3.6.9 PolarFire Video Kit Setup Instructions

These instructions describe how to setup, compile and run an example on the PolarFireVideo Kit with the MiV_RV32 Reference Design. The instructions below assume your host computer is running Linux, but similar steps can be done on Windows.

The following cables must be connected to the board for use with SmartHLS :

• Power cable (connects to 12V Power Supply Input).
• Mini-USB cable for serial communication to the board and embedded JTAG programmer. The same cable is used for both. Alternatively, you use the External FP6 programmer.
• Jumper J28 must be open to use the external programmer, or closed to use the embedded programmer.

The following programs are required to be installed on the host PC to set up the PolarFire Video Kit:

• SmartHLS v2024.2 or newer.
• Libero v2024.2 or newer.
• SoftConsole v2021.3 or later.
• A serial communication terminal of your choosing. In this guide, we will use tio.

Users need to install SoftConsole and append the RISC-V compilation tool chain to $PATH environment variable. For example, on Linux users need to run:

export PATH=$SOFTCONSOLE_PATH/riscv-unknown-elf-gcc/bin:$PATH

$env:PATH = "$env:SOFTCONSOLE_PATH\riscv-unknown-elf-gcc\bin;$env:PATH"

During the test, we will open the 3 serial terminals labeled below:

1. UART Terminal: We will use this to see the stdout from the program.
2. SmartHLS terminal: Linux terminal that we will use to run SmartHLS commands from the command line.
3. OpenOCD terminal: Linux terminal that we will use to launch OpenOCD manually from the command line, provided the SmartHLS version is 2025.1 or previous.

Create a temporary directory, for example, test, and use your favorite text editor to write the following 3 files under this directory:

$> mkdir test
$> cd test

Create a simple_add.c file with the following content:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdint.h>
 
uint32_t hw_add(uint32_t a, uint32_t b) {
   #pragma HLS function top
   #pragma HLS interface default type(axi_target)
   return a + b;
}
 
int main() {
   uint32_t sum;
   uint32_t a = 2, b = 3;
   sum = hw_add(a, b);
 
   int error = (sum != a + b);
   printf("\n%s\n", error ? "FAIL" : "PASS");
   return error;
}

Create the Makefile with the following content:

NAME=simple_add
SRCS=$(NAME).c
LOCAL_CONFIG = -legup-config=config.tcl
LEVEL = $(SHLS_ROOT_DIR)/examples
include $(LEVEL)/Makefile.common

Create a config.tcl file:

source $env(SHLS_ROOT_DIR)/examples/legup.tcl
set_project PolarFire MPF300 MiV_SoC

Note that we used the SHLS_ROOT_DIR environment variable, it should point to where SmartHLS is installed. On the SmartHLS Terminal type the following:

$> export SHLS_ROOT_DIR=/path/to/Microchip/SmartHLS_2025.1/SmartHLS

Now run the SmartHLS SoC flow to:

1. Compile the hw_add function into a Verilog module.
2. Integrate the module into the MiV_RV32 Reference Design. See MiV_RV32 Reference Design.
3. Run RTL synthesis.
4. Run place and route.
5. Check timing.
6. Program the FPGA.
7. Cross-compile software program.
8. Initialize the processor memory with RISC-V binary.
9. Run the firmware with the standard output capture via UART.