Answers Database

Flow Engine M1: Aborted Place & Route, limitations on saving intermediate results


Record #2297

Product Family:  Software

Product Line:  FPGA Core

Problem Title:
Flow Engine M1: Aborted Place & Route, limitations on saving
intermediate results



Problem Description:
Keywords: stop, abort, terminate, PAR, control-c, ctrl-c,
break, resume, save, continue, interrupt

Urgency: standard

General Description: If a compile in the Flow Engine is
aborted by the user via the STOP button, the Flow Engine does
not save the intermediate results before aborting.


Solution 1:

The place and route executable, par, updates the physical
database file, design.ncd, after every placer iteration
and after every router iteration.  These intermediate results
can be reused by invoking the Re-Entrant Route feature from
the Flow Engine's Setup->Advanced menu.  Re-entrant route will
only route the design, so if the placement was not completely
optimized the final results may not be optimal.

The Flow Engine does not provide the ability to resume
or save an aborted Place and Route.  A workaround for
this is to compile the design from command line.

To determine the appropriate syntax for command line
execution, see the Command History or Command Preview
in the Flow Engine Utilities menu and select Command
Line mode.  This will display the command line syntax
for PAR.  For example:
par -w -l 4 -d 0 map.ncd calc.ncd calc.pcf

Run this command in the appropriate Revision directory
to launch a Place and Route run.  If you abort this run
with Ctrl-C, PAR will prompt you with options to resume,
save, or terminate the run.



Solution 2:

Running from the command line gives you the ability to
save results before aborting place and route.

To determine the appropriate syntax for command line
execution, see the Command History or Command Preview
in the Flow Engine Utilities menu and select Command
Line mode.  This will display the command line syntax
for PAR.  For example:

par -w -l 4 -d 0 map.ncd calc.ncd calc.pcf


Run this command in the appropriate Revision directory
to launch a Place and Route run.  If you abort this run
with Ctrl-C, PAR will prompt you with options to resume,
save, or terminate the run.



End of Record #2297