Cadence Custom IC Design Blogs

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: ViVA (Part 2)

stacyw — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:00:00 GMT

This week's installment, boys and girls, is brought to you by the letters H, V, m & a and by the symbol %. Apologies to anyone out there who didn't grow up with Big Bird and Cookie Monster. (Is that even possible?)

Remember those letters, we'll get back to them in a bit...

First a couple of FAQ's about axes in ViVA.

How can I tell which axis a signal is associated to?

Well, this isn't the easiest thing in the world, but if you look very closely, you'll notice one or more colored bars next to each axis title. They only appear if you actually have more than one axis on your graph, which will happen if you plot quantities of different units (like voltage and current). If you look closely, you'll see that the colored bars on each axis correspond to the colors of the plotted signals associated with that axis.

How can I move a signal from one axis to another (or to a new axis)?

This is easy. Simply select the signal you want to move by clicking on the waveform or it's name in the legend (don't forget you can use the Alt key--one of the sponsors of last week's episode--to quickly see which signal is which). Then, from the menu, select Trace->Assign To Axis and either select the axis you want to move it to or choose New Axis to do just that.

Now a word from our sponsors...

The letters H, V, m & a are the bindkeys you use to create interactive marker measurements in ViVA.

H (that's capital H, or Shift-H) will place a horizontal marker and Shift-V will--no fair, you peeked--place a vertical marker.
m (that's little m, without the Shift) will place a single point marker.
a (again, lowercase) will create a delta marker between itself and the most recent "m" marker.

There are several nice things about these markers.

You can have as many of them on your graph as you like.

You can select Marker->Show Table to get a tabular readout of all your marker intercepts with your signals. There's also an icon to do this. I'll let you find that on your own. If you move the markers (or rerun the simulation), simply press the Update icon in the marker table to refresh the values. This table can then be saved to a file for documentation.

They stay where you put them (unless, of course, you drag them to move them somewhere else--or delete them)

Speaking of dragging, you can drag the marker labels around to position them wherever looks nicest, without disconnecting the marker from the trace.

Speaking of marker labels, that's where our final sponsor comes in, the mysterious % symbol. First, double-click on the marker label to bring up the marker attributes form. The marker labels can be customized and the % sign is used to create some powerful types of formatting. The complete list can be found in the Virtuoso Visualization & Analysis Tool User Guide, but here are a few useful examples:
- %X, %Y will display the X and Y coordinates (%x, %y will display the 2nd X and Y coordinates for delta markers)
- %W, %H will display delta X and delta Y
- %N will print the name of the trace (handy on a crowded graph)
- My personal favorite, %E, works with the Expression field in the form to allow you to pull an expression from the calculator buffer or one of the calculator memories (more on that in a future episode) and annotate it directly onto the graph. This way you can get a clear visual representation of what is being measured. (Note: This was broken for a while, so make sure you've got the latest IC6.1.3 ISR if it doesn't work for you)

Now you can use the File->Save As Image or File->Print menu to save your beautiful graph to display at your design review.

Stacy Whiteman

Things You Wish You'd Thought Of...But You're Glad Someone Did!

stacyw — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:00:00 GMT

On Tuesday this week we are celebrating "Innovation Day" here at Cadence, honoring inventive engineers across the company.

I must admit that most of the time I get so bogged down with the latest customer questions or figuring out how to help people learn about the latest features that I forget about all those folks in R&D whose raison d'etre is to come up with new and better ways of doing things. And there are plenty of them. Sometimes their efforts aren't really obvious to the end user (a new algorithm under the hood, or new ways of helping us develop and support the software), but they still make a big difference.

Innovation doesn't have to flashy. Maybe it's a small idea which could make a big impact. Maybe it turns out to be just too big. Maybe it's finding a new way to make people change their old behaviors.

Whatever the size or scope of the ideas, we need innovative thinkers at all levels in the world today to solve problems and make our lives better. I'm very glad Cadence has chosen to set aside a day to recognize our own very talented engineers.

Stacy Whtieman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: ViVA

stacyw — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:00:00 GMT

Sorry I've been missing from this space for so long. I've been busily working on a number of projects to try to help get the word out about all the features I have been (and will be) blogging about. I've also been becoming an expert on making video demos, some of which I'll try to feature here too. Ask your Cadence rep about the new VSE L/XL and ADE XL/GXL interactive Quick Start Guides. (If they don't know what you're talking about, have them contact me...)

The next tool I'd like to take up is ViVA and I thought I'd try using sort of a "Top 3" format and see how that works.

As I realized during a customer presentation earlier this week, the first "Thing You Didn't Know About" ViVA is:

1. What is this "ViVA" thing of which you speak?

Yes, indeed, it suddenly occurred to me that if you use ADE, you'd never know that the waveform viewer is now called "ViVA". Someone at Cadence spent all that time coming up with a cute acronym and no one even knows about it unless they run the tool stand-alone (the executable is "viva") or access the documentation (perish the thought...).

Anyway, ViVA stands for Virtuoso Visualization and Analysis Tool and it consists of the Graph Windows, Calculator and Results Browser you use to display waveforms and make measurements after you run your simulations. Pretty important tasks and, yes, I know, features that many, many people feel extraordinarily strongly about.

So allow me to try to point out some of the little things that just might help you feel enthusiastic about using ViVA.

2. I've got all these waveforms on top of each other. How do I sort out this pile of spaghetti?

Don't worry. There are a lot of easy ways to do this.

First, you'll want to start by figuring out which signal is which. Hold down the "Alt" key over each trace and you'll see the name of the waveform as well as the name of the database file it came from. This can be especially handy for parametric sweeps, when you want to find out which sweep value goes with each curve.

Now, one way to quickly straighten things out is to change to strip mode. (Strip mode is where each waveform is plotted in its own little strip, and all the strips share a common X-axis). To do this, click on the 4th icon from the left at the top of the window, called "Strip Chart Mode" (or choose Axis->Strips from the menu). Voila! Lots of skinny little graphs.

Another way to clean up the graph is to move waveforms to other windows or subwindows. You can do this by clicking on a trace to select (or hold Ctrl and click to select multiple traces). You'll know something is selected if it turns green. Then click on the 6th or 7th icon from the left at the top of the window to move the traces to a new subwindow or a new window. You can also use the Trace->New Graph menu to choose whether you want to do a copy or move operation.

Regardless of whether you are in strip mode or not, did you know that you can drag traces around and drop them in other places to move them? You can rearrange strips in strip chart mode (drop the waveform in between 2 other strips), or you can drag one or more traces between subwindows or windows.

Did you know that Ctrl-X, Ctrl-C and Ctrl-V also work to cut, copy and paste respectively, just like in many other applications?

3. Is there a way to see where the actual simulation timepoints are?

Of course there is. (I wouldn't be writing about it if the answer was "no", now would I?). Just double-click on the trace to bring up the Trace Attributes form. Now, at the end of the line that says "Symbols", click the "Show" checkbox. Then, in the drop-down box next to it, select "All Points" and click OK. This can sometimes help you understand why the waveforms look the way they do.

Worth 1000 words

As they say, watching this in action might help you more than reading about, so please watch this short video showing these and other features in action. Also, click here for another video describing how to change the default colors for waveform plotting from ADE.

If the video fails to play click here.

Stacy Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso ADE

stacyw — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:00:00 GMT

After delving into lots of new features in the Virtuoso Schematic Editor, the Library Manager and the Help System, I'd like to turn to our old friend ADE (aka Analog Design Environment, or for those of us who've been around awhile, Analog Artist). ADE is another one of those tools that you're probably using exactly the same way you've always used it because--well, because that's the way you've always used it. And besides Cadence hasn't done anything new to ADE in years...or have they?

Take a look at the ADE window on your desktop. I'll bet it's rectangular in shape about 700 pixels wide by 450 pixels high. Got it right, didn't I? Well, of course, because everyone knows that if you resize the ADE window, all you get is a bunch of extra blank space. Guess what, give it a try. We've now figured out how to resize the window properly so the contents expand to fill the extra area. The first time I showed that in a demo you could just feel the excitement in the room. All right, maybe not excitement exactly, but I did hear someone utter an only-slightly-cynical "wow".

So, besides this minor miracle, what other features have we added?

Edit in Place

Well, for starters, you'll notice that you can edit a lot of things in your simulation setup directly from the main window without having go through the menus and open a separate form. If you want to change the value of a design variable, just select the name and click in the value field to edit it. No need to do Variables->Edit..., select the name, type the number, click the Change button, then OK the form. That's about half the number of mouse clicks.

You can also check and uncheck the "Plot" and "Save" checkboxes directly from the main window.

For those items which can't be edited directly in the main window, things are simplified somewhat in that you can double-click on each entry and it will open the correct form entry for that item. For example, if you double-click on an output expression or an analysis, the form will come up with the settings for that particular entry.

VAR Parameterization

One really cool "hidden" new capability of ADE is that you can now create and use design variables just about anywhere in your simulation setup. This is done using what we call VAR syntax. For example, you can specify the transient analysis stop time by putting VAR("stopTime") in the appropriate field in the Choosing Analyses form. This will automatically create a design variable which you can change directly from the main window (and use in other places as well). Similarly, you can parameterize model files and sections, simulator options and many other things. More information on this useful feature can be found here.

Plot Refresh

You may also notice a new cyclic pulldown at the bottom of the ADE window, just under the Outputs section. It's labeled "Plot After Simulation" and the choices are "Auto", "Refresh" and "None". This allows you to control the behavior of your ViVA graph windows when you re-run a simulation. In the past, if you chose to auto-plot waveforms, any modifications you made to your graph windows were wiped out when you re-ran the simulation. If you had customized the graph at all, you had to turn off auto-plotting and then manually refresh each graph window after simulation to maintain your customizations.

Now you can select "Refresh" from this new pulldown and your graph windows will refresh with the new simulation data without undoing any modifications you may have made.

Something for the more adventurous user...

A really nice way to back-annotate results from parametric sweeps can be enabled by typing: artEnableAnnotationBalloon(t) in the CIW. This activates a large "balloon" when you hover your mouse over an instance. The balloon contains your specified annotation information for the different sweeps of the parametric run. More information on this can be found in the Virtuoso Analog Design Environment L User Guide under "Annotating Parametric Sweep Results" and a helpful video demonstration can be found here.

Well, that's all for now. Starting next time...Things You Didn't Know About ViVA!

Stacy

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: RTFM

stacyw — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 13:00:00 GMT

Wait, don't run away! In this case I really mean "Read The Fantastic Manual". A recent comment by a reader prompted a spirited internal discussion here at Cadence regarding our Help system. I suddenly realized it had been ages since I even looked at it. Seriously, when was the last time you clicked on that "Help" menu at the top of your screen?

So I started doing some exploring and discovered that--what do you know?--there are some pretty interesting and useful things lurking under that menu!

Now I'm not trying to say all our manuals are "fantastic" or that you'll always get exactly the information you want in the blink of an eye. No help system is perfect. Face it, that little Microsoft paper clip guy thinks he can read my mind, but half the time I feel like twisting him into an ornament hanger to see if that wipes the smug little smile off his face.

Anyway, let's take a peek at what's been happening with the Cadence Help system while we weren't looking. First of all, you don't have to navigate the entire documentation library in order to get help. The Help menu at the top of each window has an entry to let you open just the document applicable to that window. So Help->Contents in the ADE L window opens the Table of Contents for the ADE L User Guide. Better yet, there's a Help button at the bottom of most pop-up forms which opens the relevant documentation for that form. And if you're using any of the IC 6.1 Assistants (as I keep reminding you to...), the "?" button in the upper right corner will give you the documentation for that assistant, many even with a link to a video demonstration showing you how to use it.

Really, I'm not kidding. Try it.

Each document has Find/Search field at the top and an icon which allows you to view/save that manual as a PDF file which you can print or browse in your copious free time on the platform of your choice. The Help menus also have entries to take you directly to Sourcelink or to the online Cadence Community Forums, where you can ask questions and interact with other users and helpful Cadence experts.

Now, I realize that everyone's user environment is different and you may not be able to access all these features (e.g. availability of internet access on Linux servers, etc.), but you should at least be able to access the manuals via the Help menus as I described. If you can't, you should contact your CAD folks and tell them you need "Help".

Until next time,

Stacy

P.S. I apologize that in my recent post, one of the webinars I pointed you to (Webinar 310: ViVA), had difficulties in the recording. We are working on an alternative delivery mechanism.

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Programming...

stacyw — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:00:00 GMT

I thought I would have time for a regular TYDKAV (Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso) article this week before I go on vacation, but you know how it is when you're trying to get out of the office for a week. Things just seem to pile up higher than usual.

So in place of the usual witty repartee and pithy comments, I'll leave you with some pointers to some of the Virtuoso webinars that have been posted on Sourcelink recently. They've called these the 300-series webinars, a college course numbering analogy to let you know that you'll be getting a bit more technical depth and fewer colorful marketing slides...

Webinar 302: Minding the Gaps in Design Team Communication

This presentation explores the Virtuoso unified constraint system. It discusses the usage of electrical and physical constraints in the front-to-back design flow and illustrates how the Constraint Manager and Circuit Prospector Assistants help improve communication between circuit design and layout.

Webinar 310: Visualization and analysis of analog and mixed signal waveforms with the Cadence Virtuoso Platform

This multimedia presentation covers the ViVA waveform viewer and includes information on the new PSF XL waveform database format, details on how to customize your graphs, make interactive measurements and build expressions in the ViVA Calculator for use in ADE L and ADE XL.

Webinar 311: Specification driven design, analysis and verification with the Cadence Virtuoso Platform

This multimedia presentation provides a "quick-start" demonstration of the ADE XL tools, including how to setup multiple testbenches, define specifications and run sweeps and corners analyses in a single integrated environment.

All these webinars (and more) are available here and are each just under an hour in length.

I'll be back in a week or so with more TYDKAV as we begin to venture into ADE L, ViVA and ADE XL with a few side trips along the way.

Stacy Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Customizing the Library Manager

stacyw — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:05:00 GMT

I've told you in previous postings about some new features in Virtuoso IC6.1 which make it quick and easy to open cellviews you use frequently--namely the recently-opened files list (found in the CIW->File menu) and the ability to bookmark one or more cellviews (File->Bookmarks->Add Bookmark from any cellview window).

While these features mean that you can open that cell you work on every day with just a couple of mouse clicks and minimal mental exertion, there will always be a time when you need to go up in the attic and find the box with the Christmas lights. Next year for sure you're going to remember to label that darn box before you put it away...

As usual, I digress. I'm talking about the Library Manager. I know you're all accustomed to using the Library Manager every day (shame on you if you haven't yet tried either of the 2 features mentioned above...). You probably haven't noticed that there are 47 libraries listed there. 17 of them don't exist any more. 15 of them don't apply to your project at all. 7 of them are reference libraries which you don't have edit rights to. The other 8 are scattered all over the list. Why should you have to strain your already-overworked brain cells sorting through that mess? And what happens if you forgot that one of those libraries was just an experiment you tried once and forgot to delete when that version of the block never worked correctly? What happens if you pick that one as the basis for your new design instead of the one that worked? I don't know about you, but I've got enough gray hairs already...

So I wanted to point out 2 new features of the Library Manager which might help you streamline the way you view all that data.

Look at the Pretty Colors...

The first is the ability to customize the display attributes of any library. For example, you can specify that your reference libraries be shown in red text with a particular icon and your design libraries be shown in green text with a different icon. You can even hide some libraries so they don't get in your way, but are still accessible to the software. (Maybe you want to show your "experimental" libraries in a different color too...)

Basically the way you do this is to edit your cds.lib file. Somewhere after the DEFINE statement for a library, put the line:

ASSIGN <libName> DISPLAY <displayName>

where <displayName> is the name you're going to give to a particular set of display attributes (we'll get to that shortly).

Now when you open the Library Manager, select Edit->Display Settings. In that form, you'll be able to select your <displayName>(s) and change their colors, icons and other attributes.

All Together Now...

The 2nd new feature for library display is the ability to create "combined" libraries. Maybe you want to display all the reference libraries for your project under a single name in case you forget which cell is in which library. Don't worry, the libraries aren't physically combined, just displayed that way.

To do this, first you'll need to create a dummy directory with the name you want to give your combined library (kind of a kludge, but oh well). Then edit your cds.lib and add 2 lines:

DEFINE <combinedLibName> <pathToDummyDirectoryYouCreatedAbove>

ASSIGN <combinedLibName> COMBINE <lib1> <lib2> ...

These lines need to go after all the lib1, lib2, etc. libraries are defined.

That's it. Now when you open the Library Manager, you'll see your combined library name with a "+" sign next to it. If you click on the combined library name, you'll see all the cells in all the libraries combined. If you click the "+" sign, you can still access the libraries individually as usual.

You Do Know About Categories, Don't You?

BTW, if you look at the screenshot above, you also notice that each of my libraries has categories defined within it so I can further refine my cell selection by block or by celltype. That feature has existed in Virtuoso for years now and hopefully you're already making use of it (Hint: check out Edit->Categories from the Library Manager)

I'm running out of time right now, but you can read more about all these features in the Cadence Library Manager User Guide.

Until next time...

Stacy Whiteman

DesignCon 2010 Call for Papers

helenet — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 13:00:00 GMT

Hello,

As a member of the technical committee and as the chair member for the Analog and Mixed-Signal Design and Verification track, I would like to invite you to submit an abstract to this conference.

We solicit papers for two types of sessions: technical papers and tutorials. Technical papers, which are up to 25 pages long, address design case studies and application overviews, and are presented in forty-minute sessions. Technical sessions will be held on Tuesday-Thursday, February 2-4. Tutorials are half-day (three-hour) sessions with papers up to 50 pages long, allowing the speakers to cover their topics in greater depth and breadth. Tutorials are scheduled for Monday, February 1.

A list of suggested topics for DesignCon 2010 can be accessed at http://www.designcon.com/2010/call_for_proposals_topics.asp

The track for the Analog and Mixed-Signal Design and Verification includes the following topics:

Analog, mixed-signal, and RF design methodologies
Analog and mixed-signal simulation techniques
RF design and simulation
Design testabiliy and verification strategy
Coverage, metrics, and closure management
Power distribution & management
DfM/DfY, DfT/DfV for analog & mixed-signal designs

We look forward to hearing from you

Best regards,

Helene Thibieroz

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Search Assistant

stacyw — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 13:00:00 GMT

People say I have strong google-fu. Whether it's finding information on a homework topic for my kids or reviews for that little restaurant downtown, all it takes is a minute or two at the keyboard and there it is. Searching for information has become a very important skill in today's world, both in "real life" and at work. Laying your hands on reliable information quickly can make your life easier, amaze your friends and impress your boss.

So today, I'd like to introduce you to the new Virtuoso Search Assistant and Toolbar in IC6.1. Whether you're looking for all the places a certain design variable is used or which instances a particular net is connected to or where in your design hierarchy a specific device type is used, the Search Assistant will give you the information you need.

First of all, where is this little gem hiding? Virtuoso provides both a Search toolbar and an associated dockable assistant. Both can be invoked by--all together now--clicking the RMB near the top of the window and selecting Search from either the top (for the assistant) or the bottom (for the toolbar) of the menu. There's no difference in functionality between the two. In fact, clicking "Show All" from the Search toolbar results will open the Search assistant automatically.

Search engines are typical pretty self-explanatory, but recently, I've been amazed at what fun little secrets a little digging can expose. (For example, did you know that Google has a built-in calculator?) So it is with the Search Assistant (ok, no built-in calculator...yet, but some other cool details I'll talk about in a bit). Basically, you enter whatever it is you want to search for in the search field, hit Enter and you'll see everything in your design that matches that search string.

What do you mean--everything?

Click on the little magnifying glass at the left of the search field. This shows a partial list of the categories which will be searched (the complete list can be found by clicking Options... at the bottom of that menu). You can limit your search by enabling only one of these categories (or several if you use the Options... dialog). You can also limit your search to only those objects selected in the current view by choosing "Selected" at the bottom of the Search Categories menu.

Notice that you can even search for Skill functions and menu items. So if you forget where to find the grid snap spacing you can search for "snap" and find it right away.

Note: The Search Categories are also keywords for the search engine. So you can enter "instances nmos2v" or "nets bias" to restrict your search that way. Or type just "instances" or "nets" to get a complete listing.

Where is it searching?

Now click on the little triangle at the right of the search field. This will give you options for how the engine should match the search string (case sensitivity, substring, and/or, etc.). It allows you set the search scope, including the very powerful option to extend your search down through the design hierarchy. So now you can immediately find every place in the hierarchy where a certain block is used. In the search results, items not in the current view will be highlighted in gray.

What can I do now that I've found what I was looking for?

Good question. This is where I find the real power of the Search Assistant. First of all, you'll notice that selecting items in the Search Assistant cross-selects them in the main canvas as well as the Navigator and the Property Editor Assistant, so that's very handy right there.

But wait, there's more...

By holding down a certain mouse button (hmm..which one might that RMB...) over the items, you'll see a context-sensitive menu of options specific to items of that category. Depending on the category, you might be able to:

Add an instance of a cell
Open the cellview containing an instance or net if it's at a lower level of hierarchy
Open the Skill finder entry for a Skill function
Select a net and all instances attached to it
Open an options dialog or directly execute a menu command

In addition, you can save the search results to a CSV file for further documentation and reference.

"Searching is half the fun: life is much more manageable when thought of as a scavenger hunt as opposed to a surprise party."--Jimmy Buffett

As always, feel free to share your discoveries and experiences (good or bad) with any of these topics.

Stacy Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: The View From Above

stacyw — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 13:00:00 GMT

A few years ago I bought a wonderful book called "Earth From Above". An amazing French photographer has put together a collection of truly unique aerial photographs of all kinds of unusual natural and man-made landscapes. It's fascinating how different things look from high altitude--sometimes you can hardly recognize what you're looking at. You wonder what that same scene would look like if you were down at ground level. Well, maybe that's not the case when you're looking at penguin poop from space, but you know what I mean.

Okay, you guessed it, as usual, now I'm going to tie this subject into Virtuoso. You see, one of the new assistants available in IC6.1 is the World View Assistant. This handy little widget is activated by--you guessed it--clicking your RMB at the top of your schematic or layout window and selecting "World View". The assistant pops up in the corner of your window with what the manual refers to as a "panoramic view" of your complete schematic or layout.

The yellow rectangle, or "view box", superimposed on the view represents the current design area displayed in the main canvas. You can resize this rectangle using the drag handles on its edges. This will change the zoom level in the main canvas to display the area under the view box. You can drag the view box around to different areas of the design and the main canvas will pan right to that area. Or just click in the World View at the location you want to see and the main canvas go there. And since layouts tend to have just a bit more detail than schematics, the World View Assistant in layout has a menu available on the middle mouse button which allows you to zoom in and out of the World View itself to more easily guide the viewing area.

It's that simple. No zooming in and hitting the arrow keys a zillion times to pan across to where you were going. No "bindkey f", then zoom in over and over again. Just move the little yellow rectangle around and you'll know just where you are.

Bonus Tip: I know we did a whole article on RMB a while back, but did you know that there are some cool things tied to the MMB (middle mouse button) as well? The one I found particularly useful has to do with toggling the direction of pins while you're placing them. Like many people, when I'm drawing schematics, I often find myself placing a whole pile of pins all at once. Some are input, some are output, some are in/out. It's kind of annoying to have to keep popping back to the form to change the direction.

What I didn't know was that clicking Shift-MMB while in the "Create Pin" function will toggle through the possible pin types. Also, just clicking MMB allows you to rotate the pin before placing it (MMB will also do rotation during the "Create Instance" function--very handy!).

I did run into some trouble with this when I was using VNC and I had previously reprogrammed my middle mouse button in Windows, but these functions can be easily bound to a different key or mouse button.

That's all for now. Keep watching this space for more handy features in Virtuoso IC 6.1.

Stacy Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Which Way Should I "Go"?

stacyw — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 17:00:00 GMT

Just a short post this week, as I've been quite busy recording videos for some of our Virtuoso Platform Webinar Series, the last of which, covering Spec-Driven Design, airs Tues. June 30.

Recordings of this and past webinars can be found here. (If not posted there yet, they will be available soon). They've called these the 300-series webinars, a college course numbering analogy to let you know that you'll be getting a bit more technical depth and fewer colorful marketing slides...

You may have found, in experimenting with some of the new Virtuoso assistants (like the Navigator or the Property Editor Assistant) or toolbars (like the Bookmarks or Workspaces toolbars) that you've seen a menu entry for something called "Go". Hmmm..."Go" where? I'd like to go to the Bahamas, how about you? Well, unfortunately, this is not that kind of "Go" (it's also not an ancient Chinese board game that I really suck at).

Take a look up in the upper left corner of your web browser. See those arrows? Yep, it's that kind of "Go".

To display the Go toolbar, click RMB in the area just above the schematic canvas and select "Go". By default, it appears as a 2nd row toolbar, but you can move it around just like any other toolbar--by clicking the left mouse button on the triple-vertical-bar drag handle at one end of the toolbar and dragging it to any edge of the window.

It might not do much at first, in fact all the icons will be grayed-out until you start navigating around your design. Once you open a different cellview or descend into a sub-block, the arrows on the Go toolbar work just like the arrows at the top of your web browser. You can use the left and right arrows to move back and forward through the cellviews you have displayed. The red arrow to the right of the back and forward buttons allow you to jump forward or back to any of these cellviews right away. Again, just like your web browser.

But wait, you say, my web browser doesn't have any up arrows. What's up with that? (No pun intended--well, maybe a little..). As you've probably guessed, since Virtuoso operates on data which is intrinsically hierarchical, we've added the up arrows to intuitively take you back up your design hierarchy after you've descended. The up arrow with the little bar over it takes you immediately to the top of the design.

Well, that's all for now. Next up--another way to view the world...and extra bonus tips.

Stacy Whiteman

Optimization Environment Enables Effective Reuse of Existing Design Modules

Hiro Ishikawa — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:00:00 GMT

In order to complete a brand new design on time, it is an important factor to effectively reuse existing design modules. The use of an automatic optimization quickly and easily increases design reuse efficiency. The following figures are examples of a source layout and an optimized result made by Virtuoso Layout Migrate. Virtuoso Layout Migrate optimizes a design automatically by satisfying design specific constraints. The shape of the source layout can be maintained in the optimization result perfectly.

Before Migrate

After Migrate

One important issue that we need to carefully consider is how easily the result can be obtained. Even though the high quality optimization is possible, it would be useless if a lot of work is required to get it.

Cadence’s Virtuoso_XL, and GXL automatically extracts design constraints including Symmetry placement required for a design optimization from connectivity information in a schematic view and delivers them to a layout view via Constraint Manager. The design constraints delivered to the layout view will be applied as well as constraints added by a user manually during the optimization.

This optimization flow is as follows.

The following Fig 1-a shows the contrarians extracted by Circuit prospector. Fig 1-b is a migration result with respecting the design constraints extracted by Circuit prospector, and added by the constraint manager.

Fig 1-a. Automatic design specific constraints extraction by Circuit Prospector

Fig 1-b. Automatic design constraints addition via Constraint Manager (Schematic -> Layout)

Cadence Virtuoso XL, GXL can easily and automatically achieve extracting, maintaining, and applying complex design specific constraints that was "impossible" a decade ago. Cadence is only company offers robust, and comprehensive integrated design re-use flow in Virtuoso XL, GXL.

Hiroshi Ishikawa

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: RMB, OMG! ;-)

stacyw — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:00:00 GMT

I apologize for the Internet slang in the title (urbandictionary calls OMG "the most irritating piece of chatroom vernacular in existence"), but I couldn't resist. Ever since IC6.1 came out, it seems like every other question gets answered using the three-letter acronym (that's TLA for those in the know), RMB. RMB to open an assistant, RMB to do this, RMB to do that. If you can't find it anywhere else, look under your RMB (oh sorry, it means Right Mouse Button).

Well, the other day as I was doing just that, I saw some commands on the RMB that I had never realized were there. I started looking around and realized that, hey, they've added a bunch of stuff on the right mouse button that's pretty handy.

So here's a quick list of a few things you might want to try with your RMB. I realize that most of these functions already have bindkeys, but heck, sometimes I don't want to have to put down that sandwich I'm holding in my left hand in order to press the "e" key...

In a schematic with nothing selected
- View Fit
- Add Instance
- Add Pin
- Add Wire
- Return (if you have descended in the hierarchy)
In a schematic with a wire selected
- Delete
- Add Wire Name
- Add Probe
In a schematic with an instance selected
- Copy
- Delete
- Rotate
- Descend Read
- Descend Edit (cool, no more Shift-E--actually, did you know that now if you double-click on an instance, it does a Descend Edit too?)
Similar functionality is available in layout as well
All the new IC 6.1 assistants (Navigator, Property Editor, etc.) have context-sensitive RMB menus to do the most commonly-used command

Bonus Tip: If you have a mouse with a wheel, scrolling the wheel up and down will pan the schematic (or layout) up and down, holding Shift and "wheeling" will pan left and right and holding Ctrl and "wheeling" will zoom in and out. For those of you so inclined, the bindkey designations for wheel scrolling are Btn4Down and Btn5Down and can be programmed just like any other bindkeys.

Well, now you can do a huge heap of your daily editing tasks using only one hand. How great is that? Stay tuned to this space for more Virtuoso tips and as always, feel free to share any tricks of your own or comment on what you like, don't like or would like to see in Virtuoso.

Stacey Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Managing Your Real Estate - Part 2

stacyw — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 13:00:00 GMT

I keep my toothpaste in my bathroom. I keep the paprika in the kitchen. I keep the band-aids in the bathroom near the living room. Two points here. First, I keep the tools I need near the place where I do the activity for which I might need them. Second, I try to always keep things in the same place so I know where they are when I need them. Sounds sensible, right? Dinner would never be ready on time if I had to keep walking over to the bathroom to get spices. And I certainly don't want to run around the house bleeding while I try to find the band-aids.

These are the same principles behind Workspaces in IC61. Now, if you're bleeding profusely, you'll still have to get up and go find a band-aid (or call 911), but for most of your daily work activities, using Workspaces in Virtuoso enables you to have the tools you need arranged where you like them for the tasks you're doing at any given time.

We've talked in this space about some of the new assistants available in IC61 (Navigator, Property Editor...others we haven't discussed yet). I'm sure you've also noticed the new toolbars at the top of the screen. All these elements can be enabled, disabled, resized and moved around to your heart's content. When you're working with a huge schematic, you might want the Navigator and the World View Assistant so you don't have to keep zooming in and out. When you're first drawing a schematic you might want the Property Editor Assistant on the left and the Create and Edit toolbars on the right for quick command entry.

To get started, turn on the Workspaces toolbar (Window->Toolbars->Workspaces). It usually shows up in the upper right corner of the window. Workspaces apply to a specific application type (schematics, layout, ADE XL) and Virtuoso comes with several predefined workspaces for each application. For example, the schematic editor has Basic, Classic, and Explore, among others. Just pull down on the cyclic to try out some of the different arrangements available out of the box.

This is where the fun begins. Rearrange some assistants and toolbars. You can even undock the assistants and have them floating outside the main window. Now click on the icon just to the right of the cyclic to save your own custom workspace. You can create as many different workspaces as you like in order to have the right tools for each task right where you want them.

So next time your boss comes in frantically talking about how the project is bleeding $$$, you'll know right where you put the band-aids.

More information on Workspaces, including how your CAD department can create custom workspaces to be shared with everyone in the project, refer to the Virtuoso Design Environment User Guide.

Thanks for trying out some of these great new features. Please leave your comments and let us know about your experiences (good or not-so-good).

Next time we'll talk about some commonly used functions that I'll bet you didn't know were hiding right under your fingertips...

Stacey Whiteman

Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Managing Your Real Estate - Part 1

stacyw — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 13:00:00 GMT

Yeah, right...in this economy, don't talk to me about real estate. But I'm not talking about home prices, I'm talking about that territory on the screen right in front of you where you spend your day drawing and clicking and arranging and rearranging in order to accomplish your job. Cadence has given you lots of tools to help you develop your little plot of land. Just recently in this blog, I've told you about 2 new ones, the Navigator Assistant and the Property Editor Assistant. They can be very useful, but maybe you're starting to feel that having all of these tools lying around is making things a bit cluttered. How am I supposed to build my house with this bulldozer in the way?

Well, that's what I'm here for. I've got a few great tips for organizing those assistants so you're not tripping over them any more.

Let's start with the basics. Turning an assistant on or off can be done from the Window->Assistants banner menu, or using the right mouse button (RMB) menu somewhere in the area at the top of the window. Once an assistant appears, what can you do with it (besides the task it was designed for, of course)?

You can click and drag the edges to resize it (look for the cursor to turn into a pair of parallel lines--this is your drag handle)
You can click on the X in the upper right corner of the assistant to close it (I'll be you figured that out already, didn't you?)
You can click on the middle of the 3 icons in the upper right corner of the assistant (or simply double-click anywhere on the top bar of the assistant) to undock it.

Egads, now what? It's floating free with a life of it's own. Well, not really. It's still integrally tied to the main window it came from. You can still cross-select with the main canvas and the other assistants. But now you can grab it by the little red title bar at the top and drag it off to the edge of the screen (or even onto your 2nd monitor if you're lucky enough to have a double-wide) where it will hover obediently, doing its job. You can resize it just as you would any regular window, by grabbing and dragging its edges or corners so you can see all its contents without scroll bars.

If you double-click on the title bar of the assistant (or click the middle icon again), it will dock itself right back where it came from.

Now you may have noticed while you were dragging your little friend around that over some areas of the main window, a big gray blank area would suddenly appear near where you were moving the assistant. This is to show you the different areas in the main window where the assistant will dock if you drop it there. You can dock assistants around any of the edges of the central canvas.

Bonus Tip: If you want an assistant to remain free-floating, hold down the Ctrl key while you drag it.

Extra Bonus Tip: Did you know that assistants can be tabbed on top of each other? Simply undock an assistant, drag it by it's title bar and drop it when your mouse cursor is somewhere inside the body of another assistant. Voila! The 2 assistants (or 3 or 4 or...) are now overlapping with handy little tabs at the bottom so you can switch between them.

And now for my last trick for today, I'm going to make them all disappear! Do you have an F11 key on your keyboard? Press it. Uh-oh, where'd they all go? Press it again. Whew, that was a close one. The F11 key will hide and show all the assistants you have activated at any given time so you can clear your working area with a single keystroke.

For those of you whose function keys don't go to 11, you can do the same thing by selecting Window->Workspaces->Show/Hide Assistants or clicking the far right icon in the Workspace toolbar. What are Workspaces, you ask? Tune in next time to find out...

As always, please feel free to comment or share your own tips and tricks...

Stacy Whiteman