Advanced system C tracing and analysis framework for extra-functional properties

Abstract

System-level simulations are an important part in the design flow for today’s complex systems-on-a-chip. Trade-off analysis during architectural exploration as well as run-time reconfiguration of applications and their mapping require detailed introspection of the dynamic effects on the target platform. Additionally, extra-functional properties like power consumption and performance characteristics are important metrics to assess the quality of a design. In this paper, we present an advanced framework for instrumentation, pre-processing and recording of functional and extra-functional properties in SystemC-based virtual prototyping simulations.The framework is based on a hierarchy of so-called timed value streams, allowing to address the requirements for highly configurable, dynamic architectures while allowing tailored introspection of the required system characteristics under analysis.