How to make a VHDL design in Ubuntu/Debian

Simulation

To stay in the Free Software spirit, the best method to simulate is to use GHDL (based on GCC).
To install it on Ubuntu you just have to type :

$ sudo apt-get install ghdl

You can find a good tutorial for using GHDL here and on the official website. It's supposed that the project tree used is this one described previously.

Analysing files:

$ ghdl -i --ieee=synopsys --warn-no-vital-generic --workdir=simu --work=work src/*.vhdl testbench/testb_file.vhd

And compile:

$ ghdl -m --ieee=synopsys --warn-no-vital-generic --workdir=simu --work=work testb_file

After that a binary file named testb_file is created; to launch simulation we just have to:

$ ./testb_file --stop-time=500ns --vcdgz=testb_file.vcdgz 

The stop time option sets the simulation time and the vcdgz option will generate a gunzip compressed wave file to visualize the result.

Visualizing the result can be done with gtkwave:

$ sudo apt-get install gtkwave

We can launch it with the following command :

$ gunzip --stdout testb_file.vcdgz | gtkwave --vcd

It can be a good idea to make a Makefile instead of typing all this commands, here is a little Makefile:

# project name
PROJECT=bus_led_top
# vhdl files
FILES = src/bus_led.vhd src/bus_led_top.vhd
# testbench
SIMTOP = led_top_tb
SIMFILES = testbench/led_top_tb.vhd
# Simu break condition
GHDL_SIM_OPT    = --assert-level=error
#GHDL_SIM_OPT    = --stop-time=500ns

SIMDIR = simu
SYNTHFILES = bin/bus_led_ise/netgen/synthesis

GHDL_CMD        = ghdl
GHDL_FLAGS      = --ieee=synopsys --warn-no-vital-generic

VIEW_CMD        = /usr/bin/gtkwave

ghdl-compil :                                                                                                 
 mkdir -p simu                                                                                               
 $(GHDL_CMD) -i $(GHDL_FLAGS) --workdir=simu --work=work $(SIMFILES) $(FILES)                                
 $(GHDL_CMD) -m $(GHDL_FLAGS) --workdir=simu --work=work $(SIMTOP)                                           
 @mv $(SIMTOP) simu/$(SIMTOP)                                                                                
                                                                                                              
ghdl-run :                                                                                                    
 @$(SIMDIR)/$(SIMTOP) $(GHDL_SIM_OPT) --vcdgz=$(SIMDIR)/$(SIMTOP).vcdgz                                      
                                                                                                             
ghdl-view:                                                                                                    
 gunzip --stdout $(SIMDIR)/$(SIMTOP).vcdgz | $(VIEW_CMD) --vcd                                               
                                                                                                             
ghdl-clean :                                                                                                  
 $(GHDL_CMD) --clean --workdir=simu     

to use it, just write :

$ make ghdl-compile

to compile, then:

$ make ghdl-run

to run the design, then:

$ make ghdl-view

to launch gtkwave and visualize the results.