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6.884

Complex Digital Systems

Graduate · Historical course

Spring 2005

This course is offered to graduates and is a project-oriented course to teach new methodologies for designing multi-million-gate CMOS VLSI chips using high-level synthesis tools in conjunction with standard commercial EDA tools. The emphasis is on modular and robust designs, reusable modules, correctness by construction, architectural exploration, and meeting the area, timing, and power constraints within standard cell and FPGA frameworks.

Readings

  • Palnitkar, Samir. Verilog HDL: A Guide to Digital Design and Synthesis. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2003. ISBN: 0130449113. A good introduction to Verilog-2001 well suited for the beginner.
    Listed reading
  • Smith, Douglas. HDL Chip Design . Madison, AL: Doone Publishing, 2001. ISBN: 0965193438. A great book for the intermediate Verilog designer. Clearly outlines the relationship between Verilog models and the corresponding synthesized circuit.
    Listed reading
  • Weste, Neil, and Kamran Eshraghian. Principles of CMOS VLSI Design: A Systems Perspective. 2nd ed. Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1994. ISBN: 0201533766. Covers a wide range of digital design topics from circuits to micro-architecture.
    Listed reading
  • Smith, Michael. Application-Specific Integrated Circuits . Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1997. ISBN: 0201500221. A useful reference on many of the lower-level details about synthesis, place and route, and FPGA mapping.
    Listed reading
  • Rabaey, Jan, Anantha Chandrakasan, and Borivoje Nikolic. Digital Integrated Circuits: A Design Perspective . Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2002. ISBN: 0130909963. Classic text on desiging digital circuits. Most of the information in this book is below the level of design we will be using in 6.884, but it is a valuable resource for learning more about the circuits we are synthesizing to.
    Listed reading
  • Sutherland, Ivan, Robert Sproull, and David Harris. Logical Effort: Designing Fast CMOS Circuits . San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufman, 1999. ISBN: 1558605576. This book introduces a framework for simple back-of-the-envelope calculations useful when designing CMOS circuits. The first chapter is available online.
    Listed reading
  • Sweetman, Dominic. See MIPS Run . San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufman, 1999. ISBN: 1558604103. A very readable book about the MIPS architecture for assembly level programmers.
    Listed reading
Sources