

Upverter (YC W11): the perfect tool for open-source hardware - shamer
http://venturebeat.com/2011/09/13/upverter/

======
0x12
To me the big difference they bring to the table is that it is web based,
instead of downloadable software.

There is a lot more to your average EE CAD package than just wiring up some
parts. That's the easy bit. Rules checks, physics, placement, packages, PCB
design, (auto)routing, Gerber files and all the other 'goodies' are required
before you can take on the big guys.

Schematics is an important element in the whole chain of developing hardware,
but it really needs a lot more than that.

That's a large number of man-years, and by going the software-as-a-service
route they gain some advantages but are also stuck with a number of
disadvantages, the largest of which is that they won't be seeing the benefits
of user contributions at a level where it will move the needle. Of course
there will be contributions to the parts library that can be shared, which is
a step.

The 'perfect tool for open-source hardware' would benefit from being open-
source itself.

~~~
bradfa
I took the tour on their site and it looks neat but the first thing I thought
was, "Where's my layout tool?"

Open source hardware is no good if I can't manufacture it on a circuit board.
Yes, breadboarding is handy for small stuff, but 256 pin BGAs don't fit on
breadboards. And repeatability isn't so grand.

With a nice, reasonable to use layout tool (even with just simple routing
assistant type features [push and shove]) and tutorials on how to use it, what
DRCs are and how they're used, and maybe videos showing people who know how to
do this stuff teaching, upverter could be really cool. Heck, for a full-ish
featured EDA package in the cloud targeted at open hardware, I'd even pay to
use it (provided we're not talking Cadence or Mentor money, more like GitHub
paid account money).

~~~
zakhomuth
Hey bradfa, Zak from upverter here. We hear you! Layout will be one of the
next things we launch (we are working on it right now, hopefully just a few
months away).

The hope is to also add a "print button" to connect users designs with rapid
manufacturing suppliers.

~~~
0x12
That's a hell of a business model! Congratulations.

------
patrickyeon
As a current EDA user, I hope these guys (or something similar) take off, I
really do. It's ridiculously painful working with current EDA tools and not
having access to tools I take for granted as a programmer (version control,
diff, even text-based data that I can beat up in my own scripts).

But I think they're coming at the wrong end. Their schematic capture was
painfully slow when I tried it a couple weeks ago, and I (and I suspect nearly
every other electrical designer) rues having to change tools. If someone wants
to become the 'github of electronics', I strongly recommend working on getting
some sensible versioning and sharing going without also tackling the problem
of creating EDA tools.

Having said that, a shared crowdsourced library is a big help, and some others
have already noticed the good it can provide:
<https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit-Eagle-Library>

~~~
zakhomuth
Hey patrickyeon, its Zak one of the Upverter founders. Thanks for the comment.

We just pushed a major update publicly yesterday that had some incredible
performance gains (50 - 100x faster). We have also done a bunch of selective
rendering updates which make it feel a ton faster to use.

You should give it a try again and let me know what you think! Hopefully we
are a lot closer!

~~~
patrickyeon
I'm glad to hear you're not ignoring performance, but please keep in mind that
you're putting a big stumbling block in the way for people who would want to
use a similar service. github would've gone absolutely nowhere if they forced
programmers to re-type everything into HTML forms, or even into extremely
well-written web apps.

~~~
rcfox
Github would have also gone nowhere if they only supported code written in one
text editor.

Most EDA software is written by companies who have no interest in letting you
see how their proprietary formats work.

~~~
patrickyeon
> Most EDA software is written by companies who have no interest in letting
> you see how their proprietary formats work.

Oh boy, I know it, and it's been a pain in my side. However, EAGLE (lots of
hobbiests use it) is migrating to a fully-documented XML-based format [1], and
there are two open-source projects for schematic capture, kicad and geda,
which would give someone a head start on parsing their design files, at least.

[1] <http://www.element14.com/community/message/15751>

------
samlittlewood
Wild fantasy for library & component search - once I find a part - not only
can I pull in the symbol and footprint, but also select a canned snippet for
one of the common use cases of that part (ie: what everyone copies from the
app. note and/or reference designs). Eg: switchers+inductors+caps,
max232+caps, ... This could be a value-add for certain parts and suppliers.

Bonus points for parameterising the component selection and adapting to
current design rules!

------
slug
A few things: when placing parts, allow the user to press escape or other
key/mouse combo and jump back directly to the library part selection. It makes
it easier to populate a schematic.

Second, separate the parts into different libraries! Other EDA packages have
thousands of parts, it would be a mess to have all in one list, even with
filtering. It seems you are loading all the parts when creating the library
dialog? Probably a different approach to make it manageable...

Preview for the parts, including PCB footprint and variations. What do you
plan to do with parts with different blocks, like logical gates, power pins,
etc ?

When adding nets, allow the user to move parts around.

I have a few more, but I'll wait when you get layout, drc/erc , auto routing
and pcb webgl 3d view working ;) Besides this, keep the good work!

You can try to look at the mailing list archives of the open source packages
gEDA, PCB and kicad. There's a trove of nice info and discussions there. I
contributed long ago (1998?) to gEDA and use these , eagle and others more or
less frequently.

------
simonw
I really like the focus on getting the open source hardware people using the
product first, before taking it to the enterprise. Kind of like GitHub - free
for open source, pay if you want to keep your code private.

------
jimmyswimmy
I just took the really short tour. Looks like a neat tool, as a web-based
schematic capture package. I've never run across one of those before. I mostly
use Altium in my work, but have considered Eagle and gEDA for this. I don't
know how you'd collaborate on schematics though, seems like only one person
can work on a schematic at a time.

I don't see any support for hierarchy in a design. For scaling things you need
that. You advertise pages that are as large as you want, but that's more a
hindrance than a help, I think, because you can't print an infinite-sized
page. And how do you print? How do you get the data out at all - is that
possible? In order to do layout you'll need to be able to produce a netlist,
and the community-provided parts library is not so great if it doesn't carry
over into the physical world of PCB layout. It would also be good to be able
to do a simulation, but that is going to really be tough on your servers.

It would be really cool if you didn't have to sign up to try it, that stopped
me in my tracks even if it did look like an easy form to fill out.

------
ajray
:-( I was planning on doing this for YC next summer. Looks like I got beat to
the punch.

~~~
henry501
Competition is good.

------
samlittlewood
So when does interop. with Octopart happen?

~~~
zakhomuth
The parts library is already integrated with the Octopart API.

~~~
samlittlewood
Ah - that explains the voluminous library. I missed the references to octopart
in some of the library parameters - IMO, that should be called out as feature.

It'd be cool to go from the end of a search via octopart ui to a new symbol in
upvert without cutting and mis-pasting part numbers.

------
revorad
Really pleased to see a YC startup in this area. One of the secondary ideas I
applied to YC this round is a marketplace for new types of computers based on
Arduino.

~~~
follower
> One of the secondary ideas I applied to YC this round > is a marketplace for
> new types of computers based on Arduino.

I'd be interested in learning more about this if you wanted to share.

------
BCounsell
This is a really neat Idea. I'm working on a 60inch touch screen for doing
data analysis. I've tried it on our large system and it works like a charm
(Webkit in QT). I think this will be interesting to follow your progress!

I'm a Altium user, can't really use it on a iPad. Upverter can go almost
everywhere!

------
njs12345
Login with Facebook would be nice. Also, have you guys thought about having
some of the featured content on the front page? It's easier to get an idea of
what it's about if you don't start with a clean slate and don't have to create
an account..

------
foxhop
When I read the name Upverter, I read it like:

U-pervert-er

