FPGA Journal Article

then they'll probably be finished ahead of mine :-(

Area,

If we ever had to cross that bridge ... the core team might have to found something Xilinx could buy out?

IMO there should be no conflict between the continued existence of a technology in open-source form using XDL, and the same or derived technology streamlined into the push-button flow using NCD. Xilinx use open-source tools for PPC development already.

- Brian

Call it as you see it. I tend to. And since you are much more versed as to what is possible and/or easy/big/small, I'll defer to your expertise on the matter above. Sorry to cause a stir.

Still... can I get the bitstream info? :)

No, Tobias, you can not. The price of what you are asking is higher then you realize.

If you want it, you will have to get it by reverse engineering.

Antti

As long as the project didn't inadvertently compile and disclose the routing database as the JHDLbits project did, things are probably ok. As Phil notes though, and others have suggested, one set of tools that would be interesting would be ones capable of fixing bad nets, and that would require a database of chip capabilities and architecture that is currently only visible from the floor planner and device editors. Extracting that data and archiving it in a format useable for third party tools is pretty much what got the JHDLbits project shut down.

This team boldly set out to provide open source access similar to what is proposed before getting shut down by Xilinx.

References are a dead sourceforge project, and some papers:

Plus see the teams thesis work:

I'm not aware of the history of JHDLbits; can you give a few details? I'm assuming it was an open source project (as JHDL is) so they must've gotten a cease & desist letter at some point.

Is there any way of avoiding the same fate?

Phil

I want to thank everyone for their thoughtful, insightful, and provocative responses to my query. We've covered everything from politics to education to (strange as it seems) FPGAs. I've already contacted a number of you directly (and have a few more on my list), and I'm excited about the article.

I'll post here when it's ready for publication, and we can all start a new thread about how badly I missed the boat.

Thanks again!

Kevin