learning FPGA programming w/o LabVIEW

[jcarmody]

Say someone wanted to add FPGA programming to their repertoire but didn't want to get tied into NI products, what are their options?  I'm literally asking for a friend but I'm interested for myself, too.

A colleague (EE) was asked to consider adding FPGAs to future test adapters.  He doesn't have much programming in his background so I'd like to be able to support his efforts while he learns.

[wiebe@CARYA]

I'm pretty sure the standard for FPGA (Wikipedia) programming is Hardware description language (Wikipedia), either the Verilog (Wikipedia) or VHDL (Wikipedia) flavor.

There are C/C++ (and LabVIEW) converters to VHDL... LabVIEW FPGA is converted to HDL (VHDL I think).

You'd normally use a development suite to program an FPGA:

FPGA Design Software - Quartus® Prime (intel.com)

Vivado Overview (xilinx.com)

[crossrulz]

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@jcarmody wrote:

A colleague (EE) was asked to consider adding FPGAs to future test adapters.

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For what reasons?  My initial gut reaction is your colleague is being told to unnecessarily add complication to a test fixture.

With that said, I'm exploring the use of a RaspberryPi Pico in test fixtures.  I am playing with one at home and am very close to being able to completely replace a cRIO with the Pi Pico.  This cRIO has a ton of static DIO and 2 high-speed DIO (the actual need for the cRIO).  I have proven the high-speed DIO on the Pico.  Now I'm struggling to get an I2C DIO chip to work (I think I blew up the DIO chip).

So I would push back on the need for an actual FPGA in a test fixture.  Straight hardware gates often does the job.  If programming is necessary, then maybe a good microcontroller might do the job.  Or if you have more resources to help with FPGA programming over a microcontroller, go with the FPGA.  There are just so many variables to decide what the best route for your group is.

[jcarmody]

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@crossrulz wrote:

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@jcarmody wrote:

A colleague (EE) was asked to consider adding FPGAs to future test adapters.

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For what reasons?  My initial gut reaction is your colleague is being told to unnecessarily add complication to a test fixture.

[...]

If programming is necessary, then maybe a good microcontroller might do the job.

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You're probably correct on both points.  I've mentioned your comments to my colleague and pointed him to this thread.

Thanks.