CFSMcharts: a new language for microprocessor based system design

Abstract

Component-based design is a well known engineering design method that uses prefabricated components with known properties to design larger systems. We propose a new language called CFSMcharts for component-based design of microprocessor based systems. In this domain, there exists a vast library of programmable devices, which may be used during design synthesis for cheap bulk production of these systems. However, the use of these components during design synthesis is still low-key. CFSMcharts will alleviate the above problem by encouraging the use of programmable components during design synthesis. The language is an extension of CFSMs proposed recently to model the behaviour of programmable components. We also propose a formal semantics of the above language based on the concept of Sequence Function Trees (SFTs).