JPH03242954A - Design of integrated circuit and designing device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To realize readiness of design, effective designing operation and reduction of a design period by proceeding circuit design integrating circuits which are designed for each of control conditions. CONSTITUTION:An input part 1 receives design data in the form of language and figure, provides a design treatment part 2 with the received design data, and further receives control informations for proceeding design by controlling the design treatment part 2, a data base 3 a display part 4. The design treatment part 2 is provided with a functional drawing forming part 21, a conditional operational circuit forming part 22 and an integral editor part 23. A circuit which operates based on control conditions is designed based on the received figure for each of control conditions and each of the designed circuits is integrated with other circuits for circuit design. Therefore, it is possible to eliminate the necessity of manufacture of a circuit of control system by a circuit drawing, to enable design corresponding control conditions to circuit operation and to understand entire structure of a circuit readily. Effective circuit design and inspection can be thereby carried out.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Object of the Invention] (Industrial Application Field) The present invention relates to an integrated circuit design method and a design device that facilitate the design of an integrated circuit.

(Prior Art) Conventional computer-aided integrated circuit design methods generally use graphical input or text description based on a language according to a certain grammar as an input method.

Since integrated circuit design is performed with computer aids, the method of inputting configuration data is dependent on the development and capabilities of the input tools. For this reason, in the early stages of designing integrated circuits using computers, input methods using text description were used due to the slow development of graphical input tools such as graphic editors and because of the ease of processing on computers.

The input method using text description allows a wide range of expressions, from structural expressions of circuits to abstract expressions such as circuit states and algorithms for each condition. Furthermore, although the control system that controls the data bus system in a designed circuit tends to be complex, the series of flows of this control system can be clearly expressed, eliminating the need to actually design the control circuit.

However, in the input method using text description, character strings are displayed on the monitor, making it difficult for the designer to understand the contents at a glance, and it is difficult to understand the mutual relationships. This makes it difficult to understand the overall structure of the circuit, making it difficult to understand the flow of data in the data bus system. Furthermore, it was insufficient to visually verify the structure and operation of the circuit. Furthermore, it was necessary to select a language suitable for the design content from among multiple languages and learn the grammar of that language.

On the other hand, in recent years, with the development of graphic input tools, graphic input methods have come into widespread use.

In the graphical input method, the circuit being designed is displayed as a graphic on the monitor, making it easier for the designer to visually understand and grasp the intuitive image. Therefore, it becomes possible to clearly grasp the overall structure of the circuit, and it becomes possible to sufficiently visually verify the circuit operation.

On the other hand, in graphic input, even though the performance of input tools has improved, the input work is still more complicated than text description. Furthermore, the level of abstraction that can be expressed in a design is considerably lower than that in text description, and it is difficult to abstractly express circuit states, algorithms, etc.

Furthermore, when designing a single circuit, when inputting the design data by dividing it into sheets that serve as units of the design flow, divide the design circuit into sheets by imagining the physical division of the circuit. Therefore, it was not possible to conceptually divide circuit states, signal values, etc.

In addition, control systems, which tend to be complex, must be actually designed and constructed using circuits. For this reason, the data bus system and the control system coexist on the created circuit diagram, making it extremely difficult to distinguish between the two.

Therefore, recently, devices have been developed that enable both text/description input methods and graphic input methods. However, in devices that can use both of these input methods, the mere fact that both input methods are possible does not mean that the correspondence between the text description design data and the graphic design data in the designed circuit is established. Therefore, it was not possible to design a circuit by using both input methods in combination and selecting both input methods appropriately according to the design content.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) As explained above, the input methods using text description and the input method using graphics in designing integrated circuits each have their own drawbacks, and it is difficult to simplify the design work. It was an obstacle to this. For this reason, as the design circuit becomes larger and more complex, the design period becomes longer.

On the other hand, for devices that allow both text description input methods and graphic input methods, the design data input by each input method does not correspond to each other independently, but can be used in conjunction with both input methods to create a circuit. It was not possible to design it.

Therefore, the present invention has been made in view of the above, and its purpose is to enable circuit design using both verbal and graphical input methods, to facilitate design, improve efficiency of design work, and An object of the present invention is to provide an integrated circuit design method and design device that can shorten the design period.

[Structure of the invention]

(Means for Solving the Problems) In order to achieve the above object, the present invention designs circuits that operate according to control conditions by graphic input for each control condition, and connects each designed circuit to other circuits. It is configured to perform circuit design by integrating the

(Function) With the above configuration, the present invention eliminates the need to create a control system circuit in a circuit diagram, and enables designing by associating control conditions with circuit operations, thereby improving the overall structure of the circuit. It becomes possible to understand easily. This allows efficient circuit design and verification.

(Example) Hereinafter, the present invention will be explained in detail using the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an integrated circuit design apparatus and related configuration according to an embodiment of the present invention. The apparatus of the embodiment shown in the figure is capable of designing an integrated circuit by using both a verbal input method and a graphical input method.

In FIG. 1, the integrated circuit design apparatus includes an input section 1, a design processing section 2, a database 3, and a display section 4 as main components.

The input unit 1 inputs verbal design data and graphical design data, and inputs the input design data to the design processing unit 2.
give to The input unit 1 also inputs control information for controlling the design processing unit 2, database 3, and display unit 4 to advance the design.

The design processing section 2 includes a functional diagram creation section 21, a conditional operation circuit creation section 22, and an integrated editor section 23.

The functional diagram creation unit 21 creates a designed sheet by arranging and wiring functional blocks such as registers and arithmetic and logic operation circuits according to design data given through language input or graphical input from the input unit 1. On this sheet, unlike the conventional circuit design method, for example, one of the functional blocks
It is also permitted to connect multiple input signals to the nine input pins.

However, in such a case, it is necessary to set the conditions later. Furthermore, conditional statements may be written by linguistic input. Here, a sheet is a basic unit of an editing screen used when a designer actually designs a desired circuit by combining a plurality of functional blocks or designs using a language. For this reason, one circuit is usually constructed from a plurality of sheets.

The conditional operation circuit creation unit 22 generates a circuit that operates under a certain condition on a separate sheet different from the sheet created by the functional diagram creation unit 21, according to the design data given by verbal input or graphical input from the input unit 1. Create as.

Here, in order to distinguish between the sheet created by the conditional operation circuit creation section 22 and the sheet created by the functional diagram creation section 21, the former will be referred to as a "functional sheet." All the data of the sheet created by the functional diagram creation unit 21 and the conditional operation circuit creation unit 22 and the circuit designed on the function sheet are
A name given to the subsequent combination editor section 23 after verification of signal names, connection relationships, exclusiveness of conditional expressions, etc. In addition, all the data of the designed circuit is not only graphical information or character string information, but also functions such as the functions of each functional block, signal propagation relationships, and the results of lexical analysis of design data based on linguistic input. The information is given to the integrated editor section 23 as specification information.

The integrated editor section 23 integrates the circuit design data created by the functional diagram creation section 21 and the conditional operation circuit creation section 22, and provides the integrated design data to the database 3. The integrated editor section 23 sequentially divides design data designed on a sheet by verbal input or graphic input into sentence units, and creates both verbal and graphic design data for the divided sentences. Here, a sentence refers to one processing vehicle position for which the input/output relationship has been determined. In other words, when a circuit is designed using verbal input, blocks and coordinates are given for each input operation, and design data similar to that designed using graphical input is created. When an output signal is given, design data similar to language input is created for each input operation. The created design data is given to the database 3.

The database 3 stores and holds design data given from the integrated editor section 23, and has a structure as shown in FIG.

In FIG. 2, the data base 3 includes the data object 31 of the sheet created in the functional intercrop 0 bottom 21.
, a data object 32 of the function sheet created by the conditional operation circuit creation unit 22, and a data object 33 of the condition of the function sheet. Further, the database 3 has a data object 35 for sentences created by the integrated editor section 23 and a data object management table 34 for sentences that manages this data object 35.

However, due to the data structure, among the data on the sheet created by the function diagram creation unit 21, circuit diagram data conditionally designed by the function sheet or language data designed by conditional statement description are not included in the sheet. It is removed from the statement data object of the data object 31 and registered as a statement data object of the function sheet data object 32, which is automatically created when a conditional statement is input in the description. The data object 35 of the sentence that the data object has is
All are data objects of statements that operate unconditionally. Further, the sentence data object 35 is shared by a plurality of function sheets with different conditions. Further, the database 3 has a text data object 36 as a language for each sentence data object, and a functional block data object 37 and a connection information data object 38 for graphic information. .

With this structure, the design data designed on sheets and function sheets and divided into sentences is stored in the area of the sentence data object 35, and each stored sentence is stored in the sentence data object management table. specified by 34,
The statement data object management table 34 includes the sheet data object 31 and the function sheet data object 32.
Pointed to by. Further, the condition data object 33 of the function sheet is pointed to by the data object of the function sheet. Further, each sentence in the sentence data object 35 is stored in data objects 36 to 38 to which the linguistic and graphical design data objects correspond, respectively.

1 2 In such a structure, the statement-related data object 35 includes the structure and operation of all designed circuits, so it is possible to combine circuits that operate unconditionally and circuits that operate conditionally. Design data of the overall circuit structure is stored. Furthermore, the control conditions and circuit operations of a circuit that operates conditionally are connected as a sentence and stored in the database 3.

The design data stored in the database 3 having such a structure is provided to the display section 4. Further, since the database 3 stores and holds the design data as described above, the stored design data is directly provided to the simulator 5 and the logic synthesis section 6 without requiring any specific conversion means.

The display section 4 includes a structure display section 41 and a condition relationship display section 42. The structure display section 41 displays all the graphical circuit structures and language-designed descriptions, and the condition relationship display section 42 displays control conditions for each conditional operation circuit. The design content displayed by the structure display section 41 is immediately reflected in the functional diagram creation section 21. That is, the functional diagram creating section 21 proceeds with the design while always grasping the overall configuration of the circuit being designed. The circuit structure displayed on the structure display section 41 and the control conditions displayed on the condition relationship display section 42 have a corresponding relationship with each other, and in order to show this correspondence, the display may be displayed in different colors, for example, from other parts. I'm trying to change it. Also, the data displayed in each display section 41, 42 is displayed in different colors to distinguish the part of interest from other parts.

Next, a case will be described in which a specific design procedure for the apparatus configured as described above is first performed by graphic input.

The design of the circuit is proceeded by the functional diagram creation section 21 based on the design data given from the input section 1, but when a part of the circuit is to be operated under certain control conditions,
The conditional operation circuit creation unit 22 creates a function sheet for each control condition and proceeds with the design. When a condition is set for a certain data bus, the data object for that statement is separated from the data object for the sheet and becomes conditional data, that is, the data object for the statement for the function sheet.

The function sheet has as its attributes a control condition, a name, and an operation clock signal when the function sheet is regarded as one block, and is created by setting conditions. For example, set the THEN side of the conditional expression as “A”.
Then, the ELSE side of the conditional expression is "ELSE A", and the logical product of "A" and "B" and the logical sum of "C" is "A".
&BIC”, and when the condition signal value of condition “A” is 01, it is set as “A-101”, and when condition B is in a nested relationship with condition A, it is set as “A>>>B”. Then, set conditions and create a function sheet.
There are two design modes shown below as a creation method, and the setting mode is selected depending on the design content.

The first setting mode is a mode in which a circuit that operates according to set conditions is designed by referring to a sheet already created by the functional diagram creation section 21 or a function sheet created by the conditional operation circuit creation section 22. A design example is shown in Fig. 3.

FIG. 3(a) shows an example of a sheet (hereinafter referred to as "r base sheet") of an already designed design reference circuit, and FIG. The solid line indicates the circuit that operates when condition "A" displayed in the upper left corner of b) is satisfied.

In Fig. 3, in this design method, first the functional diagram creation section 2
A sheet containing a circuit to be operated under condition A is specified from among the sheet created by 1 or the function sheet created by conditional operation circuit creation section 22 that corresponds to the upper condition. As a result, Figure 3 (
As shown in a), the base sheet is displayed as a dotted line or divided by color. In this state, a circuit to be operated under condition A is selected using a mouse or the like. In FIG. 3, functional block 4 and its input signal are selected. Alternatively, create a new circuit. In FIG. 3, the connection between the functional block 4 and the functional block 6, and the functional block 6 and its 5 6 input/output signals are selected. In this way, the design of the circuit operating under condition A is proceeded by changing the display (for example, color) from other parts as shown by the solid line in FIG. 3(b). When expressed in language, the circuit represented graphically in FIG. 3(b) corresponds to, for example, a description expressed by an IF statement shown on the right side of FIG. 3(b). In such a design method, when a reference circuit is divided into multiple sheets, a function sheet is created for each sheet.

On the other hand, in the second design mode, when the reference circuit spans multiple base sheets, all the circuits that operate under the set conditions are summarized on one function sheet without using the base sheet. You may also design it. In such a design method, only connection information is included as internal data.

Further, for the function sheet designed using the two design modes described above, a circuit that operates in accordance with a higher level control condition or a lower level control condition is designed.

The design procedure involves specifying upper conditions or lower conditions for the function sheet displayed on the screen, and then specifying the function sheet displayed on the screen or the function diagram creation section 21.
The sheet created in step 1 or the function sheet corresponding to the upper-level condition is designated as the base sheet, and the function sheet is created according to the first design mode described above. In such a procedure, on the function sheet displayed on the screen, in order to clearly distinguish the operation of the circuit for each condition, the circuit operating under the current design condition and the lower and upper conditions of this condition is displayed. Other circuits are displayed in different colors.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of designing a function sheet for lower conditions. In the same figure, the condition “A” shown in FIG.
” is the base sheet, and from this base sheet, condition “A” is established and condition “B” is established.
Select with the mouse the circuit part that operates for "A>>>B" where the following holds true, and create a function sheet shown by the thick solid line in FIG. 4(b).

On the other hand, the condition "A>>>B" may be directly input in any sheet, and the design may be proceeded with using the function sheet for condition "A" as a base sheet. However, if a function sheet for condition "A" has not been created, the design is performed using the first design mode or the second design mode described above.

The circuit designed in this way is designed under the conditions currently being designed.
The display on the screen of the circuit operation for each of the upper and lower conditions of the condition and the other circuit operations can be changed. In FIG. 4(e), when the function sheet for condition A is opened again after designing the function sheet for condition A>>>B, the circuit operation for the condition currently being designed is shown by the thick solid line, 1
The circuit operation for the next higher condition is shown by a dotted line, the circuit operation for the next lower condition is shown by a thin solid line, and other parts are shown by dotted lines. Note that they are displayed in different colors on the screen.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of designing a function sheet for higher-level conditions. As shown in the same figure (a), for the function sheet for condition “D”, the upper condition “
If you want to operate under "ELSE C", enter the condition "ELSE C" in the upper condition setting mode.As a result, as shown in FIG. 5(b), the condition "ELSE C" is set.
ELSE C" is created. Even in such a case, the function sheet for condition "D" becomes the base sheet, and circuit operations are displayed in different colors for each nested condition.

Furthermore, since the signal names of the control conditions and their nesting relationships can become extremely complex depending on the design details, they may be displayed on the screen as a tree diagram as shown in FIG.

In such a case, a name may be given to each condition to replace it, and if a name is not given, it is automatically given. When each condition is given a name and replaced and displayed, the correspondence between the condition and the name is also displayed at the same time.

In this way, for each control condition, the control conditions are displayed on the screen, and the circuit operation is designed using the function sheet for the displayed conditions, so one 0 control conditions and circuit operation will be closely connected. Therefore, when the entire circuit diagram is displayed and a condition is specified, the operating portions corresponding to the conditions can be displayed in different colors on the entire circuit diagram.

This can be done by specifying the conditions with the mouse even when the aforementioned control conditions are displayed as a tree diagram. Furthermore, for circuits that operate with conditions, the control conditions can be displayed on the circuit diagram. In such a display method, there are two modes: one mode is where the control conditions are always displayed for the functional block, and the other mode is where the control conditions are displayed as needed.

Next, a case where a design is performed using language description together will be explained.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a design example when designing a circuit using language input. In the same figure, when a conditional statement such as an IF statement or a CASE statement is input by language, the function sheet is immediately created by the conditional operation circuit creation diagram 22, for example, the seventh
It is created as shown in Figure (a). At this time, the circuit diagram is displayed graphically on the screen, and the conditional statement is displayed in a designated area of the screen. If you wish to add or modify circuit operations to the sheet created in this way, you may modify it as is on the sheet shown in Figure 7(a), but specify conditional expression "A". Then display and design a function sheet for it on the screen. In such a case, the description for conditional expression "A" is displayed on the function sheet in the same state as it was written on the original sheet. This is similar to the first design mode using a function sheet based on graphic input.

Figure 7(b) shows an example in which the circuit diagram shown in Figure 7(a) is newly designed by adding the operation S-R by inputting a description and the operation Y-X by inputting a figure. . In such a case, the valid range of condition "A" that can be added in the description is limited and input, and the design by graphic input is performed in the first or second design mode described above. The circuit operation designed in this way is shown in Figure 7(c).
The conditional expression is marked to indicate that there is a circuit operation corresponding to that condition on the figure and description, and when the cursor points to the conditional expression text on the description, the circuit operation for that condition is displayed. are displayed in different colors on the circuit diagram and description on the screen.

However, regarding input, if the same action is designed using language and graphics under the same conditions, an error message will be output. It also has a function that displays all actions under the same conditions as one when input in a language.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a design example using a subwindow. In the figure, one sheet of design data is shown.
One sheet of text data in one window 90 is displayed in a designated area 91. The area 91 is designated by designating a predetermined starting point on the sheet, and the input text data is displayed sequentially from the designated starting point. A circuit that operates under the condition "A" displayed in the area 91 is displayed in a sub-window 92, and the design data displayed in this sub-window 92 becomes the data of the function sheet.

In this way, in the above embodiment, all circuit operations to be designed are given and stored in the database as the same data structure via the integrated editor section 23, so that the circuits that operate unconditionally and the circuits that operate conditionally are different. It is possible to display the overall circuit structure where the two overlap. Furthermore, since control conditions and circuit operations are designed in correspondence, circuit operations corresponding to the conditions or conditions for circuit operations can be easily extracted.

In addition, for each sentence created by input, whether it is graphic input or language input, a text data object and a graphic information data object are provided in the database, so graphic information and text can be converted. It is possible to switch between them and display them or to display both at the same time without performing any operations.

This eliminates the need to configure a control circuit for controlling complicated circuit operations, allowing for rapid design. In addition, the circuit structure of the data bus system is displayed as a circuit diagram, and the flow of processing control is displayed in 3 to 4 words to clearly correlate control conditions and circuit operations, making it easy to visually verify the circuit. You will be able to do this.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, according to the present invention, circuit design can be advanced by integrating circuits designed for each control condition, or circuits designed using both graphical input and verbal description input. Since the circuit design is proceeded by associating the data, it is possible to facilitate the design of integrated circuits, improve the efficiency of the design work, and shorten the design period.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an integrated circuit design apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the structure of the database shown in FIG. 1, and FIGS. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of a design display in the device shown in FIG. 1; DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Input part, 2... Design processing part, 3... Database, 4... Display part, 5... Simulator, 6... Logic synthesis part, 21... Function diagram creation part , 22... Conditional operation circuit creation section, 23... Integrated editor section, 41... Structure display section, 42... Condition relationship display section.

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) Set and input control conditions, design conditional operation circuits by inputting graphics for each input control condition, and design each conditional operation circuit designed for each control condition in other circuits. An integrated circuit design method characterized by integrating circuits and designing the circuit. (2) an input means for setting and inputting control conditions; a graphic input means for inputting design data of a circuit to be designed in the form of graphics; a first design means for designing a conditional operation circuit based on design data; and a second design means for designing a circuit based on design data inputted from the graphic input means.
and a display means for integrating and displaying a conditional circuit designed by the first design means and a circuit that operates unconditionally designed by the second design means. Integrated circuit design equipment.