First IEEE Programming Challenge at IWLS
For the first time in the history of the
International Workshop for Logic Synthesis
(IWLS) we are launching a programming challenge sponsored by the
IEEE Council on Electronic Design Automation (CEDA).
With this programming challenge we would like to build and foster a
new open source logic synthesis system which will provide the base
for future comprehensive EDA tool flows. Our long term goal is to
build a complete RTL-to-layout implementation flow that also includes
physical synthesis and optimization steps.
Individual students as well as teams of multiple students are
encouraged to participate in this challenge to either implement their
current research on this platform or to implement known and published
synthesis algorithms as
part of their education. For students who want to participate but
lack concrete ideas, we have a
list with suggestions of algorithms to implement.
The challenge is to implement one or more logic optimization
algorithms on the industrial EDA database OpenAccess. The algorithms
should make maximum use of the OpenAccess data base, be implemented in
a native manner and
adhere to the coding conventions of OpenAccess.
The algorithm should be implemented within the OA Gear
infrastructure.
OA Gear
provides an RTL-Verilog reader
and synthesis into a technology independent netlist (and-inverter
graph), a simple mapper which directly maps the nodes of the
and-inverter graph onto a specified set of three library elements
(AND, NOT, FF), accurate timing analysis with slew propagation,
and a simple equivalence checker which is based on the
and-inverter graph representation.
The technology dependent optimization algorithms should be
implemented directly on OpenAccess, technology independent optimization
algorithms should use
the functional layer in OA Gear, in the package Func, together with
the and-inverter graph (AIG) package. The results of the
technology dependent algorithms are evaluated by performing accurate
timing analysis and preferably use incremental timing analysis of the
OA Gear timer.
In addition to working on synthesis another possibility is to
implement an efficient equivalence checker.
We are thankful to the following organizations and companies for financial support:
- For a fixed number of significant contributions selected by
a jury:
A travel grant for one team member to attend IWLS including airfare (up
to a fixed cap), full registration, and lodging.
- For a single outstanding contribution selected by a jury:
In addition to the travel grant a cash prize of $500 for the selected
team.
Only full-time students registered during the spring 2006 semester
are eligible to participate. The winners will be invited to either give
a
talk or present a poster as part of the workshop program.
Submission deadline for preliminary version of
two-page technical paper |
April 15, 2006 |
Submission deadline for the final two-page
technical paper |
May 1, 2006 |
| Submission deadline for source code |
May 1, 2006 |
| Notification of winners of travel grants |
May 15, 2006 |
| IWLS workshop (near Denver, CO) |
June 7-9, 2006 |
All dates refer to midnight PST.
Please note, that these deadlines are strict.
Submissions that are received after this deadline will not be
considered.
The winners of the prizes will be selected by a jury of the IWLS
Programming Challenge Committee. The judges will grade entries using
the following criteria:
Si2 supports the programming challenge by distributing the software.
Details for obtaining an Si2 account and for downloading and installing
the IWLS challenge software are described in
this document.
Once you have obained an Si2account we encourage you to sign up for
the project list iwls_challenge_news of
the challenge website at Si2
(Si2 account required).
This forum will provide information about updates of the programming
environment and discuss questions and problems participants encounter
as they work on the project.
How to Enter
All participants have
to write a two-page technical paper which describes the algorithm,
the implementation and computational results. A preliminary version
is due by midnight (PST) April 15, 2006 and the final version
is due by midnight (PST) May 1, 2006. The papers have to be
submitted via e-mail to iwlschallenge@si2.org.
When sending an email to this address the "from" email address
has to be the address registered with your Si2 account.
All the technical papers will be published in the workshop
proceedings.
The source code has to be submitted as a gzipped tar file via e-mail
to
iwlschallenge@si2.org.
by midnight (PST) May 1, 2006 together with the final
technical paper. Your code should
be in one separate directory of the OA Gear package and compile in
this environment on one of the supported platforms. We also ask you to
add
meaningful output logfiles and scripts which run the benchmarks and a
README file so that we can reproduce the results.
You need to agree that your source code may be released after the
workshop as part of the OA Gear project under the OA Gear license. This
is an
essential requirement to ensure that your contribution can become part
of the EDA flow.
Discussion Forum
The challenge
website at Si2 (Si2 account required) has a discussion forum
where you can
discuss any ideas and problems related to the programming challenge
with other participants.
Questions
Once you have received an account from Si2 for the programming
challenge you can contact us at iwlschallenge@si2.org.
The IEEE Programming Challenge at IWLS Co-Chairs
Christoph Albrecht and Florian Krohm