Ethoscopes are modular open source tools. Anyone can build, modify or even sell them as long as this is done in accordance with their licence. We spent considerable effort at the Gilestro lab to provide an up-to-date and exhaustive documentation for people who would like to build ethoscopes but the documentation is far from perfect. If you spot any mistake or you have any suggestion please do let us know.
If you are setting up a platform from scratch, you will need three key components to get started.
Because ethoscopes work on distributed computing, many of them can be used in parallel. Once the setup is up and running, it should be very easy to use and maintain. Building the system from scratch does require an investment of time and some basic knowledge of Linux.
<aside> 💡 The files needed to build the first published version of the ethoscopes are available on ****https://zenodo.org/record/831153 - the DOIed record accompanied our PLoS Biology paper. However, the platform has been in constant maintenance since then, so you should use the instructions at these pages instead.
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These pages will focus on building the entire platform, taking care of the hardware you need to buy or create, and the software you will have to install.