It&#x27;s not the bitstream format that is stopping you. It&#x27;s the  comprehensive tooling in this field that is not open which holds you back. Bitstream formats are nothing. It&#x27;s like not having access to GCC but complaining to Intel about their microcode. There is so much more to the process of creating something useful with an fpga. Worrying about open bitstream formats is like worrying about Intel not disclosing how their microcode affected a single chip. It&#x27;s not useful for much beyond a single chip, in the same way that many cpus in a family have different microarchitectures.<p>The most useful tools in fpga dev have little to do with the part of translating the Verilog&#x2F;Vhdl into something the fpga understands.<p>Just going to add this:<p>I had to install VMware (on OS X) and load an Ubuntu ISO just to play with Xilinx&#x27;s tooling. I dev on win, Ubuntu, and OS X. Primarily Ubuntu. But just a heads up to anyone reading this that can positively affect this: if even I am on a Mac, it&#x27;s time to expand your offering.