"Generate" Statement

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The VHDL statement generate is a concurrent statement. It is used to
generate multiple instances of a program segment.

The generate statement has two different forms which are unconditional
generate and conditional generate.

Let's see these forms separately.

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Unconditional Generate

The unconditional generate as its name implies has no conditional part. Its syntax is as
follows:

Label: for parameter in number-range generate

[declarative part
begin]
Statements
end generate [Label];

The use of Label is a must in generate statement, and the word begin is used if declarative
part is available in the generate statement.

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Example-2.6: The generate statement in

Label1: for indx in 0 to 3 generate

y(indx)<=x(indx) xor x(indx+1);
end generate;

is the same as the program segment

y(0)<=x(0) xor x(1);

y(1)<=x(1) xor x(2);
y(2)<=x(2) xor x(3);
y(3)<=x(3) xor x(4);

That is, the same digital logic circuit synthesized for both program segments.

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Example-2.7: Write a VHDL statement that reverses the elements of an 8-bit logic vector.

Solution-2.7: Let x and y be an 8-bit vectors. We can reverse the content of vector x using
the following VHDL statement:

reverse: for indx in 0 to 7 generate

y(indx)<=x(7-indx);
end generate;

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Example-2.8: Write the previous example as a complete VHDL program.

Solution-2.8: The complete VHDL program is given in PR 2.6.

entity reverse_vector is
port( x_vec: in bit_vector(7 downto 0);
y_rvec: out bit_vector(7 downto 0));
end entity;

architecture logic_flow of reverse_vector is

begin

reverse: for indx in 0 to 7 generate

y_rvec(indx)<=x_vec(7-indx);
end generate;

end architecture;
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PR 2.6 Program 2.6.
Parity Generator

The parity of the binary vector

𝑥 = 𝑥0 𝑥1 𝑥2 ⋯ 𝑥𝑁−1

is calculated as

𝑝 = 𝑥0 ⊕ 𝑥1 ⊕ ⋯ ⊕ 𝑥𝑁−1

where ⊕ is the xor operation.

Note that, xor is an odd function, i.e., if the number of ‘1’s in binary vector 𝑥 is an odd
integer, then 𝑝 = 1, otherwise 𝑝 = 0.
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Example-2.9: Write a VHDL statement that calculates the parity for 16-bit logic vector.

Solution-2.9: Let x_vec be a 16-bit vector, and parr_vec be another 16-bit vector.

We can calculate the parity bit for x_vec using the following VHDL statement:

parr_vec(0)<=x(0);

parity: for indx in 1 to 15 generate

parr_vec(indx)<= parr_vec(indx-1) xor x_vec(indx);
end generate;

p<= parr_vec(15);

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Example-2.10: Write the previous example as a complete VHDL program.
Solution-2.10: The complete VHDL program is given in PR 2.7.
entity parity_bit_generator is
port( x_vec: in bit_vector(15 downto 0);
p_bit: out bit);
end entity;

architecture logic_flow of parity_bit_generator is

signal parr_vec: bit_vector(15 downto 0);

begin
parr_vec(0)<= x_vec(0);

parity: for indx in 1 to 15 generate

parr_vec(indx)<= parr_vec(indx-1) xor x_vec(indx);
end generate;
p_bit<= parr_vec(15);
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end architecture;
Conditional Generate

The syntax of the conditional generate is as

Label: if condition generate

[declarative_part
begin]
VHDL Statements
end generate [Label];

where 'condition' must be a static expression.

Note: Note that in VHDL syntax ⋯ shows the optional part.

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Example-2.11: Write a VHDL statement that checks a constant positive integer and detects
whether it is an even or odd integer.

Solution-2.11: The VHDL program segment can be written as follows:

EvenDetector: if ((number mod 2)=0) generate

EvenFlag<=1;
end generate;

OddDetector: if ((number mod 2)=1) generate

EvenFlag<=0;
end generate;

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Example-2.12: Write the previous example as a complete VHDL program.
Solution-2.12: The complete program is depicted in PR 2.8.

entity even_odd_detector is
port( EvenFlag: out bit);
end entity;

architecture logic_flow of even_odd_detector is

constant number: positive:=10001; -- 31-bit positive integer
begin
EvenDetector: if ((number mod 2)=0) generate
EvenFlag<=1;
end generate;
OddDetector: if ((number mod 2)=1) generate
EvenFlag<=0;
end generate;
end architecture; 12