Synthesis of hardware models in C with pointers and complex datastructures

摘要

One of the greatest challenges in a C/C++-based design methodologynis efficiently mapping C/C++ models into hardware. Many networking andnmultimedia applications implemented in hardware or mixednhardware/software systems now use complex data structures stored innmultiple memories, so many C/C++ features that were originally designednfor software applications are now making their way into hardware. Suchnfeatures include dynamic memory allocation and pointers for managingndata. We present a solution for efficiently mapping arbitrary C codenwith pointers and malloc/free into hardware. Our solution, which fitsncurrent memory management methodologies, instantiates annapplication-specific hardware memory allocator coupled with a memorynarchitecture. Our work also supports the resolution of pointers withoutnrestriction on the data structures. We present an implementation basednon the SUIF framework along with case studies such as the realization ofna video filter and an ATM segmentation engine