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> Since May 2015, over 600 universities around the world have licenced and downloaded the MIPSfpga core, the Getting Started Guide, and the lab exercises. Seem
by problems 9y ago
> Since May 2015, over 600 universities around the world have licenced and downloaded the MIPSfpga core, the Getting Started Guide, and the lab exercises.
Seems pretty cool, but I'm just wondering, is there any reason the core must be licensed for them to profit on this? Or could the core be opened and just the coursework licensed?
- bem94 9y agoThey aren't doing this as a money making exercise. It's a way for them to get the MIPS architecture out in the open and have the next generation of engineers get familiar with it. I think the licensing is just a way for them to protect access to what is still monetisable IP while still making it available for teaching purposes.
- wott 9y ago> It's a way for them to get the MIPS architecture out in the open. Most computer architecture courses of the last 25 years have already been based on MIPS (or any MIPS-like or -light adapted version for the course). That's because the MIPS ISA is simple, regular and elegant, and the original MIPS is a pipeline simple enough to be taught easily and nevertheless able to present most important problems and solutions that a CPU and a pipelined CPU may encounter.