Subject: Meeting minutes for 1/8/03
From: Amouroux, John (john_amouroux@mentorg.com)
Date: Wed Jan 08 2003 - 10:32:17 PST
SV-CC Meeting Minutes for January 8, 2003:
Attendances:
Francoise Martinole (Cadence)
John Amouroux (Mentor)
John Stickley (Mentor)
Doug Warmke (Mentor)
Michael Rohleder (Motorola)
Kevin Cameron (National Semi)
Bassam Tabbara (Novas)
Swapnajit Mittra (SGI)
Joao Geada (Synopsys)
Ghassan Khoory (Synopsys)
Andrzej Litwiniuk (Synopsys)
General::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Swapnajit will now maintain the rolling attendance list.
"svc" prefix:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Naming convention - the consensus is to change our function name prefix to
be "sv" instead of "svc" to prevent confusion with other api's.
Direct access issues:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
[This was a frenzied discussion that has not been captured well in these
notes - sorry. JA]
Andrzej discusses the direct pointer / access function issue.
He notes that direct access can be a problem, but we must depend on smart
users. There is no efficient way to do otherwise. This is especially true
with arrays embedded within structures.
Joao wants us all to decide now on this, as it is a fundamental issue. He
reminds us that we decided earlier that we would have binary portability,
and this can still be true even with direct access. And due to binary
compatibility we cannot use macros to solve this issue.
Kevin wants handle-based access, and notes that handles can be pointers for
efficiency.
Joao says a structure that contains an array must be laid out with the array
embedded inline for System Verilog. This is why a handle can't be placed
in-line.
Joao - there are performance issues with very large arrays, but this can't
be helped. In fact, even large structures will have performance issues.
[... there was much more back and forth discussion on what is possible / not
possible, and what the potential performance issues are]
Doug and John assert that anyone passing a large structure/array back and
forth will do so only if they are changing large amounts of data, like with
an ethernet packet. Michael notes as a counter-example that he has seen
ethernet packets passed around where only one small part changed.
Joao thinks what we can stay with direct access and possibly change things
later to address performance issues.
A consensus was not built during the discussion, and Swanajit closes this
topic for now. More emails need to be exchanged to bring this to a close.
He wants to set up for a poll for Monday.
John Stickley's queuable
request::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
John is withdrawing his request for the queuable attribute for now. He may
propose it for the next API release.
Joao's assertion
status::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::
His goal is to finish the updates and send out the spec by the end of this
week. He says he still needs an update from Francoise. Then Francoise says
the defines he needs are being addressed.
Other misc
issues::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::
Joao is working with Dave Smith from sv-ec. Strings and pointers are being
addressed. Externs have some conflicts that must be resolved.
Francoise says that the unicodes are being withdrawn.
Andrzej will combine all his proposals into a single document and send it
out within the next day or two.
Swapnajt says that for the next face-to-face we are still targeting 1/23,
but this is tentative. Francoise is checking to see if Cadence can be the
host.
Polls:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Poll on Joao's assertion for 1/14
Poll for Andrzej proposal for 1/13
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b28 : Wed Jan 08 2003 - 10:33:24 PST