Tenth annual Haifa Verification Conference
gathers world experts in verification to discuss new trends and complexities in
verification
According to Harry Foster, chief verification scientist
of Mentor Graphics and one of the keynote speakers at the recent Haifa Verification Conference, “the increasing complexities and challenges of
functional verification are like navigating the perfect storm.” Foster was referring
to an expression that describes an event where “a rare combination of
circumstances will aggravate a situation drastically.”
Today, engineers have to deal with multiple layers of
verification that converge into the “perfect storm,” when they test new
technology to answer the question: Does the proposed design do what is
intended? Does it conform to specifications?
|
Harry Foster, Mentor Graphics |
Functionality is only one layer. Today’s verification
systems have to consider the operation and interaction of increasingly
complicated and bigger designs, and the complexity of verification has grown
exponentially. In fact, the Wilson Research Group and Mentor Graphics 2014
Functional Verification Study, shows a growth rate (CAGR) of 12.5 percent for
verification engineers from 2007 to 2014, compared to 3.7 percent for design
engineers. Foster sees a trend of more time spent in verification than in the
design stage, and more layers of the verification process: “the larger the design, the higher the
adoption of verification techniques.”
What new safety features does your new vehicle or
office security system have? How many times have you replaced your cellphone
model in the past 10 years? New and better – that is what drives manufacturers to
design new products, for us to use, and for industries to improve their
operating systems. The crucial and complex process of verification is essential
to check that every component, every element, and every step runs smoothly
alone and seamlessly together.
Now and then – a new era in verification
Hosted by IBM Research – Haifa, HVC 2014 offered three
days of talks and tutorials that outlined shifts in trends and highlighted
advances in the field. This was a sharp contrast from the first HVC conference 9
years ago, back in what Ziv Binyamini, the CTO for System and Verification Group at
Cadence, described in his 2014 keynote speech as the “stone age” era of
verification, a time when verification was not yet the challenge it is today. The
ubiquitous smartphone, for example, has more computer power, memory capacity,
and faster processors than supercomputers that took up large halls only 20
years ago—even those used to guide early space crafts to the moon.
|
Ziv Binyamini and Ronny Morad |
Functional verification for NASA, the aerospace
industry, the military, our everyday transportation systems, are only some of the
integrated systems that verification engineers have to deal with looking
forward, besides all the electronic systems we use on a daily basis. And it
only gets more complicated.
Over the last two decades, assets developed by IBM Research – Haifa have
served as vital verification tools for more than 100 major IBM hardware
programs. These innovative technologies saved hundreds of millions of dollars in
development costs by enhancing quality and reducing the time and
personnel required to find bugs before hardware goes out.
Ronny Morad, general chair for HVC 2014 and manager of
systems verification technologies at IBM Research – Haifa, stressed the
importance of the annual HVC interactions, to continue the successes and
collaborations, and to create synergy between industries with the same problems
and requirements.
“The Haifa Verification Conference continues to serve as a
platform for academics and industry to exchange ideas and spark new innovation.”
Labels: Haifa Verification Conference, HVC 2014, IBM Research - Haifa