IBIS Macromodel Task Group Meeting date: 15 January 2010 Members (asterisk for those attending): Adge Hawes, IBM * Ambrish Varma, Cadence Design Systems Anders Ekholm, Ericsson * Arpad Muranyi, Mentor Graphics Corp. Barry Katz, SiSoft * Bob Ross, Teraspeed Consulting Group Brad Brim, Sigrity Brad Griffin, Cadence Design Systems Chris Herrick, Ansoft Chris McGrath, Synopsys * Danil Kirsanov, Ansoft David Banas, Xilinx Deepak Ramaswany, Ansoft Donald Telian, consultant Doug White, Cisco Systems * Eckhard Lenski, Nokia-Siemens Networks Eckhard Miersch, Sigrity Essaid Bensoudane, ST Microelectronics * Fangyi Rao, Agilent Ganesh Narayanaswamy, ST Micro Gang Kang, Sigrity Hemant Shah, Cadence Design Systems Ian Dodd, consultant Jerry Chuang, Xilinx Joe Abler, IBM * John Angulo, Mentor Graphics John Shields, Mentor Graphics Ken Willis, Cadence Design Systems Kumar Keshavan, Sigrity Lance Wang, Cadence Design Systems Luis Boluna, Cisco Systems Michael Mirmak, Intel Corp. * Mike LaBonte, Cisco Systems Mike Steinberger, SiSoft Mustansir Fanaswalla, Xilinx Patrick O'Halloran, Tiburon Design Automation Paul Fernando, NCSU Pavani Jella, TI Radek Biernacki, Agilent (EESof) * Randy Wolff, Micron Technology Ray Komow, Cadence Design Systems Richard Mellitz, Intel Richard Ward, Texas Instruments Samuel Mertens, Ansoft Sam Chitwood, Sigrity Sanjeev Gupta, Agilent Shangli Wu, Cadence Design Systems Sid Singh, Extreme Networks Stephen Scearce, Cisco Systems Steve Kaufer, Mentor Graphics Steve Pytel, Ansoft Syed Huq, Cisco Systems Syed Sadeghi, ST Micro Ted Mido, Synopsys Terry Jernberg, Cadence Design Systems * Todd Westerhoff, SiSoft Vladimir Dmitriev-Zdorov, Mentor Graphics Vikas Gupta, Xilinx Vuk Borich, Agilent * Walter Katz, SiSoft Zhen Mu, Mentor Graphics ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Opens: - Mike is unable to take minutes next week - Randy will take minutes -------------------------- Call for patent disclosure: - No one declared a patent. ------------- Review of ARs: - Walter add root/branch/leaf definitions and other changes to BIRD - Done - Mike post Walter's BIRD update - Done - Bob suggest .ami/DLL relationship language for BIRD - Walter's draft looks good - It is about the EDA tool relationship to the .ami file - Arpad: We will call this done - Arpad: Write a clarification BIRD to discuss accuracy issues related to the various AMI clock_tick algorithms in an IBIS-AMI DLL - TBD - Todd: Update the BIRD for IBIS S-parameter box based on feedback from discussion - No update - Arpad: Write parameter passing syntax proposal (BIRD draft) for *-AMS models in IBIS that is consistent with the parameter passing syntax of the AMI models - TBD - TBD: Propose a parameter passing syntax for the SPICE - [External ...] also? - TBD - Arpad: Review the documentation (annotation) in the macro libraries. - Deferred until a demand arises or we have nothing else to do ------------- New Discussion: Walter showed the draft AMI BIRD document: - Red is deleted, blue added or modified, black original - Walter: This is about how data are moved in and out of the DLL - We had decided to use parameter trees like .ami instead of column oriented - Trees have: - one root - branches with nested levels - leafs with values - Arpad: The document uses leaf and parameter interchangeably - We should have another tree showing leaf, etc. - Walter: I am calling all values arrays - Whitespace in strings is limited to blanks and tabs - Arpad: What is a string? - Walter: Descriptions and quoted strings - Walter: Numbers can not have a scale suffix - Mike: Do parameter trees have exactly 3 levels? - Walter: No, but I would not have written it this way (BNF) - Ambrish: Mike Steinberger introduced this - Maybe he should explain it - Bob: The entire param tree passed to the DLL is also a string - Arpad: #8 should say "or decimal number" - Walter: It should be "integer number" - Walter: Sub-parameters are below parameters - Bob said that term conflicts with IBIS sub-parameters - Bob: It should just explain how sub-parameter is used here. - This is minor - Walter: Ambrish said the EDA tool needs to have reserved parameters marked - Ambrish: Previously we had Reserved. - There may be confusion now - Walter: The original proposal had the Reserved param DCD passed both ways - Walter: Root and branch names are case-sensitive - Names can not differ by case alone - This allows EDA tools to write case-insensitive parsers - Arpad: Can a branch have 3 different Usage sub-parameters? - Walter: Yes - Bob: There might be cases where the order matters - Mike: We should specify that there can be no duplicate names within a branch - Walter: There can be several taps with unique names - Ambrish: We should recommend good programming practices for DLLs - Bob: There is nothing in the spec about order of AMI_Init - Walter: All sub-branches and sub-leafs are order independent - Bob: Nothing is order dependent - Fangyi: Arrays are order dependent - and Range - Fangyi: Are tap names ordered? - Walter: The names must be a number to designate order - This should be reviewed - Bob: The section on reserved names might eventually move elsewhere - Walter: AMISearchPath should be used by the EDA tool - This includes IBISCHK - Walter: Kumar asked if the env names have to be standard? - Mike: Search paths are useful, but models as delivered do not have paths - This is just an EDA tool recommendation - Should we have it in a specification? - Walter: We should set the expectation that EDA tools will do this - Bob: Delivered models may be in hierarchies with paths - Mike: Those would be relative paths - Bob: I'm OK with having this - Walter: Carriage returns are not allowed in strings - Bob: This may force very long strings - Bob: File paths can have spaces - Walter: We restrict that - Bob: IBIS has a legacy 128 character constraint, but AMI should have none - Walter: We should have NA where values have no constraint - Arpad: This applies to InOut as well as In - Bob: This is starting to require cross reference tables - Fangyi: This has to apply to Info too - Walter: NA is needed for Range types - Bob: Do we really want NA? - Mike: Typ may have to be NA - Ambrish: Does typ have to be less than max? - Walter: This is not the same as IBIS typ/slow/fast - Walter: Labels are important - They identify items in the lists - Mike: Increment can have a min, max and delta that doesn't line up with typ - Bob: IBIS has a strong concept of typ, but that doesn't apply here - Walter: These are used by IC vendors - Default has been a problem - It is now optional - Corner correlates to process while Range does not - Bob: Do Range and List overlap? - Walter: Range can be anything in between - The explanations could be more clear - Bob: There should be one rule that EDA tools use Default if present AR: Walter email BIRD to group AR: Mike convert Walter's BIRD to PDF and post to web Next meeting: 19 Jan 2009 12:00pm PT -------- IBIS Interconnect SPICE Wish List: 1) Simulator directives