[Oberon] Moving oberon to RISCV?

[Skulski, Wojciech]

Paul:

> I think the first thing would be to select an inexpensive hardware reference platform with some longevity.

Not sure if it is exists. You only learn about the longevity when the board is gone. Consider the Digilent website. It looks like a graveyard of great old boards. 

You can also seek the longevity on Ebay, but the supply is limited. One Spartan-3 Evaluation Kit is available today on Ebay for $150. Grab it before it is gone! This is the whole world wide supply at this point.

> Since this board is now sadly no longer made, the decision seems a bit unwise, but hindsight is of course 20-20.

This decision was not unwise. Any such board will follow the same route. It is the nature of these boards. The FPGAs do not enjoy the broad market like ARM processors, and therefore the turn around time of the eval boards is unlikely to last longer than a couple years. The companies like Digilent will switch to the new FPGA generations and abandon the older ones.

Which is why I designed my own RiskFive. At least I know that I have the longevity in my own hands till they stop making Artix chips, which will probably happen 10 years from now.  This projected longevity is reflected in the cost of the board, because RiskFive will stay low volume. Unless, of course, you guys decide to develop some cool apps using it, in which case it will become both more popular and low price.

Thank you,
Wojtek