moore

Moore is a compiler for hardware description languages that outputs llhd assembly, with a focus on usability, clear error reporting, and completeness. Its goal is to act as a frontend for hardware design tools such as synthesizers, linters, or logical equivalence checkers.

Usage

Installation

You need a working Rust installation to build Moore. The project also depends on the CIRCT project and transitively on MLIR and LLVM. To get a working binary, you generally want to ensure you have the circt and circt/llvm submodules checked out:

git submodule update --init --recursive

And then follow these steps:

Build LLVM and MLIR

mkdir -p circt/llvm/build
pushd circt/llvm/build
cmake ../llvm \
    -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
    -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=../install \
    -DLLVM_BUILD_EXAMPLES=OFF \
    -DLLVM_ENABLE_ASSERTIONS=ON \
    -DLLVM_ENABLE_BINDINGS=OFF \
    -DLLVM_ENABLE_OCAMLDOC=OFF \
    -DLLVM_ENABLE_PROJECTS=mlir \
    -DLLVM_INSTALL_UTILS=ON \
    -DLLVM_OPTIMIZED_TABLEGEN=ON \
    -DLLVM_TARGETS_TO_BUILD=""
cmake --build . --target install
popd

Build CIRCT

mkdir -p circt/build
pushd circt/build
cmake .. \
    -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
    -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=../install \
    -DMLIR_DIR=$PWD/../llvm/install/lib/cmake/mlir \
    -DLLVM_DIR=$PWD/../llvm/install/lib/cmake/llvm \
    -DLLVM_ENABLE_ASSERTIONS=ON
cmake --build . --target install
popd

Build Moore

Set the following environment variables to indicate where your LLVM and CIRCT build is:

export CIRCT_SYS_CIRCT_DIR=$PWD/circt
export CIRCT_SYS_CIRCT_BUILD_DIR=$PWD/circt/install
export CIRCT_SYS_LLVM_DIR=$PWD/circt/llvm
export CIRCT_SYS_LLVM_BUILD_DIR=$PWD/circt/llvm/install

Use cargo to install Moore:

cargo install moore

Development

For active development, you'll want to use the usual check, build, run, and test subcommands.

You may also find it useful to point the *_BUILD_DIR environment variables at the actual build directories (usually circt/llvm/build and circt/build), such that you don't need to re-install on every change to CIRCT or LLVM.

Example

Assume the following input file:

// foo.sv
module hello_world;
endmodule

To compile foo.sv and emit the corresponding LLHD assembly to standard output call moore with the file name and the module to elaborate (-e option):

moore foo.sv -e hello_world

You can use llhd-sim to simulate the compiled module:

moore foo.sv -e hello_world > foo.llhd
llhd-sim foo.llhd

Development

Moore is developed in this repository, but is separated into the following crates:

moore: Top-level umbrella crate tying everything together
moore-common: Common infrastructure used by SystemVerilog and VHDL
moore-derive: Procedural macros
moore-svlog: SystemVerilog implementation
moore-svlog-syntax: SystemVerilog parser and AST implementation
moore-vhdl: VHDL implementation
moore-vhdl-syntax: VHDL parser and AST implementation

Some useful commands when working on moore:

git submodule init
git submodule update
cargo check
cargo test --all
cargo run -- foo.sv -e foo
scripts/test.py --debug -v
scripts/test.py --debug -v <path-to-test-case>

Making a new Release

To create a new release, the individual sub-crates of the project have to be released in the reverse order outlined above. Follow this checklist:

Use scripts/release_status.sh to see an overview of moore/llhd crate versions used throughout the project
Update the version in all Cargo.toml files
Use scripts/release_check.sh to ensure that all crates have the same version as the root
Ensure cargo is happy: cargo check
Update the CHANGELOG.md file
Commit: git commit -am "Bump version to X.Y.Z
Tag: git tag vX.Y.Z
Publish all crates using cargo publish in reverse order