LabVIEW carrer with LabVIEW FPGA

[Terry_ALE]

The FPGA world is tricky.  You can learn to program a broader set of cards and devices by learning VHDL, Verilog, etc. which is more complex and difficult.  With LabVIEW FPGA, the complexity is reduced but you are limited to NI's hardware and their expected applications.

I too am quite a fan of what LabVIEW FPGA can do.  The known drawback is that if you need to do something that is not well served by NI hardware, LabVIEW FPGA's strengths a significantly diminished.

[govindsankar]

@Intaris

That is cool.

[govindsankar]

@Terry

Thats fine, I am interested in doing only with LabVIEW. I also enjoy programming with MATLAB but not as a programming environment. I like to develop apps in MATLAB that plot and analyse data. But my main interest is LabVIEW programming and I want to develop applications in that. 

[govindsankar]

Do you guys know any virtual environment of FPGA which I can use to run my LabVIEW code. I will start with learning LabVIEW FPGA and do I need a actual FPGA for that or can I use some virtual simulator software. Thank you. 

[ZYOng]

You can do LVFPGA programming in simulation mode.

Testing and Debugging LabVIEW FPGA Code

Everything You Need to Know About LabVIEW FPGA

However, for the best experience with I/O, it is best to have actual NI FPGA hardware. I think myRIO is the cheapest option.

[govindsankar]

Thank you very much, i will start with virtual environment first and then later buy a myRIO. 

[Yamaeda]

I've been involved in two project with FPGA and was quite surprised at how different it was. It is the same environment, but many things behave differently or are not possible or the 'best practices' are quite different, so keep the help window open.

[govindsankar]

Thank you very much. I will be using the NI forum very much while starting working with FPGA. 

[XM43]

Hi Govind,

I mostly work on FPGA. I program using LabVIEW and Xilinx Vivado (VHDL). LabVIEW is an easier but less customizable option. In my opinion it is REALLY good to start with. 

Below are few things that you may want to understand / pay attention to when programming for FPGA (regardless of programming medium you use):

1) FPGA clock (Clock speed, clock domians).

2) Difference between Single Cycle Timed Loop and While-loop or For-loop.

3) Resource utilization (you have limited resources on FPGA as compared with PC or RT).

4) LUT look up tables, Block Memory and DMA FIFOs.

5) Pipe-lined logic.

6) Some limitations like:

• Fixed array size
• Limited Data Type (as compared with PC or RT)
• Cannot have Coercion Dots
• Limitations on some functions like Quotient and Remainder in single cycle timed loop
• Create your own debugging tools, FPGA runs headless, you cannot probe on wires. So, create your own probes or break points in logic for debugging, if need be.

One thing that I have not tested but want to try is to create some logic using LabVIEW (Quicker) and then create its IP and later add that IP into a VIVADO project for ease of use. If it works out, that will be something cool to have in place. I am not sure if someone has already tried it or not.

[Intaris]

Cannot have coercion dots? Sure you can, you just need to be careful with then.