CprE 588

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Catalog Description

Cpr E 588. Embedded Computer Systems. (3-0) Cr. 3. Prereq: 308. Hardware/software systems and codesign. Models of computation for embedded systems. System-level design. Modeling, specification, synthesis, and verification. Hardware/software implementation. Design space exploration. Performance analysis and optimization. Multiprocessor system on chip. Platform-based design. Design methodologies and tools. Case studies and design projects.

Topics Covered

1. Hardware/software systems and codesign
2. Models of computation for embedded systems
3. Behavioral design
4. Architecture selection
5. Partitioning, scheduling, and communication
6. Simulation, synthesis, and verification
7. Hardware/software implementation
8. Performance analysis and optimization
9. Design methodologies and tools
10. Design examples and case studies

Course Learning Objectives

Students will:

• learn about system-level design of embedded systems comprised of both hardware and software;
• investigate topics ranging from system modeling to hardware-software implementation;
• explore analysis and optimization processes in support of algorithmic and architectural design decisions;
• gain design experience with case studies using contemporary high-level methods and tools.

The course emphasizes a top-down design methodology driven by bottom-up constraints. At course's completion, each student should be able to:

• Understand the concepts, issues, and process of system-level design of embedded systems, i.e., hardware-software codesign.
• Model and specify an embedded system at a high level of abstraction.
• Use co-simulation to validate system functionality.
• Analyze the functional and nonfunctional performance of the system early in the design process to support design decisions.
• Analyze hardware/software tradeoffs, algorithms, and architectures to optimize the system based on requirements and implementation constraints.
• Describe architectures for control-dominated and data-dominated systems.
• Understand hardware, software, and interface synthesis.
• Understand issues in interface design.
• Use contemporary software tools within a codesign environment.
• Describe examples of applications and systems developed using a codesign approach.
• Design a hardware-software system.
• Appreciate issues in system-on-a-chip design associated with codesign, such as intellectual property, reuse, and verification.