Recover FPGA Verilog or VHDL source from .SOF file

I realize that this might not be appropriate question for this group, but considering the level of knowledge I thought I would see if anyone knows much about recovering lost verilog code from a .sof altera Quartus FPGA binary? Some of the my companies IP cores source has disappeared and thought maybe someone here could help me out at recovering the missing source. Does anyone know of any altera dissassembler or decompiler for the SOF file? I'm not particularly concerned if the the output is VHDL, verilog, or even AHDL. Because of the ethics of reverse engineering I would be willing to present anyone with the evidence they might need to verify that my company has all copyrights and ownership of the .sof Im asking to derive the source code. Any thoughts how I can do this?

Mark S.

Reply to
highwayismyway
Loading thread data ...

It is possible to recover a primitive netlist of the entire design. However, picking out IP cores for reuse is not possible.

This situation illustrates the downside of keeping source code on a single machine.

A disk drive drive can die or take to the highway at any time without advance notice.

-- Mike Treseler

Reply to
Mike Treseler

Mark, If you still have a simulation library for it, you might find it in one form or another in there. For modelsim, these are typically a directory named work.

Cheers, Jim

--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jim Lewis
 Click to see the full signature
Reply to
Jim Lewis

I have done this many times as a contract for other companies that have lost Verilog, VHDL, or AHDL source code. Its quite common to have a .sof in control from manufacturing and missing the source code. For example, if the designer leaves a company and his desktop is lost or changed by IT or if the designer's hard drive has a sudden death and is not under control or backed up. The end result of my disassembling / decompiling the FPGA binary will be much better than a netlist as it will be readable (.v), (.vhdl) . I usually charge anywhere from $3,000 to $7,000 US dollars for the time required in reobtaining the source code depending on the type of FPGA and the amount of LUTS used. I can usually have the source within a time frame of 2 weeks to a month depending on my schedule at the time.

If you would like me to give you a quote on recovering your source code you can send me an email at:

rcarlson "|AT|" @ skytekinc. "|DOT| " com I realize that this might not be appropriate question for this group,

anyone

of

anyone

Reply to
rcarlson

ElectronDepot website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.