Building Open Source Hardware: DIY Manufacturing for Hackers and Makers

Alicia Gibb

Dec 2014 · Addison-Wesley Professional

About this ebook

This is the first hands-on guide to the entire process of designing and manufacturing open source hardware. Drawing on extensive personal experience with DIY, maker, and hardware hacking projects, industry-leading contributors share proven approaches to design, remixing, fabrication, manufacturing, troubleshooting, licensing, documentation, and running an open source hardware business.

Part I covers the emergence and evolution of open source hardware, what open source hardware licenses mean, and the growing role of standards in making hardware more open. Part II offers contributors’ expert advice on key tasks, ranging from creating derivatives to using source files. Part III turns to production, showing how to manufacture at multiple scales–from personal to commercial.

Appendixes provide valuable checklists for design, manufacture, security, and documentation. And to foster even more hands-on learning and experimentation, the low-cost Blinky Buildings open source hardware kit is used as an example throughout.

Learn how to

• Get involved in the open source hardware community–its history and values
• Develop designs you can successfully prototype and manufacture
• Walk step by step through making derivatives from existing projects
• Build open source 3D printers, and remix 3D printable objects
• Create open source wearables
• Work with diverse source files, from electronics to other physical materials
• Fabricate your own designs
• Move from prototype to commercial manufacturing, and troubleshoot problems
• Choose a business model and build a profitable open source hardware company
• Avoid pitfalls associated with trademarks, copyrights, patents, and licensing
• Write documentation other hardware hackers can use
• Use open source hardware in education, helping students learn without boundaries

About the author

Alicia Gibb is an advocate for open hardware, a researcher, and a hardware hacker. Alicia has worked within the open source hardware community since 2008. She is the founder and Executive Director of the Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA), an organization to educate and promote building and using open source hardware. She directs the BTU Lab at CU Boulder, where she teaches in the areas of physical computing and information technologies. Previous to serving OSHWA, Alicia was a researcher and prototyper at Bug Labs where she ran the academic research program and the Test Kitchen, an open R&D Lab. She was awarded a National Science Foundation SBIR grant for her sensor-based data collection module while at Bug Labs. She is a member of NYCResistor, where she has curated two international art shows, founded and co-chaired two Open Hardware Summits, and sits on the board of the Ada Initiative. Her electronics work has appeared in Wired magazine, IEEE Spectrum, Hackaday and the New York Times. When Alicia is not researching at the crossroads of open technology and innovation she is prototyping work that twitches, blinks, and might even be tasty to eat.