#apertus IRC Channel Logs

morning everyone!

Hello!

about the FPGA: Could we just leave the space that we don't need in the end as Partial Reconfiguration Area and already build in the interfaces to get image data to and from that area even thought its unused for now?

for partial reconfiguration, you need to know beforehand what you want to plug-in and where

but what is the idea of having a plug-in architecture for the FPGA?

also it gets really complicated if you want to have more than one plugin :)

ok so an app store for the FPGA where you can add new codecs for example is not really possible, the only thing we could do is that you can download one codec at a time only and that contains an entirely new binary FPGA image right?

(so strictly speaking an encoder)

I am thinking out loud if this app store could be of interest to IP providers currently

unlikely, for several reasons:

they could sell their proprietary jpeg2000 IP core to end users if we allow LGPL embedding of their stuff in our framework

- interfaces (we cannot accomodate all possible encoding IPs)

ad licensing - yes same as with current apps on android/iphone

which needs to be rooted/jailbroken to run free software?

well, if they adapt our interfaces, it is basically a complete FPGA reconfiguration, no?

so you want to make a closed camera now? no - I want to go through some "what if scenarios" to see how we can make everything even more modular

no, not really

well, android is open source, yes, it also uses a linux kernel (also open source)

i.e. you can only install applications certified by google (in some way)

(which is important for the security)

also note, that on a rooted android device, you can easily install apps you would have to pay for without paying :)

anyway, I think we are distracting ourselves here :)

what I am saying is, no IP provider will attach to an 'open' interface which could easily be used to wrap their IP without any permission from the IP provider, by just copying it from an axiom camera

like you can get custom ROMs for your rooted android device

(the app store experience)

I see

(be it partial bitstream or complete FPGA image)

and I realized, that it would be the perfect device for machine vision and control

(assuming that 'we' do not decide to go the proprietary path :)

so it might make perfect sense to have two or even more software branches for the same hardware, i.e. one for movie makers, the other one for scientists, the third one for solution providers ...

but I know nothing about these use cases tbh

s/be/me/

but there are already some industry cameras even with the same image sensor

do they allow to run your IP on them?

are they cost efficient?

yes, old sensor specs :)

well, let's put the it other way round:

let's say, you are a solution provider, and oscar is the customer

what will be required? what will be the costs?

basically, yes

I see, yes then Axiom is very attractinve

also because I dont need to publish any code changes I make because I only use the result "in house"

for example

because custom solutions are in general very expensive and if the camera is now 5000€ or 20.000€ will not make much of a difference for the end sum anyway right

how do you mean "it doesnt matter if we build the camera or not"?

I do not mean that we should not build it at all :)

but those solution providers would also just buy it from that someone who builds the Axiom in the end, how will we get any money from it?

despite the fact that the code and hardware design is public, a solution provider does not want to dig into details on every platform (s)he uses

Elphel has received several of such requests: "can you make a custom camera based on your elphel camera for my application"

but always turned them down because they want to create a general-purpose-camera only and leave the customizations to others

they are looking for value-adding-applications

like mediworks, a company in china is building microscopes with built in elphel cameras

so, IMHO it is important to focus on keeping it simple but extensible and more importantly adaptable for all kind of crazy uses

and personally I wouldn't bother with anything security or proprietary related because that just adds a lot of workload with little gain

ok, time for lunch

great insights, btw :)

do not install too many halls :)

welcome FergusL!

wb se6astian!

I am summarizing the appstore discussion we had on the iwiki

good, cary on :)

https://iwiki.apertus.org/index.php?title=AppStore

seems to require access credentials