however software design is much much faster then hardware. the main reason are :
a. software code is more common (open sources, libraries ). that means it is very easy to take software packages or libraries and integrate them.
b. software languages are more advanced - c, c++ jawa to hw languages.
c. software tools are more advanced and debugged, because more users are programmers.
d. software tools are chipper, and somtimes free (gnu tools), while hw tools are very expensive.
e. compilation time in sw is much much faster then in hw tools - in virtex it can take you hours to p@r.
f. more programmers then hw developper.