> I was wondering if anyone had an pointers to some sort of
> "FPGA programming for dummies" tutorials?

Well, I'm assuming that you're just starting out from the basics.. So, I would 
recommend that you do this:

Learn up a language that suits you.. there are many out there but the common 
ones are verilog/vhdl.. Most importantly, you'll need to understand how each 
segment of your 'code' is synthesized into hardware.. It will save you hours 
of debugging if you started coding from a hardware perspective rather than a 
software perspective (synthesizable vs non-synthesizable)..

As they're not cheap, I would say that getting a board should come a little 
later.. Different FPGA are suitable for different things and different boards 
are made for different applications.. So, once you've better understood 
things, you'll be able to make a better investment..

What you'll need now is a development environment.. All the major FPGA vendors 
give them away for free.. Just download it from their website.. Then hack 
away.. Code, Synthesize, Simulate, Repeat... (Just remember to simulate 
post-synthesis and not only pre-synthesis).. 

There are also open source software.. A good verilog simulator is Icarus 
Verilog and also Cver.. They generate standard VCD dump files that you can 
view with any waveform viewer.. Icarus can also do synthesis as well..

For lots of code examples, simple and difficult, you may want to visit 
www.opencores.org.. That's probably the largest open source hardware 
repository around..

cheers..

-- 
with metta,
Shawn Tan.
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