Lint Tools: Worth the money?

YES worth every penny - provided you get used to them as they usually produce lot of warnings/alarms and it takes a while to trim to your project needs. Some tools do better there (atleast claim) - see Ascent from RealIntent.com for instance. We use ALINT from Aldec and LEDA from SNPS. ALINT is very extend-able with custom rules etc. Infact a friend of mine has come up with a set of rules to check for FPGA prototyping at RTL level. Though we didn't get to productize it yet (business priorities coming in the way), it is an interesting approach.

If I can afford in the project budget, I would make LINT as part of check-in process in configuration management system. Also refer to Adam Kronlik's LINT chapter (8) in:

the functional verification of electronic systems

chapter 8: hdl lint. authors: adam krolnik,

Good luck

Srini

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