The Future in the eyes of the author

1
The Future (in the eyes of the author)

• Chapter 10

2
Reconfigurable System

• We know how to do it with software
• Just download a new system image and go
• What about hardware?
• You certainly cannot do it with component level
  designs like we create in class
• You certainly cannot do it with Application
  Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) devices built
  during the development cycle at a fab house
• But what about programmable hardware?

3
Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)

• Weve talked about this type of device in
  previous lectures
• Its basically a bunch of gates and a big
  cross-bar switch into which any circuit (of
  appropriate size) can be programmed
• In reality the bunch of gates are look-up
  tables that can implement any logic expression --
  not just AND, OR, NOT
• What if part of that device is a processor core?
• What if part of that device is general purpose
  memory?
• What we end up with is the BasicStamp BOE on a
  single chip!

4
Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)

• As discussed earlier, developers have been
  designing with FPGAs for a long time
• Rapid prototyping
• Design experimentation
• Actual product (if you can tolerate the cost)
• Once a design is deemed satisfactory it is
  relegated to ASIC status
• Assuming you plan on selling enough to make them
  cost effective

5
Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)

• The point is that you can put as many different
  designs as you want into the exact same piece of
  FPGA hardware
• This is typically done at design time
• But, there are researchers looking at real time
  reconfigurability with FPGAs
• Reconfigurable Computing A Survey of Systems
  and Software, Katherine Compton and Scott Hauck,
  ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. 34, No. 2, June 2002,
  pp. 171-210

6
When the Designer is the Customer

• We generally think of the customer as the buyer
  or end user of our designs
• But, we too are customers
• Tool vendors
• Hardware vendors
• Processor vendors
• Fabrication houses
• etc.
• Chapter 10 tells a story of a design team as a
  customer -- this is very close to how things are
  in the business
• You should read this if for no other reason as to
  understand how to make customers happy