A Rapid Prototyping Environment for Microprocessor based System-on-Chips and its Application to the Development of a Network Processor

Brinkmann A, Langen D, Rückert U. A Rapid Prototyping Environment for Microprocessor based System-on-Chips and its Application to the Development of a Network Processor. In: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Field Programmable Logic and Applications (FPL 2000). Villach, Austria: Springer Berlin Heidelberg; 2000: 838-841.The rapid advances in microelectronic circuit design have dramatically increased the design complexity of modern integrated devices. One approach to fit the time-to-market requirements is the use of rapid prototyping environments. In this paper we introduce a new FPGA based prototyping environment, on which a full functional embedded system can be implemented. The main distinction to other environments is the incorporation of a synthesizable and configurable microprocessor core into the design space. Furthermore we present the application of this environment to the development of a network processor which consists of a processor core and an Ethernet controller