International Research Journal of Engineering and Technology (IRJET) e-ISSN: 2395-0056
Volume: 04 Issue: 10 | Oct -2017 www.irjet.net p-ISSN: 2395-0072
© 2017, IRJET | Impact Factor value: 5.181 | ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal | Page 448
Netlist Optimization for CMOS Place and Route in MICROWIND
Mahesh G. Jaiswal
1
, Varsha Bendre
2
, Vinay Sharma
3
1
PG Scholar, Dept. of ME VLSI & Embedded, PCCOE Pune, Maharashtra, India
2
Assistant Professor, Dept. of ME VLSI & Embedded, PCCOE Pune, Maharashtra, India
3
Technical Director, Ni Logic Pvt. Ltd. Pune, Maharashtra, India
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Abstract - Microwind is a software tool which is used for
CMOS IC layout design. The gate level design is created in
schematic editor and simulator tool DSCH. The transistor size
in the last few decades is shrinking drastically with the rapid
advancement of VLSI technology to integrate more number of
transistors on a single IC chip. This will indirectly affect the
complexity in the placement and routing of the logic devices.
And for any tool it is always a challenging task to make an
efficient placement and routing of the cells. One of the EDA
tool for CMOS design is MICROWIND, which uses a verilog net
list generated by a schematic editor DSCH. This paper focuses
on improvement in Microwind tool by implementing a logic
optimization method for rearranging verilog net list according
to interconnect wire nodes and number of logic cells like CMOS
inverter, AND, OR etc. gates using MOS at 120nm technology
and using FINFETs at 14nm technology. Our algorithm will
rearrange net list and cells without reducing the actual
transistors count. Therefore only the total numbers of metal
layers, area of chip and interconnect delay etc. will get
reduced to produce an optimum design.
Key Words: Area, DSCH, Frontend-Backend design, Logic
Synthesis, MICROWIND, Net list, Optimize, Placement,
Routing, etc.
1. INTRODUCTION
VLSI is the process of combining thousands of transistors
into single Integrated Circuit (IC) chip. Interconnecting wires
length increases with the increase in transistors in the
circuit. It is difficult to reduce the capacitive and resistive
effects which have an impact on time delay. The
interconnecting wires also have fixed area and width making
length as the only controllable parameter. Due to this there
is a need of optimization techniques in VLSI design. In a
Hardware Description Language like Verilog or VHDL, a net
list is a description of all the devices or gates and all of the
connections or wires between each device. In its simplest
form, a net list consists of a list of the terminals (i.e. "pins")
of the electronic components in a circuit and a list of the
electrical conductors that interconnect the terminals. A net is
a conductor that interconnects two or more component
terminals. [6]
The objective of this paper is to develop an optimization
logic that will automatically rearrange the verilog net list and
create an efficient layout of the design in Microwind
program. For the simulation purpose and observing the
result of net list optimization logic, DSCH and MICROWIND
tool is required. The basic idea is to optimize the net list
generated after successful design of any analog, digital or
sequential circuit in schematic editor tool i.e. DSCH.
According to that net list a layout is generated in
MICROWIND tool which should be as much efficient to
design a chip. This must be optimized in concern with area,
interconnect, costing, metal routing etc.
To design an IC, VLSI IC design flow must be followed by the
designer. The ASIC design flow is as shown in fig. 1. This
design flow is mainly divided into two parts i.e. Frontend and
Backend. This fig 1 shows few steps of the ASIC design. This
paper introduces an optimization logic which must be
applied in between Gate Level Net list and Floor planning
step. A gate-level net list is a description of the circuit in
terms of gates and connections between them, which are
made in such a way that they meet the timing and power
requirements. The actual placement of all logic cells is done
in the way of gate level net list is arranged. Here in
MICROWIND, a verilog net list decides the floor planning,
placement of cells and their input-output routing.
Fig 1: VLSI IC Design Flow
After compiling the verilog net list in MICROWIND, the floor
planning, Partitioning, Placement and routing steps are done
at the backend to produce a CMOS layout. Placement of cells
and routing within the cells is becoming a difficult task for
the designer as number of small sized transistors increases.
To make this backend process as well as CMOS layout more
efficient, optimization logic must be applied before the floor
planning and placement steps. For physical layout structure
and time optimization the various techniques like mapping,
cell sizing, buffering and logic restructuring etc. can be