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While I don't disagree with your comment, it's a little ironic that hardware is designed visually. Instead of writing a netlist by hand, it's drawn as a schemat

While I don't disagree with your comment, it's a little ironic that hardware is designed visually. Instead of writing a netlist by hand, it's drawn as a schematic. The same applies to mechanical, construction or any traditional engineering fields. LabView targets engineers in those fields rather than those in software. So, you are right that visual programming doesn't represent how a computer software works.. But it's exactly how computer hardware works.

donquichotte 9y ago
I don't disagree with your comment either. In fact, my sentiment extends to hardware design, which is why I've been toying (and building real stuff for work) with SKiDL lately, a Python extension that allows for text based schematic capture for printed circuit board design. Of course, the actual routing of the traces still must be done by hand. However, during schematic capture, instead of drawing the same Zener diode input protection 100 times with a mouse, I just call the code that builds it in a loop.
- shortsightedsid 9y ago
  Interesting. I have not tried SKiDL. All my designs are in Cadence or Eagle. Thanks! I will try itout
marcosdumay 9y ago
Simple hardware is designed visually. When things get more complex people resort to hardware definition languages and scriptable CADs.
- shortsightedsid 9y ago
  I really meant circuit/physical design rather than high level design i.e pre-tapeout. Also PCBs are visually designed though I learnt about using python above and need to check that out.
  - marcosdumay 9y ago
    Those things are inherently mechanical, so there will always be a last visual step before production. That does not mean people don't try to push non-visual tool as far as they can.
jayd16 9y ago
Don't most use something things like SPICE and Verilog? The reason a schematic comes into play with because there are physical and spacial constraints in hardware implementation. However, that's not at the logical level. Pretty sure you don't use any visual language for FPGAs.
- crispyambulance 9y ago
  LabVIEW can also target FPGA's. This capability has been around for ~10 years now. Interestingly, LabVIEW and FPGA targets get along quite well, the structure of LabVIEW programs lend themselves to being mapped to an FPGA's HDL (see http://www.ni.com/fpga/ http://www.ni.com/fpga/)
- nickpsecurity 9y ago
  "Pretty sure you don't use any visual language for FPGAs." There are physical and spatial constraints in efficient implementation on FPGA's. Although I don't use them, I saw plenty of examples in my research of people looking at them visually and changing representations to make them more compact or something. Modifying the physical layout outperformed whatever the initial synthesis was.
  - krupan 9y ago
    Parent said nobody uses a visual language for FPGA's, and parent is mostly right (some do use LabView, legend has it). Yes, visual tools for manipulating physical aspects of the design are used, but there is little to no abstraction there like a language provides.

donquichotte 9y ago

I don't disagree with your comment either. In fact, my sentiment extends to hardware design, which is why I've been toying (and building real stuff for work) with SKiDL lately, a Python extension that allows for text based schematic capture for printed circuit board design. Of course, the actual routing of the traces still must be done by hand. However, during schematic capture, instead of drawing the same Zener diode input protection 100 times with a mouse, I just call the code that builds it in a loop.

shortsightedsid 9y ago
Interesting. I have not tried SKiDL. All my designs are in Cadence or Eagle. Thanks! I will try itout

marcosdumay 9y ago

Simple hardware is designed visually. When things get more complex people resort to hardware definition languages and scriptable CADs.

shortsightedsid 9y ago
I really meant circuit/physical design rather than high level design i.e pre-tapeout. Also PCBs are visually designed though I learnt about using python above and need to check that out.
- marcosdumay 9y ago
  Those things are inherently mechanical, so there will always be a last visual step before production. That does not mean people don't try to push non-visual tool as far as they can.

jayd16 9y ago

Don't most use something things like SPICE and Verilog? The reason a schematic comes into play with because there are physical and spacial constraints in hardware implementation. However, that's not at the logical level. Pretty sure you don't use any visual language for FPGAs.

crispyambulance 9y ago
LabVIEW can also target FPGA's. This capability has been around for ~10 years now. Interestingly, LabVIEW and FPGA targets get along quite well, the structure of LabVIEW programs lend themselves to being mapped to an FPGA's HDL (see http://www.ni.com/fpga/ http://www.ni.com/fpga/)
nickpsecurity 9y ago
"Pretty sure you don't use any visual language for FPGAs." There are physical and spatial constraints in efficient implementation on FPGA's. Although I don't use them, I saw plenty of examples in my research of people looking at them visually and changing representations to make them more compact or something. Modifying the physical layout outperformed whatever the initial synthesis was.
- krupan 9y ago
  Parent said nobody uses a visual language for FPGA's, and parent is mostly right (some do use LabView, legend has it). Yes, visual tools for manipulating physical aspects of the design are used, but there is little to no abstraction there like a language provides.