Learning FPGAs

Book description

Learn how to design digital circuits with FPGAs (field-programmable gate arrays), the devices that reconfigure themselves to become the very hardware circuits you set out to program. With this practical guide, author Justin Rajewski shows you hands-on how to create FPGA projects, whether you’re a programmer, engineer, product designer, or maker. You’ll quickly go from the basics to designing your own processor.

Designing digital circuits used to be a long and costly endeavor that only big companies could pursue. FPGAs make the process much easier, and now they’re affordable enough even for hobbyists. If you’re familiar with electricity and basic electrical components, this book starts simply and progresses through increasingly complex projects.

  • Set up your environment by installing Xilinx ISE and the author’s Mojo IDE
  • Learn how hardware designs are broken into modules, comparable to functions in a software program
  • Create digital hardware designs and learn the basics on how they’ll be implemented by the FPGA
  • Build your projects with Lucid, a beginner-friendly hardware description language, based on Verilog, with syntax similar to C/C++ and Java

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Table of contents

  1. Preface
    1. Expected Background
    2. Conventions Used in This Book
      1. Using Code Examples
      2. How to Contact Us
  2. 1. Introduction
    1. The Mojo
    2. FPGAs Versus Microcontrollers: A Comparison
    3. Setting Up Your Environment
      1. Installing ISE
      2. Installing the Mojo IDE
      3. Mojo IDE Settings
  3. 2. Your First FPGA Project
    1. Creating a New Project
    2. Understanding Modules
    3. Representing Values
    4. Using Always Blocks
    5. Connecting the Button
    6. Building Your Project
    7. Loading Your Project
    8. Some Notes on Hardware
    9. Duplication
    10. Array Indexing
    11. Always Block Priority
  4. 3. Combinational Logic
    1. IO Shield
    2. Logic Functions
    3. Bitwise Operators
    4. Reduction Operators
    5. Math
    6. Common Subcircuits
      1. Multiplexers
      2. Decoders
      3. Encoders
      4. Arbiters
      5. Decoder, Encoder, and Arbiter Example
  5. 4. Sequential Logic
    1. Feedback Loops and Flip-Flops
      1. Clocks
    2. Timing and Metastability
      1. External Inputs
      2. Add the Components
      3. Instantiating a Module
      4. Checking Timing
      5. Bouncy Buttons and Edges
      6. Running Total
  6. 5. Seven-Segment LED Displays and Finite‑State Machines
    1. Single Digit
    2. Lookup Tables
    3. Binary to Decimal
    4. The Finite-State Machine
    5. The Stopwatch
  7. 6. Hello AVR
    1. The AVR Interface
      1. Sending and Receiving Data
    2. ROMs
    3. The Greeter
    4. Getting Personal with RAM
  8. 7. Mixing Colors with an RGB LED
    1. External I/O Constraints
    2. Getting Fancy with PWM
    3. Register Interface
  9. 8. Analog Inputs
    1. The AVR Interface
    2. All the Channels
  10. 9. A Basic Processor
    1. What Is a Processor?
      1. Instruction Sets
      2. Memory
    2. Initial Design
      1. NOP
      2. LOAD and STORE
      3. SET
      4. LT and EQ
      5. BEQ and BNEQ
      6. The ALU
      7. The Program Counter
    3. The Processor
      1. The Program
    4. The Assembler
  11. 10. FPGA Internals
    1. General Fabric and Routing Resources
    2. Special Primitives
      1. Block RAM (Memory)
      2. Math
      3. Clocking
      4. Special I/O Features
  12. 11. Advanced Timing and Clock Domains
    1. Breaking Timing and Fixing It with Pipelining
    2. Crossing Clock Domains
  13. 12. Sound Direction Detection: An Advanced Example
    1. Theory of Operation
    2. Implementation Overview
    3. Implementation
      1. PDM Microphones
      2. FFT
      3. CORDIC
      4. CAPTURE State
      5. FFT State
      6. DIFFERENCE State
      7. AGGREGATE State
  14. 13. Lucid Reference
    1. Lucid Quick Reference
    2. Modules
      1. Parameter Lists
      2. Port Lists
      3. Module Body
    3. Expressions
      1. Signals and Constants
      2. Functions
      3. Groups
      4. Array Concatenation
      5. Array Duplication
      6. Array Builder
      7. Bitwise Invert
      8. Logical Invert
      9. Negate
      10. Multiply
      11. Divide
      12. Add and Subtract
      13. Bit Shifting
      14. Bitwise Operators
      15. Reduction Operators
      16. Comparison Operators
      17. Logical AND and OR
      18. Ternary Operator
    4. Literal Values
      1. Numbers
      2. Strings
    5. global Blocks
    6. Array Size and Bit Selection
      1. Array Size
      2. Bit Selectors
    7. Comments
  15. A. Full Modules and Proof
    1. Greeter Module
    2. ADC Multichannel Example
    3. Basic Processor
    4. Direction Detection Proof
  16. Index

Product information

  • Title: Learning FPGAs
  • Author(s): Justin Rajewski
  • Release date: August 2017
  • Publisher(s): O'Reilly Media, Inc.
  • ISBN: 9781491965498