Without Parallax, I do not think many/most of us would be here making and selling electronics, from being one of the first companies to bring electronics to educators, to being a pioneer for some many efforts and products in the world of educational electronics. Additionally, many of their products are made in the USA.

First up, who is Parallax? …. Wikipedia –

Parallax Inc. is a privately held company in Rocklin, California. Parallax Inc. designs, manufactures, and sells BASIC Stamp microcontrollers, Propeller microcontrollers, microcontroller accessories (such as LCDs, sensors, RF modules, etc.), educational robot kits, and educational curriculum. Parallax is headquartered in Rocklin. The Rocklin office employs thirty-five people in research and development, sales, manufacturing, education, marketing, and technical support. Parallax Inc. has over seventy distributors around the world

And also check out the Parallax about page with more details and history of Parallax. They’ve been making electronics since 1986!

What else? Parallax released the Propeller 1 Verilog Hardware Description Language source code. If you’ve ever wondered how the Propeller chip actually works, this is it.

Parallax was one of the first companies that was doing educational electronics to start to release their files and more, specifically under open-source licenses.

There is an entire section devoted to Open Source Designs, which include…

• Propeller 1 (P8X32A) Multicore Microcontroller Design Files.
• Parallax Printed Circuit Board Hardware Designs.
• Propeller Object Code.
• And Open-Source Software Projects.

One other note, we THINK Parallax was one of the first companies to put the open-source hardware gear-community logo on packaging for retail use, we have a post about their packaging but will see if we can find the back with the logo.

And here’s some of the Parallax products/project we’ve either stocked or did projects with too.

Related

• Open Source Hardware on Parallax product listings.
• Parallax open-source software.
• Parallax on GitHub.
• Parallax on Twitter @ParallaxInc.
• Parallax on Instagram.
• Over 30 years of hardware development – An interview with Parallax, Inc.
• Solving a problem with Open Source Hardware by David Carrier (Parallax) – Make Magazine.

Open source hardware month @ Adafruit:

• Growing Your Open Business – A Digital Meetup for Open Hardware Month – Day 19, 10/19/2019.
• Open-source hardware at the Museum of Modern Art, posted on 10/19/2019 – Day 18, 10/18/2019.
• Open Hardware Licenses CC BY-SA, CERN, TAPR … – Day 17, 10/17/2019.
• Open Source Hardware Month at SparkFun – Day 16, 10/16/2019.
• How many Open-Source Prusa 3D printers are there? Posted on 10/19/2019 – Day 15, 10/15/2019.
• The RepRap Project Self-Replicating Open-Source 3D Printing – Day 14, 10/13/2019.
• The first 2 orders at Adafruit… now up to 2,161,166 orders – Day 13, 10/13/2019.
• Photos of the first Arduino (2005) – Day 12, 10/12 2019.
• In 2010 there were 13 Open Source Hardware companies that were making $1 million or more… – Day 11, 10/11/2019
• Opening Hardware 2010 at Eyebeam in NYC – Day 10, 10/10/2019.
• The Open Source Gift Guide, the early years – Day 9, 10/9/2019 (posted it on 10/10/2019, whoops)
• Before the iPhone, before the Raspberry Pi, before Amazon Echo Show, there was Chumby – Day 8, 10/8/2019.
• Mitch Altman Open-source hardware pioneer – Day 7, 10/7/2019.
• The Open Source logo(s) – Day 6, 10/6/2019.
• Open Source Hardware events all month long, EVENTS! – Day 5, 10/5/2019.
• Open Source Hardware Certifications and more! – Day 4, 10/4/2019.
• Teuthis Open Source MP3 Player 2001 – Daisy by Raphael Abrams – Day 3, 10/3/2019.
• What is the Open-Source Hardware Definition? – Day 2, 10/2/2019.
• Open hardware summit – Limor “Ladyada” Fried keynote 2010 – Day 1, 10/1/2019.

October is open-source hardware month! Every single day in October we’ll be posting up some open-source stories from the last decade (and more!) about open-source hardware, open-source software, and beyond!

Have an open-source hardware (or software) success story? A person, company, or project to celebrate? An open-source challenge? Post up here in the comments or email [email protected], we’ll be looking for, and using the tag #OHM2019 online as well! Check out all the events going on here!