[Pkg-electronics-devel] Bug#1101325: nextpnr: New upstream release 0.8

[Tarik Graba]

Hello,

On 25/03/2025 18:56, Daniel Gröber wrote:
> Package: src:nextpnr
> X-Debbugs-CC: Tarik Graba <tarik.graba at telecom-paris.fr>
> 
> Hi Tarik,
> 
> On Tue, Mar 25, 2025 at 03:49:40PM +0100, Tarik Graba wrote:
>> I do not know if you have noticed that there is a new release upstream of
>> nextpnr?
>>
>> https://github.com/YosysHQ/nextpnr/releases/tag/nextpnr-0.8
> 
> I started packaging earlier today. Current blocker is that I'm undecided on
> is https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1101323.
> 
> Upstream import and WIP packaging is already in salsa if you want to help:
> 
>   $ gbp clone https://salsa.debian.org/electronics-team/nextpnr

Nice! I will take a look.

> 
>>> The important change is that they removed nextpnr-gowin which is
>> supposed to be replaced by nextpnr-himbaechel supporting Gowin FPGAs.  I
>> did not test this as I do not have Gowin FPGAs.
> 
> Right I've been mulling whether I should Conflict+Replaces nextpnr-gowin
> with nextpnr-himbaechel-gowin (symlinks) or not. Digging into what the
> cmdline differences are would be useful!

Is it really useful to keep nextpnr-gowin or even have something called 
nextpnr-himbaechel-gowin?

I see that upstream are completely removing references to nextpnr-gowin. 
For example, for apicula examples:

https://github.com/YosysHQ/apicula/commit/3225c57c53f380817250a01be17ec42283df5ca6

They are just calling nextpnr-himbaechel the Makefile:

https://github.com/YosysHQ/apicula/blob/master/examples/Makefile

Regarding he cmdline, it looks also that some options are not passed 
directly anymore but using the vopt option.
For example:

$(NEXTPNR) --json $< --write $@ --device GW1NR-LV9QN88PC6/I5 --family 
GW1N-9C --cst tangnano9k.cst

becomes:

$(NEXTPNR) --json $< --write $@ --device GW1NR-LV9QN88PC6/I5 --vopt 
family=GW1N-9C --vopt cst=tangnano9k.cst


> 
>> I do not know what is the impact of this on Debian packaging and if I
>> should open a bug report (at least for tracking the process).
> 
> Someone has to do it and it's always good to send a friendly "please
> package new upstream version" bug if there isn't one already.
> 
> Actually helps grease the wheels process wise in most cases so you should
> always do that :-).
> 
> If my BTS-foo doesn't fail me this mail should open a bugreport. Let's see.
> 
>> Thanks for your work maintaining the free FPGA toolchain on Debian.
> 
>    <3

:+1:

> 
> --Daniel