MoZdk
Occasional Contributor
4 years agoHow to ignore simulation only ports when mapping to FPGA pins?
A design has a number of simulation ports that should not be tied to FPGA pins.
A VHDL example is shown in the source below, where the sim_only_* ports are for simulation only, thus should not be mapped to FPGA pins.
entity mdl is port( -- FPGA pins clk_i : in std_logic; rst_i : in std_logic; a_i : in std_logic; z_o : out std_logic; -- Simulation pins only sim_only_in : in std_logic := '0'; sim_only_out : out std_logic); end entity;
The sim_only_* pins can be safely left unused by Quartus, since the inputs have default value.
When running Quartus, the mapper tries to map the sim_only_* ports to unused FPGA pins, which is not desired.
How can I specify that Quartus should just ignore the sim_only_* ports on the VHDL design?
Use Virtual Pin assignments in the Assignment Editor. That way the logic for the pins will still be implemented but they won't get connected to physical I/O.