SPIRIT IP-XACT Controlled Design Flow Applied on a High Level Communication Synthesis

OFFIS and Magillem Design Services have collaborated in the frame of a research project called ICODES. The overall goal of ICODES was to develop a new modeling and synthesis technology for embedded hardware/software systems, especially regarding communication aspects. The research topics consider modeling, evaluation and high-level communication synthesis of systems written in a language based on SystemC. The aim of this white paper is to present the result of the joined work to provide an efficient design flow based on IP-XACT.

As an introduction, this paper presents the OSSS library, its associate design methodology and synthesizer, the IP-XACT standard issued by the SPIRIT consortium, the MAGILLEM environment and the ICODES project context.

Then the OSSS methodology developed by OFFIS will be described. Especially the refinement of system communications by mapping an application layer model on different virtual target architectures will be presented in detail.

The third part explains how components and system description based on OSSS can be packaged in SPIRIT IP-XACT and how this packaging allows a semi-automated mapping of the application to the architectural layer and the integration of the OSSS design flow into the MAGILLEM environment.