Method and apparatus for circuit partitioning and trace assignment in circuit design
First Claim
1. A machine implemented method for designing at least one integrated circuit (IC), the method comprising:
- partitioning a circuit design into portions which represent a partitioning solution;
assigning nets to traces to interconnect the portions to generate a trace assignment solution; and
optimizing, by a data processing system, the circuit design through a modification of the partitioning solution, the optimizing based on evaluating a design parameter which is based at least in part on the trace assignment solution.
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Abstract
Methods and apparatuses for incremental circuit partitioning and incremental trace assignment. In one embodiment of the present invention, a cost function based on both the partitioning solution and the trace assignment solution is used for the partitioning of a circuit; in reducing the cost function, blocks of circuits are moved among partitions and the trace assignment are updated accordingly to evaluate the cost function. In one embodiment, the traces and nets are grouped according to the partitions they connect for trace assignment. In one embodiment, a flow diagram is constructed for assigning nets to traces; and, maximum flow algorithms are used. In one embodiment, a flow diagram includes feedthrough solutions, in which flow conservation is not preserved at certain nodes. In one embodiment, integer linear programming techniques are used for assigning nets to traces. In one embodiment, a distribution of nets, which defines the numbers of blocks that each net has in each partition, is computed and maintained for efficient determination of the number of nets in net groups.
32 Citations
21 Claims
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1. A machine implemented method for designing at least one integrated circuit (IC), the method comprising:
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partitioning a circuit design into portions which represent a partitioning solution; assigning nets to traces to interconnect the portions to generate a trace assignment solution; and optimizing, by a data processing system, the circuit design through a modification of the partitioning solution, the optimizing based on evaluating a design parameter which is based at least in part on the trace assignment solution. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
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8. A non-transitory machine readable medium containing executable computer program instructions which when executed by a data processing system cause said system to perform a method for designing at least one integrated circuit (IC), the method comprising:
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partitioning a circuit design into portions which represent a partitioning solution; assigning nets to traces to interconnect the portions to generate a trace assignment solution; and optimizing the circuit design through a modification of the partitioning solution, the optimizing based on evaluating a design parameter which is based at least in part on the trace assignment solution. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A data processing system for designing at least one integrated circuit (IC), the data processing system comprising:
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means for partitioning a circuit design into portions which represent a partitioning solution; means for assigning nets to traces to interconnect the portions to generate a trace assignment solution; and means for optimizing the circuit design through a modification of the partitioning solution, the circuit being optimized based on evaluating a design parameter which is based at least in part on the trace assignment solution. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
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Specification