(V)HDL Toolsets

[Jim Brain]

On 5/21/2020 12:24 PM, Eric Smith via cctalk wrote:
> On Thu, May 21, 2020 at 10:07 AM Jon Elson via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> wrote:
>
>> (I also use Coolrunner II and XC9500XL devices in some of my
>> products.)
>>
> I used to use XC9500XL series (mostly XC9572XL) quite a bit, but I have
> switched to Lattice LC4000ZE series because they are less expensive and
> lower power, and (like the XC9500XL) have 5V tolerant inputs.
>
> I'm not thrilled with having to use yet another different toolset, but
> c'est la vie.

Is it possible for you or someone to post about how to get an 
environment up and running in Windows and/or Linux? (or link to one you 
used?)

I use xc9500xl parts with IDE 14.7 on Win10 x64 (with DLL fix) here, and 
the environment works well.  But, I have a few things that I would love 
to fix/address:

  * CPLD work goes fine with the fix, but the FPGA toolchain portions of
    ISE won't work in Windows 10, even with the DLL fix (at least for
    me).  I'd like to fix this, as some of my designs are too big for
    xc95288xl.
  * Alan Hightower praises the open source toolchains and Lattice units,
    but my initial attempt to bring up a working environment here went
    down in flames. I think I need a step-by-step guide (and maybe
    someone who has time to help a poor soul get something up and running)
  * As much as I like the GUI, I want to learn how to write (or
    beg/borrow/steal) Makefile-based tooling for all my CPLD projects,
    whether Xilinx or other.

All my existing CPLD work is online: https://github.com/go4retro/ , 
warts and all.

Jim

-- 
Jim Brain
brain at jbrain.com
www.jbrain.com