<jackgassett>
thanks, I wanted to drop by and chat with some people working on the milkymist project.
<jackgassett>
I have an open source FPGA board called the Papilio One.
<jackgassett>
I was just chatting in my channel over at #GadgetFactory and we were talking about the milkymist project.
<jackgassett>
The Papilio One is a low end FPGA board.
<lekernel>
yup i'm checking that out
<jackgassett>
I thought it would be cool to make milkymist run on the P1 but don't want to do so if it conflicts with the high end Milkymist One board.
<lekernel>
port milkymist soc?
<lekernel>
oh, go ahead
<jackgassett>
I saw the Avnet port and thought that would most likely run on the P1.
<lekernel>
it's definitely not going to conflict, people who buy small boards like yours wouldn't buy a milkymist board anyway
<jackgassett>
But without looking too closely I couldn't tell if the avnet port was just the SOC portion.
<lekernel>
and it'll have a lot less features (no sdram, no video, etc.)
<jackgassett>
well, I do have a VGA video "Wing".
<lekernel>
but still it could be nice to have a small cpu-based system (like the avnet port)
<jackgassett>
And wanted to use Milkymist as a small demo of what can be done with the video wing.
<lekernel>
what's on that video wing?
<jackgassett>
but maybe the video features need more ram?
<jackgassett>
nothing fancy, just resistors. No RAM or anything.
<lekernel>
flickernoise uses around 25 megabytes, the demo firmware about 4 iirc
<lekernel>
you need SDRAM
<lekernel>
also the s3e500 wouldn't accomodate the graphics acceleration
<jackgassett>
ok, what I really want is a SOC system with a video controller section. It wouldn't need a lot of memory because the VGA wing only provides 8 colors.
<lekernel>
what can still be done is a small cpu system and a very low resolution vga out
<jackgassett>
and a future wing will provide 4096 colors.
<jackgassett>
yes, that is exactly what I was hoping for. With the goal being to make it easy for people to make interfaces etc.
<jackgassett>
And do interesting things with the VGA output.
<jackgassett>
cool, I'll have to dig in and look more closely. I really just wanted to touch base with you and make sure it would not be a conflict of interest.
<kristianpaul>
do you have a sdram wind?
<kristianpaul>
winG
<jackgassett>
not right now. I have a new board coming out that uses the Spartan 3A and has SDRAM built in.
<jackgassett>
But it will be a couple more months before it is ready.
<lekernel>
isn't spartan 3a already on its way to obsolescence?
<kristianpaul>
lekernel: does he really need sdram for basic vga stuff?
<jackgassett>
I think the price is right for the type of boards I'm offering. When the board was designed the Spartan 6 still did not have an option that was under $20.
<kristianpaul>
i think actually Fallenou have an ping ping game fot avnet board
<kristianpaul>
too
<lekernel>
usually yes, unless you have a resolution like 320x200 16 colors
<jackgassett>
I just recently saw their Logic optimized options. I would have selected that if it was available at the time.
<lekernel>
but people are already whining because mm isn't running in hd resolutions atm :)
<kristianpaul>
heh
<jackgassett>
I have Pac-Man running on the Papilio One now.
<kristianpaul>
jackgassett: what is your relation with gadget factory btw?
<kristianpaul>
jackgassett: nice
<kristianpaul>
do you have a repo?
<kristianpaul>
what are your plans with mikymist in the future?
<jackgassett>
I'm the owner.
<jackgassett>
kristianpaul: I was getting the link to the repo and just realized the site is down!
<jackgassett>
My VPS provider is usually pretty solid but they seem to be down right now.
<kristianpaul>
lekernel: from the mm1 soc an and avnet port, the mico32 version is same isnt?
<lekernel>
I don't remember
<jackgassett>
kristianpaul: are you asking my plans?
<kristianpaul>
jackgassett: yes
<jackgassett>
Well, my goal for the P1 is to provide a ton of concrete examples of the sort of things you can do with an FPGA.
<kristianpaul>
Your site is nice, i wast aware of poeple seliing fpga based kits
<jackgassett>
So I try to port the best projects I can find out there, usually in just a basic form. And I put together tutorial videos and example projects for doing things like implementing serial ports etc.
<lekernel>
kristianpaul: so milkymist doesn't count?
<jackgassett>
So I would only want to get a limited version of Milkymist running on the P1.
<kristianpaul>
lekernel: no no, that is already on my list !!
<jackgassett>
The board will never do what the Milkymist One can do.
<kristianpaul>
sure
<jackgassett>
but it could bring exposure, at a low cost, to the project.
<jackgassett>
I want to be the Arduino for FPGA's.
<jackgassett>
The idea is that someone buys the P1 for $50 and then browses through the repository and can test out all kinds of cool projects.
<jackgassett>
If they like the limited milkymist project then they can move on to the fully featured Milkymist One board.
<kristianpaul>
:-)
<jackgassett>
I think it is beneficial to everyone but can understand if a project owner doesn't like the idea.
<kristianpaul>
you i'll happy with a mm soc, with just processor, serial port and IO plus vga i guess?
<jackgassett>
yes, I think that would be perfect.
<lekernel_>
jackgassett: if you start with the avnet port it should be quite easy
<kristianpaul>
indeed
<jackgassett>
does the avnet port include VGA?
<kristianpaul>
nopr
<lekernel>
nope
<jackgassett>
ok, so I would have to add that in.
<lekernel>
but the milkymist vga controller requires a SDRAM bus anyway
<lekernel>
and is generally optimized for SDRAM based systems
<lekernel>
so you wouldn't want that
<jackgassett>
could it be converted to use BRAM for smaller VGA usage?
<kristianpaul>
jackgassett: but includes gpio (sysctl) you can clone that and implement a simple vga
<kristianpaul>
it think you may already have the core for that isnt?
<lekernel>
just use dual port RAM, with one port for CPU access and the other to scan the framebuffer
<kristianpaul>
ah yes :-)
<jackgassett>
ok, and milkymist SOC and software would make it easy to write to the framebuffer...
<lekernel>
it'll a lot easier than messing around with the current core, that is designed to handle memory latencies, bus contention and memory burst access
<lekernel>
just map the framebuffer to system memory, then you can run C code that display nice graphics
<jackgassett>
ok, sounds awesome.
<kristianpaul>
and is easy!
<jackgassett>
When I get ramped up to start working on it I'll keep you guys posted.
<jackgassett>
I think it would be really nice to have a low end board that people could do graphics on.
<jackgassett>
Thats something the Arduino cannot really do. People would appreciate being able to do that easily.
<lekernel>
yeah, in turn it'd be nice to introduce people to milkymist soc as well
<lekernel>
many tech enthusiasts wrongly think that MM1 is super-complex and super-expensive and not for them
<kristianpaul>
even, well i think you can port arduino lagunage to the board, is gcc so well...