Hi,

Actually I don't do anything with Matlab and other advanced tools.

You have to fully understand my scheme: my design has nothing to do with a real wave-pipelined circuit, NEVER!

So there is nothing you have to simulate in Matlab and other advanced tools at all!

In my simulation I even use a direct connection without any logic: C <= A which must imitate the behavior as if the data is passing the wave-pipelined circuit correctly.

Imitating the wave-pipelined circuit behavior needs several features:

a) If wave constant Series_clock_number = 5, an input data at 0-th cycle enters the circuit, it should be latched onto the output register at 6-th cycle if output is not blocked. If there is output block asserted by a data receiver, the situation would dramatically become complex so my new application pays special attention to it with specification of 81 pages, 48 claims and drawings of 24 pages!

b) A valid data output appearing on the output bus lasts one cycle if the circuit is allowed to output.

c) In my first version of WPC source code in VHDL, there is no blocking on the output bus. For the second version of WPC source code in VHDL output side can block the circuit from outputting on the output bus and the second version of WPC has additional buffering function.

d) If wave constant Input_cycle_number = 1, the circuit can accept one data per cycle. And the circuit can always accept one data per Input_cycle_number cycles.

e) If wave constant Multiple_cycle_number = 1, the circuit has one critical path. And the circuit always has Multiple_cycle_number of critical paths.

Very simple. The reason is that I divide the scheme for generating a wave-pipelined circuit into 2 sections with an interconnection between them during simulation that will be described shortly:

a) Designer provides CPC component as described at the first post, with correct and full information about the critical path, no more no less.

b) The hypothetical synthesizer correctly generates the specified wave-pipelined circuit. The output data passing through the circuit are always assumed correct that must be checked by my simulation and they are what only I have to check!

So what I have to do is to guarantee that if the synthesizer does it correctly, gets a set of wave constants initial value, then my WPC should work correctly based on the wave constant initial values determined by the hypothetical synthesizer for the WPC.

My scheme has 3 parts of code:

1) A CPC, CPC_1_2 is one of 2 CPCs with simplest logic C <= A.

2) A WPC. It works normally only after the synthesizer will generate correct wave-pipelined circuit, because it is the responsibility that my hypothetical synthesizer must do! And I never need to confirm whether or not the real wave-pipelined circuit works properly, it is other people's business, not mine!

3) Link statement is ignored because it is only used to indicate what a synthesizer has to do, and the link statement behaviors are reflected in 3 wave constant initial values.

Here are their interconnections:

CPC --> Critical path(s) --> 3 wave constant initial values --> WPC

What I have to check is whether the input data is equal to output data! Any logic operation between input data and output data in my simulation is unnecessary and superfluous, because I have assumed that the critical path (the wave-pipelined circuit) is always correctly generated, no matter what logic function between input data and output data is.

My responsibility has 3 points: a) My scheme works. Absolutely!

b) My 2 WPCs work normally on all conditions. The all conditions are not what you have thought for critical path under different PVTs, but under different combinations of 3 wave constants: Series_clock_number, Input_clock_number and Multiple_copy_number.

So I never need to do anything about simulating the real wave-pipelined circuit. NO, NEVER! NEVER! NEVER!

Here is how I do my simulation in a VHDL-2002 simulator: 1. What I have to simulate is to use different sets of 3 wave constant values to test whether or not my 2 WPC components are correct, that is all.

for example: a) Series_clock_number = 5; Input_clock_number = 3; Multiple_copy_number = 1;

b) Series_clock_number = 5; Input_clock_number = 1; Multiple_copy_number = 3; and so on.

All 3 wave constants must comply 3 relationships:

1) Series_clock_number >= Input_clock_number >= 1.

2) Series_clock_number >= Multiple_copy_number>= 1.

3)Multiple_copy_number = 1 if Input_clock_number > 1.

4) Input_clock_number = 1 if Multiple_copy_number > 1.

In editing...

On 1/25/18 12:49 AM, rickman wrote:
> Weng Tianxiang wrote on 1/23/2018 1:31 AM:
>>> Bottom line - if wave-pipelining were an advantage in FPGAs or even
>>> practical with benefit, one of the FPGA companies would be promoting 
>>> it.  If
>>> they could get a 20% speed improvement, they would be jumping through 
>>> hoops
>>> as it would give them a *huge* competitive advantage over the other FPGA
>>> companies.
>>>
>>> Rick C
>>
>> I appreciate your above paragraph, at least a small step forward!
>>
>> There are many Indian professors' papers on wave-pipelined circuits 
>> for FPGA. Here is one of them: Some Experiments about Wave Pipelining 
>> on FPGAs
>>
>> http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.42.2942&rep=rep1&type=pdf 
>>
> 
> This paper starts off with a fallacy, "the minimum clock period is
> not limited by the longest path, but by the difference between
> the maximum and minimum path delays, plus the clock skew,
> the rise/fall time, and the setup/hold time of the I/O registers
> [14]."
> 
> The problem is that PVT must also be considered.  If you design to the 
> typical numbers and your path delays allow you to have five stages of 
> pipeline between two registers, you are counting on the data clocked 
> into the input FFs at time T to result in stable data presented to the 
> output FF at time T+5*tck where tck is the clock period.  If the delay 
> changes from one chip to another or from one time to another (because of 
> voltage or temperature changes) then that stable period will move and no 
> longer happen at T+5*tck.
> 
> The authors construct a circuit.  "The circuit worked up to 64 MHz 
> (measured), with five waves inside it: more than seven times the speed 
> predicted by the timing analyzer tool. The highest operation band was 
> very narrow: just 1 MHz."
> 
> 1 MHz means it will not work at all if the delays change by less than 2% 
> which is guaranteed with minimal changes from PVT.
> 
> This is what happens in the real world.
> 

The other way of stating the requirement, using words like those given, 
is that you need to look at the difference of the minimum delay over PVT 
of the longest path to the maximum delay over PVT of the shortest path 
(plus the other factors). The problem of course is that due to the 
amount of variation in delay over PVT is large enough that you have 
negative margin, and of course, measuring A unit at A value of PVT, can 
well give you much better margins than if you need to account for PVT.

One option that might be able to help here is to try and automatically 
adjust the clock to adjust for changing PVT, at which point you only 
need to worry about the delta over the part, and the accuracy you could 
determine the right frequency to run.

HT-Lab wrote on 1/25/2018 5:36 AM:
> On 25/01/2018 06:01, rickman wrote:
>> HT-Lab wrote on 1/23/2018 12:48 PM:
>>> On 22/01/2018 12:18, rickman wrote:
>>>> HT-Lab wrote on 1/21/2018 1:19 PM:
>>> ...
>>>>>>
>>>>>> There's your first mistake, no one uses Actel/Microsemi FPGAs.  They long
>>>>>> for the day they are as big as Lattice, lol!
>>>>>
>>>>> Microsemi has been at the number 3 spot for as long as I use FPGA's
>>>>> (+/- 28
>>>>> years starting with Actel's A1010). They are twice as large as Lattice.
>>>>>
>>>>> Here is a reference:
>>>>>
>>>>> https://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?doc_id=1331443
>>>>
>>>> There's some BS somewhere...
>>>>
>>>> http://www.fpgadeveloper.com/2011/07/list-and-comparison-of-fpga-companies.html
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Comparing a blogger article from 2011 who took some NASDAQ vales against
>>> eetimes which using a marketing survey company results from 2017, good job!
>>
>> So who don't you trust, the blogger or NASDAQ?  It would be easy enough to
>> verify the numbers.  But if you don't believe the company's stock reports
>> then I don't know what to tell you.
>
> I don't know what to tell you either, do you know what the NASDAQ value
> represent? Do you think that Lattice only makes FPGA's?

Who said they were using the market cap for the capacity?  Companies make 
reports every quarter.  They make very complete reports annually.  Lying in 
these reports is a crime.  The information you want is in these reports. 
The only issue is what exactly is being reported.  The Intel info is most 
likely from then annual report, but there is a lot more to parse and wade 
through.


> Do you think that
> the stock price for the whole company is good indicator on how many product
> they sell in a particular group against a survey company that goes out into
> the industry to find that answer? Do you think eetimes (which has covered
> electronic news for the past 50 years) is a fake news site with no editorial
> fact checking?

You seem to be getting emotional about this.  I should believe one set of 
numbers over another because eetimes is older?


> But lets take your argument and check the stock prices, go to the Nasdaq
> website and look at the market value of Lattice (LSCC) against MicroSemi
> (MSCC) and for good measures Xilinx (XLNX), you will be surprised how well
> Microsemi is doing (even I was). Have a look at the stock prices for the
> last 5 years, Microsemi is outperforming all of them including Xilinx!
> Lattice seems to be steady at around 20-40%  (well below Microsemi). Lattice
> has not made any significant changes in the past 5 years. There was a
> negative dip in 2016 which I assume was caused when Lattice agreeding to be
> acquired by a Chinese equity firm (subsequently blocked by Trump).
>
> So, making statements like "no one uses Actel/Microsemi FPGAs..." shows you
> work in an isolated bubble. If you like Lattice FPGA's than fine, no
> argument from me, but don't use it to justify something you clearly know
> nothing about.
>
> Back to work.....

Yes, but next time try not reading what I haven't written.

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

On 25/01/2018 06:01, rickman wrote:
> HT-Lab wrote on 1/23/2018 12:48 PM:
>> On 22/01/2018 12:18, rickman wrote:
>>> HT-Lab wrote on 1/21/2018 1:19 PM:
>> ...
>>>>>
>>>>> There's your first mistake, no one uses Actel/Microsemi FPGAs.  
>>>>> They long
>>>>> for the day they are as big as Lattice, lol!
>>>>
>>>> Microsemi has been at the number 3 spot for as long as I use FPGA's 
>>>> (+/- 28
>>>> years starting with Actel's A1010). They are twice as large as Lattice.
>>>>
>>>> Here is a reference:
>>>>
>>>> https://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?doc_id=1331443
>>>
>>> There's some BS somewhere...
>>>
>>> http://www.fpgadeveloper.com/2011/07/list-and-comparison-of-fpga-companies.html 
>>>
>>>
>> Comparing a blogger article from 2011 who took some NASDAQ vales against
>> eetimes which using a marketing survey company results from 2017, good 
>> job!
> 
> So who don't you trust, the blogger or NASDAQ?  It would be easy enough 
> to verify the numbers.  But if you don't believe the company's stock 
> reports then I don't know what to tell you.

I don't know what to tell you either, do you know what the NASDAQ value 
represent? Do you think that Lattice only makes FPGA's?  Do you think 
that the stock price for the whole company is good indicator on how many 
product they sell in a particular group against a survey company that 
goes out into the industry to find that answer? Do you think eetimes 
(which has covered electronic news for the past 50 years) is a fake news 
site with no editorial fact checking?

But lets take your argument and check the stock prices, go to the Nasdaq 
website and look at the market value of Lattice (LSCC) against MicroSemi 
(MSCC) and for good measures Xilinx (XLNX), you will be surprised how 
well Microsemi is doing (even I was). Have a look at the stock prices 
for the last 5 years, Microsemi is outperforming all of them including 
Xilinx! Lattice seems to be steady at around 20-40%  (well below 
Microsemi). Lattice has not made any significant changes in the past 5 
years. There was a negative dip in 2016 which I assume was caused when 
Lattice agreeding to be acquired by a Chinese equity firm (subsequently 
blocked by Trump).

So, making statements like "no one uses Actel/Microsemi FPGAs..." shows 
you work in an isolated bubble. If you like Lattice FPGA's than fine, no 
argument from me, but don't use it to justify something you clearly know 
nothing about.

Back to work.....

Hans
www.ht-lab.com

Weng Tianxiang wrote on 1/25/2018 2:23 AM:
>> In other words it isn't a problem looking for a solution.  The guts of the
>> synthesizer are.  Until someone figures out that part, your patent won't
>> have much value even if no one challenges it.
>>
>
>> [1] IEEE  Transactions on VLSI Systems
>> http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.90.1783&rep=rep1&type=pdf
>
> Reference [1] (1998) at page 142 below table 1 indicates that "Last, due to a lack of commercial tools that are directly applicable to designs using wave-pipelining, each group has more or less developed in-house design analysis and optimization tools which enable VLSI design using wave-pipelining."
>
> The paper also indicates in Table 1 page 142: there had been 30 wave-pipelined circuits before the paper was published and it was 20 years ago.
>
> So I don't know who is right? You, a newbie in 3 days in the field, or the professor author is right?

Or both?

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

> In other words it isn't a problem looking for a solution.  The guts of the 
> synthesizer are.  Until someone figures out that part, your patent won't 
> have much value even if no one challenges it.
> 

> [1] IEEE  Transactions on VLSI Systems 
> http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.90.1783&rep=rep1&type=pdf 

Reference [1] (1998) at page 142 below table 1 indicates that "Last, due to a lack of commercial tools that are directly applicable to designs using wave-pipelining, each group has more or less developed in-house design analysis and optimization tools which enable VLSI design using wave-pipelining." 

The paper also indicates in Table 1 page 142: there had been 30 wave-pipelined circuits before the paper was published and it was 20 years ago.

So I don't know who is right? You, a newbie in 3 days in the field, or the professor author is right?

Weng

Weng Tianxiang wrote on 1/24/2018 9:17 PM:
> This post is copied from https://www.reddit.com/r/FPGA/comments/7sgzkr/my_invention_coding_wavepipelined_circuits_with/
>
>> [–]dosidicusGigas 1 point 16 hours ago
>> I wonder if he already has and this is some crazy attempt to bate people to 'steal' the idea? Otherwise what's the motivation anyway??
>
> Actually I have some difficulty understanding his words "if he already has and this is some crazy attempt to bate people to 'steal' the idea?"
>
>> Otherwise what's the motivation anyway??
>
> My motivation is simple:
>
> 1) Define a new part for all HDL languages dealing with wave-pipelined circuits.
> 2) Provide a library for all HDL languages dealing with wave-pipelined circuits.
> 3) Make code designer coding a wave-pipelined circuit as simple as coding a regular 1-cycle circuit.
> 4) Replace a pipelined circuit with its wave-pipelined circuit counterpart for most situations or as much as possible.

There is no doubt in my mind that this looked like a valid patent to the 
examiner.  I don't know if a company would prefer to challenge the validity 
of the patent or just pay a limited royalty.  The issue is whether this is 
not obvious to anyone skilled in designing software for FPGA or ASIC design. 
  It sure seems obvious to me.  Mostly it hasn't been mentioned because it 
is *not* the part of the wave-pipelining design process that constitutes a 
problem.

In other words it isn't a problem looking for a solution.  The guts of the 
synthesizer are.  Until someone figures out that part, your patent won't 
have much value even if no one challenges it.

On the other hand it might just make you rich.

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

Weng Tianxiang wrote on 1/23/2018 4:48 PM:
> Hi Mark,
>
> Good question!
>
> PVT is very complex problem beyond the ordinary people's reach, and I agree your opinion that PVT variations is the elephant in the room!
>
> Intel MMX technology has been a huge success, achieving 20% faster speed against its pipelined circuit for 64*64 bit floating multiplier!
>
> What is a technology Intel can do while Xilinx and Altera (Intel) cannot do?
>
> FPGA is none but an ASCI.

An FPGA is very much NOT an ASIC to the user.  The fact that you fail to see 
this is significant.


> Especially Altera is now part of Intel, if there is a bridge built between a code designer and a synthesizer, Altera absolutely can do it for its FPGA without doubt! That is my opinion.
>
> All coding of my scheme has 3 steps:
>
> 1) Write a Critical Path Component (CPC) with defined interface;
>
> 2) Call a Wave-Pipelining Component (WPC) provided by a system library;
>
> 3) Call one of 3 link statements to link a CPC instantiation with a paired WPC instantiation to specify what your target is.
>
> My scheme separates the critical path from 1-cycle regular logic. WPC is a regular 1-cycle component, link statement is a traditional statement used for special meanings and both of WPC and link statement have nothing to do with PVT.
>
> Now only CPC component has argument between me and your group with suspicion.
>
> What a synthesizer needs for generating a wave-pipelined circuit is the critical path logic, that is all, in any situation.
>
> My scheme makes thing simpler: only CPC of a wave-pipelined circuit's 3 parts has to be wave-pipelined.
>
> As I said before, if anybody uses HDL to code, he has nothing to do with PVT, never put PVT into consideration, not me, not you, nobody does it and full HDL has no grammar on PVT!!! That is other ones' business.

Yes, when designing with synchronous logic, the PVT issue goes away because 
it is already factored into the MAX delays.  In synchronous logic ONLY max 
delays are used and so already considers PVT without any extra work.

Wave pipelining needs to consider the max and min delays.  As you say this 
has nothing to do with writing HDL, but the point is writing HDL is not 
sufficient to deal with the problem of PVT variation widening your timing 
window so as to make wave pipelining impossible in many cases.


> Here is my opinion:
> 1. PVT is the elephant in the room.
> 2. Intel MMX technology has been a huge success since 1997.
> 3. Altera now is part of Intel.
> 4. FPGA is none but a special ASIC with greater flexibility.
> 5. I built a bridge between a code designer and a synthesizer.

You built a bridge?  I think this bridge is not very important, or I should 
say can be done many different ways.


> Now there are 2 suspicions:
> 1. Can a wave-pipelined circuit be reliably generated and used in FPGA for all FPGA users?

No


> 2. Is wave-pipelined circuit useless in FPGA?

It might work for a two stage pipeline using just input and output registers 
since this would give the widest tolerance of delay variation.  But what is 
the value?  It ignores one stage of free registers at some expense since in 
a general case LUTs will need to be added to equalize path delays.


> I like to tell you 2 stories:
> 1. Intel is one of companies who own large amount of patents, but Intel has never applied for any patents, and never published any articles on the subject.
>
> 2. I learn that Chinese Huawei designs their cell phone chips embedded with the wave-pipelined circuits.

Not using FPGAs, right?


> Based on Huawei situation, I think wave-pipelined circuits are broadly used in big companies for their ASIC.
>
> I am trying to find someone in Altera and Xilinx to contact with me and hope he/she gives me an email.

Good luck.  If you find a way to deal with the PVT issues, I bet they will 
beat a path to your door.  Coming up with the idea of using "link" 
statements isn't likely to get a phone call in my opinion.  :)

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

Mark Curry wrote on 1/23/2018 3:10 PM:
> In article <93899eff-01a7-4e78-8076-17febc2c8f0c@googlegroups.com>,
> Weng Tianxiang  <wtxwtx@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> A wive-pipelined circuit has the same logic as its pipeline counterpart except that the wive-pipelined circuit has only one stage, a critical path
>>from the input register passing through a piece of computational logic to the output register, and no intermediate registers.
>
> Weng,
>
> I read along and not commented here.  But I find it's harder to ignore..
> I've read up on some of the references you've posted.  I think I've now got
> a fairly good idea as to what this wave-pipelining thing is now.  So
> thanks for the refenences.
>
> But you've repeated claimed that your patent doesn't need to deal with PVT
> variations - that's a problem for the synthesizer...
>
> PVT variations is the elephant in the room.  It's why wave-pipelining (and
> other asynchronous design techniques) have failed to grab any hold outside
> research facilities.  It's a very difficult problem to solve.   And it's
> only getting worse at each lower technology node.
>
> Now some of the papers you cite offer some fairly clever solutions that FPGA
> manufactures COULD use to try and enable more wave-pipelined solutions - the
> one paper cited referred to small inline PLLs along the switch network to
> allow delays to be more matched.  Interesting solutions.  But one that
> the FPGA manufactures would have to take and implement.  There's nothing
> for us end FPGA users to use.  The underlying technology just doesn't enable
> end users to use wave-pipelining solutions in todays FPGAs.  Because of the PVT
> variation problem.  (and simply calling it "PVT" variation falsely
> implies that just those three variables matter.  There's many, many more
> variables that affect the variation distribution)

One interesting suggestion in the Boemo paper was the mention of passing the 
clock through logic with similar delay to the data, essentially self 
clocking of the output registers.  Yes, that gets past much of the issue of 
timing variability from PVT (not sure what the others are) but now you have 
an input and output that are asynchronous with one another.  It's hard to 
work with such clock domains.  Just ask anyone who has tried to design an 
async device.

> Now as to your patent claim.  I'm unsure at all what you're trying to claim.
> You list as an example a straightforward, and very basic pipelined datapath
> example.  One that matches thousands of others already in existance and prior
> art.  It's an input pipeline register, and large combinational cloud, and an
> output pipeline register.  Described in VHDL.  I fail to see anything at all
> novel there.  But you claim that an undescribed, unbuilt tool could then
> take such code and implement a wave-pipeline with it?   That someone else
> would have to build?

I think his claim is about the three "link" statements that I can't actually 
see in the code example he provided.  It is not clear what those three link 
statements do, but I suspect it is very obvious that they are needed once 
you dig into the concept.  But patents have been granted on what would seem 
to be obvious to someone exploring the field, but that is not the same as 
obvious to someone knowledgeable in the field if it is new work.  Many 
patents in the FPGA world appear to be obvious, but since it is new the 
first one to see it is obvious gets the patent.


> In another thread you seem to be claiming that the tool could automatically
> determing the latency, and/or clock rate and/or "how many waves" are in
> flight along the wave-pipeline circuit?  That belies how design is done - it's
> putting the cart before the horse.  And is a common misconception of new users to
> FPGAs designing even traditional pipelined design.
>
> A common question that new users ask is "how fast can I make this pipelined
> design run?".  The experienced designer then answers - that's not how it's done.
> The experienced designer has a specific problem that's trying to be solve - not
> trying to see "how fast it can run".  The designer must guide the tool towards a
> solution with a latency / clock rate / "how many waves" as a design goal up front.
> Not a derived solution output from the tool.  The designer must know these up front
> so as to design the entire solution.  How does the designer know what
> values are realistic goals?  Experience.  That's engineering.
>
> So, my 3 cents.  Wave-pipelines are in a class of asynchronous design techniques
> that's of no use to current FPGA users.  Perhaps if Xilinx or Altera (er, Intel)
> or even some up and coming startup decides to utilize some of the techniques in the
> cited papers, we may see something in the next couple of decades.  Personally, I doubt it.

I agree.  The fact that we keep getting references to research papers shows 
a lack of understanding of how any of this might be applied.

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

HT-Lab wrote on 1/23/2018 12:48 PM:
> On 22/01/2018 12:18, rickman wrote:
>> HT-Lab wrote on 1/21/2018 1:19 PM:
> ...
>>>>
>>>> There's your first mistake, no one uses Actel/Microsemi FPGAs.  They long
>>>> for the day they are as big as Lattice, lol!
>>>
>>> Microsemi has been at the number 3 spot for as long as I use FPGA's (+/- 28
>>> years starting with Actel's A1010). They are twice as large as Lattice.
>>>
>>> Here is a reference:
>>>
>>> https://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?doc_id=1331443
>>
>> There's some BS somewhere...
>>
>> http://www.fpgadeveloper.com/2011/07/list-and-comparison-of-fpga-companies.html
>>
> Comparing a blogger article from 2011 who took some NASDAQ vales against
> eetimes which using a marketing survey company results from 2017, good job!

So who don't you trust, the blogger or NASDAQ?  It would be easy enough to 
verify the numbers.  But if you don't believe the company's stock reports 
then I don't know what to tell you.

The EEtimes article, "Guesstimate of final numbers x 1,000,000 (Source: Paul 
Dillien)"  Guessing is usually not an indication of accuracy.


>> More importantly, look at the numbers in your link.  The Actell/Microsemi
>> numbers are going in the wrong direction!  X, A and L are headed upward
>> year-to-year and Actel is headed down!
>>
> Sure, but Microsemi is still number 3 which was my point. In my day job I
> speak to more companies using Microsemi than Lattice (both dwarf against
> Xilinx and Intel though). That is not to say that Lattice makes bad FPGA's
> it is just that they haven't carved out a particular niche area like
> Microsemi or say Achronix.

I don't believe the numbers because it is Microsemi saying what is in that 
group while the earlier numbers were for the company as a whole.  It would 
appear that Paul Dillien then massaged the numbers to try to extract the 
"FPGA" content for all five companies, so who knows how good the data is?


>> While looking this up I found a link indicating the JTAG interface of the
>> ProASIC3 devices has a back door which would allow their security to be
>> bypassed.  Security was their claim to fame and this could be a major blow
>> to the company.
>>
>
> Made no impact on their business, they are still the number1 company for
> secure/space/avionics FPGA's. Also note ProASIC3 is nearly 10 years old.

Yep, they have their foot in the door and if it slips out we no longer can 
make a fair amount of military gear.  No, they aren't going to abandon the 
devices because of the security problems.  But the military market is slow 
to move and the blow can still be coming.  It only requires an alternative 
that doesn't have that problem.  I just found it interesting that the 
company included a back door and pretended it didn't exist.  Back doors are 
the heart of so many security issues.

-- 

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998