An open source CPU design and verification platform for academia
What is SimpleCPU?
SimpleCPU is a CPU design and verification platform with a bunch of design and verification tools under its hood. SimpleCPU is aimed towards students and researchers, helping them learn and easily carry out CPU simulations in an intuitive way. Being an open source project makes it easier for one to get an indepth understanding of the the underlying concepts by glossing at the source.
SimpleCPU focuses on the fundamentals. Everything has been written from scratch such as ALUs, multipliers, decoders etc.
Our goal is to enable system-designers and researchers to rapidly evaluate new ideas in the field of processor design, memory hierarchy, cache design and other aspects involved in computer architecture research. We want to enable designers to quickly add the new module to the existing RTL and the models and test the new solution effectively. Along with this, SimpleCPU organisation is also in contact with many of the universities to adopt SimpleCPU as part of the labs for Computer architecture courses. This would give students a great insight on the entire design and verification flow for system-on-chips.
SimpleCPU repository consists of three main parts:
- CPU RTL and Testbench (written in Verilog/SystemVerilog)
- Instruction Set Simulator (C-based fast CPU simulation model)
- Hex Generator (C-based random instruction sequence (RIS) generator)
The CPU implementation is carried out in Verilog which is widely used across academia and industry as well. This CPU RTL is the design under test (DUT) which is verified by carrying out simulations under different random instruction sequence loads. But as the design gets vast and complicated there would be a need to add certain directed tests as well. SimpleCPU focuses on maintaining an intuitive way towards both RTL design and the verification aspects. For easy understanding of the Instruction Set Architecture, C-models were created. These help in understanding the behaviour of the different instructions and also help in verifying the RTL through SimpleCPU's co-simulation environment. The Instruction Set Simulator is therefore an important tool for carrying out RTL design and simulations. Since CPU verification requires that the CPU should work under all possible combinations of instructions available in the instruction set architecture, it becomes a daunting task to cover all these instructions. To avoid this we have written the Hex Generator tool from scratch and using basic C such that students find it more appealing. The tool generates random instruction sequences and dumps the hex value for every generated instruction - thus the name Hex Generator.
Here's an example simulation of a single cycle 32-bit MIPS CPU running a random instruction sequence along with an instruction set simulator which helps in checking the RTL state as in when each instruction retires.
perl run.pl -test alu_ops_basic
make iss
gcc -fPIC -W -shared -g -m32 -O2 main.c sim.c -o iss.so
cp iss.so ../../
rm -rf vsim.wlf wlf* transcript work/
vlib work
vlog testbench/* verilog/*
Model Technology ModelSim ALTERA vlog 10.1e Compiler 2013.06 Jun 12 2013
-- Compiling module top_tb
-- Compiling module adder
-- Compiling module alu
-- Compiling module carry_lookahead_adder
-- Compiling module carry_lookahead_gen
-- Compiling module comparator
-- Compiling module control
-- Compiling module data_mem
-- Compiling module decode
-- Compiling module instr_mem
-- Compiling module issue
-- Compiling module logical
-- Compiling module pc_reg
-- Compiling module reduced_full_adder
-- Compiling module regfile
-- Compiling module shifter
-- Compiling module top
Top level modules:
top_tb
issue
vsim -c top_tb -sv_lib iss -do "onElabError resume; run -all; exit" | tee sim.log
Reading /home/rahul/altera/14.0/modelsim_ase/tcl/vsim/pref.tcl # 10.1e
vsim -do {onElabError resume; run -all; exit} -c -sv_lib iss top_tb
Loading sv_std.std
Loading work.top_tb
Loading work.top
Loading work.pc_reg
Loading work.adder
Loading work.carry_lookahead_adder
Loading work.reduced_full_adder
Loading work.carry_lookahead_gen
Loading work.instr_mem
Loading work.decode
Loading work.regfile
Loading work.alu
Loading work.shifter
Loading work.logical
Loading work.comparator
Loading work.data_mem
Loading work.control
Loading ./iss.so
onElabError resume
resume
run -all
Time: 0 ps Iteration: 0 Instance: /top_tb
MIPS Simulator
Loading instr_hex
Read 24 words from program into memory.
Init done
CPU initialised
PC:00000000 INSTR:2e695102 SLTIU R9 , R19, 0x5102
[RTL] PC:00000000 Instr:2e695102 R9:00000001 R19:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000000 Instr:2e695102 R9:00000001 R19:00000000
PC:00000004 INSTR:112c0158 BEQ R12, R9 , 0x158
[RTL] PC:00000004 Instr:112c0158 R12:00000000 R9:00000001
[MODEL] PC:00000004 Instr:112c0158 R12:00000000 R9:00000001
PC:00000008 INSTR:03c10a61 ADDU R1 , R30, R1
[RTL] PC:00000008 Instr:03c10a61 R1:00000000 R30:00000000 R1:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000008 Instr:03c10a61 R1:00000000 R30:00000000 R1:00000000
PC:0000000c INSTR:08000222 J 888
[RTL] PC:0000000c Instr:08000222
[MODEL] PC:0000000c Instr:08000222
PC:00000888 INSTR:0237c160 ADD R24, R17, R23
[RTL] PC:00000888 Instr:0237c160 R24:00000000 R17:00000000 R23:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000888 Instr:0237c160 R24:00000000 R17:00000000 R23:00000000
PC:0000088c INSTR:0337abe5 OR R21, R25, R23
[RTL] PC:0000088c Instr:0337abe5 R21:00000000 R25:00000000 R23:00000000
[MODEL] PC:0000088c Instr:0337abe5 R21:00000000 R25:00000000 R23:00000000
PC:00000890 INSTR:08000067 J 19c
[RTL] PC:00000890 Instr:08000067
[MODEL] PC:00000890 Instr:08000067
PC:0000019c INSTR:adc97e0c SW R9 , R14, 0x7e0c
[RTL] PC:0000019c Instr:adc97e0c R9:00000001 R14:00000000
[MODEL] PC:0000019c Instr:adc97e0c R9:00000001 R14:00000000
PC:000001a0 INSTR:031c32e1 ADDU R6 , R24, R28
[RTL] PC:000001a0 Instr:031c32e1 R6:00000000 R24:00000000 R28:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001a0 Instr:031c32e1 R6:00000000 R24:00000000 R28:00000000
PC:000001a4 INSTR:030a9ea6 XOR R19, R24, R10
[RTL] PC:000001a4 Instr:030a9ea6 R19:00000000 R24:00000000 R10:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001a4 Instr:030a9ea6 R19:00000000 R24:00000000 R10:00000000
PC:000001a8 INSTR:00684661 ADDU R8 , R3 , R8
[RTL] PC:000001a8 Instr:00684661 R8:00000000 R3:00000000 R8:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001a8 Instr:00684661 R8:00000000 R3:00000000 R8:00000000
PC:000001ac INSTR:033afa25 OR R31, R25, R26
[RTL] PC:000001ac Instr:033afa25 R31:00000000 R25:00000000 R26:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001ac Instr:033afa25 R31:00000000 R25:00000000 R26:00000000
PC:000001b0 INSTR:1fbe01ac BGTZ R29, 0x1ac
[RTL] PC:000001b0 Instr:1fbe01ac R30:00000000 R29:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001b0 Instr:1fbe01ac R30:00000000 R29:00000000
PC:000001b4 INSTR:14ee0042 BNE R14, R7 , 0x42
[RTL] PC:000001b4 Instr:14ee0042 R14:00000000 R7:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001b4 Instr:14ee0042 R14:00000000 R7:00000000
PC:000001b8 INSTR:318d4a00 ANDI R13, R12, 0x4a00
[RTL] PC:000001b8 Instr:318d4a00 R13:00000000 R12:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001b8 Instr:318d4a00 R13:00000000 R12:00000000
PC:000001bc INSTR:2a9089aa SLTI R16, R20, 0xffff89aa
[RTL] PC:000001bc Instr:2a9089aa R16:00000000 R20:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001bc Instr:2a9089aa R16:00000000 R20:00000000
PC:000001c0 INSTR:323c4f7b ANDI R28, R17, 0x4f7b
[RTL] PC:000001c0 Instr:323c4f7b R28:00000000 R17:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001c0 Instr:323c4f7b R28:00000000 R17:00000000
PC:000001c4 INSTR:06a002b4 BLTZ R21, 0x2b4
[RTL] PC:000001c4 Instr:06a002b4 R0:00000000 R21:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001c4 Instr:06a002b4 R0:00000000 R21:00000000
PC:000001c8 INSTR:0290a7e4 AND R20, R20, R16
[RTL] PC:000001c8 Instr:0290a7e4 R20:00000000 R20:00000000 R16:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001c8 Instr:0290a7e4 R20:00000000 R20:00000000 R16:00000000
PC:000001cc INSTR:06010255 BGEZ R16, 0x954
[RTL] PC:000001cc Instr:06010255 R1:00000000 R16:00000000
[MODEL] PC:000001cc Instr:06010255 R1:00000000 R16:00000000
PC:00000b24 INSTR:00ca192a SLT R3 , R6 , R10
[RTL] PC:00000b24 Instr:00ca192a R3:00000000 R6:00000000 R10:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000b24 Instr:00ca192a R3:00000000 R6:00000000 R10:00000000
PC:00000b28 INSTR:02642766 XOR R4 , R19, R4
[RTL] PC:00000b28 Instr:02642766 R4:00000000 R19:00000000 R4:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000b28 Instr:02642766 R4:00000000 R19:00000000 R4:00000000
PC:00000b2c INSTR:2402000a ADDIU R2 , R0 , 0xa
[RTL] PC:00000b2c Instr:2402000a R2:0000000a R0:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000b2c Instr:2402000a R2:0000000a R0:00000000
PC:00000b30 INSTR:0000000c SYSCALL
[RTL] PC:00000b30 Instr:0000000c R0:00000000 R0:00000000 R0:00000000
[MODEL] PC:00000b30 Instr:0000000c R0:00000000 R0:00000000 R0:00000000
TEST PASSED
End of simulation reached
** Note: $finish : testbench/top_tb.sv(94)
Time: 480 ns Iteration: 1 Instance: /top_tb
The entire simulation can be carried out by simply running the "run.pl" perl script. The script compiles the model version and dumps the .so file used by the simulator for C-DPI calls. If there aren't any errors during make, the HDL code is then compiled and simulated. From the above simulation log it is quite evident that both model and RTL are simulating the same set of instructions and as the instruction retires the values are compared to remove any differences between the two implementations. The simulation is finished once the testbench detects the "syscall" instruction with register R2 containing the value 10.
Download the Altera modelsim version (for linux) from their webiste:
https://www.altera.com/downloads/software/modelsim-starter/121.html
(Note: You need to be enrolled in a university to download this edition)
You can also download a reduced version of modelsim:
wget https://github.com/SimpleCPU/SimpleCPU/releases/download/v0.0.1/modelsim_reduced.tgz
Untar the tarball and set the path in the env variable:
tar -xvf modelsim_reduced.tgz
export PATH=$PATH:<Complete path to modelsim>/modelsim_reduced/linuxNote: The free version of modelsim supports 32-bit only. To install the dependent 32-bit libraries on a 64-bit linux machine:
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential
sudo apt-get install libc6-dev-i386
sudo apt-get install gcc-multilib g++-multilib \
lib32z1 lib32stdc++6 lib32gcc1 \
expat:i386 fontconfig:i386 libfreetype6:i386 libexpat1:i386 libc6:i386 libgtk-3-0:i386 \
libcanberra0:i386 libpng12-0:i386 libice6:i386 libsm6:i386 libncurses5:i386 zlib1g:i386 \
libx11-6:i386 libxau6:i386 libxdmcp6:i386 libxext6:i386 libxft2:i386 libxrender1:i386 \
libxt6:i386 libxtst6:i386Get the latest perl module:
sudo apt-get install perlRun the simulation (for single cycle MIPS CPU) -
perl run.pl -test all_instr
The entire simulation is carried out by the "run.pl" perl script. The script first compiles the model version and dumps the .so file to be used by the simulator for C-DPI calls. If there aren't any errors during make, the HDL code is then compiled and simulated.
The SimpleCPU project has been tested on Linux (Ubuntu 14.04) only. Though it shouldn't be hard to port the scripts for windows as well. We are working towards testing the project on windows environment as well.
The documentation for every tool is present in the README file. The following files/directories may be of interest:
- verilog/README
- testbench/iss/README
- hex_gen/README
For a detailed summary of all the coding guidelines and development workflow, visit our Wiki page.
- Report Bugs and Issues
- Write Tutorials, Examples and Documentation
Also See Contributing
See Future Work
See our FAQ wiki page for more info.
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