Reconfigurable Systems and their Influence on Mobile and Multimedia Applications.
Valery Sklyarov, Iouliia Skliarova · Advances in Mobile Multimedia · 2006
With the advent of field programmable logic devices it became possible to design and implement digital systems without the need for the technological steps dealing with silicon. Tremendous progress in this area has made it possible to advance configurable microchips from programmable logic arrays - PLA (early 1970s) and further simple gate arrays, that appeared on the market in the mid-1980s, to platform field programmable gate arrays (FPGA) containing more than 10 million system gates and incorporating complex heterogeneous structures, such as PowerPC processors. Recent research results show that future programmable logic might achieve 100 billion devices per square centimeter, which permits to argue that cheap molecular-scale reconfiguration is likely to become the predominant digital technology in a decade hence. The impact of FPGAs on different development directions in computer science, electrical and computer engineering is growing continuously. Today, advanced research is being intensively performed in the areas of system-onchip and network-on-chip supported by the extensive use of computer-aided design (CAD) systems. Traditionally, FPGA-targeted CAD systems are based on schematic and hardware description language design flows involving model-specific tools and core generators. Recently, system level specification languages (such as Handel-C and SystemC) have been developed and are now frequently used. This clearly demonstrates that the domain of reconfigurable systems design is very dynamic and many-sided. The rapid evolution of FPGA technology and relevant CAD systems requires a large number of well-prepared engineers in these areas. Hence an ongoing review of the corresponding curricula is necessary to incorporate the recent advances. Consequently the impact of reconfigurable systems on contemporary engineering education is also growing continuously. This tutorial is intended to cover the majority of hot topics related to reconfigurable systems with a profound analysis and comparison of alternative approaches, such as hardware/software versus configware. It demonstrates advantages of reconfigurable systems in terms of technical characteristics and economic aspects and shows their significant influence on mobile computing and multimedia applications. The tutorial also includes a profound discussion of a novel methodology that has been used for teaching reconfigurable systems.