GEDA suite would allow arduino to be open source... because eagle cad is not open source it is a bottle neck.
Is anyone working on this?
Where can some more good tutorials or books on it be found?
Gimme a break. It is not necessary for every tool in a products development chain to be open source in order for the product itself to be "open source." Are you going to complain next that the board house gerber plotter software isn't open source either? I don't even see how EAGLE is a "bottleneck"? It's got freeware versions for all the platforms that run Arduino...
sorry don't mean to argue or gripe but my project is open source and I use three boards because im prototiping but they are too large to be one in eagle. also isn't a infringement on eagles license to sell arduinos without a licensed copy?
pceeg.sourceforge.net if you want to see the eagle files schematics etc... made from the arduino
Yes, if you're designing ardunio-based PCBs for sale, or being paid to design arduino PCBs for someone else to sell, then you should have a "real" EAGLE license. Note that for the normal sized arduino board, the $49 "lite" license is sufficient...
The exact status of WestfW designing Freedunino PCBs with the freeware version and placing the results in "open source", where at least theoretically joe random dealer can take the gerbers and run off a bunch of boards to sell without ever having EAGLE at all, is a bit questionable. I would hope that such dealers would pay for an EAGLE license, but I'm not sure whether it is required (or whether it should be.)
You raise an interesting point, in that trying to use the EAGLE cad files as the starting point for a board that exceeds the limits of the freeware/lite size restrictions DOES result in quite a large jump in "entry cost." I'd be willing to try gEDA if you can tell me where to get Mac binaries; my experiences with trying to compile linux software in macOS have been pretty painful when you get into the heavily GUI tools. (gerbv was a pain, and I never did get gpsim working...)
Maintaining "identical" CAD file for a project in multiple toolsets sounds ... fierce.
I have been able to install ubuntu 8.04 onto a usb you proably could do it with a external hard drive. People have installed that on a mac I think. Also then synaptic packagemanager installs geda with a fue clicks. Remember to right click on it and get the extera goodies.
I seem to recall a similar discussion in regard to PCB designs from the RepRap project when I enquired about using KiCad. 
It is not necessary for every tool in a products development chain to be open source in order for the product itself to be "open source."
While I agree that (particularly with hardware) the open-ness of the "tool chain" is debatable, I think it can be argued that if modifications can only be performed with a tool that is "non-Free" then that is less Open/Free than it could be.
You may or may not be concerned about this but I don't think it's unreasonable that some people are.
--Phil.
It is not necessary for every tool in a products development chain to be open source in order for the product itself to be "open source."
While I agree that (particularly with hardware) the open-ness of the "tool chain" is debatable, I think it can be argued that if modifications can only be performed with a tool that is "non-Free" then that is less Open/Free than it could be.
You may or may not be concerned about this but I don't think it's unreasonable that some people are.
--Phil.
It's not unreasonable for one to want an open source project be made even more accessible. But the OP started this thread with the implication that the arduino is not open source because eagle wasn't open source. FWIW I had a similar reaction to reading that as westfw.
Maby I named the thread wrong wouldn't it make arduino a better open source hardware design if it used GEDA a easy way to install it is use ubuntu 8.04 on some external drive if you don't mind it being slower and want to keep your old OS if you have one. Also remember to right click on the geda install in synaptic to get all the sugjested programs.
This could allow for the creation of better tools eagle can be difficult at times. But it does a great job.
I know when I get the open source licence for geda I would prefer to keep my boards small enough to still be acsessable by people who use the freeware version.
That is my reason to think about geda my project is allready outgrowing eagle's free version and arduino being reraped and sold....
pceeg.sourceforge.net if anyone wants to see it that it is big download the eagle cad files their board and schematics.
I will be ordering the parts for the microcontroler pcb this weekend.
Hi josheeg,
I very much agree with you that Eagle can be difficult to use, and I would be pleased if the arduino related board designs were supported on free toolset with similar functionality to eagle but was easer to use. But one problem with the GEDA toolset is that it's not targeted for windows and that would significantly reduce the accessibility for those that running windows.
Anyway, good luck with your project.
If in the future I switch to geda for a final relese I would imagine a zip file to be put on a usb stick to make it a bootable ubuntu enviroment with only the tools used to work on the pceeg would make it acsessable for windows users.
GEDA,
Open office,
Kompozer,
firefox
GNU C,
G++
...
or Solid state Hard drives like the eee pc uses with a usb connector could bridge the gap between speed performance and linux for laptop users who do not want dual boot.
I think it would be great to use gEDA or another open-source tool for the Arduino designs. At the time we started, all the open-source options seemed much harder to use than Eagle, especially on Macs, which much of the team uses. Also, Eagle seems to be the standard among this type of project. If people start to use gEDA or other open-source tools for this sort of thing, we will certainly look into moving over, although it would be a significant amount of work at this point.
I agree it proably would be a lot of work to move over. Thats why I wanted to see if arduino group was doing it.
It has become easier also it avoids exe specific files a librarians nightmare.
I started the pceeg project using express pcb and with no autoroute option and no connection to the schematic then it was just asking for problems.
So then I interlibrary loaned a book build your own pcb that shows eagle and how to use it. I found eagle would help me make my project work and be able to be adjusted and work with others because of it's acsessability.
The licencing & difficulty to use & lack of open source code to improve locks me in with them. So I guess that is how it will be till their is a win & mac exe for geda I agree that is a difficult thing maby autopackage or automake or some server side software could package them into a exe....
sorry. Booting a different OS just to edit a cad file is beyond what I consider reasonable. (I did experiment with that before the Mac version of EAGLE came out; I set up an old x86 system running debian and ran the linux EAGLE in a Mac X window. It sorta worked, but it was pretty painful, and I was really happy when the native Mac version came out...)
Maybe the solution would be in KiCad. Not sure it runs on mac platforms, but as it's open source, already working great and has a big community behind it, it could suite the Arduino needs.
Here is a solution for mac
Mac OSX fink packages Charles Lepple Instructions provided in link
This i found on the installation page for geda...
Also if a windows user is interested I can say ubuntu runs way faster and with less footprint than my xp system and with less lag from anti spyware and anti virus add block pluss and firefox.
Maybe the solution would be in KiCad. Not sure it runs on mac platforms, but as it's open source, already working great and has a big community behind it, it could suite the Arduino needs.
FWIW I recently discovered someone producing nightly Mac OS X KiCad builds which may be of interest--I haven't tested any yet.
--Phil.
Here is a solution for mac
Mac OSX fink packages Charles Lepple Instructions provided in link
This i found on the installation page for geda...
Also if a windows user is interested I can say ubuntu runs way faster and with less footprint than my xp system and with less lag from anti spyware and anti virus add block pluss and firefox.
But just because Ubuntu runs faster why should we choose to use it? The simple reality is that many of us, myself included, have no choice but to run Windows, however much we might HATE it!
I say use what works for you. I don't use Eagle either, but I do make PDF files and gerber files available. Does that make my adaptation any less open?
The Geek.
No that does not because we are not required to use windows to read them.
What I was trying to say is running eagle to make arduino is like saying everyone steal a coppy of windows or mac osx to make arduino stuff because the freeware version of eagle does not allow the selling of boards and arduino boards are being sold.
Arduino is doing software piracy for not buying coppies at 100$ a piece for the open source licence and sometimes the 4k full version.
Thats why I was sugjesting something else.
That also doen't mean with a little work I could make a windows installer....
You could try a dual boot of ubuntu or a bootable usb stick.
I very strongly suspect that that the vendors who are actually manufacturing Arduinos for sale (SmartProjects, Sparkfun, Gravitech) do in fact own full commercial versions of EAGLE, though they'll have to speak for themselves for definitive status. A commercial license is not required if someone (say, an individual or a university) were to take the cad files and have a bunch manufactured for their own use. Especially since the commercial license necessary to work with arduino is only $49... (Have YOU seen any arduino-derived boards FOR SALE that exceed the 80x100mm "lite license" of eagle?) I'm less sure of the various unofficial and Freeduino boards; the ones I designed were done with the eagle freeware, but I'm not selling any. Solarbotics doesn't use Eagle. Adafruit almost certainly has a commercial license.
BTW, the $100 (actually $125) EAGLE license is only for non-profit use, which makes the next step up from the $49 version is about $500 (no autorouter), and the "full" version is about $1500... (US prices.)
I installed the gEDA tools, and my initial impressions are not good. Aside from "awful to use" (which seems to be everyone's first impression of ANY eda tool), it doesn't look like it maintains an intimate relationship between the schematic and the pcb of a design. Eww! What's the point?
Thanks follower, I'll try those (even though I prefer Eagle ^^)