Added new blog.

docs/blog/2022_09_19_vunit_user_conference.rst

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+:tags: VUnit
+:author: lasplund
+:excerpt: 1
+
+VUnit User Conference
+=====================
+
+.. figure:: img/vunit_overview.drawio.png
+   :align: center
+
+Last week I visited FPGA World in Stockholm after a few years of absence. This is a place where the founding team
+of VUnit has presented VUnit and performed tutorials in the past. This year was different though.
+This year the VUnit users took the command and I had the pleasure of simply sitting down and watch their work.
+I felt that this was a step in the right direction. Over the last few years the amount of content (blogs, videos,
+tutorial, papers, etc) created by others exceeds what I'm able to produce and it is time for this to be reflected
+at conferences as well. It will provide a more diverse set of perspectives and it will take the audience to places
+which I have never explored.
+
+Mikael Wetterholm: Automated HDL Verification with VUnit
+--------------------------------------------------------
+
+The first VUnit presenter this year was `Mikael Wetterholm <https://github.com/mikaelwet>`_, student at
+`AGSTU <https://yh.agstu.se>`_, who gave an introduction to VUnit. I was very pleased to see how far he had come just
+by studying our online material. Not only did he cover the basics but he had also fully understood more advanced topics
+such as verification component design based on our `message passing mechanism <https://vunit.github.io/com/user_guide.html>`_.
+I particularly liked how he had found novel use cases for the mechanism and the clarity with which he could explain concepts:
+
+.. figure:: img/message_passing.png
+   :align: center
+
+Oskar Solsjö: VUnit + Bazel
+---------------------------
+
+The second presenter was `Oskar Solsjö <https://github.com/solsjo>`_, consultant from `Sylog <https://sylogsystems.se>`_ currently
+working at `Qualcomm <https://www.arriver.com>`_ with their camera-based automotive autonomy technology. Oskar showed how the build
+system `Bazel <https://bazel.build>`_ can cut build times for large and complex systems from days to minutes and the work he done
+to integrate VUnit with Bazel. He showed how Bazel's remote caches and remote execution can make the scale of a project work to your
+advantage rather than being a hindrance. Never build or simulate something already done by others and have your long simulations distributed
+over many machines to improve performance.
+
+.. figure:: img/remote_caching_and_execution.png
+   :align: center
+
+Unai Martinez-Corral: Bridging HW and SW verification with VUnit Co-Simulation
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+The final presenter on the VUnit track was `Unai Martinez-Corral <https://github.com/umarcor>`_ from `Antmicro <https://antmicro.com>`_ and the
+`University of the Basque Country <https://www.ehu.eus/en/en-home>`_ in Spain. Unai came to VUnit through his research on HW and SW co-simulation
+a couple of years ago and since then he has been a very valuable contributor to the community. Co-simulation is a broad topic but let me just
+provide one example of what can be done. VUnit always had a commonly used way to integrate with SW. The
+`pre_config and post_check functions <https://vunit.github.io/py/ui.html#pre-and-post-hooks>`_ allow us to run Python both before and after
+a test. These functions can for example generate input stimuli to the test and verify its outputs. They can do the work themselves or call
+functions in Matlab, Go, Rust, C, or some other language. What co-simulation brings is also a way to call these functions from within the
+VHDL simulation. Why spend time implementing a (complex) function in VHDL if it is already available in any of the other languages?
+
+.. figure:: img/vunit_co_simulation.png
+   :align: center
+
+VUnit on the Floor
+------------------
+
+One of the greatest benefits with conferences like this is of course to meet with the VUnit users between the presentations.
+There are always some new faces and old acquaintances but there is also a trend which is becoming more and more prominent. The new faces
+are, unlike Mikael Wetterholm, developers who didn't pick up VUnit online but were introduced by more senior users that over the years
+have moved on to new companies where they introduced the framework. I saw this when visiting FPGA Forum in Norway the week before and FPGA World
+made it even more evident. Considering that VUnit was founded in Sweden it is not strange to see that there are hotspots here in the Nordic countries
+but it also raises the question if there are other hotspots. Analyzing the traffic into our homepage can give some insights into this. It's a bit
+hard to see on the map below but the hottest spot is actually Munich and Germany in general.
+
+.. figure:: img/traffic_data.png
+   :align: center
+
+Open Source EDA
+---------------
+
+Historically there has been a tendency among EDA vendors to describe open source tools as generally inadequate and of low quality. Something
+that can be used in academia but not for serious professional projects. In March last year I wrote an
+`article <https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/open-source-tools-mission-critical-hardware-lars-asplund>`_ providing undeniable proof that this
+is no longer the case and just maybe we're starting to see some changes (I'm not taking credit for this). Sure, at every conference there
+will be sales representatives presenting UVM and the high-end simulators needed to run UVM as the only serious alternative to verification. That's
+their job. However, at the same time there are other vendor representatives presenting a more nuanced view of reality.
+
+For example, this year Siemens EDA had a presentation pointing out problems with UVM causing users to look into other solutions. The presentation
+then focused on open source cocotb as a potential solution. Hang on, isn't UVM also open source? Yes, it is but the vendor simulators needed to
+run UVM comes with a price tag out of reach for many companies while cocotb supports a wider range of simulators, including free alternatives.
+Not only is Siemens EDA making a presentation on cocotb. They also support an open source project called `pyuvm <https://github.com/pyuvm/pyuvm>`_
+which provides a Python implementation of UVM running through cocotb. It's still UVM though which has, as the presentation noted, a
+"high learning time/benefit ratio". However, Siemens is a big company and other parts are going in a different direction.
+For example, Siemens in Erlangen is looking for people to work with
+`"Simulation und Verifikation mit OSVVM mit Mentor QuestaSim und VUnit" <https://www.ferchau.com/de/en/applicants/jobs/328054/fpga-sw-entwickler-fur-unseren-kunden-siemens>`_.
+
+What we see now, I hope, is that the EDA vendors are starting to recognize the open source ecosystem and that there is no one solution that fits all.
+Instead there are multiple solutions that we need to acknowledge and strive to make compatible with each other if we want to serve our users.
+`Unai <https://github.com/umarcor>`_, the final presenter in the VUnit track, is very active in many of these open source solutions.
+Just click on his name to see his truly impressive track record on GitHub. Part of his work has been focusing on how we can make everything work
+together rather than having a set of isolated islands. That work led to the `Open Source Verification Bundle <https://github.com/umarcor/osvb>`_
+presented in the figure below.
+
+.. figure:: img/osvb.png
+   :align: center
+
+I think this figure clearly shows that we're well beyond the idea of a single provider and that the key for providers
+going forward is to make sure they fit into the ecosystem. If they do, they can be part of a setup like the one in the figure or in a setup with
+another selection of tools. If they don't, I think they will be left behind.