Glossary

Open standard

What is an open standard?

An open standard refers to a specification or protocol that is openly available and accessible to the public.

It is a set of guidelines, rules, or specifications that define how a particular technology, system, or process should operate. Open standards are typically developed through a collaborative and transparent process, involving input from various stakeholders. Open standard is not the same as open source, the difference being that an open standard is defined in a document and is not providing an implementation of that standard.

Some key characteristics of open standards include accessibility (freely available to anyone without restrictions), interoperability (between different systems, technologies, or software applications), and evolvability (designed to be adaptable and evolve over time to meet changing requirements and advancements in technology).

Is RISC-V an open standard?

Yes. RISC-V is an open standard. However, RISC-V is not open source. It is an open instruction set architecture (ISA) that provides a free and open framework for designing and implementing processors. It is defined by a set of specifications and guidelines that are openly available to the public, allowing anyone to develop their own processors based on the RISC-V ISA.

Being an open standard means that the RISC-V specifications are accessible to all, promoting collaboration, innovation, and compatibility among different implementations. However, it’s important to note that the open standard nature of RISC-V does not necessarily mean that all RISC-V implementations are open source.

While there are open-source implementations of RISC-V processors available, such as those developed by the RISC-V community or various research projects, there can also be commercially licensed implementations of RISC-V processors developed by companies such as Codasip.

Glossary

Open standard

What is an open standard?

Is RISC-V an open standard?

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