Summary of Electronic System-Level Design Tools.

Summary

The system design constraints (rules, specifications, and guidelines) define the design space. System engineers use computer modeling to make design trade-offs with in the design space. They explore trade-offs such as cost, performance, development risk, or TTM.

Re-use of standard known parts can speed the design and reduce the risk. These parts are called intellectual property (IP) and include blocks such as microprocessors, memory, encryption modules, and I/O interfaces. (Re-use is often difficult to achieve in practice, however. Appendix F discusses re-use and IP in more detail.)

System tools include high-level modeling programs, system-level description languages, and automatic test bench generators.

Historically, the hardware is designed first and then the software is integrated and tested, using the hardware. Errors in either or both can cause schedule slips. Approaches to hardware/software co-design and integration include simulation, emulation, rapid prototyping, and virtual prototyping. All of these use EDA support software tools, which are adapting to verify both hardware and software.

Hardware processors are often embedded on the chip. Operating system and application software is increasingly embedded on the chip as well. Real-time systems required reliable software and tight control of the chip timing. Embedded software now refers to any software on the chip, real-time or not. Therefore, system-level EDA tools now need to model software timing and reliability aspects.

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