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---
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title: "Linux.conf.au 2020: OpenISA miniconf explored OpenPOWER and RISC-V Possibilities"
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date: "2020-02-03"
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categories:
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- "blogs"
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tags:
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- "openpower"
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- "openpower-foundation"
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- "hugh-blemings"
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- "linux-conf-au"
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- "risc-v"
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- "allstair-francis"
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- "openisa-miniconf"
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---
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By: [Hugh Blemings](https://www.linkedin.com/in/hugh-blemings/detail/recent-activity/), Executive Director, OpenPOWER Foundation
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\[caption id="attachment\_7341" align="alignnone" width="700"\] Hugh Blemings and Allstair Francis at the OpenISA miniconf, held at linux.conf.au in January, 2020.\[/caption\]
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In mid-January, I made what has become an annual pilgrimage to [linux.conf.au](https://linux.conf.au/) - the Linux/Open Source conference of choice for antipodeans, not to mention a sizeable contingent of presenters and attendees from places further afield.
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Over the years I’ve had the good fortune to be involved in many capacities at LCA, and 2020 was no different. I not only presented a session but also co-organised a day-long “miniconf” on a subject close to my heart.
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[Alistair Francis](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alistair23/) (part of the great RISC-V crew at [Western Digital](https://www.westerndigital.com)) and I ran what we believe was one of the first OpenISA miniconferences that had sessions covering both RISC-V and OpenPOWER, along with sessions on general ISA related topics. I’ll come back to these in a moment but first wanted to give a bit of a tour of the OpenPOWER-related ones.
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First up was the session "[POWER OpenISA and Microwatt introduction](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFGK8rdWWvs)" by Michael Neuling. Unfortunately, Mikey got called away on business at the last minute, so [Anton Blanchard](https://www.linkedin.com/in/antonblanchard/), a fellow IBMer, stepped in. The session gives a great overview of both the now-opened ISA as well as Microwatt, a FPGA softcore implementation.
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Anton’s originally scheduled talk "[Build your own Open Hardware CPU in 25 minutes or less](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3slH03MCmo)" was up next. It gave a bit more context around the Microwatt simulation and how easy it is to add instructions to the implementation.
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Last but by no means least of the OpenPOWER-specific sessions in the miniconf was [Paul Mackerras](https://github.com/paulusmack)’ deep dive ["Microwatt Microarchitecture"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkDx_y0onSk) in which he gave a detailed tour through the implementation of Microwatt and some of the architectural decisions and optimizations that have already been made.
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As I mentioned earlier, aside from the OpenPOWER specific talks, Alistair and I co-presented an [intro session](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NM_ZNlFMKQ&feature=youtu.be) that gave a snapshot of both ecosystems and how they fit together in early 2020. Beyond this, there were several talks that covered both RISC-V and other general Open ISA topics. All are worth a look but my own favourites are probably either [Keith Packard’](https://www.linkedin.com/in/keithrpackard/)s session on [“picolibc: a C library for smaller systems”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC6aBezNFFQ) or [Sean "xobs" Cross](https://twitter.com/xobs?lang=en) on ["Paying it Forward: Documenting your Open Hardware Module."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LumvbPLtgxw) I’ve listed all the miniconf sessions for reference at the end of this post.
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Later in the main conference program, I presented a session ["Open AND high-performance Computing"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=poUGzQXHTak&t=1s) which pointed out that as an industry we need to have computing hardware that is both open and provides high performance - and that is just what OpenPOWER provides. I then gave an update on the OpenISA before a very enjoyable and thought-provoking Q&A from the audience.
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Linux.conf.au is always a great week and I recommend the many other sessions and keynotes. They’re all available through the linux.conf.au [YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCciKHCG06rnq31toLTfAiyw).
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_PS - Make sure to follow along for more updates from industry events. For example, Anton Blanchard had a great session at the Chisel Community Conference last week - keep an eye out for an upcoming blog post on it!_
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<table><tbody><tr><td><b>Session Name</b></td><td><b>Speaker(s)</b></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NM_ZNlFMKQ&feature=youtu.be"><span style="font-weight: 400;">OpenISA Miniconf Intro</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Alistair Francis & Hugh Blemings</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwkab2Z44pk&t=6s"><span style="font-weight: 400;">RISC-V software ecosystem in 2020</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Atish Patra</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GydyykyNjxs"><span style="font-weight: 400;">RISC-V FDPIC/NOMMU toolchain/runtime support</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Maciej W. Rozycki</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNM1VqEqvyE"><span style="font-weight: 400;">RISC-V 32-bit glibc port</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Alistair Francis</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GoikHB5Qcw"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Co-developing RISC-V Hypervisor Support</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Anup Patel</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU6RPYAqFzE"><span style="font-weight: 400;">POWER OpenISA and Microwatt introduction</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Mikey Neuling (Anton Blanchard presenting)</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3slH03MCmo"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Build your own Open Hardware CPU in 25 minutes or less</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Anton Blanchard</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkDx_y0onSk"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Microwatt Microarchitecture</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Paul Mackerras</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LumvbPLtgxw"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Paying it Forward: Documenting your Open Hardware Module</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Sean “xobs” Cross</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC6aBezNFFQ"><span style="font-weight: 400;">picolibc: a C library for smaller systems</span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Keith Packard</span></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDP315b6_Bs"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Universal Tools for Acceleration, Timing, Integration & Machine Enhancement </span></a></td><td><span style="font-weight: 400;">Hasjim Williams</span></td></tr></tbody></table>
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