Many of us toss the process node into casual conversation, pretending we know what it actually means…  “I hear that SilBlaster is already working on a 37nm FPGA based on TSMC’s medium-K, oxide-minimized, semi-strained, anti-dielectric half-pitch.”  (If you get enough things that sound like buzzwords in there, most people will be too frightened to challenge you.)

In reality, though, most of us designing products with programmable logic are pretty well insulated from the vagaries of semiconductor processes.  When I got my first car that had four valves per cylinder, … Read More → "How Many Nanometers Do I Need?"

Over 60,000 people in over 100 countries read FPGA Journal.

Apparently, you’re one of them.

While we may be the perennial pundits of programmable logic, we don’t deceive ourselves into thinking that FPGAs are some sort of universal unification language.  We do, however, think that programmable devices like FPGAs will be one of the most important technologies in electronic design moving forward.  With the rapid evolution of the global high-tech economy, our position in the FPGA space gives us a fascinating lens through which we can observe and prognosticate about the … Read More → "Who Are You People?"

Alpe d’Huez loomed large ahead.  His team had been supporting and protecting him until now, keeping him squarely in the running for the yellow jersey.  Today, however, he’d have to prove himself on his own – without the benefit of the drag-reducing veil of his teammates’ slipstream shadow.  Years of training, and it all came down to this – the classic weed-out mountain stage of the tour.

The unruly crowd cheered, and the adrenaline went straight to his soul.  He felt like he was flying up the hill.& … Read More → "The Right Equipment"

How often has it happened that you have just finished a complex module for an FPGA project only to later find out that a very similar module was completed a month earlier by another team within the company? Not only have you just wasted several weeks of your time, but this wasted time has also cost the company money. A quick way to become a hero by saving the company both time and money is to put in place a simple reuse repository to prevent this scenario from ever happening again.

Today many design teams and companies … Read More → "Building an FPGA Design Repository"