Simply Gaming Final Project Project Leader: PJ Acevedo Fall 2009

ML507 Development Board FPGA UART DVI

10/31/09 Project Idea Create an interactive Visual Response System(VRS) – Use “minicom” as an input to system – Update “echo.c” to provide output to monitor – Connect from any remote PC via the internet Motivation stems from the ability of FPGAs to process data in parallel thus giving the ability to apply changes to different data blocks concurrently Result will be to create a simple game such as Tic-Tac- Toe to explore the above possibilities

10/31/09 Visual Template DVI Interface

10/31/09 Initial Concerns Not enough memory to store the four fixed frames Monitor refresh needs to be faster than 60Hz which is a typical monitor refresh rate System might be too slow when refreshing squares

12/05/09 Gantt Chart Board Layout – Create dimensions of game frame by 10/31 Minicom Interface – Basic read/write subroutines by 10/31 Monitor Interface – Basic draw subroutines by 10/31 APU Interface – Game engine and project integration by 11/14 Top-Level Integration – Integrate all interfaces into a complete system by 11/28

12/05/09 ml507 System Block Diagram Virtex 5 PPC 440 apuDDR memory video uart minicom game_ engine

10/31/09 Visual Template DVI Interface VGA MONITOR – Break up display into eight frames – Place dividers in between frames – Refresh the frames as needed and leave the rest unchanged STORED MEMORY – The initial idea of having a stored image in DDR was changed. – As a new frame was needed, the PPC440 dynamically allocated the image where needed

12/05/09 Game Frame Dimensions Dimensions denoted by meas(s,e) where meas signifies measurement coordinates, s equals starting pixel x/y coordinate and e equals ending pixel x/y coordinate – Outer frame meas(A,G) – Inner vertical frame meas(B,F) – Inner horizontal frame meas(C,E) – Maximum player X/O designator meas(A,D)

10/31/09 Human Input UART Interface Use Minicom to communicate with system – Command entries: X 1 1. : Enter an X in the first row, first column O 2 2. : Enter an O in the center M : Display menu S: Start new game E: Exit game Notification of winner will be displayed with a green highlight over the winning choices.

12/05/09 Minicom Terminal UART Interface Prints Welcome Menu – Display game input options Signal user of invalid inputs Provide a restart/terminate option to user Note: This is an actual copy of screen

12/05/09 Game Engine State Machine FPGA Fabric via APU fill_e ntry chk_ entry start CHOICE= X(x,y) or O(x,y) CHOICE= PREV_CHOICE/ IS_REPEAT= '1' DONE= '1' CHOICE /= PREV_CHOICE P_EDGE / (IS_FULL = '0', X_STATUS = '1' or O_STATUS= '1') P_EDGE / (IS_FULL = '0' or IS_FULL = '1') P_EDGE / (IS_FULL = '1', X_STATUS = '1' or O_STATUS= '1') RESET = '0' Default Outputs and description of signals: – IS_REPEAT <= '0'. Notifies of a repeat of X or O. – IS_FULL <= '0'. Notification if board is full. – X_STATUS <= '0'. Notification if X wins. – O_STATUS <= '0'. Notification if O wins. – DONE <= '0'. Notification if user entry has been processed.

12/05/09 store/127 Game Engine HW FPGA Fabric via APU game engine apu load/127 o_status/1 is_repeat/1 done/1 is_full/1 x_status/1 col/1 row/1 choice/1 store: 127-bit bus that sends game_engine results to processor load: 127-bit bus that accepts user game input from processor choice: Denotes if X or O has been chosen row: Denotes row of game board col: Denotes column of game board done: Tells apu that game_engine is done processing is_full: Denotes if game board is full is_repeat: Denotes if user input is a repeat x_status: Denotes if X has one the game o_status: Denotes if O has one the game

12/05/09 Final Product Monitor displays each player in different colors Monitor gives visual feedback og game winner by highlighting appropriate squares and text prompt at bottom of screen Minicom provides a user menu and game feedback

FPGA Resource Allocation

10/31/09 NOTES Use parallelism of FPGA to update Bit Patterns 10/31 Bit Patterns will contain pre-defined.ppm 10/31 Changed initial concept of a stored image in DDR and used dynamic creation 11/01 Used the “apu_inv” hardware from the previous project as the interface between the ppc440 and the game_engine created in the fpga fabric. 11/21 The game_engine is the brains of the game. It makes all the decisions related to game play. 11/21 The ppc440 controls communication with the user via the minicom interface using one of its UART peripheral setups. It also controls the visual display via the vga controller. 11/21

10/31/09 Related Research Papers FPGA RTL View: – from National Instruments website by G-Money Decision Algorithm: – by John F. Wakerly

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