A system-level infrastructure for multidimensional MP-SoC design space co-exploration

Abstract

In this article, we present a flexible and extensible system-level MP-SoC design space exploration (DSE) infrastructure, called NASA. This highly modular framework uses well-defined interfaces to easily integrate different system-level simulation tools as well as different combinations of search strategies in a simple plug-and-play fashion. Moreover, NASA deploys a so-called dimension-oriented DSE approach, allowing designers to configure the appropriate number of, well-tuned and possibly different, search algorithms to simultaneously co-explore the various design space dimensions. As a result, NASA provides a flexible and reusable framework for the systematic exploration of the multidimensional MP-SoC design space, starting from a set of relatively simple user specifications. To demonstrate the capabilities of the NASA framework and to illustrate its distinct aspects, we also present several DSE experiments in which, for example, we compare NASA configurations using a single search algorithm for all design space dimensions to configurations using a separate search algorithm per dimension. These proof-of-concept experiments indicate that the latter multidimensional co-exploration can find better design points and evaluates a higher diversity of design alternatives as compared to the more traditional approach of using a single search algorithm for all dimensions. M. 2013. A system-level infrastructure for multidimensional MP-SoC design space co-exploration.

Exploring Exploration: A Tutorial Introduction to Embedded Systems Design Space Exploration

“…The knowledge of a few design points is used to predict the expected improvement of unknown configurations. Alternatively, in hierarchical DSE (e.g., [28], [29], and [30]), DSE is first performed using analytical or symbolic models to quickly find the interesting parts in the design space, after which simulation-based DSE is performed to more accurately search for the optimal design points.…”

A Case for Security-Aware Design-Space Exploration of Embedded Systems

“…Moreover, we consider system-level DSE in which both the platform architecture (e.g., selection of platform components such processing elements, memories, and networking components) as well as the mapping of application tasks and communications to the selected platform components are optimized for traditional objectives such as performance, power consumption, and cost, but now also for secureness. Such system-level design-space exploration is depicted in the top-middle part of Figure 2 and could, for example, be performed with system-level DSE frameworks such as Sesame [18,19] or a similar environment (e.g, References [20][21][22]). Important to note here is that the performance, power and cost models used in the DSE also need to account for the effects of deploying specifically selected security protection mechanisms (as discussed above) inside a platform architecture.…”

Hepsycode-Rt

“…A remarkable number of research works have focused on the system-level HW/SW co-design of D-HMPS [3]. In such a context, the most critical steps are always related to the System Specification and the Design Space Exploration (DSE) activities [4].…”