Migrating Command-line Projects to the Vitis Unified IDE - Migrating Command-line Projects to the Vitis Unified IDE - 2026.1 English - UG1702

Vitis Reference Guide (UG1702)
Document ID
UG1702
Release Date
2026-06-23
Version
2026.1 English

In the AI Engine application development flow, you can build and simulate the AI Engine graph application using the command line. To debug and analyze the design, use the AMD Vitis™ Unified IDE.

The Vitis Unified IDE provides a user-managed flow that uses pre-compiled results from the command-line for debug and analysis. This section provides a methodology to migrate your AI Engine graph application from the command line interface to the Vitis Unified IDE.

To migrate your command-line project to the Vitis Unified IDE:

  1. Launch the Vitis Unified IDE and select Set Workspace from the Welcome page.
  2. Select the directory where you built the command-line based AI Engine graph application.

    The IDE recognizes that there are no managed components in the directory and switches to the user-managed flow.

Analyzing Results

In the user-managed flow of the Vitis Unified IDE, you can analyze project results.

  1. In the Vitis Unified IDE, note the following two views:
    Vitis Component Explorer
    In this view, the directory opens and displays output directories from after the result of compiling and/or simulating the AI Engine graph.

    The AI Engine compile output from the command-line flow is in the Work/ directory. A LST file and a mapping file are available in the Work/ directory after the AI Engine compiles each active AI Engine core.

    Flow Navigator
    In this view, you can access options for building, running, and debugging the design.
  2. From the toolbar at the left of the screen, click the Graph button to open the Analysis View to examine the results.

    In the Analysis view, you can analyze all summary files in the current workspace.

Debugging the AI Engine Code

You can debug the AI Engine code in the user-managed flow.

  1. First, create and add a launch configuration.
    1. In the Component Explorer or Flow Navigator view, right-click and select Edit launch configuration.
    2. Select New launch configuration.
    3. In the Create Launch Configuration dialog box, specify the build directory with the AI Engine compile summary files. Click Submit.
    4. Enter a name for the launch configuration. Enable trace and profile settings if necessary. For more information about trace and profile options, see Profiling and Debugging the Application in the Data Center Acceleration using Vitis (UG1700).


  2. In the Flow Navigator, select Debug. Set breakpoints in the source code. Using the breakpoints, step through the code and observe the contents of registers and memory in the Register Inspector and Memory Inspector views, respectively.

  3. You can recompile the AI Engine graph application in the user-managed flow with the steps below.
    1. In the Explorer view, right-click and select Edit Build Configurations.
    2. Select New Build Configuration.
    3. Optionally, edit the default configuration name, and add a build command.

      The build command you enter in the Build command field is the build command from your Makefile, for example, make aie TARGET=x86sim.