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by jason mcdonald, senior editor | read other blog posts

Time to take a look at the fpga and programmable logic market. News from Xilinx and Altera. Best FPGA websites. Cool stuff from others.

contents of this post:

1. fpga - the big guys and the big picture
2. fpga - cool stuff and new product news
3. fpga and programmable logic - website picks
4. feedback - read it
5. feedback - give it

fpga - the big guys and the big picture

First and foremost, for everyone following the FPGA and programmable logic market, the big guys - Xilinx and Altera are "must follow" companies. This is so not just for news, but also because according to our annual FPGA surveys at eg3.com, the informational aspects of their websites are pivotal. FPGA is one of the few areas in which vendor websites outpoll media sites as resource centers.

One hidden gem, for example, is the Xilinx education home , where you can find lectures, hands-on labs, interactive discussions, and best practices. Xilinx also publishes an FPGA tutorial . Altera's website is not so helpful, but they do have the Altera forums where users can review Altera technology and information. Both of the big guys have free software tools to get you started - shall we say "hooked" on their technologies. It's pretty easy - just go to their home pages, and click around.

Beyond Xilinx and Altera, other smaller FPGA players are definitely worth a look. Because they are smaller, these guys often "try harder." Check out Lattice and Actel. Actel in particular has done a good job beefing up their website with training, tutorials, online webinars, and free downloads.

The FPGA ecosystem remains organized in the following way:

• The big FPGA vendors (Xilinx, Altera) along with a few smaller FPGA vendors. All supply educational information, evaluation / development kits, and the like. All encourage you to "design in" their products, and have extensive third party vendor networks.
• The major (paid) FPGA tool vendors - like Mentor Graphics, Synplicity (Synopsys), Aldec and the like - providing FPGA development tools at a premium for enhanced features and vendor neutrality.
• FPGA - board development companies, most notably Altium and, to a lesser extent, National Instruments. These guys are trying to make it easy for you to take an FPGA and develop a board. Or, better yet, use their prototyping systems for deployment.
• FPGA board vendors - vendors like Pentek or Bittware, companies that are experts in FPGAs and produce FPGA-based boards.

fpga - cool stuff and new product news

As of June 21, 2009, eg3.com has over 60 news submissions for new products in the programmable logic space. Here are some of the more recent and interesting ones -

• Impulse CoValidator™ Automatically Generates ModelSim® FPGA Test Benches from C - Impulse Accelerated Technologies' CoValidator, a tool that automatically generates FPGA test benches from C. CoValidator is an extension of the Impulse CoDeveloper C-to-FPGA tools.
• Altera's Embedded Systems Development Kit Accelerates the Creation of Cyclone III FPGA.... - This is a comprehensive platform that accelerates the prototyping and development of FPGA-based embedded systems. This multi-board development kit features a Cyclone III EP3C120 device, the industry's highest density, low-cost FPGA currently shipping and combines a robust set of on-board memories, I/O interfaces,...
• Actel Rolls Out Low-Cost IGLOO nano Starter Kit - Actel's new low-cost starter kits for the company's low-power IGLOO® nano FPGAs. Available for $49.95, the nano kits are expected to accelerate industry-wide adoption of Actel's nano FPGAs.
• Cadence Introduces Innovative FPGA-PCB Co-Design Solution - Cadence has introduced an innovative, scalable co-design solution for designing FPGAs onto PCB systems.

You can browse all of this news at http://www.eg3eclips.com/fpga/ , our archive site. Just click on the news tab. You can also sign up for our e-clips service which will automatically alert you to FPGA news.

fpga and programmable logic - website picks

We get a lot of search queries and inquiries from engineers as to the "best" websites to learn about FPGA technology, or keep up with programmable logic. Here are some of my favorites. First of all there is the FPGA newsgroup, which has a decent enough level of discussion. Then there is the FPGA and Structured ASIC Journal, which is a free portal and newsletter. Programmable Logic DesignLine is a newsfeed from EE Times, although I find if you read EE Times, this ends up just being reposted content from their network. Rumor is that they have all but fired the editorial staff for the DesignLines.

Coming up in December, 2009, is the FPGA Summit. If you are in Silicon Valley, this is a great event, although it tends to be rather high end. DesignCon and DAC also have some coverage of FPGAs but tend to be focused more on EDA.

We have all of the FPGA sites indexed on eg3.com @ eg3.com/fpga . Again, I'd recommend starting with Xilinx and Altera, with the caveat that both companies are trying to sell you on their technologies. But by toggling between them and some of the sites mentioned above, you can do a good job at getting a balanced FPGA education for your next project.

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