The Growing Complexity of FPGA CAD Tools

Summary form only given. FPGA tools have become very complex software systems. Today´s FPGA tool sets include state of the art synthesis, place and route, timing analysis and power analysis tools. They also include complex graphical interfaces like floor plan and RTL viewers and system level integration tools like SOPC builder. In this article, the author gives a brief description of the history of Altera software tools. The author describes some of the key tools in the portfolio. The author also describes the development of new TimeQuest timing analyzer as a case study