Poll: Do you want the internal simulator back?

[Altera_Forum]

One of the changes in Quartus 10.0 is the missing of the internal simulator. As some people here wanted a poll: Here we go... 

 BTW: I have started a similar poll regarding the lpm-functions in the MegaWizard PlugIn-Manager at: http://www.alteraforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=24291 (http://www.alteraforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=24291)

[Altera_Forum]

--- Quote Start ---  Hi,    Try testing a video processing pipeline with waveforms...   I definitely won't miss it, but please do NOT take away the "free" Altera Modelsim!   Regards, Niki  --- Quote End ---      LOL -> I did just that. And with the analog waveform display I saw my results. If you know how to use the waveform entry patterns, constructing a video frame of around 128 pixels by 8 lines of video took me less than 5 minutes. Though, I was only interested in 'Functional mode' and, the debugging of clock & data enable running through my DSP chain.

[Altera_Forum]

--- Quote Start ---  LOL -> I did just that. And with the analog waveform display I saw my results. If you know how to use the waveform entry patterns, constructing a video frame of around 128 pixels by 8 lines of video took me less than 5 minutes. Though, I was only interested in 'Functional mode' and, the debugging of clock & data enable running through my DSP chain.  --- Quote End ---    Not really the best testing is it though? With the right code in HDL (in, say, a video testing package) you can get this going in less than 5 mins, with any video standard.

[Altera_Forum]

--- Quote Start ---  Not really the best testing is it though? With the right code in HDL (in, say, a video testing package) you can get this going in less than 5 mins, with any video standard.  --- Quote End ---     You are correct, with a full video frame, or, working with an actual graphics, the built in simulator is useless. I was not trying to get the simulator to process an actual image. However, it was just what I needed to solve the occasional loss of a pixel on the right hand side of a dynamically programmable window in my GPU.

[Altera_Forum]

At a minimum, it would be nice to retain the waveform drawing capability for 

the purpose of setting up test benches.  At the time I began using Altera Quartus II five years ago, I had previous experience in writing test benches. However, I found that although ModelSim is a good simulator, it is not easy to learn. I took the expedient route to get going on my new job by using the Quartus II simulator. Since then, I have been making more use of ModelSim, but still haven't found the time to write test benches to replace all of the input waveforms that I had created in Quartus II.

[Altera_Forum]

In theory, Modelsim is a much more powerful and flexible tool. In practice, it generally takes me longer to set up a simulation in Modelsim than it does to write the testbench. As a result, since losing the internal simulator, I find myself going to great lengths (usually involving devel boards and Signal Tap abuse) to avoid having to set up simulations. 

 This is not a good situation, so yes, i would like the internal simulator back.

[Altera_Forum]

Me too. Waiting for 5 minutes to recompile and use a tap is easier than setting up a simulation.

[Altera_Forum]

I have a confession to make: I recently started using ModelSim (as you have to if you want to simulate a Cyclone IV E design). In the beginning I used the Gate Level simulator as I had an issue with RTL simulation and 'user libraries' (which I have cured by now). And I start to like it ... as today I simulated an MAXII design in AHDL with ModelSim Gate Level Simulation. A few months back I would have used the internal simulator (as I was doing this in Quartus II 9.1sp2), but today I just used ModelSim without thinking about it ...

[Altera_Forum]

--- Quote Start ---  I have a confession to make: I recently started using ModelSim (as you have to if you want to simulate a Cyclone IV E design). In the beginning I used the Gate Level simulator as I had an issue with RTL simulation and 'user libraries' (which I have cured by now). And I start to like it ... as today I simulated an MAXII design in AHDL with ModelSim Gate Level Simulation. A few months back I would have used the internal simulator (as I was doing this in Quartus II 9.1sp2), but today I just used ModelSim without thinking about it ...  --- Quote End ---    Josyb - boy, am I glad to hear from you. I've been wondering if it was possible to do AHDL sim in ModelSim, and you said you've succeeded. Could you please tell us the steps necessary to do a gate level sim starting from an AHDL code snippet? Thank you -  -Dano-

[Altera_Forum]

i posted a brief explanation of AHDL sim here: 

 http://www.alteraforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=26776

[Altera_Forum]

Yes. Bring it back please. There are many of us who used to do real work with it. 

    I have used it for 15 years. Seriously, why did they remove it? What idiot bean-counter thought that was a good idea? I can hear it now, some idiot 22 year old in a board meeting saying “I know, lets throw away 20+ years of a working tool, and **** off thousands of our customers, so we can help another company profit from our own stupidity, all the while reducing short term costs in the (very small budget) set aside for the simulator team” That’s great long-term thinking! This decision was obviously made by someone who has never used an FPGA in his / her life for anything real.    Hey Altera – LISTEN UP: Not every FPGA design is a matlab-simulink-to-hardware design that can only be simulated using automatically generated vhdl test benches!! Some of us real engineers design some very real things, selling thousands of your chips using the tools that have been refined for 15+years. Don’t alienate us! – If you must move on then at least replace the tool with something just as easy to use! Seriously, Are you retarded?    This is just as stupid as the idiots at Microsoft totally re-engineering the windoze user interface that we have all become accustom to. I use the tools to do my job - I am not excited abut the prospect of "getting" to learn a new user interface because it looks cooler. I have actual work to do, and when you add to my load by changing where things are, I get ****ed! Yes, I am angry, deal with it. I am your customer. I write part of your paycheck.    This idiot pop-culture mentality belongs on MTV - not in my design tool.      So, yeah, bring it back please.

[Altera_Forum]

I share you all that anger regarding interfaces of windows, various other programs, mobiles, videos and all the stupid changes made by those software engineers/managers playing around - having nothing else to do-. 

 I respect progress, evolution of products but changing where things are without due necesssity should made illegal, seriously as it causes a lot of stress on hearts of people.

[Altera_Forum]

I agree! Let's bring back DOS and BASIC! After all, real engineers who've been doing engineering for *30* years know that these tools are the ones that get the job done!

[Altera_Forum]

Oh, wait! My colleague who's been doing this for *40* years had a great point. If you can't do all your work with a pencil, paper, and slide rule, then you really don't have any business doing engineering because you really don't understand what you're doing anyway. All that computer stuff has made people's brains mushy. 

 If you can't solve Karnaugh Maps on paper, or perform your own boolean algebra reduction, then you simply don't have the basis for doing digital design.

[Altera_Forum]

No not that far. if you look at products 30 years ago you will be laughing at. 

30 years laters, others will laugh at ours. We have to accept progress but real progress and not cosmetic surgery

[Altera_Forum]

kaz, 

 It seems like your 2nd and 3rd sentences set up premises that collapse on each other, but your last sentence about "real progress and not cosmetic surgery" definitely hits on the truth.  Altera, in getting away from their old simulator, is pushing people to use more modern and industry-standard tools. As much as I have used the old Altera simulator, using Verilog and/or VHDL with a testbench and modern simulator is the current state of engineering... has been for quite a number of years now. It is a technology that is much more flexible and scalable to support both small and enormously large projects. You may counter with the fact that for the projects you work on, the old simulator works just fine. That may be true, but that is a very a very narrow and self-absorbed view. You cannot expect Altera to keep supporting an outdated methodology because you don't want to update your skill set. The software engineers who are tasked with maintaining that simulator could be used to help create new tools and features that are needed with the latest FPGA technology -- like a better device floorplanner or linting tool.  I know that sticking with a tried and true methodology is efficient and comfortable, but we must all as engineers move and adapt with the technology and methods of the time we live in. Embrace the new world lfaustini, it is here.

[Altera_Forum]

To 'lfaustini': I too missed the internal simulator so much that I hung on to the Quartus II 9.1sp2 on my system. However as I am now in a project around Cyclone IV I was forced to learn to use ModelSim, and although I didn't really have the time (I thought), I persevered and as you can read a few posts back I am now totally fine using Modelsim, in fact I won't go back! Even today I learned to use the 'textio' package to log the output of a simulation rather than scrolling through the diagrams.

[Altera_Forum]

Looks like there is a good market for somebody to step in with a handy all round simulator. Get rich quick

[Altera_Forum]

New doesn’t always mean better - and it certainly doesn’t mean that its the best tool for the job. 

 Your $20k 8 giga-sample oscilloscope is a much more sophisticated voltmeter than your $3 harbor-freight POS digital voltmeter, but when you are trying to figure out if the 9 volt battery in your kids toy is any good, which are you going to use? Guess I will go drag out the Agilent digitizer on Christmas morning – “Wait here patently Mary while daddy finds a 240 volt outlet, and lets win7 boot up in his voltmeter"   Every tool has a purpose. The simulator is no different. Am I going to use the simulator to verify my PID control loop - no! ModelSim is a better tool for that. Am I going to use ModelSim to see what I messed up in my one-shot circuit? Guess I have no choice now.. While I am at it I am going to throw out all of my crescent wrenches – the ratchet set I got has made them obsolete.   The thing is, just because the "industry" is doing something stupid doesn’t mean that Altera should too. The industry is full of stupid ideas that failed. Altera used to be a leader of indistry - now they are a follower I guess.   As for Karnaugh maps and pencils argument –FAIL– Did anyone take your sheets of paper and pencils away when they dropped that Intel box on your desk, or does your office still have a supply cabinet? Guess that when you need to write a note to someone in your office you use MS power point instead of a post-it.

[Altera_Forum]

I certainly see that need for quick debugging tasks of some nodes as you build up your design and going back and forth to modelsim is a pain. 

One option might be to set an automated template with generics, file management... etc. to be used to run short sessions of debugging in modelsim just to view waveforms.

[Altera_Forum]

lfaustini, 

 By all means, stick with the methods that work for you. What I was trying to point out is that this methodology is disappearing and perhaps you might want to learn some newer methods. You might be the frog in the boiling pot.  I know that you were trying to make a point with your oscilloscope/voltmeter comparison, but it doesn't address the point I was trying to make: that if you have a pay the salaries of an engineering staff to maintain the oscilloscope and the voltmeter, which one is the better investment? Which do you keep if you can only afford one of them? If the overwhelming majority of your customers are using the oscilloscope, then the choice is clear. No matter how useful the voltmeter is, no matter how attached to it you are, it has to go.  Adoption of the Modelsim simulator doesn't have to be so painful, either. If you really have no interest in learning HDL or writing testbenches, you can still just use waveforms. The Modelsim-Altera simulator provides a waveform editor tool that can generate the stimulus for your simulation.  I agree that the "industry" does come up with "stupid ideas that failed", but I hope you're not trying to apply this label to standard HDL simulators, right? This is, by far, the most popular and enduring method for designing both small- and large-scale digital designs for the past 20 years.  I know that it can be frustrating to learn new methods, but I think that you'll find embracing the new tools can be just as quick and efficient as using your old ones -- in time you'll be more efficient. After you write a couple of testbenches, you'll see how quickly you can construct them, and you'll soon have your own small library of simulation tools that you can customize to address all of your verification needs -- large or small.

[Altera_Forum]

"I think that you'll find embracing the new tools can be just as quick and efficient as using your old ones " 

Okay, lets give this a try. please point me to a link that will walk me trough modelsimAltera, and , give me 15 years of working knowledge in 30 min or less.. I am half way serious here, please point me to some link that will get me through chip-trip using model-sim.