IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2023 - 128

methods next to the components as well as any tools needed
for postfabrication and assembly, allowing for alternate
methods and equipment where possible.
■ Although more information for the user is better than less,
a good documentation package ensures that the instructions
are presented in a logical and clear manner. To this
effect, annotated images or videos can go a long way in
communicating complex and multistep building processes
effectively to even the novice user.
■ Once the design files and documentation packages have
been prepared, developers can disseminate the project
through online repositories or project websites to reach as
many users as possible. There are also several open source
project hubs (such as OSHWA and ORH directories).
■ For disseminating within academic communities,
journals dedicated to open
source hardware can further spread the
reach of the ORH. Sending e-mails on
popular research mailing lists, publishing
research papers, and participating in
conferences and workshops can also
help increase the user base.
■ Indicating the license applied to the
ORH files prominently on the site
can inform prospective users early on
and prevent any breach of the user
agreement.
■ Developers can also support and nurture
their user community by creating
forum spaces for users to interact with
each other as well as provide feedback
on the project. An active user base for
the ORH amplifies the aforementioned
advantages of open sourcing the project
for the developer.
"
SURVEY OF ORH PROJECTS
The development and dissemination of open hardware can
vary depending on its scope and purpose within the application
area. As robotics encompasses a wide range of fields,
each requiring unique hardware and using distinct design and
fabrication methods, the primary attribute used for the categorization
of ORH in this article is that of the hardware's
application domain within robotics. The list of ORH projects
classified here is certainly not exhaustive, but rather aims to
identify the practices of some of those projects that led to
their widespread adoption within the user community.
The surveyed projects for which the files are still accessible are
listed in Table 2 and also published through the ORH website [16].
In this table, we note the ORH properties and practices, followed
by each project so that prospective developers
can identify the current ORH with the
desired attributes.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF
A SUCCESSFUL ORH IS
THUS CONTINUALLY
ITERATIVE: USING THE
FEEDBACK FROM SUPPORT
PROVIDED TO
USERS IN INFORMING
DESIGN CHANGES,
WHICH SUBSEQUENTLY
GET DOCUMENTED AND
DISSEMINATED ON THE
PLATFORM IN A PRO■
With the pace of progress in rapidly
growing fields like robotics, it is crucial
to update and revise the ORH
files regularly to support current users.
Updates should be tracked and re -
leased to add compatibility for new
versions of off-the-shelf parts, or to account for novel fabrication
methods. Users can inform the developer when
and which updates may be needed to the project, and even
prepare these revisions themselves if the project files are
modifiable in freely available CAD software.
The development of a successful ORH is thus continually
CESS THAT GETS REPEATED
THROUGH THE LIFETIME
OF THE ORH.
„
iterative: using the feedback from support provided to users
in informing design changes, which subsequently gets documented
and disseminated on the platform in a process that gets
repeated through the lifetime of the ORH. Thus, an ORH project
can be made vastly more effective by employing these best
practices at different stages of the process. In the " Developing
an ORH Project " section, we further detail these stages of the
development process, focusing on the tangible steps prospective
developers can take when building their ORH.
12 IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE SEPTEMBER 2023
8
ROBOT ARMS AND HANDS
Applications in grasping and manipulation
require the robot to be outfitted with different
end effectors depending on the task and
objects used. The choice of end effector is
often limited by compatibility with the
robot arm. Open source robot hands seek
to expand the robot systems' functionality
by offering inexpensive and customizable
robot hands that users can implement for
their own use cases. The Yale OpenHand
project [23] sought to create a library of
such low-cost, 3D-printed hand designs for
researchers to use [see Figure 2(a)]. The
source design files are available to public,
along with a fabrication guide and videos to
aid users in reproducing the hands on their
end [27]. The Baxter EasyHand [28] draws
from the OpenHand designs to offer an even
less expensive and easy-to-build robot hand
that functions with existing actuators on the
Baxter robot arm. The EasyHand project
exemplifies an instance of a derivative
ORH project modifying and redistributing another ORH project.
Similarly, the OpenBionics initiative [29], initially inspired
by the OpenHand project, releases several open source robot
and prosthetic hands, such as a series of modular robot hands
[30]. Open robotic hand platforms also present users with an
opportunity to standardize evaluations of algorithms through
benchmarking test setups. Several such platforms have been
developed for testing learning algorithms for dexterous manipulation,
such as the ROBEL D'Claw [31] and TriFinger [24] platforms
[see Figure 2(b)]. Both of these three-fingered hands aim
to lower the cost barrier for experimentation with a full-commercial
robot system and are intended to be used on standalone
mounts without a robot arm.
Anthropomorphic hands form a large portion of robot hand
designs used to carry out grasping and manipulation tasks in
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