18-643 Reconfigurable Logic: Technology, Architecture and Applications

• No recitation first two weeks of school
• Recitation attendance optional. Recitation provides supplemental help on labs and projects.
• Students on waitlist should email the instructor. (This is important as Lab 0 starts on day 1 and is due on 9/13 noon. We have to observe headcount max in the classroom. We may not be able to accommodate waitlisted students. I will record and post lectures for the first 2 weeks for waitlisted students until attendance is finalized.)

• Fall 2021 Lecture Schedule and Notes
• Preview lecture notes from the last completed semester
• Communications
  • visit Canvas for official announcements, handouts, work submissions, etc.
  • use Piazza for lab-related discussions
  • subscribe seminars@nexusfpga.org to receive FPGA related seminars announcements (available to anyone with cmu.edu or pitt.edu address)

Three decades since their original inception as a lower-cost compromise to ASICs, modern Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) are versatile and powerful systems-on-a-chip for many applications that need both hardware level efficiency and the flexibility of reprogrammability. More recently, FPGAs have also emerged as a formidable computing substrate with applications ranging from data centers to mobile devices. This course offers a comprehensive coverage of modern FPGAs in terms of technology, architecture and applications. The coverage will also extend into on-going research investigations of future directions. Students will take part in a substantial design project applying the latest FPGA platforms to compute acceleration. Register-Transfer Level (RTL) hardware design experience is required.

Prerequisites: 18-341 or 18-447

• Instructor
  • James C. Hoe (contact)
• Teaching Assistants
  • Shashank Obla
  • See Canvas for contact info and office hours

• Lectures: Monday and Wednesday, 1:25pm to 3:15pm, WEH 5421
• Recitations: Wednesday, 4:40pm to 6:00pm, WEH 5403

• None required. Please see Canvas for supplemental reference materials.

• Intel/VMware Crossroads 3D-FPGA Academic Research Center
• Computer Architecture Lab at Carnegie Mellon (CALCM)
• HDLBits Verilog Practice
• A Short Intro to ModelSim Verilog Simulator