Re: FPGA C Compiler on sourceforge.net (TMCC derivative)


Rene Tschaggelar wrote:
> Why are those guys so keen on C ? Suggesting
> compatibility with something while having least
> readability ?
>
> Rene

The description at the project page pretty much says it all:

"C provides an excellent alternative to VHDL/Verilog for algorithmic
expression of tasks targeting FPGAs for reconfigurable computing."

Project page at http://sourceforge.net/projects/fpga

The object is to use FPGAs as computing engines, and less concerned
about how to describe circuits in an HDL for synthesis, as most
hardware designers would with VHDL or Verilog. VHDL and Verilog are the
rough equivalent of programming in assemenbly language, as the
implementation languages are directly expressing clocks, registers and
wires which adds a tremendous design state factor and skill level in
their use.

Simplifed C to netlist compilers, such as FpgaC are attempting to hide
most of synthesis details, to ease the design burden for hardware
implementations of applications which have rich algorithmic complexity.
These applications range from doing network stacks in FPGAs for wire
speed performance at gigabit rates, to richly parallel algorithms such
as searching which are performance limited by the serial nature of
traditional CPU/Memory architectures.

FPGAs in this decade are simply building blocks for high performance
computing,
not just a dense PLD to express hardware funtions for the logic
designer.

.

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