Designing FPGAs and Reconfigurable SoCs Using Methods of Program Analysis and Prototyping
V. I. Enns, S. V. Gavrilov, Vasilii M. Khvatov, В. Г. Курбатов · Russian Microelectronics · 2021
Abstract This paper describes approaches and methods for software circuit prototyping of field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and reconfigurable systems-on-a-chip (RSoC). Software circuit prototyping is a new stage in the design flow for FPGAs and reconfigurable SoCs in contrast to the classical FPGA-based prototyping using ready-made FPGA chips. It allows to evaluate the efficiency of the user circuit design implementation and select the basic chip architecture before its tape-out because of the computer-aided design (CAD) tools promptly adapting to any changes in the structure, circuitry and layout of a basic chip. The flexible and dynamic software customization to maintain the required FPGA or RSoC architecture is provided by the developed formalized description of the basic circuit, which is used in CAD and is represented in this paper. This formalized description can be used both for the analysis of the basic chip and for the analysis of a user circuit design implemented on an FPGA or RSoC.