Well actually the title of the article should have been ‘Fedora for EDA’, but I chose to generalize because of a fact (mentioned at the end).

Linux, EDA – What are they?

Linux has, for a long time, being considered as a free, open-source, robust/stable, and versatile OS. From servers and workstations, it has moved towards the desktop environment as well with the help of rapid development in graphical tools – something that novices like a lot.

                EDA (Electronics Design Automation) is the process of using computers to perform designs relating to electronics. It includes the following

• Circuit Simulation
• VLSI Layout
• Digital Design
• Analog/Mixed Signal Design
• PCB Designing
• and much more…

What is a Spin?

Fedora’s official site describes it as follows.

 “Fedora Spins are alternate version of Fedora, tailored for various types of users via hand-picked application sets and other customizations.”

Fedora Electronic Lab (FEL)

It provides an advanced and open-source hardware design and simulation platform.

Its features include

• A collection of Perl modules to extend Verilog and VHDL support.
• Tools for Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) Design Flow process.
• Extra standard cell libraries supporting a feature size of 0.13µm. (more than 300 MB)
• Extracted spice decks which can be simulated with gnucap/ngspice or any spice simulators.
• Interoperability between various packages in order to achieve different design flows.
• Tools for embedded design and to provide support for ARM as a secondary architecture in Fedora.
• Tool set for Openmoko development and other open source hardware communities.
• A peer review web-based solution coupled with an Eclipse IDE for Embedded/Digital Hardware IP design.
• PLA tools, C-based design methodologies, simulators for 8051 and 8085 microcontrollers and many more.

Tools Categories include

•  RTL and logic synthesis design flows
• Circuit and PCB Layout
• Embedded Systems Development
• CAD Tools
• Project Management and budget tracking

Packages

Complete list of packages is available at http://chitlesh.fedorapeople.org/FEL/list.html. By the way, all the packages can be installed separately on any Linux OS. The availability of all softwares within a single distro makes it easier to install and manage.

What are you waiting for? Grab the free package...  :-)