Introduction

This repository consists of the implementation of various hash functions in the NEORV32 soft processor as Custom Fuction Unit (CFU), ALU, instructions and as Custom Function Subsystem (CFS) co-processors. This exercise was made for an MSc, and the purpose was to compare the performance of software vs hardware acceleration.

Installation Requirements

Before compiling, please install the following packages, depending on your setup.

Debian-based

sudo apt-get install build-essential make git gcc

RHEL-based

sudo dnf group install c-development
sudo dnf group install "development-tools"

Setup

Before proceeding with the compilation of the project, there are two things that must be configured. The first is the toolchain for the RISC-V architecture. The second is the NEORV32 project itself.

Tool Chain

The project was compiled and tested using riscv-none-elf-gcc-15.2.0-1; please consider using this version.

IMPORTANT: If you do not have any RISC-V-compatible compiler on your system, you must install one; otherwise, this project will not compile.

To download the RISC-V toolchain used for this project, please visit: https://github.com/xpack-dev-tools/riscv-none-elf-gcc-xpack/releases/

This is a precompiled version of the required toolchain. To download and set up the compiler, you can use the following steps.

wget https://github.com/xpack-dev-tools/riscv-none-elf-gcc-xpack/releases/download/v15.2.0-1/xpack-riscv-none-elf-gcc-15.2.0-1-linux-x64.tar.gz

tar -xf xpack-riscv-none-elf-gcc-15.2.0-1-linux-x64.tar.gz

export PATH="PATH_TO_DOWNLOAD_FOLDER/xpack-riscv-none-elf-gcc-15.2.0-1-linux-x64/bin:PATH"

Neorv32

Another requirement for the project to compile is to have the NEORV32 project installed. You can install the project with the following steps. The project uses NEORV32 v1.12.5; therefore, I suggest using the same version. I have provided the instructions to switch to the corresponding version using the git checkout v1.12.5 command.

git clone https://github.com/stnolting/neorv32.git
cd neorv32
git checkout v1.12.5

Finally, make sure to export the following environment variable.

NEORV32_HOME="PATH_TO_DOWNLOAD_FOLDER/neorv32/

Compile

To download and compile the project, follow the instructions below.

git clone https://github.com/constarg/neorv32-performance-comparison.git
cd neorv32-performance-comparison
make all 

If you want to modify the contents of the project or program using the NEORV32 environment, I suggest executing the following command using the tool bear.

bear -- make all 

This command will produce a compile_commands.json file, which can be used to efficiently traverse the project through most IDEs, like Code, CLion, or Vim (if configured to do so).

IMPORTANT: Make sure the project is cleaned before executing the bear command; otherwise, the produced compile_commands.json file will be incorrect!.