Introduction P. Marwedel 1 New, flexible target technologies As the tendency towards more complex electronic systems continues, many of these systems are equipped with embedded processors. For example, such processors can be found in cars, and in audio-, video-, and telecommunication-equipment. Essential advantages of these processors include their high flexibility, short design time and (in the case of off-the-shelf processors) full-custom layout quality. Furthermore, they allow an easy implementation of optional product features as well as easy design correction and upgrading. Furthermore, processors are frequently used in cases where the systems must be extremely dependable 1 [32]. In such cases, the re-use of the design of an off-the-shelf processor greatly simplifies dependability analysis. This contrasts with the limitations of application-specific circuits (ASICs): due to their low flexibility, the cost for the desig

This tutorial responds to the rapidly increasing use of various cores for implementing systems-on-a-chip. It specifically focusses on processor cores. We will give some examples of cores, including DSP cores and application-specific instruction-set processors (ASIPs). We will mention market trends for these components, and we will touch design procedures, in particular the use compilers. Finally, we will discuss the problem of testing corebased designs. Existing solutions include boundary scan, embedded in-circuit emulation (ICE), the use of processor resources for stimuli/response compaction and self-test programs. I. Introduction In response to the increasing size of advanced chips and the continuing need for fast design cycles, a major amount of new designs is using complex cores (rather than standard cells and macroblocks) as building blocks. Such cores include: processor cores, communication cores, bus interface cores, and memory cores. These cores are available both from vendors...

This tutorial responds to the rapidly increasing use of cores in general and of processor cores in particular for implementing systems-on-a-chip. In the first part of this text, we will provide a brief introduction to various cores. Applications can be found in most segments of the embedded systems market. These applications demand for extreme efficiency, and in particular for efficient processorarchitecturesand for efficient embedded software. In the second part of this text, we will show that current compilers do not provide the required efficiency and we will give an overview over new compiler optimization techniques,which aim at making assembly language programming for embedded software obsolete. Thesenew techniquestake advantageof the special characteristics of embedded software and embedded architectures. Due to efficiency considerations, processorarchitecturesoptimized for application domains or even for particular applications are of interest. This results in a large number of ...