Logix IDE

"The Arduino experience, for FPGAs."

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Logix is a simple, friendly app for programming FPGA boards. If you've used the Arduino IDE, you already know how it works: write your design, click Verify to check it, and click Upload to put it on your board. No command line, no complicated setup.

What's an FPGA, and why Logix?

An FPGA is a chip you can rewire with code. Instead of running a program step by step like a microcontroller, it becomes the circuit you describe: counters, blinking LEDs, video signals, even a whole processor. You describe the circuit in Verilog, a hardware description language.

Getting started with FPGAs used to mean installing many tools and learning their commands. Logix takes care of all of that so you can focus on your design. It's built on Apio and the open source FPGA tools, and it downloads everything it needs by itself.

What you can do

• ✏️ Write Verilog in a clean editor with syntax colors. Mistakes are underlined as you type.
• ✅ Verify your design: Logix checks it for common mistakes, builds it, and tells you how much of the FPGA it uses and how fast it can run.
• ⚡ Upload it to your board with one click. Logix even tells you when your board is connected.
• 📚 Learn from examples: more than a hundred ready-to-run examples for over a hundred boards, from a blinking LED onwards.
• 🧪 Test and simulate your design with testbenches, and look at its signals in GTKWave, without a board.
• 🔍 See your design as a diagram of its modules and signals.

GTKWave screenshot from the Apio project.

Install Logix IDE

Logix runs on Macs with Apple Silicon (M1 or newer) for now. Windows and Linux are planned.

1. Download the latest logix-darwin-arm64-<date>.dmg from the releases page to your Downloads folder.

2. Open Terminal and run this command, using the name of the file you downloaded. Logix isn't signed by Apple yet, and this tells your Mac it's OK to open it:

   xattr -c ~/Downloads/logix-darwin-arm64-<date>.dmg
   

3. Double-click the .dmg file and drag Logix IDE into your Applications folder.

4. Open Logix IDE. The first time, it downloads the FPGA tools it needs. This takes a few minutes and needs an internet connection. After that, Logix starts quickly and works offline too.

That's it: nothing else to install.

Is it safe to install?

It's wise to be careful with apps from the internet, so here's how Logix earns your trust:

• Fully open source. All of Logix's code is public, right here in this repository. Anyone can read it, check it, and suggest improvements. It's free to use, change and share under the Apache License 2.0, except for using the name Logix.
• Built in the open. Every installer is built by GitHub's servers from this public code, using public build scripts (.github/workflows). No installer is ever built on someone's personal computer, and each release lists the exact code version it was built from.
• Scanned for viruses. Each installer is automatically scanned with ClamAV, an open source antivirus, before it's published.
• Made by the Apio maintainer. Logix is made by the main maintainer of Apio, the open source FPGA toolchain Logix runs on, with one goal: making FPGAs accessible and fun for everyone.

Why the Terminal step, then? Apple asks app makers to pay for a yearly developer account to "sign" their apps. Logix isn't signed that way yet, so macOS is cautious with it by default. The xattr -c command only tells your Mac that you chose to open this file you downloaded. It doesn't change any security setting on your Mac.

Your first blinking LED

1. Start Logix and wait for Ready. at the bottom of the window. Logix opens a first project for the Alhambra II board. Have a different board? Choose it in the list at the top, then pick its blinky example.
2. Click Verify (the ✓ button). Logix builds the design and shows how much of the FPGA it uses.
3. Plug in your board. When Logix sees it, the word next to the board list changes to Connected.
4. Click Upload (the → button). Your board's LED starts blinking! 🎉
5. Now make it your own: change the blinking speed, save with ⌘S, and upload again.

The Quick start guide walks through these steps with pictures.

Learn more

The Logix documentation covers everything, in short, beginner-friendly pages:

• Installing
• Quick start
• Using Logix
• Testbenches and simulation
• Troubleshooting

You can also open these pages from Logix's Help menu.

Need help or found a problem?

Check Troubleshooting first. If you're still stuck, choose Help > Report a Problem in Logix, or open an issue on GitHub. It helps a lot to attach Logix's log: Help > Show Log Folder, then drag logix.log into your report.

Thanks

Logix stands on the shoulders of great open source projects: Apio and the FPGAwars community, Yosys, nextpnr, Icarus Verilog, Verilator, Verible, GTKWave and more. Thank you!

For developers

Want to change Logix itself? See DEVELOPERS.md.

Trademarks

Logix is not affiliated with or endorsed by Arduino. Arduino is a trademark of Arduino SA. Logix only compares itself to the Arduino IDE to describe how it feels.

License

Logix is licensed under the Apache License 2.0: you can use, copy, change, share and sell it, as long as you keep the license and copyright notices and mark the files you changed.

The one exception is the name "Logix", which isn't part of that (the license doesn't give rights to names or trademarks). If you make your own version, please give it a different name, so people can tell it apart from the original.