Functional Verification of Programmable Embedded Architectures

by Mishra, Prabhat; Dutt, Nikil D.

• ISBN13: 9780387261430
• ISBN10: 0387261435
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-07-30
• Publisher: Springer-Verlag New York Inc

Summary

Validation of programmable architectures, consisting of processor cores, coprocessors, and memory subsystems, is one of the major bottlenecks in current System-on-Chip design methodology. A critical challenge in validation of such systems is the lack of a golden reference model. As a result, many existing validation techniques employ a bottom-up approach to design verification, where the functionality of an existing architecture is, in essence, reverse-engineered from its implementation. Traditional validation techniques employ different reference models depending on the abstraction level and verification task, resulting in potential inconsistencies between multiple reference models. This book presents a top-down validation methodology that complements the existing bottom-up approaches. It leverages the system architect's knowledge about the behavior of the design through architecture specification using an Architecture Description Language (ADL). The authors also address two fundamental challenges in functional verification: lack of a golden reference model, and lack of a comprehensive functional coverage metric. Functional Verification of Programmable Embedded Architectures: A Top-Down Approach is designed for students, researchers, CAD tool developers, designers, and managers interested in the development of tools, techniques and methodologies for system-level design, microprocessor validation, design space exploration and functional verification of embedded systems.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 3
Architecture specification	p. 15
Validation of specification	p. 29
Executable model generation	p. 65
Design validation	p. 83
Functional test generation	p. 95
Conclusions	p. 121
Survey of contemporary ADLs	p. 127
Specification of DLX processor	p. 141
Interrupts & exceptions in ADL	p. 147
Validation of DLX specification	p. 151
Design space exploration	p. 155
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