Arduino creator explains why open source matters in hardware, too

From [arstechnica.com]

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Ars conducts a Q&A with Massimo Banzi as Arduino's rise continues
Why is openness important in hardware? "Because open hardware platforms become the platform where people start to develop their own products," Banzi told Ars. "For us, it's important that people can prototype on the BeagleBone [a similar product] or the Arduino, and if they decide to make a product out of it, they can go and buy the processors and use our design as a starting point and make their own product out of it."

While Arduino has been around since 2005, the Raspberry Pi has been the hot platform for hobbyists over the past 18 months. But the Pi's hardware isn't open.

"With the Raspberry Pi you cannot even buy the processor," Banzi said. "With the processor on the BeagleBone, you can go buy even one of them if you need to." Raspberry Pi is "a PC designed for people to learn how to program. But we are a completely different philosophy. We believe in a full platform, so when we produce a piece of hardware, we also produce documentation and a development environment that fits all together with hardware."

Arduino being open source is part of the reason that RepRap is where it is today. Can you imagine trying to design around a single-source product like the Raspberry Pi?

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I strongly suspect that the Raspberry Pi has been successful because of their extensive contacts and access to the media, in particular the BBC, as well as strong support from Broadcom.
Otherwise, apart from being cheap, there is not a lot to say about it.

The Arduino team faced a lot of difficulties, and I thought they might give up Open Source in the face of widespread cloning, but they have stuck to their principles and the Arduino ecosystem continues to thrive. Even Raspberry Pi now has an Arduino shield...

I have been surprised at the success of the PI. It seemed unnecessarily complex compared with an Arduino (or a PIC). And it seemed to me to offer little compared to a cheap PC or laptop - with a lot of stuff missing especially as most of the applications it was/is targeted at would fit more easily on a PC or laptop. By the time you have a screen and keyboard etc it's no cheaper than a used PC or laptop - or the old "free" one under the stairs.

What has put me off the PI is the fact that I don't have a TV or equivalent to view it on - and I have enough Linux fun on my netbook.

I guess it's good if it is attracting people to Linux who would otherwise stick with Windows based PCs and laptops.

...R

> Previous-generation Arduinos are not obsolete, either.

Dunno, whats keeping the Uno for being depreciated in favor of the Leonardo?

The Arduino Tre they mention.

I hope they make those small computers 'stateless' except for the SD card.(well the Tre has a second arduino firmware apparently. Sounds neat.) It just makes sense, makes it less likely to be bricked, foils malicious software from infecting new SD cards..(you basically have as many computers as you have sd-cards only one runs at a time of course) A big thing i am hoping from these things is an OS aimed at security, because if you have a second computer, and a fixed hardware, you can aim for it in particular. RPi is in my experience fast enough, you can browse with it using a bit of patience.(the latter is probably good for security :p) Meaning you can do high-security stuff, like browsing with it, reading email,(i mean plain text/the simple html is faster than arbitrarily bad browsing in the wild) afaik tor isnt very intensive, nor is email. (maybe bitmessage, bitcoin..)

> By the time you have a screen and keyboard etc it's no cheaper than a used PC or laptop - or the old "free" one under the stairs.

Uhm, no. You can plug it in the television, screens of computers you already have. and keyboards and mouses, arent that expensive, and as similarly already acquired... Same for power.(phone chargers, thank the EU for getting phone manufacturers into all using usb)

> Can you imagine trying to design around a single-source product like the Raspberry Pi?

I suppose you mean that you'd have to fear being deprived of this source by whatever reason? It has the potential to be used as a invisible might or advantage, that no-one using the product feels, but it stings when people try to leave.(or maybe when the relationship of the usage is revealed for what it is) For instance the driver/document format troubles linux had, or the backdoor windows undoubtedly has.

Of course, regardless of that, open source is just the right thing to do.

I dont know electronics that well, but the raspberry pi seems capable of doing it,(though possibly only running a RTOS/no OS) using pololus. It may not be good.(And addons are essentially cheating)

Sounds like Arduino is being upstaged by a better, cheaper competitor and they're scared.

Tre is too expensive to be competitive (yes, even OSH has to be competitive which I wonder if the Arduino people understand). What Arduino needs to do is make a strictly ARMS product and a strictly AVR product but not this Frankenstein monster of 2 in one. Backwards compatible only when using it in the AVR mode which is worthless since you can just purchase an UNO and be done with it.

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I await Skynet and my last vision will be of a RepRap self replicating the robots that is destroying the human race.

ohioplastics Wrote:
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> Sounds like Arduino is being upstaged by a better,
> cheaper competitor and they're scared.

They aren't the same kind of tools. Arduino is an AVR prototyping environment and Pi is a single board micro PC. Different animals. The strength of an Arduino isn't so much to provide a complete product (like RAMPS) but rather to be able more easily prototype AVR devices. Except small batches using an Arduino instead of building a purpose built board for the application is going to be more expensive. A good example (other than RAMPS though I could argue at this point it would be more cost effective to make a single board RAMPS like RAMBo) is the reflow oven shield from Rocket Scream. Since not that many of us will be building reflow toaster ovens it makes sense to put it on an Uno shield.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/23/2013 01:59AM by vegasloki.

I totally agree with @vegasloki .

The Arduino is a mirco-controller not a micro-computer.

I have various Arduino boards, from Micro up to Mega 2560 and I also have a RaspberryPI, but for most small applications I find that the Arduino is all that I need.

For applications that need either low power, or instant startup, or lots of outputs to drive TTL loads of up to 40mA, or interrupt driven inputs that need instant response, the RaspberryPI is not much use.

However as soon as you want more processing power or internet connectivity etc, you need to use something like the RaspberryPI. I can't see why they can't co-exist.

Also, as previously mentioned, there are many other boards similar or better to the RaspberryPI e.g. BeagleBone Black, but which don't have so many contacts in the media and dont get so much coverage.

I don't currently have a BeagleBone Black, but I suspect that for most of my projects it would probably be more useful a RaspberryPI

Arduino is a good example showing why hardware needs additional, gentle restrictions compared to open source software. They have a trademark prohibiting clones under the Arduino name, which is in effect pretty similar to an open hardware licence with NC clause. This is not compliant with OSHWA's definition of Open Source Hardware, nevertheless very successful. Maybe even because of this additional restriction.

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Generation 7 Electronics	Teacup Firmware	RepRap DIY

> They have a trademark prohibiting clones under the Arduino name, which is in effect pretty similar to an open hardware licence with NC clause.

I dont understand how you can say this. Not being able to use the name 'arduino' in no way makes it more difficult to use their open designs. All it means you cant use the name arduino and their trademark without their permission. It prevents people who make low quality versions from affecting their reputation.

Trademark allows enforment of the open source/open hardware logos too. Presumably they're allowed if the valid licenses are used correctly.. But the link broke (I dont know the the reprap logo is meant only for reprappro or for reprap(as opposed to 3dp)-machines in general..(I am fine with either)

Where did you see the price of the Tre?

I suppose that they could focus on making cheaper microcontrollers, but presumably their organization is tuned a particular level of income. They'd either need to lay off some people, or the price decrease must induce more baught items. One way is simply more people(but is that so price dependent?), the other is people buying more stuff. I think currently a limitation is that people can only do so many projects. If simple instructions were made to make items, so people could do more projects, and the items are cheap enough to expend them on the project.(more than temporarily) But arduino lacks the mechanical aspect of making such item.

We do have the mechanical aspect, of course. It all exists, kindah, but 'it doesnt line up', and the threshhold is quite big. To be specific, outside, we have solar-powered lights that turn on if it is dark .. getting the parts sparkfun is quite a bit more expensive than buying one whole. On the other hand, LEDs can flash quite quickly, you could experiment with sending data with that. (I send audio over light, quite simply with a LED flashlight, phototransitor, a pair of transistors.. cant get the damned thing working now though..)

Also pairing a processor and a microcontroller makes perfect sense to me. I dont think the microprocessor adds much cost. The processor boards often have less robust pins. I dont have any experience in 'programming for the electronics' with these, but there are reasons why RTOS-ses exist, it is because otherwise the OS is doing something different when it should have been looking at the pins.

Traumflug Wrote:
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> Arduino is a good example showing why hardware
> needs additional, gentle restrictions compared to
> open source software. They have a trademark
> prohibiting clones under the Arduino name, which
> is in effect pretty similar to an open hardware
> licence with NC clause. This is not compliant with
> OSHWA's definition of Open Source Hardware,
> nevertheless very successful. Maybe even
> because of this additional restriction.

I think it's the availability of the tool that makes it successful and also the ease of use. I don't see most of the users being concerned with what license it's released under but rather what kind of things they can do with it. I don't see it at all like an NC license as the design is freely available to use even for a commercial app. With a clone, for example the Taurino, it's allowable to call it "Arduino compatable".

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vegasloki
I think it's the availability of the tool that makes it successful and also the ease of use. I don't see most of the users being concerned with what license it's released under but rather what kind of things they can do with it. I don't see it at all like an NC license as the design is freely available to use even for a commercial app. With a clone, for example the Taurino, it's allowable to call it "Arduino compatable".

Yes I know it's an old thread but I came across it when looking into the Tre. Anyway I have to agree with vegasloki and Jasper1984 that having a trademarked name you use for your products (which is actually very common, remember even Linux is trademarked, let alone wikipedia, Firefox, OpenOffice...) is very different from a NC licence.

The NC licence means no one besides you can produce your whatever commercially, unless they get you to licence it to them seperately. It doesn't even matter how much work you put in to what you make, if any part of what you made is a derivative of the copyrighted NC licenced work, you need to comply with the NC licence. Well unless you can claim fair use or whatever other exception is allowed under law where you live/sell/whatever which is unlikely for a commercial product if what you're using is actually a core part of your product. (Of course how well copyright protects hardware isn't always clear but let's not complicate things too much.)

The trademark simply stops you producing something under that name. Other then that, you just have to comply with the terms of the licence which if it's copyleft probably means you have to release your work including its source code under a compatible licence (well presuming you release your work), but doesn't restrict you from commercial use, or anything else.

They each have their different uses and if you produce something entirely of you own work it's you're right to choose how you licence and protect your work but let's not confuse the different methods.