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Re: Makefile or not?

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On 05/12/18 23:34, Grant Edwards wrote:
> On 2018-12-05, Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Never, ever, use any software written or provided by the silicon
>>> vendor.  Everytime I've failed to obey that rule, I've regretted it.
>>
>> How about for FPGAs? ;)
> 
> I spent some time working with a NIOS2 core on an Altera
> Cyclone-something-or-other.  In the beginning, somebody got conned
> into using the Altera tools for doing software development.  As
> expected, they were horrendous.  It was Eclipse with a bunch of
> plugins.
> 
> IIRC, there were Eclipse plugins that called scripts written in bash
> that called Perl scripts that called Java apps that generated TCL that
> got fed to other scripts that generated header files... and on and on
> and on.  The tools required more RAM that most of our development
> machines had.  And it appeared to re-generate everything from scratch
> everytime you wanted to build anything.
> 

If you think that is fun, just imagine doing it on Windows - with all
the TCL and perl running under Cygwin.

It is a long time since I used the Nios, and I only did so very briefly
(the project was cancelled for many reasons).  But I seem to remember
there being a lot of extra building going on due to the interaction
between the software and the hardware.  On the one side, the software
for the Nios was made into a ROM component for the FPGA design, and thus
meant at least a partial FPGA rebuild (and incremental builds were only
in the expensive version of the tools, not the free ones).  On the other
side, a build in the FPGA side could mean changes to the automatically
generated include files for the peripheral registers and addresses,
triggering a software rebuild.

But it certainly /was/ possible to separate software and hardware
development.  Typically you only have such tight integration for a small
part of the software - a boot rom - that sets up memory and loads the
real program from external flash.  That program can be developed
independently.  (And again, separate makefiles are more efficient - but
the IDE with plugins can make debugging nicer.)

It is also worth noting that Eclipse has got far better since the early
days of the NIOS2.  It used to be a serious memory and processor hog,
with few features to justify the weight.  These days it still takes a
fair chunk of memory, but it is a far lower fraction of the typical
workstation.  (My main Linux system generally has at least three or four
distinct instances of Eclipse running at any one time, in different
workspaces, for different projects.)  And I find it to be the best
choice for bigger projects in C, C++, and Python - as well as convenient
for LaTeX and other coding.  (But with external makefiles!).

> After fighting what that for a few months we threw it all out and
> started from scratch with the gnu toolchain, makefiles, and our own
> header files we wrote with info gleaned from the above mess.
> 
> There was also some sort of gdb-server executable that we extracted
> from deep within the bowels of of the Altera IDE.  We had to write
> some sort of wrapper for that to get it to run stand-alone and talk to
> the USB byte-blaster thingy.
> 
> Once we ditched the massive pile of Altera's garbage IDE, things went
> much smoother.  [Until, as the project neared completion, it became
> obvious that the performance of the NIOS2 was nowhere near what was
> promised, and the whole thing was abandoned.]
> 
> The hardware guys were, of course, chained to the Altera VHDL IDE
> software for the duration -- presumably for heinous sins committed in
> a previous life.
> 

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Thread

Makefile or not? pozz <pozzugno@gmail.com> - 2018-12-03 09:18 +0100
  Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-03 11:06 +0100
    Re: Makefile or not? pozz <pozzugno@gmail.com> - 2018-12-03 12:13 +0100
      Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-03 12:57 +0100
        Re: Makefile or not? pozz <pozzugno@gmail.com> - 2018-12-03 23:29 +0100
    Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-03 15:39 +0000
      Re: Makefile or not? Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2018-12-03 15:49 +0000
        Re: Makefile or not? Dave Nadler <drn@nadler.com> - 2018-12-03 09:41 -0800
        Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-03 21:31 +0100
  Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-03 15:30 +0000
    Re: Makefile or not? DJ Delorie <dj@delorie.com> - 2018-12-03 14:05 -0500
      Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-03 19:36 +0000
        Re: Makefile or not? Clifford Heath <no.spam@please.net> - 2018-12-04 09:30 +1100
          Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-03 23:19 +0000
            Re: Makefile or not? raimond.dragomir@gmail.com - 2018-12-03 22:02 -0800
            Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-04 12:18 +0100
              Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-04 15:46 +0000
                Re: Makefile or not? Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2018-12-04 20:22 +0000
          Re: Makefile or not? Rob Gaddi <rgaddi@highlandtechnology.invalid> - 2018-12-03 15:38 -0800
        Re: Makefile or not? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2018-12-04 21:25 -0500
          Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-05 03:22 +0000
          Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-05 09:06 +0100
        Re: Makefile or not? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2018-12-05 11:37 -0500
        Re: Makefile or not? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2018-12-05 15:37 -0500
          Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-05 22:34 +0000
            Re: Makefile or not? Rob Gaddi <rgaddi@highlandtechnology.invalid> - 2018-12-05 14:56 -0800
              Re: Makefile or not? Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2018-12-05 23:50 +0000
                Re: Makefile or not? Rob Gaddi <rgaddi@highlandtechnology.invalid> - 2018-12-05 16:27 -0800
                Re: Makefile or not? Rob Gaddi <rgaddi@highlandtechnology.invalid> - 2018-12-05 17:47 -0800
                Re: Makefile or not? Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2018-12-06 08:12 +0000
                Re: Makefile or not? Rob Gaddi <rgaddi@highlandtechnology.invalid> - 2018-12-06 10:17 -0800
                Re: Makefile or not? gtwrek@sonic.net (gtwrek) - 2018-12-06 18:35 +0000
                Re: Makefile or not? Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2018-12-06 18:39 +0000
            Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-06 09:22 +0100
            Re: Makefile or not? Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2018-12-06 18:46 +0000
              Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-06 21:51 +0100
                Re: Makefile or not? Dave Nadler <drn@nadler.com> - 2018-12-06 13:47 -0800
                Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-06 22:48 +0100
                Re: Makefile or not? Dave Nadler <drn@nadler.com> - 2018-12-06 14:01 -0800
                Re: Makefile or not? Tauno Voipio <tauno.voipio@notused.fi.invalid> - 2018-12-07 14:54 +0200
    Re: Makefile or not? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2018-12-03 21:34 +0100
  Re: Makefile or not? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2018-12-03 11:06 -0500
    Re: Makefile or not? Jacob Sparre Andersen <jacob@jacob-sparre.dk> - 2018-12-03 22:05 +0100
      Re: Makefile or not? Phil Hobbs <pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> - 2018-12-04 21:19 -0500
  Re: Makefile or not? queequeg@trust.no1 (Queequeg) - 2018-12-07 13:45 +0000

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