Abstraction is a key concept that makes it easier for humans to deal with large and complex systems. Since abstraction reduces complexity, without abstraction, hardly any innovation would be possible because the human brain cannot process large sets of low-level items and make sense of them.
Abstraction not only plays a significant role in engineering and science, but also in art. Artists started to abstract to show the essence of their subject. For example, Pablo Picasso used abstraction when he drew the essence of a bull, and many other artists followed with similar drawings.
In a similar way, today’s engineers make use of abstraction to simplify the essence of their complex designs.
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The Universal Verification Methodology (UVM) has clearly become the predominant verification methodology and library. UVM provides a set of classes and an approach that is designed to make verification more productive, streamlined, and consistent.
In order to make the use and the adoption of UVM easier, Cadence has added several GUI features that can help you in your interaction and debugging of your verification environment, and its associated tests.
One of the gems of our extensions to UVM is the UVM Sequence Viewer. The Sequence Viewer provides you with the ability to abstract an essential and complex part of an advanced environment and test suite: the verification traffic (in the form of UVM sequences). In use, the UVM Sequence Viewer shows you all the sequences and sequence items that are in the simulation. You can see sequence hierarchies on a per-sequencer basis, including fields, and their values. You can also view them on a type-basis.
The reduction in complexity enabled by the Sequence Viewer allows you to quickly get to the essence of the traffic of the test. And, it implicitly allows you to quickly assess if this traffic meets your expectation.
Let’s abstract to get productive!
Axel Scherer
Twitter: @axelscherer