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IBIS INTERCONNECT MODELING AD HOC TASK GROUP MEETING MINUTES AND AGENDA

http://www.eda.org/ibis/adhoc/interconnect/

Mailing list: ibis-interconn@freelists.org

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Next Meeting
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
8 AM US Pacific Time

               Telephone     Bridge   Passcode
              916-356-2663     3      455-2001

LiveMeeting* may not be available for this meeting; updates
will be posted separately.

Agenda:
- Call for patents
- Opens
- Review of latest version of the document
- Discussion on Interconnect Port Groups

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Minutes from September 10:

Attendees:
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(* denotes present)
Agilent                    - Radek Biernacki*, John Moore, Ken Wong
Ansoft                     - Denis Soldo
Cadence Design Systems     - Terry Jernberg, Brad Griffin
Green Streak Programs      - Lynne Green
Hewlett-Packard            - Rob Elliott
Intel                      - Michael Mirmak*
Mentor Graphics Corp.      - John Angulo, Vladimir Dmitriev-Zdorov*
Micron Technology          - Randy Wolff
Sigrity                    - Sam Chitwood, Raymond Y. Chen, Tao Su, Brad Brim
SiSoft                     - Walter Katz*
Teraspeed Consulting Group - Bob Ross*

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No patents were announced.

Michael asked about moving the meeting time, possibly to 8 AM US Pacific.
Bob and Radek indicated this would be acceptable.  Michael will distribute
a poll question on the meeting time and day to the Interconnect mailing list.

Michael also raised a question regarding relationship between ICM, Touchstone
and this task group: should ICM updates and changes be handled here once
Touchstone work is completed?  How should this work relate to the 
Advanced Technology Modeling task group, which may create a superset
specification that includes the functions of ICM?  Bob suggested that
ICM updates and changes continue to be handled by this organization.

Changes to the main Touchstone 2.0 document were discussed by the team.
- Bob and Radek noted that on p. 8, the new [Reference] rule should restate
  the old rule, to match the example on p. 3
- Radek suggested moving the discussion of mixed-mode ordering concepts
  before the actual [Mixed-Mode Order] keyword definition
- Radek and Vladimir also suggested that the word "relationships" as 
  used for [Mixed-Mode Order] groups be changed to "descriptors," "types"
  or another term
- Vladimir noted that the [Reference] keyword in the example is still not 
  correct: this should be 50 75 50 75 0.01 0.01
- Vladimir also observed that example A-2 should state "admittance" not
  "conductance"
- the team also discussed using another letter rather than I for the identity
  matrix; I should be maintained as current only, while E or bolded 1 should
  be used as the identity matrix

The team briefly discussed Interconnect Port Groups.  Bob noted that he
is "not a fan" of the keyword, noting that it will effectively be optional
and informational-only, as it cannot be checked (similar to the comment
character).  Connections between terminals should be external, not internal, 
in his opinion.  In addition, he stated he believed it should not be required 
of all ports.  Radek agreed that terminal connections should be outside the 
file.  Enforcing consistency with internal and external connectivity is 
difficult.  

Walter noted three reasons why Touchstone connectivity is required within
the file:
- for StatEye and other tools which use S-parameters for passive
  interconnect characterization and must have clear and automated means
  to know the "sides" of the interconnect
- to avoid requiring computation to figure out the low-impedance path
  between interconnect end terminals
- for tying near-end and far-end terminals of cables and connectors 
  correctly in interconnect simulations

The team will continue these discussions in the next meeting.

ARs:
Bob - check IEEE style guide
Michael - provide draft document to Bob for equation editing
Michael - distribute updated document featuring both team suggested
          changes and Bob's edited equations       

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Team Objectives:
1) complete ICM-IBIS linking BIRD and any associated changes to the
   ICM specification
2) update the ICM specification, if needed, to clarify the mapping of
   ICM nodes to S-parameter ports
3) complete a specification for "Touchstone Plus" or similar
   industry-standard definition for Touchstone-like files, to include
   complex impedance references, removal of limits on the maximum number
   of ports and per-port impedance references

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