Benefits of cdsTextTo5x

Importing netlist files into the Virtuoso Studio Design Environment involves launching Virtuoso, creating the schematics, and then creating the database. An ideal solution would be to create a very small binary which accepts a netlist file and some settings, generates the required symbols and the OpenAccess database, and imports the netlist file into the Virtuoso Studio Design Environment.

The cdsTextTo5x binary can import any analog, digital, or mixed-signal netlist information file. It does not use the traditional DPL-based mechanism but instead uses an mAPI or Verification Procedural Interface (VPI)-based engine.

Verification Procedural Interface (VPI) is an interface used primarily for the C programming language.

When you use a VPI-based engine, the shadow database is generated more quickly. In comparison, a DPL-based engine that is used by the Virtuoso Text Editor utilizes more system resources and is more time-consuming.

For analog languages, shadow database generation is fast because these languages do not depend on DPL-based engines. The dependency on DPL exists only for digital languages. Using a VPI engine removes the high dependency on DPL engines and removes the involved capacity limitations.

cdsTextTo5x produces the same results as the Text Editor. It imports a design and then creates the corresponding symbols and shadows 10 times faster than the Text Editor. Based on Cadence benchmarks, cdsTextTo5x imports 20M pin with 10M instances in an hour as compared to 10 hours with the Text Editor. Additionally, cdsTextTo5x also supports importing the cell as a blackbox when you want to import only the interface information.

Performance results may vary depending on design size and hardware configuration.

The main features of cdsTextTo5x are:

Supports the most commonly used netlist description languages
Increases the import time performance of Verilog-based designs
Imports a cell as a blackbox when you want to import only the interface information
Provides full shadow support, which includes instance information
Removes dependency on Virtuoso to generate symbols
Starts by importing the instance master. If the master definition does not exist, it does not import the cell and exits with appropriate error messages.
Allows faster parsing to import only the specified cell if multiple module definitions exist in the same text file
Eliminates the use of SKILL-based information and increases performance and supportability with reduced resources
Supports Component Description Format (CDF) for analog and digital languages

Virtuoso Import Tools User Guide
Product Version IC23.1, September 2023