Book Image

FPGA Programming for Beginners

By : Frank Bruno
5 (1)
Book Image

FPGA Programming for Beginners

5 (1)
By: Frank Bruno

Overview of this book

Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) have now become a core part of most modern electronic and computer systems. However, to implement your ideas in the real world, you need to get your head around the FPGA architecture, its toolset, and critical design considerations. FPGA Programming for Beginners will help you bring your ideas to life by guiding you through the entire process of programming FPGAs and designing hardware circuits using SystemVerilog. The book will introduce you to the FPGA and Xilinx architectures and show you how to work on your first project, which includes toggling an LED. You’ll then cover SystemVerilog RTL designs and their implementations. Next, you’ll get to grips with using the combinational Boolean logic design and work on several projects, such as creating a calculator and updating it using FPGA resources. Later, the book will take you through the advanced concepts of AXI and show you how to create a keyboard using PS/2. Finally, you’ll be able to consolidate all the projects in the book to create a unified output using a Video Graphics Array (VGA) controller that you’ll design. By the end of this SystemVerilog FPGA book, you’ll have learned how to work with FPGA systems and be able to design hardware circuits and boards using SystemVerilog programming.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
1
Section 1: Introduction to FPGAs and Xilinx Architectures
3
Section 2: Introduction to Verilog RTL Design, Simulation, and Implementation
9
Section 3: Interfacing with External Components

Investigating the keyboard interface

I'm sure you are familiar with computer keyboards as a user, but perhaps not how keyboards are physically implemented.

Keyboards consist of a matrix of switches. When you depress a key, you close a circuit. A keyboard controller activates one line at a time and checks to see which lines are connected, which will identify a unique key (assuming only one key is pressed). It will also detect when a key is released:

Figure 10.1 – Keyboard matrix

The keyboard controller will apply a voltage across each input one at a time. With the voltage applied, it will look at the outputs to identify whether any key is pressed. In Figure 10.1, when the controller scans input 2, and key K is depressed, output 2 will be active high.

When IBM introduced the PS/2 computer, they introduced a new keyboard and mouse standard. The keyboard pulled the matrix decoder into the keyboard and simplified the interface to two wires. The...