| With respect, I don't see any of these as insurmountable barriers. Reliance on proprietary IP blocks is a time saving measure rather than a given. > ... the same way you wouldn't invent your own compression algorithm or tcp stack But people did write open source TCP stacks and invent open source compression algorithms (eg. xpih, codec2). A notable omission from the github list is Icestorm, part of the the open source end-to-end tool chain for Lattice iCE40 FPGAs [1]. There is a stable open source DDR4 controller [2]. The point is that individuals are filling the gaps. To an extent open hardware suffers from a lack of coherence. A surprising number of the required components exist, but they are invisible, yet to be drawn into a coherent whole like the GNU project did for software. In 1999 OpenCores and the "Open Collector" search engine started an effort to bring it together but its still ongoing. OpenCores continues to make some great contributions but never got real traction, so there are opportunities for people to renew the exiting structures or make new ones. There's an element of the organisation meandering, but also GNU has a 17 year head start (dating from OpenCores). If the next 17 years for open hardware looks like the last 17 years for open software then it should be an interesting place to be. [1] https://wiki.debian.org/FPGA/Lattice [2] https://opencores.org/projects/ddr_sdr |