style
menu interface.
● Intel EFI Firmware update for MAX:
https://uefidk.com/content/minnowboard-max
● eLinux Wiki page on BIOS:
http://www.elinux.org/Minnowboard:MaxBios

OlinuXino
https://www.olimex.com/Products/OLinuXino/open-source-hardware
● Open Source Hardware low cost Linux computers
● Designed & manufactured by Olimex in Bulgaria
● Originally Freescale i.MX233
● Newer models have Allwinner: A10, A13, A20, H3
● Agreement with Allwinner for longevity support and
sell individual chips to customers
● “Open Source Hardware (OSHW), why it matters
and what is pseudo OSHW”
https://olimex.wordpress.com/2016/01/13/open-source-hardware-oshw-why-
it-matters-and-what-is-pseudo-oshw/

A64-OlinuXino:
● https://olimex.wordpress.com/tag/a64/
● Allwinner A64: Quad Core 64-bit ARM Cortex-A53
● Designed completely with KiCAD
● 1GB RAM (2GB is possible), 4GB fast SLC eMMC Flash,
WiFi+BLE4.0 module

http://www.slideshare.net/olimexbulgaria/designing-with-kicad-of-64bit-arm-board

● http://getchip.com/
● Next Thing Co. in Oakland
● Kickstarter in 2015:
● 39,560 backers
● $2,071,927 pledged

PocketC.H.I.P. makes C.H.I.P. portable!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-first-9-
computer/posts/1245278
● 3,000 mAH battery (5 hours)
● 4.3" 470px x 272px screen w/ resistive touch
● Full Super-Clicky QWERTY keyboard
● Rugged Injection Molded Shell
● Fully open source
● GPIO breakouts
● C.H.I.P. is removable via hatch

● https://github.com/NextThingCo/CHIP-Hardware
● Schematics
● PCB Layout
● Bill of Materials (BOM)
● Datasheets for BOM:
https://github.com/NextThingCo/CHIP-Hardwar
e/tree/master/CHIPv0_21-BOM-Datasheets
CHIP Hardware repo

Mainline C.H.I.P. Kernel Changes
● Kickstarter post: “All about Open Source”
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-first-
9-computer/posts/1247188
● Run official & current version of Linux kernel
● Merge changes into Linus Torvald's tree in a process
called "Mainlining"
● Linux-Sun-Xi community has already made great
progress on for Allwinner SoCs:
https://linux-sunxi.org

● Contracted by Next Thing Co to support the
CHIP in mainline Linux kernel:
– “Free Electrons working on the $9 C.H.I.P. computer”
http://free-electrons.com/blog/free-electrons-chip-nextthing/
● Free Electrons has been supporting Allwinner
processors in the mainline Linux kernel for
several years
● Free Electrons engineer Maxime Ripard is the
maintainer of the Allwinner SoC support

Resources
● Join OSHWA!
– http://www.oshwa.org/membership/
● Subscribe to the mailing list:
– http://lists.oshwa.org/listinfo/discuss
● Follow on Twitter:
– @OHSummit
– @oshwassociation
● Building Open Source Hardware
– http://www.amazon.com/Building-Open-Source-Ha
rdware-Manufacturing/dp/0321906047/

What about silicon?
● LowRISC!
– http://www.lowrisc.org/
– “lowRISC is producing fully open hardware
systems. From the processor core to the
development board, our goal is to create a
completely open computing eco-system”

Novena laptop
https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/novena
● Created by Bunnie & xobs!
– Chumby! Hacking the X-Box! Amazing reverse engineers:
● The Exploration and Exploitation of an SD Memory Card
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPEzLNh5YIo
● 100% Open Source Hardware laptop
● Quad-core 1.2GHz Freescale ARM CPU
● FPGA! 4GB RAM, WiFi, 2x Ethernet, SSD

Lulzbot 3-D Printers
https://www.lulzbot.com
100% Open Source
Hardware & Software
● FSF Respects Your Freedom certified
https://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your
-freedom

Respects Your Freedom
● Hardware product certification by
the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
● Certified products: “respect your freedom and
your privacy, and will ensure that you have
control over your device.”
● Hardware design can be proprietary, but all
software & firmware must be Free/Libre

● Libreboot X200 laptop
– http://minifree.org/product/libreboot-x200/
– reconditioned ThinkPad X200
– libreboot firmware (free BIOS/UEFI replacement)
– Trisquel GNU/Linux-libre 7.0 LTS
● Linux-libre is the Linux kernel with all non-free modules
and firmware removed

● ThinkPenguin WiFi with Free Software Firmware!
– https://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/thinkpenguin
● TPE-NWIFIROUTER Wireless N Broadband Router
– pre-installed with libreCMC, an FSF-endorsed embedded
GNU/Linux distribution
● TPE-N150USB & TPE-N150USB USB Adapters
– Free Software firmware for Atheros AR9271
– Linux-libre ath9k-htc kernel module

Linux on Open Source Hardware

More Related Content

What's hot

Viewers also liked

Similar to Linux on Open Source Hardware

More from Drew Fustini

Recently uploaded

Linux on Open Source Hardware