 Okay, so I'm really excited that so many people came to this talk. Thank you very much for joining and I would like to present you the Open hardware project that we are doing PS lab pocket science lab. I will give it around in a moment as well and Yeah, I would like to share a bit of What we did what's our background and how we went to production and I hope I get some questions From you guys, so we're really eager to help others also Produce open hardware, so I can just hand this around here for the pros right away and Yeah, I will just go through a few slides first so the background of pocket science lab is that We developed this together with the first Asia community I've lived for many years in Vietnam and Singapore and China So I have a lot of relationships and we started first Asia 2009 as an event Inspired by foster Because we thought like not so much is going on around us So why not just make an event and as it happens people have ideas during events So we started an organization on github and we started to make like software projects For example for events that we could use ourselves so we can run an event more freely So here are a few projects a lot of things that we do we also in Google some of code and all kinds of programs Please check it out and Recently in the last few years we've become a more interested in hardware So this is a friend of us. It's a Praveen Kumar from India and he joined the annual first Asia summit in 2014 and he brought us a lot of small hardware gadgets That yeah, we thought this is really cool He is a physics teacher in India He also runs science hack day in India and he proposed to us why not develop something for physics Students and he had a hardware at that time and but the hardware wasn't open source it was a sea lab led hardware and He showed to us how he uses it with his physics student and we said okay cool. Let's Further develop and like create new software that can be used with this hardware But in order to get us really excited about this if we could have open hardware that would be so cool, yeah, and so the conversation started with the developer of sea lab led and Yeah, we got an agreement after like a year because like open hardware people like asked all these kind of questions that they used to ask For free and open source before oh how can I make money and I paid for this and I spent my time and this right so so we found ways to convince him and Based on this first heart where we developed the first version of the Arduino Uno form factor PS lab So it's not an Arduino Uno many people ask that but we think like it's always good If you have for example a casing or something like that and it's the same form factor You can just use it with this device as well. Okay, so that was the first Version and then we went to many events like we always come to foster and but we also go to the chaos communication Congress and You see it's very dark there Yeah, first time is a very bright event for for hackers and many developers But like I don't know if some of you can identify here some people for example. This is Bunny Huang This is a ming ting way from the Debian community and and they had a lot of feedback on our Hardware because I said, okay, it's all good. It's all working But if you want to produce it, it's gonna be super expensive Yeah, because for example the first versions that we made and they had Components on both sides. Yeah, and this is just one step more on production. It's very simple But like after we changed it we could reduce the cost already by 25 percent So that's pretty huge if you go to large-scale production. So the next form factor that we then had was Following again, why not follow it? I dream is what people can use the case and and this one also supported Now an ESP 8266. So we have Wi-Fi now But we don't ship with Wi-Fi. You can solder it on the device. So when it goes around you can see it Reason here for example is in some countries is more difficult to sell if you have Wireless components like let's say in Japan and you need certification and so on And we just leave the slot and people can solder it and for now it's it's good for us Yeah, and many small enhancements plus four more digital pins That we added so you can actually plug in Sensors into the device. So here's the roadmap We started with C-Lablet Yeah, we made the first PS lab hardware and we developed a PS lab desktop app also So we have we have an app for Android as well so desktop app is Python application and the PS lab Android app is in Java and Kotlin and the future we want a web app as well so this is how it looks like from the top and Yeah, so what's what's the goal? Usually the question comes. What is the difference to Arduino? What's the difference to? Raspberry so Raspberry I would say it's a computer Like they try to make it very cheap. They try to make it as open as possible accessible for everyone and Arduino. I would say it's Yeah, you can build your own electronics with Arduino very easily you can make your own firmware Make prototypes and so on and our goal is science. So we want to enable students but like also professionals and to conduct scientific experiments So it's not so much the goal that they Like add different components and upload the new firmware the device already comes with a firmware Of course, it's free and open so you can change it. You can upload your own firmware. You can upload your changes But maybe some people don't know how to do that and right we want them to start right away. Yeah, so What you do is you plug in different Cables here into these small Into these small pins there are many different pins and the device goes around you can see on the backside There's a description and and then you can use it for example as an oscilloscope or multimeter I will show you some screenshots in a moment as well So there's an array of useful controls and measurement tools and the integrated components can be used by pins and functionalities can be accessed through the apps and of course you can make your own app and the Communication is following the you are standard. So if you maybe have an app, it might be working already And so this is how you connect it here. You see an earlier version of PS lab so it's connected through the USB then directly to the phone and This means we can power the pocket science lab directly through the phone by via USB and we can also get the Data at the same time on the left-hand side you see a screenshot from the app So we have many different tiles on the app and behind each tile. There is an instrument This is how they look like for example. So on the left-hand side you see an oscilloscope So again, like you connect the two Wires and then you can do your measurements and then get the output here in the oscilloscope here We have a power source, which is another instrument We have a multimeter Wave generator, there's a logic analyzer. So all kinds of tools Also, like each tool has a guide. Yeah, you can just like scroll up like this And then there will be a guide with some information and looks like this. So To get newbies started Then the desktop app. So During the last year we focused on the Android app And because the reason is right, I mean people have an Android phone many people have it They can just install it from the play store from fdroid and can get started quickly and try it out Whereas installing it on an on a desktop Yeah, it's more difficult. Yeah, you need to set up a server You need to set up Python and all these things. So we want to make it easy as well It's our goal for this year and have an exo file many universities and and Schools still use windows unfortunately, but like make it easy open it up more and so people can Use open source hardware and so but they are already 50 different scientific instruments on the app. So has some good Start as well in overview what it can function as this is already what we implemented. So we also implemented a lax meter Yeah, it's cool because you can try out the app with it built-in lax meter that the phones usually have here on top right and Yeah, see how it works and once you have the device you connect the device that you can have for example a sensor connected to the device So just to be clear the device doesn't have all the sensors built in it can measure electronics But you can plug in any sensor like that is the I squared C standard. Yeah, that Arduino also uses Yeah, so that can be plugged in and it should be working and software stack. He's an overview so so for Python we use the Python Qt and Yeah, Android is pretty standard Move to Kotlin mainly still a few Java components in in there as well and the PS lab firmware is Also available. Okay, so hardware specs I put this on you. It's a lot of text always discouraged to lose a lot of text in Presentations, but people like it, right? I mean like people in the hardware community like it. Yeah, because they can see what's on there And it gives an idea what is the range and so on so recently for example, we had some discussions on the microcontroller Forum and I saw a lot of people coming over to the website and then checking it out and then some people microcontroller said Oh, yeah, here. I have this device for 300 euros. It's much better. Yeah, so Yes, of course, we won't increase the range We won't like to expand and see what other cool things we do we do but right now We actually started to sell for 55 euros. So and that already includes the tax in Europe. So right so When you compare compare like the same kind of level so for channel oscilloscope many have only two channels and Yeah, we supporting I squared C SPI you are and I already mentioned that and Yeah, more hardware specs here and to make a samples per seconds Maybe so I think I just leave this for now. You can check this out in detail also on our website PS lab I o Okay so Because we wanted actually to talk more about production here in this session. So production Yeah, it's It's not easy. How many here in this room have experience with production? Yeah Well, okay The question is what kind of person how many people have experience with like production like let's say batches larger than a thousand Okay, cool. So Yeah, that would be good to get your feedback as well and to get to learn what you are doing So a few people here in the room already so it was our first time that we with pocket science lab that we produced hardware and the larger scale and So the project was already ongoing for nearly four years and We got a lot of feedback. So that was our advantage here for example from the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany they told us that Yeah, to make some changes for example to make the components a little bit further into the board like not so much on the edge and Yeah, to use like different soldering ways so that Helped a lot like really with the details and then we had one big advantage because we are based in Asia We actually have people who speak Chinese so So here is we tat and yeah our main like Event and the main operations are in Singapore and in Singapore you have Indians you have Malays you have Chinese origins and we thought is a Singaporean who speaks Chinese and at the beginning He communicated or helped us to communicate also in English. Yeah, because for them. It doesn't matter Chinese English or good and Yeah, and yeah, it was Really interesting and I'm always like why do they answer this and I don't understand it doesn't make sense So we went back and forth a few times and then he also like sometimes ask in Chinese And then we realized that actually the answer in English was completely different to the answer in Chinese Yeah, really in detail. So Yeah, I mean if you want to make large-scale production It's pretty good if you have somebody who can speak Chinese and well, I'm always a fan of languages Yeah, maybe you could like for example talk to to somebody in a university. It's always a good place I don't know if there are many Chinese students here in the university in Belgium But in Germany we have many Chinese students So why not go there and ask them if they want to do an internship for you Maybe like if you do hardware production, it could potentially save you a lot of money and to help you with this and explain to you And then here are some lessons learned so And I thought it's unrealistic what the other team members thought so They thought we just sent the bomb we sent the details We figured it all out what which components we want we send it over two months later We get the components well, it's not like that right so creating a bomb and coordinating with producers is a full-time job Yeah, it really can keep you busy and then there are parts in reels and tubes and prices are different so I Don't know reels. Yeah Round and then tubes you can pull in and also depends like they have different machines So some machines can use sometimes just the reels or so So when we actually checked out the prices for example for the chip the difference can be One dollar and that means a thousand dollars when you produce a batch of one thousand devices So this was something that that we learned and then expect components to become unavailable Yeah, so Right. We might use old components or like that are not available anymore in China But maybe they are many in the US or so, but when you produce in China Usually it doesn't make sense to re-import from the US Yeah, would be very difficult and actually the Chinese always charge for imports again So even if you export they charge for imports or any anything that you import into China You have to pay for it and even though you take it out later again. Yeah, it's very difficult for them to do this So then understand when they offer remanufactured. Yeah, who has heard this term remanufactured. Yeah Yeah, so we could I didn't understand so you have such a small component and we could be resist a really small like you know Sense yeah, and they say remanufactured. How can you remanufacture it? So what they do is actually sometimes doing production things can drop on the floor or they could just be like You know lying around and then the they have a real and they really have somebody who for example Puts it back into a real manually. Yeah, even the component is just like, you know a few cents very cheap So but what happens then is that they could be broken? Maybe some broken components could go in and and that means maybe the whole device doesn't work and you wasted all the money then We had a problem with the micro USB Had us so so here we have the micro USB and When you plug it in there are different tolerances so And if they use a different tolerance than what you have in your Gerber file And yeah, that's that's pretty Problematic because with the prototypes we never had this problem But then suddenly had this problem in in production and we didn't know where it comes from so we really got all the Details from the different producers and we saw that we have very tiny difference And so what we had to do here was we actually had to get somebody manually to to push it and solder it again Yeah, otherwise it would go off with the micro USB so check these kind of things with a Producer and then the female pan pin headers. They weren't straight. So yeah here for example I have one that is not straight. I don't know. Maybe the front row can see that Yeah, so it's not like a fit in straight these headers and so what will be Did the first ones there was somebody who then made them straight manually, but then we just Built like a component on top so they could be straight Yeah, so these are things like we we don't know we just think we we sent our files there We don't know and some PS laps didn't work to due to refreshing Problems so and yeah, so they have you you'd flash the chip and Then you Yeah, it should work right and you would think it's a standard everyone follows the standard and Yeah, and then it's all good But actually it wasn't the case because we used one device to flash it and they used another device to flash it and then Right, it didn't work. So expect this here's a screenshot and you can see that is what remanufactured means So in in the middle here There you see like some Parts that were broken and we had actually two companies that we engaged so whatever something went wrong They wanted wanted to try to put it on the other one Yeah, so that was good that they informed us about this Yeah, so don't always think about finding the cheapest price. Please please check if it's like, you know 20 times cheaper that happens. Yeah, then the other price something Can't be right. Yeah So non-crucial components like resistors and capacitors that are already very low in price Just forget about the lowest price if you think it's okay, and if all the other parts are okay just follow follow that one and Yeah, be ready to anticipate extra charges while in production. So to get the pin header straight We actually had to pay for the Component that they built in order to make it straight for example So something might come up and they will charge for it and let them know how to test the finished product I mean we always test manually when we make prototypes, but how do you test large badges? So you should develop a test case and the perfect way would be if you have actually Like a male or female whatever for your device to actually test it. Yeah for them like one person tested into another one Yeah, and always know the public holidays. Yeah, so yeah They have public holidays a whole week in October. So that might mean like a production stops for two or three weeks Now is the Chinese new year production stops for a month Yeah, so yeah because they always need some time to get back into production. So And they don't tell that they don't tell you that because in China they often live in you know in Chinese everything is in Chinese Yeah, they don't think about it. Yeah, it's it's like everyone should know it's just like in their world I mean we're not working with a super high-end Manufacturers that like, you know, I have somebody they have offices all around the world We're working with Chinese producers in order to get a price that's acceptable. So yeah So this is bit of the story and I already received the notes that we are don't have so much time Left but what we are doing now actually we're doing open hardware I think yeah, I don't have to talk so much about why we do it and what is our goal We want all the layers to be free. There are many different ideas about it Like my idea would be it would be so cool if we could just send schematics around the world And just how we do it with 3d printers today in future. We can just produce boards somewhere and We want to share our knowledge. We want to learn from others what they do And if we do open hardware and all this will be possible, right? I mean we don't have to we can save the environment. We can do many things and with our device you can do many Yeah, many experiments and so on so now after we have the board ready We are selling the boards already to the to the interested public But the next step is to make tutorials The next step is to see what else we can do with the device and we use a microchip here People said they would be interested in making the next version with arm We also have more ideas to make for example A gadget or an EEG gadget to collect brainwaves open BCI is an existing open hardware project already We have some people they have like some other ideas to make it. So this is these are our next steps And what we want from you is feedback Help us to make for example the desktop app better anyone doing Python here Python yeah, yeah, if you're interested, please check it out. We need the to upgrade to Python 3.7 We're also participating in GSOC and we have our own internship program So if there any students who would like to spend some time like either online, but you can also come to our Office in Vietnam. We actually started an open-source hotel. That's a completely different talk So who if you would like to stay with us for some weeks or have any other ideas You can come and talk with me and yeah, do the usual stuff solve issues Make YouTube videos or whatever you like Or just become part of the community you can buy it on C studio is a pretty Good sale at the moment because we were on Hackaday the day before yesterday and we are largest market at the moment Is switch science if you want to sell in Japan and I can help you here at the event There's you Tucker Nebel. Are you here? No, no, I met him earlier today He could also give you feedback and we are selling in more and more places the next Possibility to meet up is at our annual first Asia summit and that happens always in the middle of March from 14 to 17 In Singapore and yeah, and please join us if you want to know more about the device come also to our booth is here on the ground floor and Yeah, you can check out a few of the sensors and so on that we have We are thinking of making a complete box still checking out what we put into the box exactly Yes, that was my last slide. So thank you very much One quick question. Yeah Yes, we use key cat. Yeah, and yeah, it's pretty cool. It's like developed some people are religious like we're about Just the same with the women emacs. Yeah, so they say oh no use another solution use this and that but key cat works Well for us and everything is on Github by the way so you can just check out for Asia and PS lap and here's also the QR code and Yeah, it's it's good for us. Yeah, I mean we have a few other people. They say they still use eagle It's free but not open. I mean for free. It's always, you know in English, right? Yeah, but you know what I mean Yeah, yeah Okay, thank you very much