IP-lohkon suunnitteluvuon käytäntöjen parantaminen

Digital systems are really complex and, thus, their design is not straightforward either. Big part of the actual design work is done by designing IP (Intellectual Property) components, re-using them and integrating them. This thesis focuses on IP development flow at Nokia Solutions \& Networks (NSN). The goal is to identify working habit related issues and their importance, and provide some easily implementable actions to improve the situation. This thesis includes a literature study of the common flow issues and solutions. The issues could be categorized in the following way: inefficient communication, finding correct documents/files, unclear documentation, unclear code, scripting, version control, software tool related problems including computational platforms and IT support. The field of IP design is not studied widely so software development was used as a reference when applicable. After the most common issues were identified, 7 employees of NSN were interviewed to get more specific information and find out the impact of different issues. The issues with most impact were: IT related issues, unclear documentation, finding correct documents and tool related problems. As a conclusion, action points were suggested to improve the situation with most important issues. Since there were already ongoing actions to improve IT and unclear documentation, the point of focus became finding correct documents and tool related problems. Based on the more specified results from the interviews the following actions were suggested: link library with short descriptions for different kinds of documents and locations (especially for not-design-related documents such as tool instructions and guidelines) and more comprehensive tool training and instructions. Additionally, the need for script training and guidelines came up in most of the interviews, so that is also recommended