Synchron’08 Jean-François LE TALLEC INRIA SOP lab, AOSTE INRIA SOP lab, EPI AOSTE ScaleoChip Company SoC Conception Methodology.

Synchron’08

Jean-François LE TALLECINRIA SOP lab, INRIA SOP lab, EPI AOSTEAOSTEScaleoChip CompanyScaleoChip Company

SoC Conception Methodology

2

• System on Chip & conception

• Early experiment & result

• Next

System on Chip3

What’s a SoC ?

• Piece of software

• IP software for modularity

IP softwareIP software



System on Chip4

What’s a SoC ?

• Piece of software & hardware


• IP hardware for fast execution




IP hardwareIP hardware



System on Chip5

What’s a SoC ?

• Piece of software & hardware & interconnect



• interconnect










System on Chip6

What’s a SoC ?

• Piece of software & hardware & interconnect



• interconnect







ChipSystem




SoC conception7

full designfull design softwaresoftwareSpecSpec Final productFinal product

Usual methodology up to now:Usual methodology up to now:

SoC conception8

full designfull design softwaresoftwareSpecSpec

FPGApre-design

FPGApre-design

softwaresoftware

ScaleoChip methodology:ScaleoChip methodology:

Real designReal design

Final productFinal product

Final productFinal product

Speed up SoC conception

More tolerant to bug

Speed up SoC conception

More tolerant to bug

SpecSpec

Usual methodology up to now:Usual methodology up to now:

Designing problems9

Problems up to now

• Hardware needed to test software

• Interconnect Dimensioning

• HW/SW partitioning

Designing problems10

Problems up to now

• Hardware needed to test software

• Interconnect Dimensioning

• HW/SW partitioning

Potential solution

• Physical one : ScaleoChip

• Virtual one : virtual platform

• ARM SoC designer (SystemC inside)

• Virtutech

• Vast

• Coware

• Cofluent

SystemC11

• C++ library

• Aiming to describe HW & SW

•Different level of description

• PV to RTL

• Simulation & event based

• wait on event or on time

• Hierarchical description

• modules, ports, signals

• Process type

• sc_method • sc_thread

Early experiments12

Encoding of a realistic case study of an IP component :

Proprietary Flash Controller from Verilog to SystemC (our running example)

Cortex M3Cortex M3

AHB2APBBridge

AHB2APBBridge

FlashController

FlashController

Flash AFlash A

Flash BFlash B

AHB Bus

Early experiments13

Several steps

• replace Verilog version by SystemC-RTL rewritting

• verify behavior preservation

• plug in a larger system description for RTL simulation

Early experiments14

Several steps




Results

• Time consuming

• Behavior can be maintained

• Simulation consumes 11% more than original one

Early experiments15

Several steps




Results

• Time consuming

• Behavior can be maintained

• Simulation consumes 11% more than original one

=> Don’t really scale up

Some other results16

• SystemC scheduler Parallelism emulation

• method re-activation during delta-cycle til stabilization

=> event partially ordered may be more efficient

• Assume static cycle will stabilize

• Known at simulation time if scenario is well chosen

Next17

• Flash Controller

• control oriented

• three different interfaces

• kind of synchronous behavior

Next18

• Flash Controller

• control oriented

• three different interfaces

• kind of synchronous behavior

• Rise level of description (abstraction)

Two options :

• SystemC-TLM

• Multi-clock Esterel

Models control part in Esterel See what could be TLM programming in Esterel

SystemC vs Esterel19

•Event driven + physical time

•Input / Sensitivity list

•Wait()

•Parallelism emulation

•Can describe different level of abstraction

•PV to RTL

•Simulation based approach

•Activity stabilization (delta cycle)

• Clock driven + logical time

•Input / Interface

•Await()

• Parallelism

•Can describe different level of abstraction (maybe …)

•Esterel multi-clock ?

• Synthesis based approach

•Static cycle must be avoided

Q&A | Q&!A20

Thanks.

21

22

23

Convert sc_thread into sc_method + clock24

thread << event

loop

wait(event)

body1

wait(time)

body2

end loop

method1 << event << ready_to_restart

do

body1

emit event_start_count

end do

clock (min_time_resolution)

method2 << event_start_count&clock

do

when event_start_count

count time clock period

emit event_time_elapsed

end do

method3 << event_time_elapsed

do

body2

emit event_time_elapsed

end do

SystemC module representation25

Here state are methods that potentially emit signal when terminating and then activate other methods

I/O esterel language26

esterel

c/c++

SystemC

Verilog

VHDL

FSM Bliff

?

Esterel method representation27

Each method can be translate by a state running in parallel with the others and waiting on it sensitivity list to emit signal

Loop

await event1

emit refresh

End loop

Loop

await event2

emit refresh

End loop

Loop

await refresh

if cond then emit event3

End loop

Synchron’08 Jean-François LE TALLEC INRIA SOP lab, AOSTE INRIA SOP lab, EPI AOSTE ScaleoChip Company SoC Conception Methodology.

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