Jasper User Group Keynotes

Jasper User Group Keynotes
by Paul McLellan on 11-13-2012 at 1:31 pm

I attended the Jasper User Group this week, at least the keynotes, the first by Kathryn Kranen the CEO of Jasper and the second by Bob Bentley of Intel.

Kathryn went over some history, going back to when the company was started (under the name Tempus Fugit) back in August 2002 with a single product for protocol verification. Now, since… Read More


Next Generation FPGA Prototyping

Next Generation FPGA Prototyping
by Paul McLellan on 11-12-2012 at 7:00 am

One technology that has quietly gone mainstream in semiconductor design is FPGA prototyping. That is, using an FPGA version of the design to run extensive verification. There are two approaches to doing this. The first way is simply to build an prototype board, buy some FPGAs from Xilinx or Altera and do everything yourself. The… Read More


Smartphone Market Share

Smartphone Market Share
by Paul McLellan on 11-09-2012 at 12:47 pm

The numbers for smartphone sales in Q3 are starting to roll in. These are in units and not yet revenue (let alone profit) numbers although everyone down to Sony is for sure profitable. Samsung is running away with the volume, selling more than Apple, Huawei and Sony put together. One name that is missing is Motorola (Google) which … Read More


Carbon has Six Weeks of ARM, not to Mention Imagination and MIPS

Carbon has Six Weeks of ARM, not to Mention Imagination and MIPS
by Paul McLellan on 11-09-2012 at 12:18 pm

As George E.P. Box said, “essentially all models are wrong but some are useful.” That is certainly the case with Carbon’s models. For processors they have two models, one that is fast (but not timing-accurate) and one that is accurate (but not fast). But both are useful.

Carbon attended the ARM TechCon in Santa… Read More


ICCAD at 30: Alberto Looks Back and Forward

ICCAD at 30: Alberto Looks Back and Forward
by Paul McLellan on 11-08-2012 at 8:10 pm

At ICCAD earlier this week, CEDA sponsored a talk by Alberto Sangiovanni-Vincentelli looking back over the last 30 years (it is the 30th anniversary of ICCAD) and looking to the future. As is always the case in these sorts of presentations, the retrospective contained a lot more detail than the going forward part. Clayton Christensen… Read More


IJTAG, Testing Large SoCs

IJTAG, Testing Large SoCs
by Paul McLellan on 11-08-2012 at 5:57 pm

Test is the Rodney Dangerfield of EDA, it doesn’t get any respect. All designs need to be tested but somehow synthesis, routing, analog layout and the rest are the sexy areas. In my spoof all purpose EDA keynote address I even dissed it:You are short on time so slip in a quick mention of manufacturing test. Who knows anything … Read More


Gustafson on Parallel Algorithms

Gustafson on Parallel Algorithms
by Paul McLellan on 11-05-2012 at 4:54 pm

At the keynote for ICCAD this morning, John Gustafson of AMD (where he is Chief Graphics Product Architect as well as a Fellow) talked about parallel algorithms. Like Gene Amdahl, whose law states that parallel algorithms are limited by the part that cannot be parallelized (if 10% is serial, then even if the other part takes place… Read More


Internet of Things

Internet of Things
by Paul McLellan on 11-01-2012 at 8:10 pm

Another announcement from the Warren East’s ARM keynote this morning was the creation of a SIG within Weightless, which is an organization responsible for delivering royalty-free open standards to enable the Internet of Things (IoT). The SIG is focused on accelerating the adoption of Weightless as a wireless wide area… Read More


Jasper Apps White Paper

Jasper Apps White Paper
by Paul McLellan on 11-01-2012 at 7:30 pm

Just in time for the Jasper User Group meeting, Jasper have a new white paper explaining the concept of JasperGold Apps.

First the User Group Meeting. It is in Cupertino at the Cypress Hotel November 12-13th. For more details and to register, go here. The meeting is free for qualified attendees (aka users). One thing I noticed at the… Read More


SpyGlass IP Kit 2.0

SpyGlass IP Kit 2.0
by Paul McLellan on 11-01-2012 at 6:00 pm

On Halloween, Atrenta and TSMC announced the availability of SpyGlass IP Kit 2.0. IP Kit is a fundamental element of TSMC’s soft IP9000 Quality Assessment program that assesses the robustness and completeness of soft (synthesizable) IP.

IP Kit 2.0 will be fully supported on TSMC-Online and available to all TSMC’s soft IP alliance… Read More