In IC Design, physical placement, routing navigation, and layout debugging can take up a significant amount of engineering time. In this article, experts from Siemens’ Solido Custom IC Design team share tips and techniques to help users make more effective use of L-Edit, focusing on four key tasks: placement, routing, object editing, and debugging.
1. Use Flylines to Optimize Placement
Master Device Placement with Show Connected Flylines in L-Edit
Instead of relying solely on the current positions of cells, users can visualize the connections between them during placement. These visual cues help engineers make more informed placement decisions and avoid creating unnecessarily complex routing connections from the outset.
Flylines are particularly useful in designs with numerous cells and connections that need to be arranged efficiently. By displaying relevant connections during placement, engineers can evaluate component positions before moving on to subsequent routing tasks.
2. Highlight Connected: Navigate Routing More Efficiently Across the Design
Introducing the Highlight Connected Feature in L-Edit
When used alongside Flylines, Highlight Connected provides a more intuitive approach to placement and routing.
Rather than tracing each connection manually, engineers can quickly identify related objects and their connections. This allows them to focus more on resolving design issues instead of spending time locating objects and understanding their connectivity.
3. Master Mouse Interactions in L-Edit for More Efficient Object Editing
Editing objects in L-Edit
For tasks that need to be repeated frequently, smooth object interaction can reduce the time spent on manual editing. Although this may seem like a minor aspect of the user interface, it can make a meaningful difference when engineers work continuously with numerous layout objects.
Understanding mouse controls and object interaction techniques helps users work more efficiently in L-Edit, particularly when editing physical layouts.
4. Debug Faster with Fully Integrated Calibre RealTime
Running Calibre RealTime interactively from L-Edit
Calibre RealTime provides access to Calibre’s DRC rule deck within an environment integrated with L-Edit. This allows selected areas of the design to be checked individually before running DRC across the entire chip.
Instead of waiting until the entire layout is complete to perform full-chip DRC, engineers can check critical areas of the design throughout the layout process.
Read more:
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5. Summary: Features That Optimize the Custom IC Layout Workflow
| Feature | Key benefit |
| Flylines | Visualizes connectivity to support physical placement |
| Highlight Connected | Enables faster navigation and identification of connected objects |
| Mouse Interaction | Makes object editing and movement more convenient |
| Calibre RealTime | Supports early DRC checks and debugging during layout design |
Together, these features help L-Edit address two important aspects of Custom IC design: creating the physical layout and verifying the design throughout the process.
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