MicroBlaze is free with Vivado and the Digilent Nexys4 I am using has a Xilinx Artix 7 XC7A100T on it, which allows one to use Vivado for free on it, via a WebPack license (The free WebPack license is restricted to certain chips.)
https://www.xilinx.com/products/design-tools/mb-mcs.html https://www.xilinx.com/products/design-tools/vivado/vivado-webpack.html (WebPack is the license I am under) which includes the IP integrator (allowing one to place a MicroBlaze processor into a project) And, since version 2016.1, the Xilinx SDK (which has the standalone OS for MicroBlaze, C compiler, etc.) has no additional licensing requirements. https://www.xilinx.com/support/answers/71607.html Finally, there are, apparently, some open source clones fo MicroBlaze: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MicroBlaze#Clones JRJ On 6/15/2020 7:37 AM, Tom Uban wrote: > Very cool! > > I know of MicroBlaze, but always thought it wasn't free? > > --tom > > On 6/14/20 4:25 PM, Jay Jaeger via cctalk wrote: >> Don't know if anybody much cares, but: >> >> The HDL synthesis aspect of the SMS data gathering / HDL synthesis >> application is coming along. I can now handle: >> >> - Oscillators (using a counter divider) >> >> - Delay lines (using a shift register, so limited to a reasonable number >> of FPGA clock clock cycles, so, say 200 ns is not unreasonable (20 bit >> shift register at 100 MHz). >> >> - Recognition and consolidation of individual signals into a "bus" when >> generating groups corresponding to a group of individual ALD sheets. >> (The individual ALD sheets use the individual signal names as they >> appear on the sheet). A simple database table associates a given >> individual signal with a bus, and identifies the bit in the bus that >> corresponds to the individual signal. >> >> So, I have not generated the IBM 1410 main oscillator, its main logic >> clock and its I Ring - used to control instruction decode. I have >> synthesized the logic clock into an FPGA and run it (with a slowed down >> 1410 oscillator so I could see what was going on.) >> >> Also, a word about VHDL - and the Xilinx Vivado. While GHDL is useful, >> I have found that Vivado is not slow at editing and *simulation*. Silly >> me - I got in the habit of synthesizing stuff before I tested it under >> simulation - partly because I didn't know any better at first. Vivado's >> waveform viewer has some advantages (and disadvantages) compared to what >> is available for GHDL. >> >> I have also started exploring a piece of "intellectual property" I can >> use - MicroBlaze - to allow my generated system to talk to my PC, via >> TCP, for things like lights and switches. (Kind of like how the Amdahl >> machines used to use first DG Novas, and later little UNIX systems for >> their consoles, giving them access to the internals of the machine.) >> >> I knew MicroBlaze existed, but now I have actually played with it a bit >> -- still learning. >> >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MicroBlaze >> >> >> >
