The CERN Open Hardware Licence (OHL or CERN OHL) is an

open-source hardware Open-source hardware (OSH, OSHW) consists of physical artifact (software development), artifacts of technology designed and offered by the open-design movement. Both free and open-source software (FOSS) and open-source hardware are created by th ...

licence A license (American English) or licence (Commonwealth English) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another part ...

created by

CERN The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in Meyrin, western suburb of Gene ...

. The licence comes in three variants: strongly reciprocal (CERN-OHL-S), weakly reciprocal (CERN-OHL-W), and

permissive Permissiveness may refer to: * Permissiveness (endocrinology), between hormones and cells. * Permissiveness (virology), between viruses and cells. Permissive may refer to: * Permissive society, a liberalization of social norms in a society. * ...

(CERN-OHL-P).

History

The CERN OHL licence was created as an initiative of the members of the Open Hardware Repository, a knowledge-exchange project of electronics designers working in experimental-physics laboratories, founded by CERN engineers, to regulate the use of the designs published by CERN.

Version 1

Version 1.0 was published in March 2011. Following community feedback, Version 1.1 was published in July 2011 to follow the generally accepted principles of the free and open-source movements and make it easier for use by entities other than CERN. Version 1.2, published in September 2013, removed the obligation for licensees that modified a CERN OHL-licensed design to notify upstream licensors about the changes and introduced a notion of "Documentation Location" to guarantee hardware recipients access to the design documents. The license's text ceased to single out Intergovernmental Organizations such as CERN, making them the same as any other licensor or licensee.

Version 2

Version 2.0, published in March 2020, simplified the licence's terminology and divided it into three variants: strongly reciprocal (CERN-OHL-S), weakly reciprocal (CERN-OHL-W), and permissive (CERN-OHL-P). The license's range was broadened to include artistic, mechanical, and electronic designs, as well as adapting it to cases such as

application-specific integrated circuits An application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC ) is an integrated circuit (IC) chip customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use, such as a chip designed to run in a digital voice recorder or a high-efficien ...

field-programmable gate arrays A field-programmable gate array (FPGA) is a type of configurable integrated circuit that can be repeatedly programmed after manufacturing. FPGAs are a subset of logic devices referred to as programmable logic devices (PLDs). They consist of ...

, and even

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

Reception

The CERN OHL is an accepted

free content Free content, libre content, libre information, or free information is any kind of creative work, such as a work of art, a book, a software program, or any other creative content for which there are very minimal copyright and other legal limi ...

licence according to the Free Cultural Works definition, and Version 2.0 is approved by the

Open Source Initiative The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is a California public benefit corporation "actively involved in Open Source community-building, education, and public advocacy to promote awareness and the importance of non-proprietary software". Governance The ...

Projects using the CERN OHL

On the CERN OHL website they have a list of projects using their licence. These projects include:
Most projects in the Open Hardware Repository OHR
*

AXIOM An axiom, postulate, or assumption is a statement that is taken to be true, to serve as a premise or starting point for further reasoning and arguments. The word comes from the Ancient Greek word (), meaning 'that which is thought worthy or ...

– digital cinema camera
Gizmo For You Ltd

Mechanical Ventilator Milano
Rapid production ventilator design as an answer to COVID-19 shortage
The Monero Hardware Wallet
The first (licensed schematic and layout) Monero hardware wallet * Mycroft Mark I – smart speaker with open-source digital assistant (design files availabl
here
* ScopeFun open source oscilloscope
SimpleMachines
* SatNOGS-the open satellite ground station network * The

synchrotron A synchrotron is a particular type of cyclic particle accelerator, descended from the cyclotron, in which the accelerating particle beam travels around a fixed closed-loop path. The strength of the magnetic field which bends the particle beam i ...

instrumentatio
PandAbox
which chorographs experiments at particle accelerator and other facilities *

Tinkerforge Tinkerforge is an open-source hardware platform of stackable microcontroller building blocks (Bricks) that can control different modules (Bricklets). The primary communication interface of the building blocks can be extended using Master Extensio ...

Bricks and Bricklets * The tristimulus colorimeterbr>Colorhug2
uses version 1.1 of this licence. * UPSat-the first open hardware satellite 1 * A Free Beer variation, brewed for the RMLL 2012 and

recipe A recipe is a set of instructions that describes how to prepare or make something, especially a dish (food), dish of prepared food. A sub-recipe or subrecipe is a recipe for an ingredient that will be called for in the instructions for the main r ...

History

Version 1

Version 2

Reception

Projects using the CERN OHL

See also

Notes

References

External links