HDL designs continue to become more complex. This inevitably means engineers editing and using more and more "files". Manually keeping track of changes and managing sets of files which combine to create a design, rapidly becomes a nightmare. Version control tools have been deployed by software projects for many years and are a necessity for successful projects. But to most hardware engineers using "Version Control" to help with HDL designs, particularly in a team design environment, is leap in to the unknown. This paper aims to explain the simple principles of Version Control tools. It will use Renoir illustrate how to use version control to create a robust and repeatable HDL design environment for multiple engineers.

Bio

Peter Davy is the Renoir(tm) Field Marketing Manager for Mentor Graphics Corp based at the corporate headquarters in Wilsonville, Oregon.

Peter joined Mentor Graphics in 1989 and has held positions in engineering and marketing. As the Technical Marketing Engineer for Renoir in 1997 Peter helped launch Renoir(tm) providing specialist product knowledge to ASIC and FPGA designers a like.

Peter has a BSc (Hons) in Electrical & Electronic Engineering from University of Nottingham, England.