Edited FPGA guide and created Simualtion guide

doc/Flubber_FPGA_Startup_Guide.md

@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ OPAE Environment Setup
 OPAE Build Configuration
 ------------------------
 
-Within the /hw/syn/opae directory, there are source text files for each core-option for the fpga build (the 32 and 64 core options are not currently implemented) which have the following parameters that can be configured:
+Within the `/hw/syn/opae` directory, there are source text files for each core-option for the fpga build (the 32 and 64 core options are not currently implemented) which have the following parameters that can be configured:
 - NUM_CORES: the number of cores per cluster
 - NUM_CLUSTERS: the number of clusters alotted to the processor
 - L3_ENABLE: enable the use of the L3 cache
@@ -35,35 +35,33 @@ The Flubber FPGA has to following configuration options:
 - 16 cores fpga (fpga-16c)
 
     $ cd hw/syn/opae
-    $ make fpga-*# of cores*c
+    $ make fpga- *# of cores* c
 
 Example: `make fpga-4c`
 
-A new folder `build_fpga_*# of cores*c` will be created and the build will start and take ~30-45 min to complete.
+A new folder (ex: `build_fpga_4c`) will be created and the build will start and take ~30-45 min to complete.
 
 OPAE Build Progress
 -------------------
 
 You could check the last 10 lines in the build log for possible errors until build completion.
 
-    $ tail -n 10 ./build_fpga_*# of cores*c/build.log
-
-Example: `tail -n 10 ./build_fpga_4c/build.log`
+    $ tail -n 10 ./build_fpga_4c/build.log
 
 Check if the build is still running by looking for quartus_sh, quartus_syn, or quartus_fit programs.
 
-    $ ps -u `username`
+    $ ps -u *username*
 
 
 If the build fails and you need to restart it, clean up the build folder using the following command:
 
-    $ make clean-fpga-*# of cores*c
+    $ make clean-fpga- *# of cores* c
 
 Example: `make clean-fpga-4c`
 
 The file `vortex_afu.gbs` should exist when the build is done:
 
-    $ ls -lsa ./build_fpga_*# of cores*c/vortex_afu.gbs
+    $ ls -lsa ./build_fpga_ *# of cores* c/vortex_afu.gbs
 
 
 Signing the bitstream and Programming the FPGA

doc/Simulation.md

@@ -0,0 +1,36 @@
+# Vortex Simulation Methods 
+
+### RTL Simulation
+
+[Verilator] (https://www.veripool.org/projects/verilator/wiki) is a Verilog/SystemVerilog design simulator that converts the Verilog HDL to single- or mult-ithreaded C++/SystemC code to perform the design simulation. An installation guide for Verilator is located [here.] (https://www.veripool.org/projects/verilator/wiki/Installing)
+
+### Cycle-Approximate Simulation
+
+SimX is a C++ cycle-level in-house simulator developed for Vortex. The relevant files are located in the `simX` folder.
+
+### FGPA Simulation
+
+The current target FPGA for simulation is the Arria10 Intel Accelerator Card v1.0. The guide to build the fpga with specific configurations is located [here.] (https://github.com/vortexgpgpu/vortex-dev/blob/master/doc/Flubber_FPGA_Startup_Guide.md)
+
+### How to Test
+
+Running tests under specific drivers (rtlsim,simx,fpga) is done using the script named `blackbox.sh` located in the `ci` folder. Running command `./ci/blackbox.sh --help` from the Vortex root directory will display the following command line arguments for `blackbox.sh`:
+
+- *Clusters* - used to specify the number of clusters (collection of processing elements) within a configuration.
+- *Cores* - used to specify the number of cores (processing element containing multiple warps) within a configuration.
+- *Warps* - used to specify the number of warps (collection of concurrent hardware threads) within a configuration.
+- *Threads* - used to specify the number of threads (smallest unit of computation) within a configuration.
+- *L2cache* - used to enable the shard l2cache among the Vortex cores.
+- *L3cache* - used to enable the shared l3cache among the Vortex clusters.
+- *Driver* - used to specify which driver to run the Vortex simulation (either rtlsim, vlsim, fpga, or simx).
+- *Debug* - used to enable debug mode for the Vortex simulation.
+- *Perf* - is used to enable the detailed performance counters within the Vortex simulation.
+- *App* - is used to specify which test/benchmark to run in the Vortex simulation. The main choices are vecadd, sgemm, basic, demo, and dogfood. Other tests/benchmarks are located in the `/benchmarks/opencl` folder though not all of them work wit the current version of Vortex.
+- *Args* - 
+
+An example of using the `blackbox.sh` commandline arguments is shown below.
+
+Run the sgemm benchmark using the vlsim driver with a Vortex configuration of 1 cluster, 4 cores, 4 warps, and 4 threads:
+
+    $ ./ci/blackbox.sh --clusters=1 --cores=4 --warps=4 --threads=4 --driver=vlsim --app=sgemm
+