Re: Spartan 3 documentation confusing...

Steve Knapp (Xilinx Spartan-3 Generation FPGAs) wrote:
I encourage active feedback. If something is confusing, please let us
know, as it will likely be confusing to others. Most of our best
product and documentation ideas come from Xilinx users! Feel free to
E-mail me directly for Spartan documentation or use the Feedback link
from the Xilinx web site.
http://www.xilinx.com/askx/feedback.htm

You might also try educating your FAEs. I specifically asked my local
FAE about using resistors to set the mode pins ("Why do the app notes
show direct connections to Vcc and Gnd, will resistors work ok?") and
he said that we could use 4.7 kohm resistors. Clearly this is not a
correct answer. Based on his reply I almost commited to a design that
would not have worked.

Like I said in my email, the info is mostly in the data ***. But
there are many places where it seems to contradict itself and is so
scattered around that it would take a hour or more of intensive
searching to find all the relevant info. I actually sat down earlier
and did a search on "pull-up" trying to find all the info on the
pullups and the configuration pins. Even then I missed a few items
like the *only* place in the document where pull-ups on the mode pins
are mentioned, in the header for the pin description section that
covers the configuration pins.

I am asking that you not wait until a frustrated user reports your
mistakes. I am asking that you have someone look at what it takes to
find all the info that an engineer needs to configure these parts and
make the info consistent and more usable.

.