Unified Data Model for Heterogeneous Integrated Circuit Design
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Solution Overview
Problem
The traditional approach to developing circuit designs for heterogeneous integrated circuits involves using multiple system-specific design applications, leading to a piecemeal development process that hinders the creation of a unified and comprehensive representation of the circuit design, resulting in suboptimal performance across different systems in terms of power consumption, area usage, and timing metrics.
Innovation Solution
A unified data model is introduced, which includes a unified netlist and device model that uses common constructs to represent circuit designs across disparate systems, enabling a unified software framework for design applications and facilitating cross-system optimization.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If multiple system-specific design applications are used for heterogeneous IC, then each system can be designed with specialized tools, but the development process becomes piecemeal and lacks unified representation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies universality by creating a unified data model that can represent multiple heterogeneous systems (programmable logic, processor arrays, FPGAs, ASICs) within a single framework. This unified model enables a single design application to handle diverse systems that previously required separate specialized tools, thereby reducing development process complexity while maintaining adaptability to different system types.
Solution Approach 2:
The unified data model serves as an intermediary layer between the heterogeneous IC systems and the design application. This mediator translates various system-specific representations into a common format, enabling unified processing and optimization across different system types without losing the specialized capabilities needed for each system.
2Manufacturing precision
If multiple disparate design applications are used, then each system's characteristic properties can be addressed, but cross-system optimization is hindered
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges multiple system-specific design applications into a single unified design application by combining their respective data models into one comprehensive unified data model. This merging enables cross-system optimization by allowing the design tool to simultaneously consider and optimize across programmable logic, processor arrays, and other heterogeneous systems, thereby improving productivity while maintaining the precision needed for each system type.
3Ease of manufacture
If piecemeal development approach is used, then development can proceed with available tools, but comprehensive representation of circuit design as a whole is lost
Solution Approach 1:
The patent adds a new dimension to circuit design representation by introducing a hierarchical unified data model that simultaneously captures both individual system details and the holistic circuit design view. This multi-dimensional representation maintains ease of development by preserving system-specific information while adding the capability to view and optimize the entire heterogeneous IC as an integrated whole.
Data Source
AI summary
A unified data model for creating a circuit design for a heterogeneous integrated circuit is provided. The unified data model is stored as a data structure in computer hardware. The unified data model includes a unified netlist specifying the circuit design and a unified device model representing the heterogeneous integrated circuit. The unified netlist includes netlist objects configured to communicate over bitwise connections and network connections representing packet-based communications. The unified netlist may be mapped to the unified device model using computer hardware. Using the computer hardware, at least a portion of the device model may be displayed in coordination with at least a portion of the unified netlist mapped thereto.