Xilinx inference development platform Vitis AI available for download

Combined with the Vitis unified software platform, Vitis AI offers deep learning acceleration, enabling developers to incorporate it as part of their software code.

Vitis AI integrates a domain-specific architecture (DSA) and configures Xilinx hardware to be programmed using frameworks including TensorFlow and Caffe.

It provides the tools to compress and compile trained AI models running on a Xilinx device in one minute, the firm claims.

Xilinx has open sourced Vitis accelerated libraries and AI models, as well as corresponding example designs that can be used from endpoint to edge in addition to cloud platforms.

At the Xilinx developer forum Americas in early October, Xilinx first unveiled Vitis, a software platform that allows developers, including software engineers and AI scientists, to take advantage of hardware adaptability.

Five years in the making, Vitis automatically tailors the Xilinx hardware architecture to the software or algorithmic code without the need for hardware expertise. Rather than imposing a proprietary development environment, the Vitis platform plugs into common software developer tools and utilizes a set of open source libraries.

Vitis is separate to the Vivado design suite, which will still be supported for those who want to program using hardware code, but the Vitis platform can also be used by hardware developers to package hardware modules as software-callable functions.

The Xilinx developer site provides examples, tutorials and documentation, as well as a portal to connect the Vitis and Vitis AI developer community.