"Fast Integrated Tools for Circuit Design with FPGAs"
Stephan W. Gehring and Stefan H.-M. Ludwig
Note #1997-031. December 16, 1997

To implement high-density and high-speed FPGA circuits, designers 
need tight control over the circuit implementation process. However, 
current design tools are unsuited for this purpose as they lack fast 
turnaround times, interactiveness, and integration. We present a system 
for the Xilinx XC6200 FPGA, which addresses these issues. It consists 
of a suite of tightly integrated tools for the XC6200 architecture 
centered around an architecture-independent tool framework. The system 
lets the designer easily intervene at various stages of the design
process and features design cycle times (from an HDL specification to 
a complete layout) in the order of seconds.