This book concentrates on common classes of hardware architectures and design problems, and focuses on the process of transitioning design requirements into synthesizable HDL code. Using his extensive, wide-ranging experience in computer architecture and hardware design, as well as in his training and consulting work, Ben provides numerous examples of real-life designs illustrated with VHDL and Verilog code. This code is shown in a way that makes it easy for the reader to gain a greater understanding of the languages and how they compare. All code presented in the book is included on the companion CD, along with other information, such as application notes.

The first edition of Principles of Verifiable RTL Design offered a common sense method for simplifying and unifying assertion specification by creating a set of predefined specification modules that could be instantiated within the designer's RTL. Since the release of the first edition, an entire industry-wide initiative for assertion specification has emerged based on ideas presented in the first edition. This initiative, known as the Open Verification Library Initiative (www.verificationlib.org), provides an assertion interface standard that enables the design engineer to capture many interesting properties of the design and precludes the need to introduce new HDL constructs (i.e., extensions to Verilog are not required). Furthermore, this standard enables the design engineer to `specify once,' then target the same RTL assertion specification over multiple verification processes, such as traditional simulation, semi-formal and formal verification tools. The Open Verification Library Initiative is an empowering technology that will benefit design and verification engineers while providing unity to the EDA community (e.g., providers of testbench generation tools, traditional simulators, commercial assertion checking support tools, symbolic simulation, and semi-formal and formal verification tools). The second edition of Principles of Verifiable RTL Design expands the discussion of assertion specification by including a new chapter entitled `Coverage, Events and Assertions'. All assertions exampled are aligned with the Open Verification Library Initiative proposed standard. Furthermore, the second edition provides expanded discussions on the following topics: start-up verification; the place for 4-state simulation; race conditions; RTL-style-synthesizable RTL (unambiguous mapping to gates); more `bad stuff'. The goal of the second edition is to keep the topic current. Principles of Verifiable RTL Design, A Functional Coding Style Supporting Verification Processes, Second Edition tells you how you can write Verilog to describe chip designs at the RTL level in a manner that cooperates with verification processes. This cooperation can return an order of magnitude improvement in performance and capacity from tools such as simulation and equivalence checkers. It reduces the labor costs of coverage and formal model checking by facilitating communication between the design engineer and the verification engineer. It also orients the RTL style to provide more useful results from the overall verification process.

SystemVerilog is a rich set of extensions to the IEEE 1364-2001 Verilog Hardware Description Language (Verilog HDL). These extensions address two major aspects of HDL based design. First, modeling very large designs with concise, accurate, and intuitive code. Second, writing high-level test programs to efficiently and effectively verify these large designs. This book, SystemVerilog for Design, addresses the first aspect of the SystemVerilog extensions to Verilog. Important modeling features are presented, such as two-state data types, enumerated types, user-defined types, structures, unions, and interfaces. Emphasis is placed on the proper usage of these enhancements for simulation and synthesis. A companion to this book, SystemVerilog for Verification, covers the second aspect of SystemVerilog.

The book is intended for digital and system design engineers with emphasis on design and system architecture. The book is broadly divided into two sections - chapters 1 through 10, focusing on the digital design aspects and chapters 11 through 20, focusing on the system aspects of chip design. It comes with real-world examples in Verilog and introduction to SystemVerilog Assertions (SVA).

The skills and guidance needed to master RTL hardware design This book teaches readers how to systematically design efficient, portable, and scalable Register Transfer Level (RTL) digital circuits using the VHDL hardware description language and synthesis software. Focusing on the module-level design, which is composed of functional units, routing circuit, and storage, the book illustrates the relationship between the VHDL constructs and the underlying hardware components, and shows how to develop codes that faithfully reflect the module-level design and can be synthesized into efficient gate-level implementation. Several unique features distinguish the book: * Coding style that shows a clear relationship between VHDL constructs and hardware components * Conceptual diagrams that illustrate the realization of VHDL codes * Emphasis on the code reuse * Practical examples that demonstrate and reinforce design concepts, procedures, and techniques * Two chapters on realizing sequential algorithms in hardware * Two chapters on scalable and parameterized designs and coding * One chapter covering the synchronization and interface between multiple clock domains Although the focus of the book is RTL synthesis, it also examines the synthesis task from the perspective of the overall development process. Readers learn good design practices and guidelines to ensure that an RTL design can accommodate future simulation, verification, and testing needs, and can be easily incorporated into a larger system or reused. Discussion is independent of technology and can be applied to both ASIC and FPGA devices. With a balanced presentation of fundamentals and practical examples, this is an excellent textbook for upper-level undergraduate or graduate courses in advanced digital logic. Engineers who need to make effective use of today's synthesis software and FPGA devices should also refer to this book.