VMM 1.1 is finally out

Even though VMM 1.1 is only the second Open Source release of the VMM library, it follows in a long series of customer-based productivity enhancements that have been made to VMM since the original specification was published back in 2005.

I would like to thank all of the customers who kindly contributed to the requirement specification, reviews and beta-testing. The feedback from late beta customers and early adoptees has been very positive.

So, what’s new in VMM 1.1?

First, we have fixed all of the non-compliant language usage that were reported in VMM 1.0.1.

It also adds two new functional coverage models to the generated Register Abstraction model. One measures that all addresses have been accessed, the other that all interesting field values have been used.

It adds a new Performance Analysis package to measure coverage metrics that are more statistical in nature, compared to the simple singular counts of traditional functional coverage.

It adds a Multi-Stream Scenario Generator (MSSG) that can generate and coordinate stimulus across multiple channels, anywhere in the verification environment. Multi-Stream Scenarios (MSS) can be built of individual transactions, single-stream scenarios (used by the VMM Scenario Generator) or other multi-stream scenarios.

It adds a transactor iterator that brings the simple named-based controllability of vmm_log to vmm_xactor. It makes it possible to control and configure transactors reguardless of where they are located in the verification environment.

It adds a message catching mechanism that combines, in a single handler, the capability of vmm_log::modify() and vmm_log::wait_for_msg(). It can catch any message, making it easy to react or mask exceptions and perform negative testing (i.e. making sure that your environment does catch errors when they are present).

It adds a command-line option manager that makes it easy to define, document and manage environment and test options. Options can be specified on the command line or in a series of option files. And the +vmm_help option will display the automatically-generated usage documentation of all the options available in an environment or test.

And finally, it adds a mechanisms for run-time test selection for those who prefer to compile all of your tests in one simulation binary then select, via the command line, which test to execute.

Examples are provided that demonstrate how to use each of these new productivity-enhancing capabilities.

There are other minor additions that are too numerous to mention here. Just refer to the file “RELEASE.txt” in the distribution for an exhaustive list.

VMM 1.1 requires the following versions of VCS: 2006.06-SP2-9(*), 2008.09-4 or 2008.12. As usual, we believe that it is implemented using IEEE-compliant SystemVerilog code — but should some non-compliant usage be identified, be assured that it is entirely unintentional and it will be fixed as soon as possible.

The Open Source distribution of VMM 1.1 can be downloaded immediately from vmmcentral.org but will also be included in VCS2009.06. If you wish to use this version of VMM with OpenVera and/or DesignWare VIPs that require OpenVera interoperability, you must download the “SvOv” version of the distribution and patch your VCS installation using the “patch_vcs” script. This latter version is identical except for some additional encrypted code that enables methodology-level interoperability between OpenVera and SystemVerilog.

Give it a try and let us know what you think. And keep those suggestions and requests coming! We have a healthy backlog of enhancement requests that are sure to keep VMM moving forward for years to come!

(*) See VCS2006.06-SP2.txt in the distribution. The `VCS2006_06 symbol MUST be defined to enable some work-arounds unsupported SystemVerilog features.