About the OHO Search Engine

From OHO - search engine for sustainable open hardware projects

Why the OHO search engine exists

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Open Hardware and Do it Yourself projects are huge treasures of valuable technical knowledge. Hundreds of thousands of people worldwide have successfully developed technical solutions for a wide range of applications, and more are being created every day. Most of these are technical solutions that can be produced with relatively simple technical resources in small workshops.

Potentially, this technical knowledge is free because it is hardly protected by patents or other regulations. However, the vast majority of this knowledge is not or insufficiently documented. In almost all cases, there are no plans, parts lists, etc., which are necessary for rebuilding or further developing a project. There are many publications, especially on the internet, but these publications are often on small and anonymous websites and are only available in a single language.

This technical knowledge could have a huge impact, especially on small businesses, start-ups and individuals. It could enable a more localized and regional kind of technical and economic development. It could enable sustainable development from an ecological, social, and economic point of view. With OHO, we would like to contribute to this.

What does the OHO Search Engine do

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The OHO Search Engine crawls, an entire web for a variety of search keywords and their combinations and is thus able to find even small "hidden" websites. It searches specifically for Do it Yourself and Open Hardware projects. In the current beta version, the search engine is available in three languages: English, German and Spanish. Further language versions are in preparation. In addition, developers can upload their projects directly to OHO. (more)

The search results found go through a partly automatic and partly manual quality control. They are listed, classified, arranged in categories, and displayed with thumbnails and short descriptions. Currently, search results from the following main categories can be found on OHO

  • Computers
  • Electronics
  • Renewable Energies
  • Health care
  • Trade
  • Industry
  • Agriculture
  • Forestry
  • Mobility
  • Logistics
  • Environmental technology

What is the benefit of the OHO Search Engine?

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OHO Search Engine is the only multilingual search engine specialized in sustainable Open Hardware and Do it Yourself projects. The visitor can browse through the categories and can also search for results with specific properties (for example "has blueprints" or "is published under free licenses" etc.). Currently, the OHO Search Engine offers about 12,000 search results in more than 500 categories.

OPEN HARDWARE OBSERVATORY 2020
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