For simulation, ModelSim-Altera Starter Edition is a free version of ModelSim provided by Altera, and is very user friendly and widely used. It has a build in editor with VHDL color coding, so you can do editing, compile, and simulation from within ModelSim.

I tried Vivado and Quartus, but both of them are quite heavy, and the tools are very complicated for a starter. Is there a lightweight free IDE + Simulator for a starter who is learning VHDL?

tashuhkamommomonthewindmommomonthewind

4 Answers

For simulation, ModelSim-Altera Starter Edition is a free version of ModelSim provided by Altera, and is very user friendly and widely used. It has a build in editor with VHDL color coding, so you can do editing, compile, and simulation from within ModelSim.

Vivado (Xilinx) and Quartus (Altera) are synthesis tools, which can transform your VHDL design files into a hardware representation that can be downloaded into an FPGA. These synthesis tools are used for step two, after a design has been created and simulated to verify proper operation.

Morten ZilmerMorten Zilmer

VHDL-Simulation:

There are ports of the linux programs GHDL and GTKwave for windows:

GHDL is a command line tool to compile VHDL files and 'simulate' them. the output is a waveform file, which can be viewed/inspected by gtkwave. You can write some scripts (I would advice PowerShell) to automate the compilation or you can use a build tool.

In my opinion (Quartus) ModelSim / QuestaSim is not lightweight. The Xilinx simulators iSim (included in ISE) and xSim (included in Vivado) are good enough for every day simulations. ghdl is very fast, but does not support all (advanced) VHDL features.

VHDL-IDEs:

If you are familiar with state-of-the art coding environments like Visual Studio, SharDevelop, MonoDevelop, Eclipse or NetBeans then I would say coding HDLs is still in the stone-age !!

All big vendors offer free HDL toolchains, which are paided by the devices, but these tools are only multi-tabbed text editors with a design hierarchy viewer and some buttons to hide the command line tool executions.

The mentioned Sigasi Eclipse plugin (there is also e free version) is new on the market and has some advantages. This plugin is under constant development and still increasing in its features. I tested several versions in the past, but I'm not satisfied with some features so I'm still using ISE :)

As a students I have not the chance to try some professional tools from Aldec, Mentor, ..

PaebbelsPaebbels

If you are a student, you can get a free student license for Sigasi. It's an eclipse based vhdl IDE, with all the modern IDE features like on the fly error checking, formatting, hovers..

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It has integration with Modelsim, ISim and riviera, Sigasi compiles the the vhdl files for you in the background and you can start the simulator with 1 click. It's not the 100% IDE experience but it's as close as you can get for VHDL.

VHDL is complicated and not lightweight. Live with it.

For a list of free simulators, see: http://www.sigasi.com/faq/which-free-vhdl-simulator-can-i-use

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There are plenty of free SPICE and Verilog simulators out there such as LTSPICE or TINA or even WinSPICE. There are also several Verilog simulators as well. However, I am looking for free VerilogA simulators. Does anyone know one?

Verilog Simulator

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3 Answers

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The GPL spice simulator Ngspice has an extension called ADMS that compiles Verilog-AMS code into C code that works with the API used by spice simulators. So you'd end up with something that could be compiled into an executable that a spice simulator (like Ngspice) could simulate.

Since Verilog-A is apparently just a subset of Verilog-AMS, this may suit your needs.

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you may find what you are looking for :

Advance Spice + Model Verilog A Compiler Build In-> a lot of improve features-> with New advanced Verilog A features to ensure convergencies ( Model Init & Limit Functions)

Schematic Capture ( 2 versions Xlib + Motif)Logic Simulations

Free Verilog Simulator For Windows 7

etc ..

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Verilog Simulator For Windows 7 Free Download

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you should try Dolphin Integration's SMASH it is free or you should try VeriWell simulator

Free Verilog Simulator For Windows 10

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Icarus Verilog Windows

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