We have the chips produced from earlier eras, but what attempts have
been made to preserve the design tools from those earlier eras?
Schematic Capture
PCB Layout
Netlist Tools
IC transistor-level design
IC gate-level design
etc.
I know several of you out there have microprocessor development
environments from Intel and TI, IIRC. Ditto for things like PROM
programmers.
What about the design software? I imagine the first generation of EDA
software was created in-house by pioneers of VLSI design. But what
about when the tools started to become commodities? What about early
releases of software from a company like Mentor Graphics?
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