New Technologies for Very Large-Scale Electronic Design Automation

电子设计自动化领域涉及开发能够使电子设备的设计过程自动化的软件。电子工业以设计复杂性和由此产生的电路性能的指数级增长而闻名[1]。与此同时，在其他领域也在开发新的技术来解决难题，例如机器学习、MapReduce编程模型和高性能计算系统。以下概述的研究计划旨在开发使用新技术来解决电子设计自动化中的超大规模问题的新方法。外地面临的主要挑战与规模问题有关。例如，在创建具有数十亿个元件的电路时出现的超大规模问题。行业不断感受到压力，需要迅速为计算机、手机和平板电脑等竞争对手的电子产品制造商制造设备。自动化是能够快速设计的关键，但最具挑战性的设计需要设计师进行大量干预，以便为每个设计配置软件。在汇聚成符合产品规格的最终设计之前，设计可能会发生多次迭代。对于尖端电路，设计过程可能需要几个月到一年多的时间。因此，这些目标可能无法及时实现，赶不上制片人的最后期限。未能在最后期限前完成可能相当于巨大的损失和未来业务客户的损失。所有这些因素都支持了以前所未有的规模解决大问题的研究。该研究计划的最终目标是开发几个部分，这将是高度可扩展的设计自动化工具的开始。该工具将通过云服务提供，在云服务中，计算核心的数量是有弹性的，实际上是无限的。消费者将能够拥有任意大小的设计，并根据他们需要制造电路的速度来支付或多或少的计算资源。拥有这样的工具将极大地造福于行业，该提案中描述的项目将使这一愿景更接近现实，并激励其他研究人员追求类似的目标。提案中讨论的项目对价值数十亿美元的电子设计行业有直接影响。然而，这项研究也涉及对加拿大具有战略重要性的主题。与NSERC在信息和通信技术方面的战略拨款目标领域的重叠就是明证，这些领域强调与行业的密切联系，并认识到研究、合作、技术和资金影响的市场潜力，以及在五年内实现研究的价值。特别是下一代计算平台的类别：云计算，从数据到知识到行动：非结构化模式识别，以及人工智能中的高级应用。拟议的研究计划也得到了系的支持，并与卡尔加里大学的战略研究计划保持一致，即到2016年成为加拿大前五名研究型大学。拟议的研究计划在平衡、好奇心、合作、交流、全球化和卓越等类别上与Eyes的高级战略愿景保持一致。总而言之，它们支持投资于具有全球影响的新调查路线的项目，并鼓励跨学科合作。

The field of electronic design automation is concerned with creating software capable of automating the process of designing electronic devices. The electronics industry is known for exponential increases in design complexity and performance of resulting circuits [1]. At the same time, new technologies are being developed in other fields to solve difficult problems, for example, machine learning, MapReduce programming models, and high performance computing systems. The research program outlined in what follows is aimed at developing new ways to solve very large scale problems in electronic design automation using new technologies. Major challenges being faced in the field are related to problems arising from scale. For example, the very large-scale problems arising out of creating circuits with billions of components. Industry is constantly feeling pressure to quickly create devices for competitive producers of electronics including computers, phones, and tablets. Automation is the key to being able to design quickly, yet the most challenging designs require substantial intervention from designers to configure the software for each design. Many iterations of a design can take place before converging to a final design meeting product specifications. The design process may take between several months to over a year for cutting-edge circuits. Hence, the targets may not be met in time to meet the producer’s deadlines. Failing to meet a deadline can equate to big losses and loss of future customers in business. These factors all go to support research into solving large problems at scales never previously seen before. The ultimate goal of the research program is to develop several pieces which will be the beginning of a highly scalable design automation tool. The tool will be available through a cloud service where the number of computing cores is elastic and practically limitless. Consumers would be able to have designs of arbitrary size and pay for more or less computing resources depending on how quickly they need the circuit fabricated. Having such a tool would greatly benefit industry and the projects described in this proposal will bring this vision closer to reality and inspire other researchers to pursue a similar goal. The projects discussed in the proposal have a direct impact on the multi-billion dollar electronic design industry. However, the research also involves topics that are of strategic importance to Canada. This is evidenced by the overlap with NSERC's strategic grants target areas in information and communication technologies that emphasize a close connection with industry and recognize market potential of research, collaboration, technical and financial implications, and realizing value of the research within five years. In particular, the categories of Next Generation Computing Platforms: cloud computing, From Data to Knowledge to Action: unstructured pattern recognition, and advanced applications in artificial intelligence. The proposed research program also has the support of the department and aligns with the University of Calgary’s strategic research plans to become a top five Canadian research university by 2016. The proposed research program aligns with the Eyes High strategic vision in the categories of balance, curiosity, collaboration, communication, globalization, and excellence. Taken together, they support programs invested in new lines of inquiry with a global impact and encourage interdisciplinary collaboration.