Learn Verilog by Example

This post will be about programming a reaction timer in verilog and make it ready for FPGA implementation which in our case will be on the BASYS2 (Spartan 3E) board but can be programmed for any other board by simply changing the .ucf file. The reaction timer or reflex tester will check and time how fast you can respond after seeing a visual stimulus or in other words it will test your hand eye co-ordination. The code for this is a bit more busy than any of my other projects, but it has been heavily commented so just by reading the code you can easily understand what is going on. The code will be followed by a video demonstration in Isim along with it working on the FPGA board. Here we will be using three inputs; reset , start , stop and one output led along with displaying the time on the seven segment display . When the reset button is pressed it will obviously reset all registers and counters and will make the system ready for the next reflex test. Also when in this state it ...

In verilog a random number can be generated by using the $random keyword but that works only for simulation purposes and cannot be implemented. So when we need a random number for implementation i.e. in hardware it can be achieved using an LFSR (Liner Feedback Shift Register). An LFSR is simply a shift register with some of its bits (known as taps) XOR'd with themselves to create a feedback term. When implementing an LFSR it's width and it's repeatability must be kept under consideration .An N-bit LFSR will be able to generate (2**N) - 1 random bits before it starts repeating. For example a 30 bit LFSR will have 1073741823 random states before repeating, so for most practical purposes this can be considered true random. In an LFSR the MSB will always be the feedback point also the main thing to take care of while coding an LFSR is to know which bits are the taps (to be selected for XOR ). This is confusing as the taps are different for different size registers. For e...

A shift register will "shift" itself to the left or right by one position every clock cycle. A shift left - shift left circuit, as simple as it sounds is a very important part of many circuits and will be a part of many of my future projects and that is why it needs to be addressed. The code for this circuit in verilog is written below. It is very simple and does not need any detailed explanation. It is controlled by 2 control signals which determines whether the circuit will shift right or left. If control[0] is high the circuit will shift right and if control[1] is high the circuit will shift left and if both are low stay with the default value. The data shifted is stored in an internal register and is output as a bus. I have coded it using if - else statements. This can also be coded using a case block if further control is required. module shift( input clock, input reset, input [1:0] control, input in, output [7:0] out ); reg [7:0] r_reg, r_nex...