Who we are

Free EDA UG (written and pronounced "Free Dog") is the Free Electronic Design Automation Users Group. We are an association of engineers and electronics professionals devoted to promoting the use of free, open-source EDA tools, both in personal, as well as in commerical settings. We believe that using free and open EDA tools brings the following advantages to engineers and electronic design professionals everywhere:

• Open source tools are transparent: the engineer can read the source and understand why the tool gave the answer obtained.
• Open source tools are also transparent in that they use ascii file formats: the engineer can modify and improve any of the files produced by his tools along the design chain.
• Open source tools represent a better value proposition to the end user than their closed-source bretheren. Procurement of the tools is usually free, as opposed to costing up to hundreds of thousands of dollars for commercial, closed-source tools. Despite their low cost, many free EDA tools (such as gEDA and Icarus Verilog) are mature enough to offer equivalent functionality.
• The value proposition offered by free tools also extends to support: In the event of problems with open-source tools, help stands ready on the web, as well as via open-source consultants. Because the source is open, many diverse people know how the tools work. With closed source tools, the only source of support is the vendor. With open source tools you don't have to wait for hours on a tech-support line to talk to somebody in India (or Seattle) about a bug you have found, only to find that they don't really know anything beyond what is printed on a laminated Q/A sheet they were issued upon taking the job!
• Open source tools are often stabler and more robust than their closed-source bretheren.
• Open source tools run on better platforms (i.e. Linux) than many closed source tools. Linux offers the entire repitoire of unix shell tools (Perl, Python, TCL, etc.) which are used in electronic design. No other platform offers the same value, power, and flexibility to engineers natively.
• When it comes to handling design problems, Open source tools offer the possibility of providing transparent, adaptable "building blocks" to engineers, which is what they want. Closed source tools offer "end-to-end, packaged solutions", which sounds appealing to marketeers, but isn't really how engineering is done. (And the end-to-end solution is acheived with a closed, binary file format.) Put succinctly: open-source software moves the balance of power back to the engineer, and away from his software vendor.