Memory allocation and mapping in high-level synthesis - an integrated approach

• Published in: IEEE transactions on very large scale integration (VLSI) systems Vol. 11; no. 5; pp. 928 - 938
• Main Authors: Jaewon Seo, Taewhan Kim, Panda, P.R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway, NJ IEEE 01-10-2003; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Algorithm design and analysis; Allocations; Applied sciences; Arrays; Costs; Design automation; Design engineering; Electronics; Energy consumption; Exact sciences and technology; Exploration; Filters; Heuristic algorithms; Integer linear programming; Integrated circuits; Integrated circuits by function (including memories and processors); Random access memory; Registers; Semiconductor electronics. Microelectronics. Optoelectronics. Solid state devices; Space exploration; Specifications; Strategy; Synthesis; Very large scale integration; memory allocation; SRAM chips; High-level synthesis; memory mapping; Behavioral analysis; DRAM chips; Mapping; Scheduling; Circuit synthesis; High level synthesis; Storage allocation; Algorithm
• ISSN: 1063-8210; 1557-9999
• DOI: 10.1109/TVLSI.2003.817116

With the increasing design complexity and performance requirement, data arrays in behavioral specification are usually mapped to memories in behavioral synthesis. This paper describes a new algorithm that overcomes two limitations of the previous works on the problem of memory-allocation and array-mapping to memories. Specifically, its key features are a tight link to the scheduling effect, which was totally or partially ignored by the existing memory synthesis systems, and supporting nonuniform access speeds among the ports of memories, which greatly diversify the possible (practical) memory configurations. Experimental data on a set of benchmark filter designs are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed exploration strategy in finding globally best memory configurations.