Digital Design and Computer Architecture

Chapter 4 Hardware description languages

4.1 Introduction

4.2 Combinational Logic

4.3 Structural Modeling

4.4 Sequential Logic

4.5 More Combinational Logic

4.6 Finite State Machines

4.7 Parameterized Modules^*

4.8 Testbenches

4.9 Summary

Exercises

Interview Questions

4.1 INTRODUCTION

Thus far, we have focused on designing combinational and sequential digital circuits at the schematic level. The process of finding an efficient set of logic gates to perform a given function is labor intensive and error prone, requiring manual simplification of truth tables or Boolean equations and manual translation of finite state machines (FSMs) into gates. In the 1990’s, designers discovered that they were far more productive if they worked at a higher level ...