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What is the future of Open-Hardware and Open-Source Code in your opinion?
Will we have an open processor? Not only architecture, but also firmware.
- jqpabc123 2y agoRISC-V is an open processor that can load and run Ubuntu. I'm pretty sure the boot loader needed to do this is open source too.
- sparkie 2y agoRISC-V is an ISA. There are many processors for it - some open and some proprietary. An ISA alone doesn't make a fully open processor. You still need buses, which are often proprietary. Even many of the open source RV processors are using ARM's proprietary AMBA/AXI or similar, and few are attempting to use fully-open technologies like Wishbone. You still also need PCIe, USB and other bus technologies to make a consumer grade computer, which are huge tasks and not often undertaken by these RISC-V processors, which are aimed at embedded solutions and come only on SBCs. IMO, the SBC situation might be holding back open source hardware. Every chip developer also needs to develop their own motherboards. It would be nice if there were some effort to have a more modular open-source motherboard where the CPU can be replaced in a socket rather than using BGA where they're soldered directly onto the motherboard. Preferably it would use Wishbone and come with a set of libraries in Verilog/VHDL/Chisel etc, which could be utilized by chip developers. And then the next big challenge is developing open-source GPUs and NPUs, since this is where much of the computation happens these days.
- camel-cdr 2y agoCheck out https://github.com/OpenXiangShan/XiangShan https://github.com/OpenXiangShan/XiangShan