What does it mean to harden a chip design?

Hardening is the industry term for taking an HDL description and using a tool like LibreLane to convert it into the GDS2 files necessary for manufacture by a foundry.

What is the input and output of the hardening process?

The input to hardening is an HDL description of the design, and the output is GDS2 files that contain the physical layout ready to send to the foundry.

What tool is commonly used to harden a design?

LibreLane is the open source tool commonly used to harden a design, automating the steps from RTL through to finished GDS2 files.

Harden

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November 12, 2020

Harden is the fancy industry word that means to take your HDL and using a tool like LibreLane turn it into the GDS2 files necessary for manufacture by a foundry.

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