Design Verification With E - Hardcover

Palnitkar, Samir

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0131413090 ISBN 13: 9780131413092

Publisher: Prentice Hall, 2003

Synopsis

E is a new Hardware Verification Language, or HVL. Verification is one of the most time consuming and cumbersome processes in hardware design. Design teams spend 50% to 70% of their time verifying designs, rather than creating new ones. As designs grow more complex, the verification problems increase exponentially - when a design doubles in size, the verification effort can easily quadruple. In the past design teams have used Verilog and VHDL. E gives engineers the speed and efficiency they have been craving, while also allowing for simulation of other components as well. This book emphasizes breadth rather than depth. It imparts to the reader a working knowledge of a broad variety of e-based topics, thus giving the reader a global understanding of e-based design verification. This book should be classified not only as an e book but, more generally, as a design verification book. Due to its popularity, it is likely that e will be standardized in the future.

About this title

About the Author

About the Author

Samir Palnitkar is the President of Jambo Systems, Inc., a leading ASIC design and verificationservices company and a Verisity Verification Alliance partner. He previously founded IntegratedIntellectual Property, Inc., an ASIC company that was acquired by Lattice Semiconductor, Inc.,and Obongo, Inc., an e-commerce software firm that was acquired by AOL Time Warner, Inc. Heholds a Bachelor of Technology in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute ofTechnology, Kanpur; a Master's in Electrical Engineering from the University of Washington,Seattle; and an MBA degree from San Jose State University, San Jose, California. Heis a recognized authority on e , Verilog HDL, modeling, verification, logic synthesis, andEDA-based methodologies in digital design. He has worked extensively with design andverification on various successful microprocessor, ASIC, and system projects; worked on many e -based projects; and trained hundreds of students on e since 1997.

From the Back Cover

Design Verification with e Samir Palnitkar

Written for both experienced and new users, DesignVerification with e gives you a broadcoverage of e . It stresses the practical verification perspective of e rather than emphasizing only itslanguage aspects.

This book&;

• Introduces you to e-based verification methodologies
• Describes e syntax in detail, including structs, units, methods, events, temporal expressions. and TCMs
• Explains the concepts of automatic generation, checking and coverage
• Discusses the e Reuse Methodology
• Describes essential topics such as coverage driven verification, e verification components (eVCs), and interfacing with C/C++
• Illustrates a complete verification example in e
• Contains a quick-reference guide to the e language
• Offers many practical verification tips

Includes over 250 illustrations, examples, andexercises, and a verification resource list. Learning objectives and summariesare provided for each chapter.

&;Mr. Palnitkar illustrates how and why the power ofthe e verification language and the underlying Specman Elite testbench automationtool are used to develop today's most advanced verification environments. Thisbook is valuable to both the novice and the experienced e user. I highlyrecommend it to anyone exploring functional verification&;

&;Moshe Gavrielov

Chief Executive Officer

Verisity Design, Inc.

&;This book demonstrates how e can be used to createstate-of-the-art verification environments. An ideal book to jumpstarta beginner and a handy reference for experts&;

&;Rakesh Dodeja

Engineering Manager

Intel Corporation

&;The book gives a simple, logical, and well-organizedpresentation of e with plenty of illustrations. This makes it an ideal text book for universitycourses on functional  verification&;

&;Dr. Steven Levitan

 Professor

 Department of Electrical Engineering

 University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA

&;This book is ideal for readers with little or no e programming experience. It gives the reader athorough and practical understanding of not only the e language, but also how to effectively use thislanguage to develop complex functional verification environments.&;

&;Bill Schubert

Verification Engineer

ST Microelectronics, Inc.

&;The flow of the book is logical and gradual. Plentyof illustrations and examples makes this an ideal book for e users. A must-have for both beginners andexperts&;

&;Karun Menon

Staff Engineer

Sun Microsystems, Inc.

PRENTICEHALL

ProfessionalTechnical Reference

UpperSaddle River, NJ  07458

www.phptr.com

ISBN:0-13-144309-0

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Preface

During my earliest experience with e , I was looking for a book that could give me a "jumpstart" on using e . I wanted to learn basic digital verification paradigms and the necessary e constructs that would help me verify small digital designs. After I had gained some experiencewith building basic e verification environments, I wanted to learn to use e to verify largedesigns. At that time I was searching for a book that broadly discussed advanced e -based designverification concepts and real design verification methodologies. Finally, when I had gainedenough experience with design verification of many multi-million gate chips using e , I felt theneed for an e book that would act as a handy reference. I realized that my needs were differentat different stages of my design verification maturity. A desire to fill these needs has led tothe publication of this book.

Rapid changes have occurred during the past few years. High Level Verification Languages(HVLs) such as e have become a necessity for verification environments. I have seenstate-of-the-art verification methodologies and tools evolve to a high level of maturity. Ihave also applied these verification methodologies to a wide variety of multi-million gateASICs that I have successfully completed during this period. I hope to use these experiences tomake this edition a richer learning experience for the reader.

This book emphasizes breadth rather than depth. The book imparts to the reader a workingknowledge of a broad variety of e -based topics, thus giving the reader a global understandingof e -based design verification. The book leaves the in-depth coverage of each topic to thereference manuals and usage guides for e .

This book should be classified not only as an e book but, more generally, as a designverification book. It important to realize that e is only a tool used in design verification.It is the means to an end--the digital IC chip. Therefore, this book stresses the practicalverification perspective more than the mere language aspects of e . With HVL-based designverification having become a necessity, no verification engineer can afford to ignore popularHVLs such as e .

Currently, Specman Elite by Verisity Design, Inc., is the only tool that supports e .However, the powerful constructs that e provides for design verification make it an excellentHVL. Because of its popularity, it is likely that e will be standardized in the future andmultiple vendors will create tools to support e . Therefore, in this book, although SpecmanElite is used as a reference tool, the treatment of e is done in a tool-independent manner. e concepts introduced in this book will be generally applicable in the future regardless of thetool that is used.

Who Should Use This Book

This book is intended primarily for beginners and intermediate-level e users. However, foradvanced e users, the broad coverage of topics makes it an excellent reference book to be usedin conjunction with the manuals and training materials of e -based products.

The book presents a logical progression of e -based topics. It starts with the basics, suchas functional verification methodologies, and e fundamentals, and then it gradually builds onto bigger examples and eventually reaches advanced topics, such as coverage-driven functionalverification, reusable verification components, and C/C++ Interface. Thus, the book is usefulto e users with varying levels of expertise as explained below.

Students in verification courses at universities

Parts 1, 2, and 3 of this book are ideal for a foundation semester course in e -based designverification. Students are exposed to functional verification methodologies and e basics, and,finally, they build a complete verification system with e .

New e users in the industry

Companies are rapidly moving to e -based verification. Parts 1, 2, and 3 of this bookconstitute a perfect jump start for engineers who want to orient their skills toward HVL-basedverification.

Basic e users who need to understand advanced concepts

Part 4 of this book discusses advanced concepts such as coverage-driven functionalverification, reusable verification components, and C/C++ Interface. A complete verificationsystem example is discussed in Part 3. These topics are necessary to graduate from smaller tolarger e -based verification environments.

e Experts

Many e topics are covered, from the e basics to advanced topics like coverage-drivenfunctional verification, reusable verification components, and C/C++ Interface. Plenty ofexamples are provided. A complete verification system example is discussed in Part 3. For e experts, this book is a handy guide to be used along with the reference manuals.

How This Book is Organized

This book is organized into five parts.

Part 1, Introduction, presents the basic concepts of functional verification to the user.It also explains why it is important to maximize verification productivity and themethodologies used to successfully verify a digital ASIC. Finally, it discusses how anenvironment can be modeled using e for effective verification. Part 1 contains two chapters.

Part 2, e Basics, discusses the e syntax necessary to build a complete verification system.Topics covered are basics such as struct/units, generation, procedural flow control, timeconsuming methods, temporal expressions, checking, and coverage. This section ends with achapter that puts together all the basic concepts and explains how to run a complete simulationwith an e -based environment. Part 2 contains nine chapters.

Part 3, Creating a Complete Verification System with e , takes the reader through thecomplete verification process of a simple router design. Topics discussed are designspecification, verification components, verification plan and test plan. The section ends withan explanation of the actual e code for each component required for the verification of therouter design. Part 3 contains two chapters.

Part 4, Advanced Verification Techniques with e , discusses important advanced concepts suchas coverage driven functional verification, reusable verification components (eVCs) andintegration with C/C++. Part 4 contains three chapters.

Part 5, Appendices, discusses important additional topics such as the e Quick Reference Guideand interesting e Tidbits. Part 5 contains two appendices.

Edition details

• Publisher: Prentice Hall
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0131413090
• ISBN 13: 9780131413092
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 416