Quartus® Prime Pro Edition User Guide: Design Optimization

ID 683641
Date 4/01/2024
Public

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5.5.7. Aggregating and Comparing Compilation Results with Exploration Dashboard

You can use the Exploration Dashboard (quartus_edw) in the Quartus® Prime Pro Edition software to aggregate and compare compilation results between multiple Quartus® Prime projects or sets of compilation results.

The Exploration Dashboard allows you to easily coordinate and view the compilation and timing results from multiple projects running on separate instances of the Quartus® Prime software. For example, you can analyze and compare versions of the same design that differ by RTL changes, or perhaps only differ by project settings. The Exploration Dashboard provides the power and flexibility to support multi-project analysis for a diverse range of work flows and analysis tasks.1

The Exploration Dashboard interfaces with multiple Quartus® Prime projects simultaneously in a single workspace to help you close timing by aggregating and comparing results from multiple seeds or multiple versions of your design.

  • Aggregating compilation results—Exploration Dashboard reports what is common in all the compilation results for a version of your design.
  • Comparing compilation results—Exploration Dashboard reports the differences between different versions of your design.
Figure 61. Exploration Dashboard Use Model

Use the Exploration Dashboard to quickly compare the aggregated compilation results from multiple projects or sets of results to determine the best implementation and impact of changes. The Exploration Dashboard supports use cases like the following:

  • Identify all of the failing timing paths, in all seeds, after completing a seed sweep.
  • Determine whether the average fMAX improves after RTL optimization.
  • Track a scorecard of design performance as the project proceeds towards completion.
  • Compare compilation results across Quartus Prime software versions.

For example, you can use Exploration Dashboard to report timing on all of your various compilation seeds, and view the path from all seeds in a single report view. Exploration dashboard allows you to compare historical results against new data. This allows you to track improvement over time on critical design metrics, such as Fmax and power.

The Exploration Dashboard is currently a Tcl-based API that employs an object-property model to aggregate and compare objects across multiple compilation databases that store results from your different compilations.

Note: For a step-by-step tutorial using the Exploration Dashboard GUI and an example design, refer to AN 1006: Multi-Project Analysis with Exploration Dashboard.
1 Exploration Dashboard is pre-production status in Quartus® Prime Pro Edition v.24.1, and supports analysis of compilation results generated with Quartus® Prime Pro Edition software version 21.1 through version 24.1. Other versions may function but are not verified.