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drbarryh's avatar
drbarryh
Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor
21 days ago

The best way to implement SignalTapII

Hello Altera SigalTap Experts, I have been trying to use Signal Tap in my MAX10 FPGA with Quartus STD 25.1 project. I was trying to use the Signal Tap GUI at first. The problem seems to be that for...
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drbarryh's avatar
drbarryh
Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor
16 days ago

Hi sstrell, Thanks a lot ! I know what you mean ...how often do you switch between AND and OR triggers or even Compares. For me it can be occasionally i suppose in reality. But unless you nail down all your trigger situations BEFORE compiling you never really know do you !

And i guess i got used to the ChipScope Pro way which requires no compiles when you change any of your trigger conditions on existing probes.

But thanks for the explain and yes i see how i can add in columns now to allow more flexible triggers. That is a really helpful suggestion, thanks very much for your detailed replay.

I will also take a look at the LOCK feature you mentioned, that might be of use as well.

One other thing i am having trouble with is State Machines and FSM triggers for an FSM i have written in System Verilog. When i try to add the state register i can't seem to add it at all. It shows up in RED, even though i have it assigned like this in my RTL

My FSM definition is like so:

 typedef enum logic [3:0] {
    ST_IDLE,
    ST_WR_MAC0,
    ST_WR_MAC1,
    ST_WR_FLEN,
ST_WR_IPG,
ST_WR_MDIO_ADDR0,
ST_WR_MDIO_ADDR1,
ST_WR_FIFO_LEVELS,
    ST_RD_CMD,
    ST_WR_CMD,
    ST_DONE
 } state_t;
 
 (* preserve = "true" *) state_t state;
 
Can you suggest Any ideas why it doesn't even show up in pre-synthesis ? The state variable is being used in an always_ff clocked process and is needed in the design, so it must be there! 
 
Thanks,
Dr Barry H

 

sstrell's avatar
sstrell
Icon for Super Contributor rankSuper Contributor
16 days ago

Any warnings or errors when you synthesize the design?  No way to tell if there's an issue from this snippet.

  • sstrell's avatar
    sstrell
    Icon for Super Contributor rankSuper Contributor
    16 days ago

    Settings on the right, set the number of trigger conditions.

  • drbarryh's avatar
    drbarryh
    Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor
    16 days ago

    Hi sstrell,

    Thanks, and No none That i can see. I will verify that though again in the fitter report and post synthesis! I think i see how to do it now...using the 'add state machine nodes...' menu item. 

    One other point: How do i add in a new trigger column ? I can't see hw to do that in Quartus Standard Edition version 25.1 If i right click for example on the existing trigger column, marked as 1, nothing in the popup menu here offers any way to add in anew Trigger Column. And none of the other menus do either as far as i can see./

    Cheers, Dr Barry H

  • drbarryh's avatar
    drbarryh
    Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor
    16 days ago

    Thanks sstrell, yes i see that now. And you can have advanced mode as well for triggers. That might be worth investigating. And adding in a Mnemonic text file to link to any State Machines will be useful too :)

    cheers, Dr Barry H