Which design activity is in charge of mapping operations to hardware?a...
Hardware/Software Partitioning
Hardware/Software Partitioning is the design activity that is in charge of mapping operations to hardware. It is an essential step in the design process of embedded systems, where the goal is to determine which operations should be executed by hardware components and which should be executed by software components.
Definition
Hardware/Software Partitioning is the process of dividing the functionality of a system into hardware and software components. It involves determining which parts of the system should be implemented in hardware (such as dedicated hardware accelerators or custom circuits) and which parts should be implemented in software (such as algorithms running on a processor).
Importance
Hardware/Software Partitioning is crucial for optimizing the overall system performance, cost, and power consumption. By mapping operations to hardware, the system can take advantage of the parallelism, speed, and efficiency offered by dedicated hardware components. On the other hand, software components provide flexibility and programmability, allowing for easier updates and modifications.
Process
The process of hardware/software partitioning involves several steps:
- System Analysis: Analyzing the system requirements, constraints, and specifications to understand the overall functionality and performance goals.
- Operation Identification: Identifying the operations that need to be performed by the system.
- Operation Classification: Classifying the operations into different categories based on their complexity, criticality, and resource requirements.
- Operation Mapping: Mapping the operations to hardware or software components based on the classification and system constraints. This involves considering factors such as performance, power consumption, cost, and design complexity.
- Optimization: Iteratively refining the mapping decisions to optimize the system performance, cost, and power consumption.
- Validation: Verifying the correctness of the mapping decisions through simulation, prototyping, or testing.
Conclusion
Hardware/Software Partitioning is a critical design activity in the development of embedded systems. It involves mapping operations to hardware or software components based on the system requirements and constraints. By optimizing the mapping decisions, the overall system performance, cost, and power consumption can be improved.