Improving the Quality of Fractured Mask Data through In-place Optimization of the Fracturing Solution

摘要

In this paper, we present the idea of (in-place) substitution of the fracture solution for some of the badly or non-uniformly fractured instances of polygons, by a better fracture solution. Polygons could be categorized as badly or non-uniformly fractured based on the values of various quality metrics - such as number of generated trapezoids, number of slivers, uniformity in fracturing etc. The inferior quality of fracture solution may be due to sub-optimal fracturing. This In-Place Optimization (IPO) strategy proposes a solution wherein rather than carrying out a complete re-fracturing of the mask data, the QoR of fractured data can be improved "in-place" through applying patches to the hotspots of badly or non-uniformly fractured polygons.The proposed IPO scheme is flexible enough to classify the QoR of a fractured solution of a polygon using externally defined parameters or formulae. In a way, the users responsible for mask MDP can categorize the quality of a fractured solution as good or bad through defining some criteria externally to the tool. The IPO scheme allows internal substitution, where a better fracture solution for any given polygon is found within the same fracture data at some other instance of the polygon, or external substitution where a better fracturing solution is generated using a third party fracturing tool or by using the same fracturing tool with different inputs. Since this IPO technique modifies the fractured mask data, it is mandatory to have a built-in validation scheme which is discussed in detail.