also for the google SDK thing, is using caravel required or not? I probably won't need it.

For Google sponsored free MPW shuttle runs, you must incorporate your design into either the

caravel

or

caravan

framework.

I can't find the ccaravan framework anywhere

It's in the

caravel

repo. Clone https://github.com/efabless/caravel_user_project_analog and then

make install

(don't forget to set

PDK_ROOT

)