[CamperBob]

I wish. FPGA tools, without exception, suck. No C programmer would put up with compilers and linkers that work the way FPGA synthesis tools do. Open-source efforts could only improve things.

FPGA vendors don't document the details needed to configure their chips at the nuts-and-bolts level, so any FOSS toolchain would have to rely on a sustained reverse engineering effort.

[live_to_code]

What's preventing the reverse engineering effort? Legality issues? Difficulty? Time? (I've heard stories about samba, and it seems like if MS protocols can be reverse engineered, then things that have to obey the laws of physics couldn't be that much worse).

[CamperBob]

I'm not sure. Probably the relatively obscure nature of the task and the manufacturers' relatively short design-life cycles discourage any sort of heroics.