TOOLS FOR HARDWARE/SOFTWARE DESIGN MODELING AND SIMULATION

MTL SYSTEMS, INC. AND THE UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI PROPOSE TO CONDUCT A PRELIMINARY DESIGN FOR, AND FEASIBILITY ASSESSMENT OF, A TOOL FOR HARDWARE/SOFTWARE TRADEOFF DESIGN MODELING AND SIMULATION. THE TOOL WILL BE BASED UPON A VERSATILE, STANDARDIZED AND PROVEN TOOL ALREADY DEVELOPED CALLED RPDI, WHICH IMPLEMENTS VHDL AS THE HARDWARE DESCRIPTION LANGUAGE, IS LOOSELY COUPLED TO ADA OR OTHER PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES, AND CONTAINS AN X-WINDOWS-BASED GRAPHICAL INTERFACE. THE OBJECTIVES OF THE PROGRAM WILL BE TO QUANTIFY ALL ASPECTS OF THE REQUIRED TOOL, DETERMINE WHICH PORTIONS OF RPID MAY BE APPLIED AND WHICH PORTIONS REQUIRE ORIGINAL DESIGN, AND FROM A PRELIMINARY DESIGN CONCEPT USING STRUCTURED DESIGN TECHNIQUES. FEASBILITY WILL BE ESTABLISHED AS A FUNCTION OF ASSESSED DESIGN CAPABILITY THROUGH EXPERIMENTATION, DEMONSTRATION AND ANALYTICAL MEANS. TASKS INCLUDE REQUIREMENTS DEFINITION, RAPID ANALYSIS, OTHER CAPABILITIES DETERMINATION, DESIGN CONCEPT PRODUCTION, FEASBILITY ASSESSMENT, CRITICAL ASPECT DEMONSTRATION AND FINAL REPORT PRODUCTION. THE APPROACH OFFERS AN INNOVATIVE MEANS FOR CAPITALIZING ON THE EXISTING RAPID TOOL TO ACHIEVE THE PROGRAM OBJECTIVES. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS: THE BENEFIT OF THIS TOOL WILL BE TO PROVIDE AN EASY-TO-USE SIMULATOR BY WHICH HARDWARE/SOFTWARE TRADEOFFS MAY BE CONDUCTED IN COMPUTING SYSTEM DESIGN. APPLICABILITY WILL ENCOMPASS THE FULL BREADTH OF COMMERCIAL AND MILITARY COMPUTING SYSTEM DESIGN NEEDS.