COMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE FOR RECONFIGURABLE SYSTEMS: CONCEPTS AND TECHNIQUES
Vincenzo Rana · 2007
Application convergence adds complexity to digital designs, since on–chip integration deals with etherogeneous modules within a single system. A relevant feature of such complex systems is that different modules address different communication issues. Together with (self) dynamic reconfiguration capabilities of modern Xilinx FPGAs, tasks are not known at compile time; with this capability we are able to tune the system’s behavior at run–time, i.e. while the system is still executing. By doing so we are able to make systems more flexible and capable of serving the user on demand. Communication infrastructure is a relevant part of a generic digital System–on–Chip, since it has to gurantee communication among all the modules in a reliable and flexible fashion. Several communication paradigms have been historically adopted; nevertheless new approaches have been proposed to deal with emerging communication issues; a new relevant paradigm is based on a network–approach, namely Network– on–Chip . The purpose of this project is to show the widely used paradigms in on–chip communication designs, as well as to present and discuss the main issues that dynamically reconfigurable devices address.