Virtuoso Floorplanner

Length : 1 day

Course Description

This is an Engineer Explorer course.

In some labs, you are expected to use the Virtuoso^® Floorplanner without assistance to solve loosely defined problems. You need to be familiar with top-level floorplanning and Virtuoso XL connectivity-driven layout.

When you finish this course, you will be able to create a top-level floorplan. In this course, you use the floorplanner to calculate the area required for the top-level boundary and the top-level blocks. You create the I/O rows, place the I/O pads, insert the filler cells, place the corner cells, generate and place the top-level blocks. Some of the blocks are existing blocks and some are calculated for their area. You also create a top-level floorplan without using an existing layout so you can see how to calculate the area and then modify the blocks to fit in a specific top-level boundary.

View the videos available in the course in the channel links given below:

• Virtuoso Floorplanner
• API/SKILL Based Command-Line Flow for Virtuoso Floorplanner

Learning Objectives

After completing this course, you will be able to:

• Generate soft blocks to represent a layout that has not been created yet
• Specify which cells to use when generating the blocks in the hierarchy
• Place the blocks in the top level
• Optimize the pin placements for top-level routing
• Edit the soft-block shapes to accommodate the available area and pin alignments
• Use soft blocks for all the top-level blocks to allow for maximum flexibility in your floorplan
• Use the SKILL^® API-Based Flow for Virtuoso Floorplanner

Software Used in This Course

Virtuoso Layout Suite GXL IC6.1.7

Modules in this Course

• Using cdnshelp and Floorplanner Features
• Floorplanner Environment
• Configuring the Physical Hierarchy
• Generating and Placing the Physical Hierarchy
• Level-1 Editing
• Pin Optimization
• Top-Down Floorplanning
• API/SKILL-Based Flow for Virtuoso Floorplanner
• API/SKILL Based Flow for Virtuoso Floorplanner: SKILL APIs (Optional)
• Virtuoso Floorplanner Updates (Optional)

Audience

Layout Design Engineers, Layout CAD Managers, IC Designers, Analog/Mixed-Signal IC Designers, Analog IC Designers, Custom Circuit Designers, Chip Designers

Prerequisites

You must have experience with or knowledge of the following:

• Cadence^® physical design tools
• Layout design experience
• Virtuoso XL connectivity-driven layout
• Top-level floorplanning