How To Install ghdl on Ubuntu 22.04

In this tutorial we learn how to install ghdl on Ubuntu 22.04. ghdl is VHDL compiler/simulator

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install ghdl on Ubuntu 22.04.

What is ghdl

ghdl is:

GHDL is a compiler and simulator for VHDL, a Hardware Description Language. GHDL is not an interpreter: it allows you to analyse and elaborate sources to generate machine code from your design. Native program execution is the only way for high speed simulation.

GHDL offers three machine code generation backends: one based on GCC, one using the LLVM compiler suite and a GHDL specific one called mcode. These are available in the ghdl-gcc, ghdl-llvm and ghdl-mcode packages respectively. Both the GCC and LLVM backends create highly optimized code for excellent simulation performance while simulations compiled with the GCC backend also allow coverage testing using gcov. The mcode backend creates less performant code but makes up for it with much faster compilation. It is therefore preferable for smaller projects without large or long running simulations.

Multiple backends can be installed at the same time and selected by either invoking the desired GHDL directly (as ghdl-gcc, ghdl-llvm or ghdl-mcode) or by providing a GHDL_BACKEND environment variable (containing gcc, llvm or mcode) while invoking ghdl.

This package is a dependency package that will make sure at least one backend is installed.

There are three methods to install ghdl on Ubuntu 22.04. We can use apt-get, apt and aptitude. In the following sections we will describe each method. You can choose one of them.

Install ghdl Using apt-get

Update apt database with apt-get using the following command.

sudo apt-get update

After updating apt database, We can install ghdl using apt-get by running the following command:

sudo apt-get -y install ghdl

Install ghdl Using apt

Update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

After updating apt database, We can install ghdl using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install ghdl

Install ghdl Using aptitude

If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Ubuntu. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.

sudo aptitude update

After updating apt database, We can install ghdl using aptitude by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install ghdl

How To Uninstall ghdl on Ubuntu 22.04

To uninstall only the ghdl package we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get remove ghdl

Uninstall ghdl And Its Dependencies

To uninstall ghdl and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Ubuntu 22.04, we can use the command below:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove ghdl

Remove ghdl Configurations and Data

To remove ghdl configuration and data from Ubuntu 22.04 we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y purge ghdl

Remove ghdl configuration, data, and all of its dependencies

We can use the following command to remove ghdl configurations, data and all of its dependencies, we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge ghdl

References

Summary

In this tutorial we learn how to install ghdl package on Ubuntu 22.04 using different package management tools: apt, apt-get and aptitude.