1. Summary of the IP-XACT
Standard & SPIRIT Consortium
Gary Leonard Dare
Electrical Engineer in Electronics,
Computing, and EDA
présenté à
École Polytechnique,
Université de Montréal
Sept. 2009
All non-published, non-public, non-excerpted content – Copyright Gary Dare
2. Gary Dare - résumé
Education
B.Sc. - Manitoba (Winnipeg)
Ph.D. - Columbia (New York City)
Professional
Nortel: BNR (Toronto), RBN (Montréal)
Motorola Labs (Chicago)
Mentor Graphics Corporation (Portland, OR)
Delegate to SPIRIT Consortium, 2004-09
3. Outline
Overview
SPIRIT Consortium
IP-XACT Overview
IP-XACT Adoption
Post-SPIRIT World
Accellera-SPIRIT Merger
IEEE P1685 Standardization
Further Work
Some IP-XACT Shortcomings
4. Outline II
Sources
Intro to XML, DesignCon 2006 presentation
Organization Overview, July 2007
DAC 2007 presentation
DAC 2008 presentation
DAC 2009 presentation
Public sources (web pages, data sheets, etc.)
http://www.spiritconsortium.org/
http://www.spiritconsortium.org/press/presentations
5. Main Themes
SPIRIT Consortium
Organization
Standards Development
Accellera Merger
IP-XACT
1.2 (RTL)
1.4 (RTL, ESL)
1.5 (IEEE P1685)
Industry Adoption
7. SPIRIT & IP-XACT
SPIRIT Consortium
standards organization
founded 2003 (inc. 2006)
merging with Accellera
IP-XACT
IP meta-data standard (original name: SPIRIT)
XML Schema
based on Platform Express 1.0 XML Schema
(Mentor Graphics; donated 2003)
8. SPIRIT Scope
“Establish a set of IP and tool integration
standards that enable proliferation of IP
reuse through design automation.”
from Accellera-SPIRIT merger announcement
meeting, DAC 2009
http://www.spiritconsortium.org/
9. SPIRIT Standards
IP-XACT
SystemRDL
RDL donation 2006 (Denali)
Release 1.0 (May 2009)
IP Tagging
from VSIA (organization dissolved, 2008)
IPP 1 3.0 Hard IP Tagging (orig. Artisan)
IPP 4 2.0 Soft IP Tagging
Tag reader/writer (orig. Freescale)
18. Use Case for Design
Automation
Use/Support elements of IP-XACT
Import IP Component Libraries
internal, external, 3 rd Party
Export/Transfer Designs
Interconnection of Standard Interfaces
Transaction (ESL) or Signal (RTL)
Execute Generators
functions to access data about components and
designs (TGI)
generator chains to implement methdology
design flows for hardware and/or software
19. Introduction to XML
http://www.spiritconsortium.org/
http://www.spiritconsortium.org/press/presentations
Presentations from DesignCon 2006
Introduction_to_XML.pdf
20. Why Use XML?
An open, machine readable metadata
standard
Maintained by W3C (controls web standards)
http://www.w3c.org
XML enables cross-domain information
processing tools from multiple vendors
storage in ASCII text
data interchange between incompatible systems
Backed by a wealth of tools and support
many libraries and development environments
see Introduction_to_XML.pdf
21. IP-XACT XML Schema
Highlights
Component
VLNV
Design
Channel
Bus and Abstraction Definitions
Generators
Abstractors
signals to/from transactions
XSL Transform
1.2 to 1.4
1.4 to 1.5
22. IP-XACT Component
Component describes an IP Object including
data on:
VLNV
Bus Interfaces
based on Bus and Abstraction Definitions for Standard
Memory Map(s), Address Space(s)
Register Descriptions
Model
Ports – TLM or RTL signals (“wire ports”)
Filesets
all relevant sets of files for models, etc.
ESL, RTL, drivers, boot code, assertions, stimulus, etc.
Can be a leaf or hierarchical component
23. VLNV
VLNV uniquely identifies a component by
specifying: Leon2 UART
— Name <spirit:vendor>spiritconsortium.org</spirit:vendor>
UART Timers
<spirit:library>Leon2</spirit:library> UART
— Version <spirit:name>UART</spirit:name>
V1.0 V1.0
V1.0
<spirit:version>1.2</spirit:version>
— Library
... UART
— Vendor
Lib1 V1.1 Lib2
- or ANY Vendor1
IP-XACT
Object! UART
Vendor2
V1.0
Lib2
from 20061205_IP-XACT_Worked_Examples_V1.2.pps – IP-SOC 2006
24. IP-XACT Design
Design documents a set of Components
and Interconnections
Accompanied by one or more designConfig
XML files
each contains configuration data for
components present in the design file
A design can become a hierarchical
component
must be referenced by an IP-XACT
Component XML file
25. IP-XACT Channel Concept via
Design Example
Simple subsystem: CPU, AHB-APB bus
bridge, 2 peripherals, 2 interconnects
Channels implement interconnections
bus interfaces are mirrors of standard ports
(Mirror-Master, Mirror-Slave)
based on Bus and Abstraction Definitions
i_apbbus
i_leon2Proc i_apbmst MS0 i_UART
i_ahbbus
M MS1 S
S0 M MM0 MS0 S MM
MM1 MS1 MS2
S1
MS3 S
i_timers
from 20061205_IP-XACT_Worked_Examples_V1.2.pps – IP-SOC 2006
26. Bus & Abstraction Definitions
Bus Definition
Identifies a named interconnection standard
e.g., AMBA AHB 2.0; OCP 2.1; IBM CoreConnect
Also extensions
e.g., OCP 2.x Profiles – block data, xbus read, etc.
Abstraction Definition
defines actual ports for an interconnect standard
references Bus Definition's VLNV
up to 1 transaction level definition (TLM/ESL)
up to 1 signal (wire) level definition (RTL)
27. IP-XACT Generator
TGI – Tight Generator Interface API
Independent of vendor and language
Consistent Data Access about an IP
28. A Word on Generators
IP-XACT TGI
General Purpose
Portable
Generator Chains access data according to IP
designer intent (i.e., databook)
Proprietary Generators
Specific to IP provider and/or DE
not usually portable between EDA tools
IP Provider-specific support is selective
recognized by some DE's, ignored by other DE's
Powerful in supporting environment
29. IP-XACT Adoption
Section 3
Initial adoption focus at enterprise level
Large corporations with lots of IP
Great Recession started in late 2007 in the US,
then went Global ...
Pockets not as deep after 2001 tech recession
Slow recovery to 2007 for high technology
Support for IP-XACT initiatives have stalled in many
large companies
e.g., significant layoffs at NXP, ST, Infineon, Freescale, etc.
EDA firms are suffering because their Customers are
suffering (credit crunch)
30. IP Providers
Design IP
ARM
Synopsys
DesignWare
ST*
NXP* (Philips Semiconductor)
Freescale* (Motorola Semiconductor/SPS)
etc.
Verification IP
Synopsys
DesignWare VIP
Yogitech * Distribution Controlled, Not Open Market
etc.
32. DE Common Characteristics
Import components, designs
Recognize bus and abstraction definitions
Export designs and/or hierarchical
components
Packaging – generate IP-XACT XML for IP
40. IEEE P1685 Standardization
Based on IP-XACT 1.5
ratified in June 2009
SystemRDL-compatible Register Data
bug fixes, enhancements (structure, tag names)
For Standardization
NOT for Production
use IP-XACT 1.4 until P1685 1.0
Schedule
Unknown at Present
Last organizing meeting was 4 Oct 2007
http://www.eda.org/spirit-p1685/
Awaiting a re-start ...
On attends le recommencer ...
41. Further Work I
External Filesets
Multiple Models of an IP ...
can appear from Multiple Sources ...
at Different Times!
Carbon C/C++ (TLM) @ T3
Original CPU - RTL Version Management
(ARM, IBM, etc.) @ T1 Mentor Seamless @ T2 Problem for IP-XACT
XML file of the IP ...
42. Further Work II
Hierarchy
hierarchical components composed of lower
level components
designs become IP ... reusable subsystems
Issues
Port Mapping across levels
some ports may not exist in different views of lower
level components!
Mixed Abstraction Levels
Single TLM model == RTL hierarchical component
no access to subcomponents (e.g., VIP probe ... for RTL!)
semantic rules may not be complete for this situation
43. Summary and Epilogue
SPIRIT Consortium had successful 7 years
Created two standards, adopted a third one
IP-XACT gained significant acceptance for IP
reuse in platform-based design
But not wide first generation adoption (recession)
SPIRIT merger with Accellera combines IP
metadata + language standard development
Language users are also IP-XACT adopters
IEEE P1685 standardization based on 1.5
IP-based design & reuse will be even more
important in the coming New Normal
http://www.eetimes.com/hr/ ... for tech news
44. FIN
End ... of the Beginning!
Q&A
Merci!