OpenLane
OpenLane is an Open Source ASIC tool. You can download it from here. The installation instructions are pretty straight forwards and it takes about 15 minutes and 3GB of disk space.
For a lot of great information on how it works and what it does, please watch Mohamed Shalan’s OpenLane FOSSI dialup presentation
Here’s the overview:
We put our HDL in at one end, and out the other comes the GDS2 files that are the standard file format for the foundry.
The most fundamental steps are:
- Synthesis
- Floor planning
- Place and Route
- sign off: Layout vs Schematic, Design Rule Check, Static Timing Analysis
To see more about OpenLane’s output files - check this article
OpenLane makes a lot of use of OpenROAD. This is a project funded by DARPA to develop open source ASIC tooling.
You can watch some interviews I did with Tom Spyrou, lead dev of OpenROAD here.
Tom also did a presentation for OpenTapeOut.
Course feedback
I love the layout of the course, you did a perfect job Matt. Building up the foundation and then getting into the depths of it. Having everything lined up. I love the walkthroughs at the end of each section. I did the work and then I looked back, maybe there's a better way and in your videos you point out some other interesting things as well so that was really helpful. So yes I love the course.