While it's nice finally having access to FPGA's on the cloud, it's still a shame that there isn't much going on with Open source development on FPGA's, on either the toolset or libraries/modules. Though this is largely due to manufacturer hostility. Maybe wider access and adoption might finally do something about this situation.
If you're looking to learn an HDL on an FPGA, it's probably still cheaper and easier to just buy your own, maybe something like <a href="http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-board-artix-7-fpga-development-board-for-makers-and-hobbyists/" rel="nofollow">http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-board-artix-7-fpga-develop...</a> ($99). And for that matter, you can also get started by just using a sim and no FPGA for free
FPGA newbie here; How does this relate to toolsets that Cadence, Synopsys and Mentor Graphics and others make for chip design? Would you use tools from these companies to design VHDL / Verilog for the 'FPGAs as a service' or is this at all related?
"Each FPGA contains approximately 2.5 million logic elements and approximately 6,800 Digital Signal Processing (DSP) engines."<p>Can an FPGA guru provide a real-world example of the kind of processing power this provides?