Subject: EIA IBIS Open Forum Minutes 12/5

From: Stephen Peters <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 08 Dec 1997 08:56:53 -0800

DATE: 12/9/97

 SUBJECT: 12/5/97 EIA IBIS Open Forum Minutes
  
 VOTING MEMBERS AND 1997 PARTICIPANTS LIST:
 AMP                            Jeff Walden
 Applied Simulation Technology  [Dileep Divekar], Norio Matsui, Raj Raghuram,
				Fred Balistreri*
 Cadence Design & UniCAD        C. Kumar, Don Telian, Cameron Seitz
 Cypress                        Bruce Wenniger
 Digital Equipment Corp.        Jeff Chu
 Hewlett Packard, EEsof         Karl Kachigan, Henry Wu
 High Design Technology         (Razvan Ene)
 HyperLynx                      Kellee Crisafulli, Steve Kaufer, Matthew Flora*
 INCASES                        Olaf Rethmeier, Werner Rissiek
 Intel Corporation              Stephen Peters*, Arpad Muranyi*, Henry Maramis,
				Will Hobbs, Frank Kern
 Interconnectix                 Bob Ross*, Neven Orhanovic
 Mitsubushi                     Tam Cao, Hoang Nguyen
 Motorola                       [Ahmed Omer], Michael Desiderio, Paul Bolden,
				Tom Myers, Rob Wenzel
 National Semiconductor         Syed Huq*, Cheng-Yang Kao, Mike Bristol,
				[Peter Laflamme], [Kevin Smith]
 NCR                            Dave Moxley*, Richard Mellitz
 NEC                            (Hiroshi Matsumoto)
 Quantic EMC                    (Mike Ventham)
 Texas Instruments              Thomas Fisher
 Thomson-CSF/SCTF               (Jean LeBrun)
 Viewlogic                      Jon Powell, Chris Rokusek, Peivand Tehrani
				Graham Bell
 VeriBest                       Ian Dodd, William Bell, Dave Wiens
 VLSI Technology                Harish Patel, D.C. Sessions*
 
 OTHER PARTICIPANTS IN 1997:
 3M                             [Fran Hart]
 Actel                          Scott Schlachter
 Acuson & Free Model Foundation Richard Munden
 Alcatel                        John Fitzpatrick
 Ansoft                         Eric Bogatin
 Apteq Design Systems           Dan FitzPatrick 
 Compaq                         Weston Beal, Mark Leonard
 Dell Computer                  Dave Baranauskas, Doug Wallace
 EIA                            Patti Rusher
 EMC                            Fabrizio Zanella
 Hewlett Packard, Boise         Paul Gregory*
 Hewlett Packard, France        Jean-Christophe Pautrat
 Hitachi                        Saburo Hojo, Yasushi Ogawa 
 IBM                            Brad Herrman
 Interface Technology           Dan Waterloo
 Micron Technology              Brian Johnson                      
 Molex                          Gus Panella
 North Carolina State U.        (Michael Steer)
 Philips Semiconductor          Todd Andersen
 S3, Inc.                       Porsh Shih, Sarathy Sribhashyam
 Symmetry                       Andy Hughes
 Tandem                         Mark Simpson
 TRW                            Ray Steele
 Ultratest International        Charles Im
 Zeelan Technology              George Opsahl 

 In the list above, attendees at the meeting are indicated by *.  Principal
 members or other active members who have not attended are in parentheses.
 Participants who no longer are in the organization are in square brackets.

 Upcoming Meetings:  The bridge numbers for future IBIS teleconferences are as
 follows:
   
   Date               Bridge Number     Reservation #    Passcode
   January 9, 1998    (916) 356-9200    6-8002           4618642
 
 All meetings are 8:00 AM to 9:55 AM Pacific Time.  We try to have agendas out 
 7 days before each Open Forum and meeting minutes out within 7 days after.  
 When you call into the meeting, ask for the IBIS Open Forum hosted by Will 
 Hobbs and give the reservation number and passcode.
 
 NOTE: "AR" = Action Required.

 -------------------------------- MINUTES -------------------------------------

 INTRODUCTIONS AND MEETING QUORUM
 No new participants.

 MEMBERSHIP UPDATE AND TREASURER'S REPORT
 No new report since the last report of about $6008.  Bob Ross wants the
 IBIS DAC98 support fee of the EDA Booth at the Design Automation Conference
 (DAC) to be taken out of these funds.  

 Bob also requested Syed Huq to do the update of the roster to catch up with 
 company name changes, affiliations, etc.  Syed will do this in January.

 REVIEW OF MINUTES AND AR'S
 Bob Ross noted a name correction.  The AR's will be talked discussed during 
 the meeting.

 MISCELLANY/ANNOUNCEMENTS
 Bob Ross mentioned that discussions about Majordomo conversion have begun.
 Some points still need to be resolved regarding archiving mail, bounced
 messages, and "closed" list.  One of the consequences may be that only
 people whose e-mail addresses match those on the list will be able to
 send messages.  In other words, if you send a message from another account
 or from your system which does not match the "alias" address, you would get
 a Majordomo message on how to subscribe message.  So this could be an in
 convenience to some during the transition.  Arpad Muranyi asked why we are 
 doing the conversion, and Bob responded that this was requested for 
 computer support reasons.

 Bob will be on vacation through December 15, and Syed Huq will be handling
 the Sys Op duties including mailing list management.

 PRESS AND WEB PAGE UPDATES
 Syed Huq reported that he has uploaded his presentation on "Understanding and
 Using IBIS Models for Signal Integrity Analysis", presented at the High-level
 Electronic System Design Conference, (HESDC) in October, 1997.   It is
 located on the EIA IBIS Home page under "Articles" for downloading.

 Syed also has corrected the FAQ file.  Bob Ross changed bug.dir to bugdir.txt
 under /pub/ibis/bugs/ibischk on eda.org so that it could be more easily viewed
 and downloaded from browsers.

 NEW MODELS AVAILABLE, LIBRARY UPDATE
 Bob Ross reported an updated link from QuickLogic:

   http://www.quicklogic.com/support/tech_support

 Bob also reported new models on the Cypress and IDT sites.

 OPENS FOR NEW ISSUES
 Bob Ross on IBIS East Meeting.
 Bob Ross on meeting regarding helping create good models
 Matthew Flora on BIRD46, Relaxation of some IBIS Model file name restrictions

 INTERNATIONAL PROGRESS

 - IEC 62014-1 (IBIS Version 2.1) - Bob Ross reported that Patti Rusher is
   still waiting for the official approval of the unanimous vote from IEC.
   When approval is reached, the IEC nomenclature will be added to the
   ANSI/EIA-656 document.  Patti will also issue a press release.

 - EIAJ III (I/O Interface Model for ICs) - No report

 DESIGNCON98 IBIS SUMMIT
 Syed Huq updated us on the IBIS Summit meeting planned on Monday, January 26,
 1998 and Hosted by National Semiconductor and the same location as
 DesignCon98.

 Syed Huq updated us on plans for the EIA IBIS Summit Meeting on Monday,
 January 26, 1998.  He has reserved a room at the Westin Hotel adjacent to the
 Santa Clara Convention Center.

 Syed has sent out early information regarding location and hotels and a
 call for presentations.  He is still seeking more presentations.  If you
 want to do an IBIS related presentation, send the information to 

   [email-masked]

 Please indicate the Title, and estimated time.  

 (We are looking for about 15-20 minute presentations with possible discussions
 afterwards, and will plan the agenda around the presentations submitted.  If
 possible electronic copies should be submitted beforehand to Syed so that
 he can have copies available at the IBIS Summit.)

 Bob Ross indicated that he might talk about what he looks at to validate
 models - and have a discussion based on some material discussed later
 in the minutes regarding getting better IBIS models.  Paul Gregory and/or
 Arpad Muranyi might talk about higher speed considerations.  Arpad might
 also talk about modeling dynamic clamps.  (later, Ed Sayre might talk about
 IBIS East Users group.)

 Syed will send out the formal call for presentations at a later time.  He
 also needs people to sign up for planning the buffet lunch.

 Syed and Bob discussed that IBIS Meeting attendees who are on the IBIS
 mailing lists may get a discount to attend DesignCon98.  If this is possible,
 the details will be in the next IBIS Summit message from Syed.  The only
 issue is if the logistics are doable.  

 DESIGNCON98
 DesignCon98 (formerly Design SuperCon) is scheduled Tuesday-Thurday, January
 28-30, 1998 at the Santa Clara Convention Center.  The Signal Integrity
 track on Tuesday has three presentation that relate to IBIS modeling along
 with an IBIS panel session on "How Good are the Currently Available IBIS
 Models".  Several IBIS Committee members are expected to be on the panel.
 This will provide an opportunity to express plans in addressing the issue
 of getting better IBIS models from all sources.  DesignCon98 information is
 available at:

   http://www.designcon.com

 DATE98 (DESIGN AUTOMATION AND TEST IN EUROPE) IBIS SUMMIT
 The DATE98 Conference will be held Monday thru Thursday, February 23-26, 1998
 in Paris France.  Several IBIS and PCB Design related activities are being
 planned.

 The DATE Conference itself is the continuation of EuroDAC (with EuroVHDL) and
 ED&TC (EDAC, ETC, and EuroASIC).  More information is available at:

   http://www.date-conference.com

 - IBIS Fringe Meeting - Tuesday, February 24, 1998
 Bob Ross mentioned that there is a possibility of an IBIS fringe meeting
 on Tuesday evening, February 24 to give general IBIS information, answer
 questions, and discuss IBIS.  This has not been formally set up yet and 
 is probably unlikely in view of the activity the following days.

 - PCB Symposium - Wednesday, February 25, 1998
 Bob Ross reported on plans in progress for an all day PCB Symposium on
 Wednesday, February 25, 1998.  So far, it is co-sponsored by Cadence, Incases,
 Mentor Graphics, VeriBest, ViewLogic, Xynetix, and Zuken-Redac.  The plans are
 to include 30 minute presentations from each company on an aspect of PCB
 design.  The Mentor contribution will be on Getting IBIS Models by Bob.  Also
 a one-hour panel session is planned.  A buffet lunch will be provided.  This
 is planned from 10 AM to 5 PM.  Information on this including how to sign up
 will be sent to the IBIS reflector when it is available.

 - IBIS Summit - Thursday, February 26, 1998
 Bob reported that so far Cadence and High Design Technology and Mentor
 Graphics are co-sponsoring the IBIS Summit meeting scheduled on Thursday,
 February 26, 1998.  A buffet lunch will be planned for attendees.   Bob has
 sent out an initial Call for Papers and is still seeking papers.  The response
 so far indicates a very good program for exchanging ideas and information.
 Possible presentations planned so far include:

   John Fitzpatrick:  Use of IBIS in Alcatel
   Syed Huq:          IBIS Model Development at National

   Incases:           IBIS and Radiation Analysis
   Razvan Ene (HDT):  IBIS Models for EMC and High-Frequency Devices

   Bernhard Unger (Siemens)     SI-Analysis with HSPICE Based on IBIS
		      Behavioral Models

 Other presentations so far may be from Arpad Muranyi, (another from Siemens),
 and Bob (if needed).  Send presentation proposals to 

   [email-masked]

 S2IBIS2
 Bob Ross reported that R. Sanjeev (Presi) has done some working on s2ibis2
 for handing ECL devices.  He has put out a request on the reflector for 
 Spice models for ECL devices to test s2ibis2. 

 The Veribest AR regarding s2ibis2 for NT remains.

 AR - Ian Dodd put s2ibis_ver2.1 for Windows on the VeriBest Web site.

 EDITING COMMITTEE
 Bob Ross reported again that the first editorial pass of IBIS Version 3.0 as 

    /pub/ibis/wip/ver3_1a.ibs

 The BNF AR remains.

 AR - Bob Ross generate and post a BNF for IBIS Version 3.0 (and IBIS Version
 3.0 ratification AR).

 BIRD44 - INTERPRETATION OF MIN/MAX/WEAK/STRONG DATA
 Discussion on this was planned, but it was deferred until later.  Later, the
 Bob wanted this to be considered at this time since the idea of having 
 explicit min and max columns be changed to slow, or slow/weak and fast or
 fast/strong needs to be considered for continuing the editorial pass for
 IBIS Version 3.1.

 IBISCHK2+ (VER 2.115) PROGRESS
 Matthew Flora reported that he plans to address BUGs 8-18 this weekend and
 work with the ibischk3 developer since development is beginning the following
 week.  Bob Ross will post any ibischk2+ parser upgrades on eda.org.

 AR - Matthew Flora implement the bug fixes needed to produce ibischk2
 version 2.115.

 VERSION 3.1 PARSER DEVELOPMENT
 Atul Agawal of APT Software Avenues Pvt Ltd. plans to formally start the
 ibischk3 project Monday, December 8, 1997.  As mentioned, Matthew Flora 
 should communicate directly with Atul concerning updates and to help Atul 
 become more effective.

 Bob Ross reported that he believes at least 8 purchase orders have been
 received and two more actually exist.  He is correlating this with EIA.
 Several others may be possible.

 COOKBOOK
 No report, all the ARs are carried forward.

 AR - The following people have volunteered to supply examples
  Steve Kaufer/Hyperlynx -- Example 1 (Version 1.1 basic model)
  Arpad Muranyi - Example 2
  Stephen Peters - Example 3 

 AR - Syed Huq.  Review and expand (if necessary) Section 3.3. on "Obtaining
 I/V and Switching Information via Lab Measurement".

 IBISEAST MEETING
 Bob Ross reported off of some notes that Ed Sayre had just sent regarding
 the IBIS EAST Users Group meeting held on Thursday, December 4, 1997 on
 site at Cadence.  

 Briefly, 23 people attended.  Two sub-groups were formed.  One deals with
 user community aspects such as IBIS to Spice, Spice to IBIS, syntax and
 documentation, materials for education, and standardization, etc.  The
 second is focused on IBIS model validation, how one constructs a standard
 for valid model useful in system applications, how they simulate under
 different loading and termination conditions, etc.

 The plan is to make this group "open", not regionalized, but at this time
 working via face-to-face contact.  The next meeting will be at Stratus
 computer on January 15, 1998.  Ed may also give a presentation of the plans
 and activities at the IBIS Summit in January.

 The full minutes of the meeting will be sent out on the IBIS reflectors.

 MEETING ON HELPING GENERATE GOOD IBIS MODELS
 Bob Ross reported on a meeting on Thursday, December 4, 1997 with Bob,
 C. Kumar, Jon Powell, Stephen Peters, and Syed Huq.  Syed had called this
 meeting to discuss educating semiconductor vendors on producing good IBIS
 models and how to deal with some flawed models that exist.  Syed wanted to
 explore the ideas first with a small group to get some feedback and some 
 additional ideas that would result in some actions.

 Bob reported that the discussion covered a variety of ideas ranging from
 a one day free education seminar to having the committee start "policing"
 or certifying sites.  Bob indicated that the standard for a good IBIS model
 is much higher than for a Spice model where the user is expected to be
 knowledgeable about Spice to understand, configure (e.g., take out a built in 
 test load) and connect the Spice model.  Ideally, IBIS models should plug in 
 just like the part itself into simulators and contain accurate and suitable
 information necessary for simulation and checking.  The committee considered
 a seminar, but felt that the commitment to do it was too large considering
 the large number of other projects that the IBIS committee is doing.  The
 most effective approach was to consider a process to review models and
 provide effective feedback to the model provider to help correct (and 
 educate directly) what is needed for good suitable IBIS model.  A number
 of ideas were discussed, leading to the proposal that we should ask for
 volunteers to form a sub-group for such a review.  The action item from
 this meeting was to put this on the IBIS Agenda for general discussion.

 To start the discussion regarding setting up such a sub-group, Bob noted
 that there were still a variety of opinions what constituted a good IBIS
 model, and that the group itself would have to work this out.  Part of
 the reason is that different simulators may need different capabilities
 and may deal with abnormal data in different ways.  So it is possible for
 IBIS models to work or be suitable for some simulators, but not in others.

 An interactive discussion occurred covering many aspects of what the
 sub-group would look at and how it would function.  Only a few of the
 points are captured here.

 Bob noted that he tests models by inspecting the contents, using ibischk2+,
 looking at the plots of the tables and doing actual simulation.  Some
 simulators or translators do additional checks.  So it would be ideal that
 a step in testing plug in compatibility would be to have the Model tested
 in several simulators.
 
 Many older IBIS models with problems were developed in environments where
 no IBIS simulator was available or, at best, one simulator.  The only tools
 at the time were the evolving ibis_chk and evolving versions of s2ibis
 and s2ibis2 and plotting utilities.  So there can be artifacts that 
 are associated with the earlier development tools themselves that went 
 undetected with the earlier checking processes and testing.

 As a more current example, a fully compliant IBIS Version 2.1 model which 
 passes ibischk2 many still have waveform table end point data errors which 
 are difficult to detect, but may be uncovered using ibishchk2+.
 
 Stephen Peters indicated that he had a model that he would like reviewed.
 D.C. Sessions also indicated that VLSI has some IBIS models for newer
 buffers that he would like reviewed..  However, they are available only 
 through NDA.  Furthermore, while the intent may be good, there may still 
 be problems making such models available to what might be perceived as a
 "competing" semiconductor vendor for review.  Bob indicated that many 
 companies issue IBIS only directly to individuals that must not be 
 distributed.  Besides NDA processes, models are issued through direct
 request including including requesting a unique password for access or
 decryption.  Since one desirable aspect of reviewing models would be to 
 test them in a number different simulators, the most effective sub-group
 would be composed of simulator vendor personnel only.  Then all members 
 could, if necessary, go through the appropriate permission processes 
 individually to get, review, and test the models.  We must deal with the
 the reality that different companies have different policies regarding how
 they release IBIS models and optimize our processes accordingly.  D.C.
 felt that this should be acceptable since it may be very difficult in
 some companies to issue permission to a multi-company sub-group.
 
 Further aspects of the process were mentioned.  With a group composed
 of individuals from different simulator vendors, a model can be tested
 using several simulators.  In reality, no semiconductor vendor is 
 expected to have the resources directly available to the specific model
 developer to run it through several simulators.  So the sub-group itself
 is a potential resource for more robust testing that is not available
 in practice.
 
 Furthermore good IBIS models with good data may work with some simulators 
 and not work or be modified to work with others.  This information could 
 also be provided to the developer.  Bob noted that some simulators may add 
 even more checks than ibischk2+ such as non-monotonic checking of a 
 summation of tables (ibischk2+ only checks one table at a time).  Also some 
 simulators have different ways for dealing with problems including rejecting 
 the model, accepting the model or attempting to do "reasonable" adjustments.  
 D.C. Sessions pointed out that some buffers really do have some slight non-
 monotonic [Pulldown] tables due to a method well-known and used in the
 semiconductor industry to protect the device during power-off/on cycles.
 The technique involves a feedback transistor to create a small current
 fold-back effect (less current for increasing voltage).
 
 Other points mentioned included whether IBIS Version 2.1 should be the
 baseline level for testing.  Also, commercial model supplier vendors should
 really use this service since the greatest majority of models are available 
 from such providers.

 The overall sense of the committee is recognize that there is a problem
 and to be pro active in addressing it in the most helpful method possible
 to provide information back to the model developer.
 
 So the action is to form a sub-group to address this issue.  It should
 contain simulator company representatives.  Bob and Matthew Flora said
 that they would join.  It is seeking volunteers from other companies, and
 Matthew will be the contact person.  To volunteer, contact Matthew at 
 [email-masked].

 BUG19 - Warning for "typ" Data Outside "min" and "max"
 Paul Gregory had introduced BUG19 and there was some reflector discussion
 regarding it occurred.  Bob Ross and others pointed out that there
 could be legitimate data where certain numbers fell outside the I/V
 table ranges.  It would be a lot of work to do a thorough examination
 taking into account actual voltages, and Bob was concerned that we already 
 have a lot of work in other areas.

 Bob classified BUG19 as an Enhancement of Low priority.  After some
 further discussion the action is to classify this as Open, with the
 comment that we could do the testing only for table values where the
 data is ordered by definition according magnitudes into the typ, min
 and max columns.  Examples would be C_comp, L_pkg, C_pkg, and R_pkg.
 No commitment was made that this enhancement would be done.

 BIRD42.3 - MODELING CURRENT WAVEFORMS
 No discussion.

 BIRD45 - DYNAMIC CLAMPS
 Bob Ross mentioned briefly that per the suggestion at the last meeting
 by Dave Moxley, we will still want to investigate using [Driver Selection]
 as part of the process.  Arpad Muranyi will issue a comment on this subject
 on the reflector.

 BIRD46 - RELAXATION OF SOME IBIS FILE NAME RESTRICTIONS
 Bob Ross mentioned that Matthew Flora and Kelly Chrisafulli had just generated
 BIRD46, recently issued.  Bob questioned whether this was for IBIS Version
 3.1 or a later version, and after some discussion concluded that it could
 be for Version 3.1.  This will be discussed at a later meeting.

 NEXT MEETING:
 The next meeting is on Friday, January 9, 1998, 8:00 A.M. to 9:55 A.M.
 ==============================================================================
				       NOTES
 
 IBIS CHAIR: Bob Ross (503) 603-2523, Fax (503) 639-3469
	     [email-masked]
	     Modeling Engineer, Interconnectix
	     10220 SW Nimbus Ave, K4, Portland, OR 97223

 VICE CHAIR: Syed Huq (408) 721-4874, Fax: (408) 721-4785
	     [email-masked]
	     Staff Applications Engineer, National Semiconductor, M/S A-2595
	     2900 Semiconductor Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95052
 
 SECRETARY:  Stephen Peters (503) 264-4108, Fax: (503) 264-4515
	     [email-masked]
	     Senior Hardware Engineer, Intel Corporation
	     M/S JF1-56
	     2111 NE 25th Ave. 
	     Hillsboro, Oregon 97124-5961

 LIBRARIAN:  Jon Powell (805) 988-8250, Fax: (805) 988-8259
	     [email-masked]
	     Senior Scientist, Viewlogic (formerly Quad Design)
	     1385 Del Norte Rd., Camarillo, CA 93010
  
 This meeting was conducted in accordance with the EIA Legal Guides and EIA
 Manual of Organization and Procedure.
 
 The following e-mail addresses are used:

   [email-masked]
       To join, change, or drop from either the IBIS Open Forum Reflector
       ([email-masked]), the IBIS Users' Group Reflector ([email-masked])
       or both.  State your request.

   [email-masked]
       To obtain general information about IBIS, to ask specific questions
       for individual response, and to inquire about joining the EIA-IBIS
       Open Forum as a full Member.

   [email-masked]
       To send a message to the general IBIS Open Forum Reflector.  This
       is used mostly for IBIS Standardization business and future IBIS
       technical enhancements.  Job posting information is not permitted.

   [email-masked]
       To send a message to the IBIS Users' Group Reflector.  This is 
       used mostly for IBIS clarification, current modeling issues, and
       general user concerns.  Job posting information is not permitted.

   [email-masked]
       To report ibischk2 parser bugs.  The Bug Report Form Resides on
       eda.org in /pub/ibis/bugs/ibischk/bugform.txt along with reported bugs.

       To report s2ibis, s2ibis2 and s2iplt bugs, use the Bug Report Forms
       which reside under eda.org in /pub/ibis/bugs/s2ibis/bugs2i.txt, 
       /pub/ibis/bugs/s2ibis2/bugs2i2.txt, & /pub/ibis/bugs/s2iplt/bugsplt.txt
       respectively.

 Information on IBIS technical contents, IBIS participants, and actual
 IBIS models are available on the IBIS Home page found by selecting the
 Electronic Information Group under:

   http://www.eia.org

 Check the pub/ibis directory on eda.org for more information on previous 
 discussions and results.  You can get on via FTP anonymous.
 
 "IBIS Spoken Here" placards are available from Jon Powell ([email-masked]) for 
 use at trade shows.
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