ISE 8.2 and partitions from command line

--
 __
/ /\/\ Aurelian Lazarut
\ \  / System Verification Engineer
/ /  \ Xilinx Ireland
\_\/\/
 
phone:	353 01 4032639
fax:	353 01 4640324

Yes, I've read that part of the documentation. But my problem is (correct me if I'm wrong here) that there is no information about how to use the tcl interface unless the project navigator GUI is started. Is it even possible to do so?

If not, is it possible to start project navigator and force it to run a certain tcl script at startup?

For automatic regression testing for example, it is not really acceptable that you have to start a GUI and manually compile the project. In fact, you probably don't want to start a GUI at all since you are probably running it from a cronjob...

Another reason would be that it would be nice if partitions could be used in flows that do not use Project Navigator such as the one used in FPGA Advantage where only the Xilinx backend tools are used.

My personal reason is that I'm not very fond of Project Navigator, it is basically too sluggish and it doesn't interact well with dual head. I also don't like the idea of putting all project data in a binary blob (.ise) which is quite hard on revision control systems [1]. I use emacs to edit all files anyway so my only use for project navigator is basically to press the "Generate bitfile" button.

/Andreas

[1] I know that you (nowadays) can use tcl to export and import files which makes this situation better but still awkward.

--
 __
/ /\/\ Aurelian Lazarut
\ \  / System Verification Engineer
/ /  \ Xilinx Ireland
\_\/\/
 
phone:	353 01 4032639
fax:	353 01 4640324

Use xtclsh.

Whatever commands related to creating a project, adding files and setting partitions you might do through the GUI's tcl console, you can do in this shell.

You can script it and avoid the GUI, as you see fit.

Other tcl shells might also work. ymmv

Thank you! I must have overlooked any reference to xtclsh in the documentation.

/Andreas