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12. Verilog 2000

Our Verilog implementation is currently a rapidly growing subset of the proposed Verilog 2000 standard. This chapter documents some of the new V2000 features and how they are implemented in out compiler. Like any new standard Verilog 2000 has a small number of inconsistencies that will probably be ironed out as they are first implemented, our take on these are outlined here.

12.1 V2000 Things not yet implemented

At this point we believe we've implemented the full V2000 feature set if you think you've found something we've missed please let us know.

12.2 Finding Top Level Modules

In the original Verilog model determining which modules are at the top level was relatively simple - look at all the modules, all those not specified as being in a library and not referenced by any other module in the source are top level modules and are instanced by the compiler - elaboration (creation of the hierarchical tree of dependent instances) continues from there.

In Verilog 2000 this is problematical - basically in order to determine which modules are not referenced elaboration must occur (because generate statements can cause conditional instantiation depending on which parameters are passed down from modules above, and because the Configuration Management subsystem can replace one module with another with hierarchical path names [again requiring elaboration]). For these reasons in some situations the compiler is faced with a 'chicken and egg' sort of situation when trying to determine which modules are 'top level'. It is even possible to generate verilog programs with no obvious 'top' module, or two mutually exclusive 'top' modules.

For this reason we use the following much simpler mechanism for determining whether a module is a top level module.

  • A top level module must be in the library 'work' (the default library in which all modules from files not explicitly placed in a library are put).
  • A top level module must not be file a file included as a library using a '-v' flag
  • If any non-library modules in 'work' references a module of the same name as a second module in 'work' the second module can not be a top level module (even if it's a conditional module in a generate statement that is never actually instanced or is replaced by another module in another library by a configuration management operation)

12.3 Generate Statements

This section is intended as a quick introduction to the new 'generate' statements, it's not intended as an in-depth reference.

Verilog 'generate' statements allow conditional declarations of variables, instantiation of other modules or of always statements.

The basic syntax is:

	generate
	
		.... generate statements
	
	endgenerate

Valid 'generate' statements include:

	if (<expression>) <generate statement> 

	if (<expression>); <generate statement> else 
			       <generate statement> 

	begin : <block name>	 <generate statements> end

	case (<expression>)
	<expression>: <generate statement>
	....
	default:  <generate statement>
	endcase

	for (<assign>; <expression>; <assign>)
	begin : <block name>
	end

as well as any:

	wire declaration
	register/time/integer/event/etc declaration
	a module or primitive instance
	continuous assignments

In addition you can declare compile-time variables using:

	genvar <name> ;

That can be used in a generate block's for statements for the <assign> statements and can be accessed as constants within the scope of the for block. Apart from genvar variables all <expression> in the above blocks must be compile-time constants expressions consisting of constants or parameters passed into module instances.

genvar variables can only be accessed within the for loop that assigns them and for loops that use the same variable may not be nested.

Some examples:


module x(input in, output out);
	parameter p = 1;	// set when x is instantiated
	parameter y = 1;

	wire		w[p:0];	// an ARRAY of wires
	assign out = w[p];
	assign w[0] = in;

	generate
	
		if (p == 2) 	reg x;			     // x is only declared if p = 2
		if (y > 8)	reg [y:0]r; else reg [7:0]r; // r is min 8 bits wide

		case (p)
		1:	initial r = 3;
		2:	initial begin x = 1; r = 4; end
		default:initial r = p;
		endcase

		genvar xx;

		for (xx = 0; xx < p; xx=xx+1) begin:block
			b #(xx+1)b(.in(w[xx]), .out(w[xx+1]));
		end
	endgenerate
endmodule


In this example the if and case statements are just intended to show you their formats and show how various things can be used with them, however look carefully at the for statement - it not only instantiates 'p' copies of the module 'b' it also passes unique parameters to them and stitches them into a chain of instances with wires connected in between.

Great care should be taken with generate for statements - they can result in the compiler entering an infinite loop - since we can't put any reasonable upper side limit to the number of times you go around such a loop our compiler wont stop you from doing this - however we will issue a warning the 10,000th time you go around a loop.

12.4 Configuration Management

Verilog 2000 has a new feature called 'configuration management' this process is basically a formalized description of how verilog source libraries are managed. This mechanism allows you to do things like have two versions of a module, one in RTL and another the compiled gate version of the same thing and then switch backwards and forwards between them easily.

Each library has a unique name and modules are collected into them. For each particular source file all the modules in that file are placed in the same library. The standard ways for describing library mapping (ie which source file's modules will be in which library) are supported along with the '-v+<library> <file name>' flag (which is recommended). We resolve library mappings in the following order:

  • If a file is included with a '-v+<library> <file name>' flag then it will be in the library <library>
  • If there are one or more '-L' flags that introduce library mapping files containing statements of the form 'library <library> <pattern>' and a file name matches the <pattern> then modules from it will be included in the library named <library>
  • If there are no '-L' flags and there exists a file called 'lib.map' in the current working directory then it is used as if it were introduced with a '-L flag
  • Modules from all source files that don't match any of the above ways of assigning libraries are assigned to a library called 'work'
Note: the Verilog 2000 specification is somewhat vague about the syntax of 'library' statements in mapping files - some examples terminate them with ';'s others don't, also some examples enclose the <pattern>s with double quotes, others don't - we support all of these syntax forms.

12.5 Parameters

One of the few places where V2000 is actually slightly incompatable with the traditional verilog is in the area of module parameter passing. Previously any range size on a parameter was quietly ignored - in V2000 if no range size is given then the parameter gets the size of the value assigned to it, if a size or type is given then any value is coerced to that size. You can also declare a parameter to be a signed, real, time etc type.

This change can possibly cause a program to behave differently under V2000 - however this is highly unlikely to actually happen in most existing programs.


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