Flow to HDL

This article does not cite any sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Flow to HDL" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2012) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Flow to HDL tools and methods convert flow-based system design into a hardware description language (HDL) such as VHDL or Verilog. Typically this is a method of creating designs for field-programmable gate array, application-specific integrated circuit prototyping and digital signal processing (DSP) design. Flow-based system design is well-suited^{[according to whom?]} to field-programmable gate array design as it is easier to specify the innate parallelism of the architecture.

History

The use of flow-based design tools in engineering is a reasonably new trend. Unified Modeling Language is the most widely used example for software design. The use of flow-based design tools allows for more holistic system design and faster development. C to HDL tools and flow have a similar aim, but with C or C-like programming languages.

Applications

Most applications are ones which take too long with existing supercomputer architectures. These include bioinformatics,

design can also be done using this flow.

Examples

• Xilinx System Generator from Xilinx
• StarBridge VIVA from defunct
• Nimbus from defunct Exsedia

External links

• [1]^{[permanent dead link]} an overview of flows by Daresbury Labs.
• [2] Xilinx's ESL initiative, some products listed and C to VHDL tools.

See also

• Application Specific Integrated Circuit
  (ASIC)
• C to HDL
• Comparison of Free EDA software
• Comparison of EDA Software
• Complex programmable logic device (CPLD)
• ELLA (programming language)
• Electronic design automation (EDA)
• Embedded C++
• Field Programmable Gate Array
  (FPGA)
• Hardware description language (HDL)
• Handel-C
• Icarus Verilog
• Lustre (programming language)
• MyHDL
• Open source software
• Register transfer notation
• Register transfer level
  (RTL)
• Ruby (hardware description language)
• SpecC
• SystemC
• SystemVerilog
• Systemverilog DPI
• VHDL
• VHDL-AMS
• Verilog
• Verilog-A
• Verilog-AMS