VHDL-Tool

Overview

VHDL-Tool is configured through a single plaintext YAML file. The file needs to be at the root of your VHDL source code and must be named vhdltool-config.yaml. The configuration syntax is self-explanatory and should be clear from the example below. Note that YAML is indentation sensitive.

To test your configuration file for common errors, run VHDL-Tool as below from the root of your source code (the same directory as the configuration file).

$ vhdl-tool check-config

Example

#Define your project's libraries and source files here.
#This section is compulsory.
Libraries:
    #The name of the library.
    - name: hardware_lib
    #The paths where the source files for this library can be found. Use "**" to match arbitrarily nested directories.
      paths: 
        - "hardware_lib/**/*.vhd"
        - "hardware_lib/**/*.vhdl"


    - name: hardware_lib2
      paths: 
        - "hardware_lib2/**/*.vhd"
        - "hardware_lib2/**/*.vhdl"


    #Point to the IEEE standard libraries
    - name: ieee
      paths:
        - "/home/awesome-vhdl-dev/ieee/*.vhd"
        - "/home/awesome-vhdl-dev/ieee/*.vhdl"


Preferences:
    #Enable/disable typechecking
    TypeCheck: True


    #Display errors over multiple lines
    MultiLineErrors: True


    #Enable/disable check-as-you-type
    CheckOnChange: True


    #Enable/disable linting
    Lint: True


    #Display the first sintax error only in a file
    FirstSyntaxErrorOnly: True


#Linter rule configuration.
#Rules can be enabled or disabled.
#Rules also have a severity. It may be one of Info, Warning, Critical or Error.
Lint:
    #Threshold, below which messages are not displayed.
    Threshold: Warning


    #Long form rule configuration. Both enabled/disabled status and severity can be configured this way.
    DeclaredNotAssigned: 
        enabled:  True
        severity: Warning #Default severity Warning


    #Short form. Only enabled/disabled status can be specified. Severity is the default for the rule.
    DeclaredNotRead:             True #Default severity Warning
    ReadNotAssigned:             True #Default severity Critical
    SensitivityListCheck:        True #Default severity Warning
    ExtraSensitivityListCheck:   True #Default severity Warning
    DuplicateSensitivity:        True #Default severity Warning
    LatchCheck:                  True #Default severity Critical
    VariableNotRead:             True #Default severity Warning
    VariableNotWritten:          True #Default severity Warning
    PortNotRead:                 True #Default severity Warning
    PortNotWritten:              True #Default severity Critical
    NoPrimaryUnit:               True #Default severity Warning
    DuplicateLibraryImport:      True #Default severity Warning
    DuplicatePackageUsage:       True #Default severity Warning
    DeprecatedPackages:          True #Default severity Warning
    ImplicitLibraries:           True #Default severity Warning
    DisconnectedPorts:           True #Default severity Critical
    IntNoRange:                  True #Default severity Warning

Sections

Only the Libraries section is compulsory. The other sections assume sensible defaults.

Libraries

This section defines the name and location of each library that can be imported in your source code. This section is compulsory because VHDL-Tool uses it to create an index of all types and identifiers so that it can type check and search your code.

It consists of a YAML list of records. Each record must contain "name" and "paths" fields. Name is straightforward — it specifies the name of the library that is being defined. Paths is a YAML list of locations where the source files for this library can be found. It may contain wildcards.

You may want to download the IEEE standard libraries from here and reference them from this section so that you can type check code that uses them and jump to identifiers defined in them. The example configuration file above does this.

Preferences

TypeCheck: Enable/disable typechecking.
MultiLineErrors: Display errors over multiple lines.
CheckOnChange: Enable/disable live check-as-you-type, instead of waiting for the file to be saved.
Lint: Enable/disable linting.
FirstSyntaxErrorOnly: Display the first syntax error only in a file.

Lint