Resources / documentation on hardware? To facilitate constructing our own boards

#1

Hi. I bought an earlier version of the core second hand, it is heading my way. I am a programmer but I have absolutely no background in electronics except building my own computers which is easy.

I am interested in the idea that the hardware itself has been characterized as open source. Does this mean that if a user wanted to construct their own core, there is sufficient documentation to describe exactly what to build, if not how to build it?

The most basic reason I can think of is to relieve what appears to be dependence on the project maintainer for the hardware, which might suppress other people from stepping up and helping with all phases of development.

This tool is unique, the project should thrive

#2

I think the only thing not available (and I may be wrong) is the PCB layout files and BOM.

#3

I googled a lot over the weekend and apparently Coretex also makes an m7 chip of the same kind with better performance. Where is the line between these mcus if that is what they are called and a system on a chip? Could you run axo code on a blackfin chip? SHARC?

#4

I purchased a core from a community member on reverb. And got another embedded in a Believotron chassis. So that is good.

I guess it seems that it is straightforward to address the project as open source on the software side but maybe not on the hardware side.

I am an ok programmer but basically zero hardware so I will take the approach of reading the code to see where the os and or firmware meets the hardware. I already found a lot of this in github.

The software is a kind of specification of what facilities must exist in the hardware. So understanding that might help a developer understand what would be involved for example in moving to the cortex m7 chip, or a ti system in a chip that is multi core but still embedded.