Re: [oc] About VHDL

[Victor the Cleaner <jonathan@canuck.com>]

> I am just starting to get myself up with VHDL. Maybe you can give me some
> advice.

"Run screaming."
 
> I went to the bookstore today and found several books covering VHDL. I found
> some of them has CD-ROM at the inside back cover of the book and it contains
> a VHDL program for Windows. The book cost around  US $60.00.
> 
> My question is: Is it OK for me to buy the book that has the CD-ROM?

In future, I humbly submit that you should include actual "informational
content" in your questions.  "I found a book with a CD, should I buy it?"
is not something that will generally result in a non-sarcastic answer.

That having been said, you're probably talking about Kevin Skahill's
"VHDL for Programmable Logic", which includes a CD.  I suppose it's not
a lot worse than most of the others, but the CD will be of marginal
usefulness, as it contains the Cypress WARP software, and most of what's
being discussed here revolves around Xilinx.

If you really want it, you might try what I did:  I dropped in on 
the local Cypress rep, and he gave me a copy of the book minus the 
CD.  I then called up Cypress to find out how I could get the missing 
CD, and when they couldn't figure out how to get me the CD alone, they 
sent me another copy of the book *with* the CD.  No charge for any of it.

For books, I rather like Sundar Rajan's "Essential VHDL - RTL Synthesis
Done Right".  As it focuses more on synthesis than simulation, I find it
more useful than many I've looked at.  AFAIK, it's only available from 
Computer Literacy^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H fatbrain.com .

Jonathan