Mentor's Catapult C to synthesize C++/SystemC from Tim Koeppe, Nokia-Siemens (via John Cooley)

Thanks to John Cooley for passing along a great user report about using Mentor's Catapult C to synthesize C++/SystemC into RTL. Very complete and interesting.

Worth reading because regardless of whose synthesis you use, it is interesting to think about what kinds of debuggng you need to do along the way.

http://www.deepchip.com/items/0486-02.html

Cheers,
Connie L. O'Dell
Sr. Verification Specialist
c.odell@co-consulting.net
303-641-5191
_____________________________________________
CO Consulting - Boulder, CO - http://co-consulting.net

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: jcooley of zeroskew eldoto como
Date: Tue, Oct 26, 2010 at 3:57 AM
Subject: FPGAs, Palladium, CatapultC, SNUG, Wall Street, Zocalo
To: c.odell@co-consulting.net


Migrating from homebrew FPGA emulation to Cadence Palladium
http://www.deepchip.com/items/0486-01.html

Mentor CatC user on control logic synthesis and AC Channels
http://www.deepchip.com/items/0486-02.html

An analog EDA engineer's Boston SNUG 2010 trip report
http://www.deepchip.com/items/0486-03.html

Jay's Wall Street analysis of SNPS, MENT, CDNS, LAVA stock
http://deepchip.com/wiretap/101014.html

---------------------------------------------------------------

Zocalo's Introduction to SVA Assertions for Design Engineers
http://www.deepchip.com/look/see101008-01.html

I don't *want* Windows7 to guess what I mean...

... and , thanks to My Digital Life, this is at least one way to prevent it:

http://www.mydigitallife.info/2009/05/20/disable-aero-snap-auto-maximize-and-arrange-window-in-windows-7/

Disable Aero Snap Auto Maximize and Arrange Window in Windows 7

Windows 7 includes a new feature called Aero Snap that intends to improve open windowsmanagement on the desktop. Aero Snap allows user to drag a window to the top of the screen to maximize the window automatically, or to the left or right side of the screen to resize the window to fill and take up half of the screen estate on the moved side automatically. 

...

Use the trick below to disable and turn off Aero Snap ability to auto arrange or auto maximize window when dragging.

1. Go to Control Panel.
2. Click on Ease of Access link or Ease of Access Center icon.
3. Select Change how your mouse works or Make the mouse easier to useoption.
4. Tick the check box for Prevent Windows from being automatically arranged when moved to the edge of the screen with the mouse under "Make it easier to manage windows" section.

Cheers,
Connie "I Get Paid The Big Bucks To Arrange My *Own* Windows!" O'Dell

HS girls in Science/Technology: Money, laptops, recognition; still time to apply!

Looks like the application date has been extended a little - it isn't too late for high school girls to apply!

Cheers,
Connie

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ruthe A. Farmer <Ruthe.Farmer@colorado.edu>
Date: Thu, Oct 21, 2010 at 1:24 PM
Subject: Award for HS girls in STEM - please share
To: Aspirations Award <aspirations@ncwit.org>

There are 10 days left to apply!  Applications are due at 11:59PM ET on 10/31/10!

We are currently accepting applications for the NCWIT Award for Aspirations in Computing. This award is open to any high school girl residing in the US and territories including Puerto Rico.  

National Award-winners receive:
   * $500 in cash
   * a laptop computer, provided by Bank of America
   * a trip to attend the Bank of America Technology Showcase and Awards Ceremony in Charlotte, North Carolina
   * an engraved award for both the student and the student's school

Affiliate Award-winners receive an engraved award for their home and school, and a range of great prizes from local sponsors. Visit www.ncwit.org/award to see details.  There are Affiliate programs available in 20 US States and Puerto Rico.

There will be 35 National Winners and 150 National Runners up selected.  In addition, there will be 275 Affiliate Winners selected in 19 local affiliates. 

Complete details on the program and the application can be found at www.ncwit.org/award.

Ruthe Farmer, MBA

Director of Strategic Initiatives

The National Center for Women & IT

www.ncwit.org

V 303-735-5578

M 303-720-1913

F 303-735-6606

Ruthe.Farmer@colorado.edu

####

Tech savvy girls! Apply now for the NCWIT Award for Aspirations in Computing!  http://www.ncwit.org/award

Cool SystemC Synth/Sim resources of recent interest + Formal/SystemC trivia time

There are, obviously a lot of useful SystemC resources. Just FYI, I found the videos below useful for a little update on the latest thoughts on SystemC. There are good insights related both to verification of SystemC, as well as high-level synthesis (HLS) of SystemC. When you watch the videos you can also download handouts for most of them (sadly not for John Aynsley's long but very good presentation). The first set of videos is almost like spending a half-day at DVCon 2010 earlier this year, which sadly I missed this year! They also have some videos on YouTube but some of them are very short, so the netbook wins over the iPad as an educational platform once again. :-)

If you have more time, the following books have yet more detail. The David C. Black book is so far the most-recommended SystemC book I have found. The new TLM-Driven design book is currently price-reduced on Amazon to ~$85. The latter also is reported to be somewhat vendor-specific, but it is not clear what else really covers the HLS synthesis process from top to bottom.

SystemC: From the Ground Up, Second Edition

by David C. Black, Jack Donovan, Bill Bunton, Anna Keist

See this book on Amazon »

Connie is reading this book

TLM-Driven Design and Verification Methodology

by Brian Bailey, Felice Balarin, Michael McNamara, Guy Mosenson, Michael Stellfox, Yosinori Watanabe

See this book on Amazon »

And of course, as always, Doulos has all sorts of great stuff:

http://www.doulos.com/knowhow/systemc/

like this below, and much more:

For SystemC tutorials, answers to frequently asked questions and other SystemC resources, see below:

• NEW:Functional Coverage without SystemVerilog How to collect functional coverage information using VHDL or SystemC
• Dealing with Deprecated Features in SystemC 2.2
• New SystemC Standard
• Tutorial
• FAQ
• Resources
• Using Doxygen
• Utilities

Also, I welcome any perspective readers are willing to share on the following questions at the top of my brain:

Is there an open-source code coverage solution that works pretty well for SystemC, and is not too painful to set up? Or if you recommend a vendor solution, is it expensive, and is it worth it?

Is there an open-source linting solution that works pretty well for SystemC, and is not too painful to set up? Or if you recommend a vendor solution, is it expensive, and is it worth it?

And seemingly unrelated, but interesting to me nonetheless, as I assume that formal (property) verification is too immature for SystemC:

Do you know of a vendor-supplied formal (property) verification tool that is moderately priced, has a good verilog parsing engine, and is good enough at pruning away the parts of the logic irrelevant to a given property that it would be practical to apply to apply with relatively little design knowledge at a relatively high level, without one having to hand-abstract the design in a painful way? My immediate interest would not be formal property proof, but rather a coarse kind of design exploration of some fairly basic but pervasive functionality. And it is always nice if it has a vaguely english-like property language, of course.

(Don't tell me what is wrong with this question, I already know that this is not a recommended methodology, and that I am asking for a lot. I used to recommend FV methodology. Sheesh.)

Cheers,
Connie

Google Web History - pretty cool - check it out!

Oh, This is a cool new feature, I can use this!

https://www.google.com/history/?hl=en

Today  8:25am  Not starred Searched for  From 1717 View Point Rd, Boulder, CO 80305 To 906 Main Street, louisville, colorado    8:23am  Searched for  google maps  -   Viewed 1 result    Not starred Google Maps  -  google.com  -  Viewed 12 times  8:22am  Searched for  my maps on ipod  -   Viewed 1 result    Not starred Put Google MyMaps on iPhone/iPod Touch  -  adlr.info    7:46am  Not starred Searched for  From 1717 View Point Rd, Boulder, CO 80305 To 906 Main Street, louisville, colorado  7:46am  Not starred Searched for  906 Main Street, louisville, colorado   Yesterday  9:10pm  Searched for  open source systemc "code coverage" -cadence -mentor -synopsys

...

Check it out!

Cheers,
Connie

Computing Award for HS Girls, deadline 10/15

In case of interest...

Cheers,
Connie 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Aspirations Award <aspirations@ncwit.org>
Date: Tue, Oct 5, 2010 at 9:45 AM
Subject: Reminder: Computing Award for Girls (please share with your networks)
To: Aspirations Award <aspirations@ncwit.org>

Seeking Tech-savvy HS girls - Apply Now for the NCWIT Award for Aspirations in Computing

As part of an effort to encourage more young women to choose careers in technology, the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) seeks to recognize high school women with outstanding achievements and aspirations in computing and technology through the NCWIT Award for Aspirations in Computing. 

PLEASE help us spread the word about this competition with any K-12 or groups who serve young high school women!

National Award-winners receive:

• $500 in cash
• a laptop computer, provided by Bank of America
• a trip to attend the Bank of America Technology Showcase and Awards Ceremony in Charlotte, North Carolina
• an engraved award for both the student and the student's school

Affiliate Award-winners receive an engraved award for their home and school, and a range of great prizes from local sponsors. Visit Find a Competition to see details. We will be hosting local Affiliates in 18 locations including Puerto Rico!  Applicants in those areas are eligible to apply for BOTH local and national awards.

Young women in grades 9-12 interested in computing and technology are STRONGLY encouraged to apply.

Applications are due Friday, October 15 at 11:59PM ET.  Check out the Preparing Your Application guide to learn more about the application process and information needed. Instructions are also available in Spanish at www.ncwit.org/award!  

Please let us know if you have any questions and thank you so much for helping us spread the word about this exciting competition and opportunity for our young women interested in technology!

The Aspirations Award Team

aspirations@ncwit.org