Linux on Open Source Hardware with Open Source chip design

January 13, 2020January 12, 2020 fustini36c3, FPGA, linux, oshw, risc-vLeave a comment

I attended the 36th Chaos Communication Congress (36c3) during the last
week of 2019 in Leipzig, Germany. It was an amazing event and Hackaday has good coverage. All the talks are available online including my talk:

Linux on Open Source Hardware with Open Source chip design

Want to run Linux on open hardware? This talk will explore Open Source Hardware projects capable of that task, and explore how RISC-V and free software FPGA projects can be leveraged to create libre systems.

The video is also available on YouTube:

My slides are on SlideShare:

The slides are also available as a PDF on GitHub.

Open Hardware Summit tickets on sale!

January 12, 2020January 11, 2020 fustiniconference, nyc, OHS, OHSummit, open hardware summit, oshwaLeave a comment

Join us for the Open Hardware Summit on March 13th in New York City! It will be the 10th anniversary and Sophi Kravitz will be giving a keynote. More speakers will be announced soon!

Buy tickets on Eventbrite

The 2020 Open Hardware Summit will be held Friday, March 13th 2020 at Tishman Auditorium at NYU School of Law, New York located at 63 5th Ave, New York, NY 10003.

The Open Hardware Summit is the annual conference of the 501c3 Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA). We aim to foster technological knowledge and encourage research that is accessible, collaborative and respects user freedom. OSHWA is recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt public charity and donations and sponsorships to OSHWA and the Summit are tax deductible to the extent permitted by law.

Types of ticket:

Early Bird Backer – Help others get to the Summit. This ticket price funds the Ada Lovelace travel grants.The early bird ticket will be available only for first few weeks of the tickets launch.
Early Bird Standard – This will give you access to the Open Hardware Summit event. The early bird ticket will be available only for first few weeks of the tickets launch.
Backer- Help others get to the Summit. This ticket price funds the Ada Lovelace travel grants.
Standard – The standard ticket gives you access to the Open Hardware Summit event.
Hardship – Are you a student, starving artists or just low on funds? We still want you to be able to attend the Summit. This ticket is for those who cannot afford standard admission.
Standard + OSHWA membership! – This will give you access to the Open Hardware Summit event on 13th March along with a year long subscription of OSHWA (Open Source Hardware Association) membership.

Follow updates about the Open Hardware Summit on Twitter:

Tweets by ohsummit

Hackaday Belgrade: Call for Proposals

January 8, 2020January 7, 2020 fustinibelgrade, conference, hackadayLeave a comment

Join Hackaday in Belgrade, Serbia on May 9th, 2020 for the Hackaday Belgrade conference!

The biennial hardware conference is just seventeen weeks from now. Early Bird tickets will go on sale shortly, but beginning right now you can hack your way into the conference by submitting a talk proposal. Accepted speakers receive free admission, plus everyone who submits a quality talk proposal will be given priority when tickets go on sale.

Yes, I’m talking to you. Hackaday strives to include first-time speakers in the slate of presenters at our conferences. We’re looking for unique, cutting-edge, whimsical, crazy, formidable, or world-changing topics revolving around hardware creation. From learning new tools or techniques to fabrication adventures, from code-wrangling that firmware project to pulling off an art installation, and from forgotten hardware history to the impossible made possible on your own workbench, we need to hear your stories!

That project for which you went into the deep weeds and worked your way back out again? Everyone at a Hackaday conference wants to hear about it and in the greatest detail possible. After all, we’re your fellow hackers. In fact, you should probably bring the hardware along for the ride.

WE NEED YOU

None of this happens in a vacuum. This is the third Hackaday Belgrade conference, which have now settled into a tick-tock cadence of even-numbered years. The first two both sold out, this one will as well, and the result is always an action-packed, nearly 24-hour marathon sprint of talks, workshops, and hardware hacking. But the only reason this works is because amazing people just like you make it a priority in their life to be there.

via Hackaday Belgrade: Call for Proposals — Hackaday

Learn to code KiCad at FOSDEM 2020

January 7, 2020January 7, 2020 fustinibelgium, brussels, conference, FOSDEM, kicadLeave a comment

FOSDEM 2020 is a free event on Februrary 1st and 2nd for software developers to meet, share ideas and collaborate. Every year, thousands of developers of free and open source software from all over the world gather at the event in Brussels:

The Friday before FOSDEM, January 31st, will be an event for those that want to learn about KiCad development from project leaders like Wayne Stambaugh and Seth Hillbrand:

Learn to Code KiCad at FOSDEM 2020

Are you looking to write code that improves KiCad?

On Friday, Jan 31 (the day before FOSDEM), we’ll be hosting a Learn to Code KiCad session in Brussels, BE. I will be there as will Wayne and possibly a few other of the lead development team. We’ll help you understand how the various KiCad components fit together and work with you to get your favorite feature from idea to committed code.

What you need:

1) An identified bug report (or multiple) that you’d like to address. This can be either a legitimate bug or a wishlist feature that is triaged in our system.
2) A laptop with your development environment
3) A launchpad account
4) A compiling version of KiCad
5) A working knowledge of C++ coding

What we’ll provide:

1) Space, power outlet, wifi
2) Coffee
3) A short introduction to the structure of KiCad and how the parts work together
4) Up to 8 hours of development time with others who share your interests
5) Clarifying insights to your KiCad coding questions

At the end of the day, you should be able to get at least 1 and possibly multiple bug report fixes under your belt and into the code base!

If you’re coming to FOSDEM 2020 and would like to participate, please e-mail me directly (off-list to preserve people’s inboxes). Send me your name/contact info and the list of 1 or more launchpad bugs you’d like to work on during the day. I’ll add you to our shared sheet (to deconflict bugs people are addressing) and get you all of the relevant information for the meeting

Here is a talk that Seth gave at KiCon 2019 which talks about their development community:

and also the KiCad developer panel:

Hackaday Superconference: An Analog Engineer Dives Into RF

January 5, 2020January 5, 2020 fustinihackaday, RF, superconLeave a comment

Those of us who work with electronics will usually come to the art through a particular avenue that we master while imbibing what we need from those around it. For example, an interest in audio circuitry may branch into DSP and microcontrollers as projects become more complex. Some realms though retain an aura of impossibility, a reputation as a Dark Art, and chief among them for many people is radio frequency (RF). Radio circuitry is often surprisingly simple, yet that simplicity conceals a wealth of complexity because the medium does not behave in the orderly manner of a relatively static analogue voltage or a set of low-frequency logic levels.

Chris Gammell is a familiar face to many Hackaday readers for his mastery of much electronic trickery, so it comes as something of a surprise to find that RF has been one of the gaps in his knowledge. In his talk at the Hackaday Superconference he took us through his journey into RF work, and the result is a must-watch for anyone with a curiosity about radio circuitry who didn’t know where to start.

via Hackaday Superconference: An Analog Engineer Dives Into RF — Hackaday

The first Adafruit Show ‘n Tell of 2020

January 2, 2020January 2, 2020 fustini36c3, adafruit, circuitpython, ECP5, FPGA, linux, risc-vLeave a comment

https://youtu.be/ENVEeFbJBQ8?t=839

Joining Adafruit Show ‘n Tell with Helen Leigh was a fun way to start 2020!

Helen embroidered the CircuitPython-powered Serpente board from Arturo at Chaos Communication Congress (36c3):

Another awesome thing about #36c3 was all the hardware I got to try! @arturo182 gave me a Serpente board that runs @CircuitPython. It has castellated edges which are great for sewing to. Here's the Neopixel sampler I stitched with it, running some modified @adafruit code. ✨🐍⚡ pic.twitter.com/AdfPAb6WWu

— Helen Leigh ⚡ (@helenleigh) January 1, 2020

I showed Linux running on a RISC-V core in the ECP5 FPGA on the Hackaday Supercon badge:

Joining @Adafruit Show n Tell with @helenleigh was a fun way to start 2020https://t.co/sAhp0SnNp2

Helen embroidered the @CircuitPython-powered Serpente board from @arturo182 at #36c3

I showed Linux running on a RISC-V core in the ECP5 FPGA on the Hackaday Supercon badge pic.twitter.com/uDaYWQDuY9

— @[email protected] (@pdp7) January 2, 2020

I gave a shout-out to Greg Davill who got Linux booting the OrangeCrab while at 36c3:

Greg’s open hardware OrangeCrab board features the ECP5 FPGA in an Adafruit Feather form factor and is capable of running a RISC-V “soft” core using LiteX.

Done. 😃 pic.twitter.com/CRvStmsikR

— Greg (@GregDavill) December 28, 2019

Find out more about Linux on RISC-V using open source FPGA toolchains in the slides from my 36c3 talk

https://github.com/pdp7/talks/raw/master/oshw-linux-36c3.pdf

Hardware Happy Hour Berlin this Friday, Jan. 3rd

January 1, 2020 fustini3H, 3HBerlin, berlinLeave a comment

Hardware Happy Hour Berlin will be this Friday, January 3rd, at xHain hackspace

Please bring your latest project with you! Anything you’re working on, electrical, mechanical or software works! We want to see the stuff that you’re interested in!

Please bring your latest project with you! Anything you’re working on, electrical, mechanical or software works! We want to see the stuff that you’re interested in

This is special post-Congress edition of 3H at Berlin hackerspace xHain

Apologies for the short notice. I wanted to schedule something this week for people that are visiting Berlin after Chaos Communication Congress (36c3) in Leipzig last weeken

Hackaday at the 36th Chaos Communication Congress (36c3)

December 28, 2019December 29, 2019 fustini36c3, hackadayLeave a comment

Drew (@pdp7) is at the Chaos Communication Congress (36c3) and so is the Hackaday community:

It’s that time of year again here in Germany. The mulled wine flows all night long at the Christmas markets, the Krampus runs wild in the streets, and hackers are perched frantically behind their keyboards and soldering irons, trying to get their last minute projects “finished” for the 36th annual Chaos Communication Congress (36C3) in Leipzig.

We’ll have an assembly for all fans and friends of the Jolly Wrencher, so if you’re coming to Congress, you can come join us or at least stop by and say hi. [Elliot] and [Sven] and a number of Hackaday.io luminaries will be on hand. (Ask us about secret stickers and an as-yet unannounced upcoming Hackaday conference.)

Even if you’re not able to make it, you should keep your eyes on Hackaday from the 27th to the 30th, because we’ll be reporting on the best of Congress. But you don’t have to take our word for it: the Chaos Computer Club makes all of the talks available on livestream during the event, many with simultaneous translation, and final edited versions often appearing just a few hours afterwards.

We’ve looked through the schedule, and it’s going to be a hum-dinger! Gather ’round the glowing box with your friends at your own local hackerspace, or call in sick from work and make yourself some popcorn. This is must-see nerd TV.

Whether you’ve been naughty or nice, swing by our assembly if you’re going to be in Leipzig for the last few days of 2019. See you there!