I wrote: > You're saying that Xilinx Webpack isn't a "good free tool"? (Free as > in beer, in this case.)
John Tsiombikas wrote: > Not really a part I'm involved with (I don't do hardware :) but you > should value your freedom more and not be content with good "free as in > <insert favourite alcoholic beverage here>" tools :) > The other kind of free is the most important one. I'm all in favor of free-as-in-speech software. I release almost every program I write that isn't for hire or under contract (and even a few that are) under the GPL. With respect to FPGA development software from the major vendors (Xilinx and Altera), that isn't going to happen any time soon. For now we'll have to settle for free-as-in-beer. Xilinx has a *very* large staff of programmers developing their FPGA tools. They have invested literally thousands of man-years in development. They're not likely to want to release it as free-as- in-speech unless a major competitive threat appears, and right now they're on the top of the heap. The staggering amount of development necessary to build even very basic usable FPGA tools by reverse-engineering is such that it is rather unlikely that any such free-as-in-speech tools will ever be developed. If there is anyone (or group) willing to work on that, I wish them luck. I think free-as-in-speech software development efforts are much better spent build complementary tools, rather than trying to replace the Xilinx tools. For instance, a way to import the Xilinx primitives for Modelsim XE simulation into Icarus Verilog would be incredibly useful. Once upon a time there was a company that did the reverse-engineering in order to produce a commercial vendor-neutral FPGA tool chain. Xilinx purchased them. In practical terms, for something as complex as an FPGA tool chain, it is possible that we may be better off with the free-as-in-beer tools anyhow, since they are fully supported by the vendor. Eric _______________________________________________ Open-graphics mailing list [email protected] http://lists.duskglow.com/mailman/listinfo/open-graphics List service provided by Duskglow Consulting, LLC (www.duskglow.com)
