Debug Data API In Action
First Debut of Working API at DVCon U.S. 2016
The Debug Data API is set to make its first public debut at a “meet up” of interested people at DVCon U.S. The meet up will be from 5:15pm – 5:45pm on Tuesday, March 1st in the Fir ballroom at the DoubleTree Hotel in San Jose, CA. You are invited to see a demonstration of a debug function written in C running on first prototypes from Mentor and Cadence that take a common design with simulation datasets from two simulators and produce identical debug results. In addition, we will present current status on the Debug Data API development and projected timeline of support. The industry has invested decades in access methods for live simulation, but common post simulation results data access has been generally limited to ASCII file dumps in the VCD or eVCD format that have reached their end-of-life.
For more complex designs, the one-engineer to one-simulator day has passed and long replaced by verification runs leveraging the Universal Verification Methodology (UVM) that is deeply connected to constrained random simulation techniques within simulation data centers that produce a magnitude more information. Add to that the impact of emulation and the massive amount of verification results is daunting and motivates us to support an industry-wide common data read API.
Register for DVCon
The Tuesday evening meet up will be during DVCon exhibition hours. If you have registered to attend DVCon U.S., you already have an exhibit pass. If you have not yet registered and only wish to attend this event, it is free, but you need to register for exhibit access. In addition to being able to attend the exhibition for free, Expo-only registrants can also attend panels and Wally Rhines’ keynote on Tuesday fee free as well.
The meet up is not the only place to learn more about the emerging prototype implementation of the Debug Data API. Feel free to visit the demo booths Monday – Wednesday to learn more. You will find Mentor Graphics at booth (#501). You can always stop me at DVCon too and I would be more than happy to update you on our progress and plans.
It was not too long ago at DAC 2015, a project to incubate a debug data API standard was launched and I blogged about the need for it. At DAC we demonstrated data exchange between simulation and debug environments and shared an overall architectural outline. Then in October 2015, the initial Debug Data API specification was released for public comment and input and I blogged about it at that time. This resulted in several months of industry interaction and a refined specification, which is now taking first implementation steps.
Join us Tuesday evening to witness and celebrate these first steps. See you at DVCon U.S.!
