eFPGA User Tools
The Aurora 2.6 Development Tool Suite integrates fully open-source modules for scalability, longevity, and full code transparency.
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Introduction
The Aurora 2.6 eFPGA development tool suite is ideal for eFPGA development. It features core tool enhancements that improve the eFPGA utilization and performance of designer's RTL, particularly in the area of reconfigurable computing.
Here’s what’s new — Aurora v2.6 Highlights:
Support for Windows and Linux OS Platforms
Aurora is now available on Windows 11/Windows 10 OS platform and all of the major Linux distributions (including Centos, RedHat, and Ubuntu), via a unified Linux installation package.
K6N10 Architecture Improvement
The Aurora 2.6 suite brings an improved K6N10 architecture, delivering an average timing performance boost of 6% across various designs. In certain cases, the enhancement leaps to as much as 15%, underscoring QuickLogic's dedication to optimizing performance and efficiency. Detailed comparisons and benchmarks are available for review, showcasing the tangible benefits of the updates implemented in this version.
Interactive Path Analysis (IPA) Feature
A standout addition is the Interactive Path Analysis (IPA) within the new Graphical User Interface (GUI). Interactive Path Analysis (IPA) Feature allows users to debug their design timing in lot more detail by highlighting the routing for critical paths in the design. This will enable users to decide how they can improve the design's timing performance. The inclusion of IPA exemplifies Aurora's evolution towards more intuitive and insightful design analysis, facilitating smoother development processes for engineers.
Aurora 2.4 Highlights
Features
Benefits
Asymmetric BlockRAM (BRAM) Inferencing
Aurora's Inferencing feature streamlines the implementation of reconfigurable computing algorithms, by automatically adapting BlockRAM (BRAM) read/write widths, eliminating the need for manual RTL design modifications.
State-of-the-Art “Single Stage” Routing
The Single Stage Routing algorithm significantly enhances the maximum operating frequency (Fmax) of designs for QuickLogic eFPGA cores. It has shown an impressive Fmax increase of up to 24% in QuickLogic's benchmark designs, ultimately optimizing FPGA performance.
Power Calculation
This latest version of the Aurora FPGA Tools calculates dynamic power from a user’s design’s clock frequencies and extracted capacitance models extracted from QuickLogic’s ASIC-like design methodology.
The Tools simplify power calculation for eFPGA cores by automatically estimating dynamic power consumption based on design clock frequencies and capacitance models. This automation, coupled with QuickLogic's CI infrastructure and CLI options, enables users to efficiently calculate power consumption across a range of designs.
Time Efficiency: It significantly reduces the time-consuming task of understanding dynamic power consumption across a wide range of use cases, making it more efficient for users.
Reproducibility: The feature calculates dynamic power based on design clock frequencies and capacitance models, ensuring consistent and reliable power estimates.
Automation: With QuickLogic’s Continuous Integration (CI) infrastructure, Command Line Interface (CLI) option, and advanced scripting examples, FPGA users can calculate anticipated power consumption across libraries of user designs – in a fully automated way.
Flexibility: The feature is adaptable to a variety of user designs, enhancing its versatility for different applications and scenarios.
Usability
The tools includes several developments to the workflow to improve overall user’s design time. These include:
- Upgraded Integrated Development Environment view screenshot
- Project Workspace view screenshot
- Execution Control Panel view screenshot
- Expanded Log Console view screenshot
- Physical Viewer view screenshot
- Critical Path Analysis view screenshot
- Detailed Timing/Utilization Information view screenshot
Aurora Features & Benefits
Features
- Open-source components provide full inspectability and ensures device longevity
- Enables evaluation of different FPGA architectures using QuickLogic’s definition files
- Includes support for tcl/tk and GUI through the open-source FOEDAG interface
- Supports multiple hardware description languages
- Includes evaluation, definition and implementations tools
- Supports Linux Ubuntu, and other versions of Linux through Docker, Podman container, and Windows 10/11
Benefits
- Simplified Evaluation - Supports quick and easy evaluation of eFPGA technology for SoC applications
- Architectural Trade-Offs - Ensures that the generated eFPGA IP has the optimal amount of logic (LUTs), BRAM, and DSP blocks to meet each customer’s unique eFPGA requirements
- More Transparency – Because Aurora is based on open source, the code is highly inspectable, enabling continuous improvement by the development community
- Flexibility – Publicly auditable code leads to higher quality software and allows for the merit-based addition of features by the community, as well as the option to make enhancements that suit each customer’s needs
- Highly Customizable - Private label of Aurora can be available for OEM customers for distribution of the user tools to their end users
- Future-Proof – Aurora uses readily available open-source components that the broader community is actively improving upon. With access to source code, the user has ultimate control of the future
Aurora Tool Components
Tool Flow
Resources
Description of Components
QuickLogic Custom Architecture
With QuickLogic’s Australis eFPGA IP Generator, and the evaluation results from running Aurora, customers can customize and specify the architecture without being restricted to a pre-defined fixed tile implementation.
Modifications include:
- CLB(LUT) sizes columns and rows
- Number of columns for BRAM and DSP
- Optimizations for Area/Power or Performance
Integration with Yosys HQ (TabbyCad) Open-Source Synthesis Tool
The Aurora 2.4 Development Tool Suite is based on fully open-source implementation for scalability, longevity, and full code transparency. It supports all major development languages including Verilog, System Verilog and VHDL. Aurora uses open-source synthesis tool (Yosys) for front end synthesis. There are custom plugins developed in Yosys to efficiently target QuickLogic eFPGA architecture features and achieve the best Quality of Result (QoR). The synthesis tool uses ABC engine for logic-optimization and technology mapping which supports both area and delay trade-off.
Implementation Flow
The netlist generated by the synthesis tool is available within Aurora to run the implementation flow. The Implementation flow within Aurora uses open-source Versatile Place & Route (VPR) Tool for Packing, Placement and Routing. The Implementation flow support area vs speed tradeoff by implementing Timing Driving algorithms and supports specifying SDC (Syopsys Design constraint) to achieve best Quality of results (QoR). The placement engine also uses Reinforcement Learning (RL) techniques to achieve the best run-time without sacrificing the QoR.
Utilization Reporting
Aurora tool reports detailed design resource utilization after each stage of the Implementation flow to help end-user understand the how effectively the design is mapped to the FPGA resources.
STA
Aurora’s Static Timing Analysis engine provides Timing Summary of the designs by providing key timing metrics like Fmax, Critical path delay (CPD), Worst Negative Slack (WNS), Total Negative Slack (TNS) and Slack Histogram. STA also provides detailed setup and hold timing violations report to allow easy debugging of the critical paths in the designs.
Power Estimation
eFPGA cores have nearly unlimited reprogrammability, therefore, understanding dynamic power consumption across the universe of use cases can be an incredibly time-consuming task. This latest version of the Aurora FPGA Tools calculates dynamic power from a user’s design’s clock frequencies and extracted capacitance models extracted from QuickLogic’s ASIC-like design methodology. Moreover, with QuickLogic’s Continuous Integration (CI) infrastructure, Command Line Interface (CLI) option, and advanced scripting examples, FPGA users can calculate anticipated power consumption across libraries of user designs – in a fully automated way.
Post Layout Simulation
Aurora tool generates the post-layout files (Verilog and SDF) after the Placement & Routing. The post layout Verilog file along with the timing annotation can be used along with Quicklogic provided primitive libraries to verify the functionality and timing of the design using any industry-standard simulator such as Questa, Active-HDL, NC-Sim, and VCS, or other open-source simulators.
IDE
Aurora’s enhanced IDE (Integrated Development Environment) based makes it easy for designers to Import their user designs into the too, run through the complete execution flow, generate detailed metrics, debug and gain a better understanding about the design and its placement, routability, and more. Aurora’s built-in Physical Viewer provides ease-of-use options to the eFPGA user, which makes it easier to understand how the design is being mapped to the eFPGA fabric.
