Virtuoso Video Diary: Device-Level Routing for Advanced Nodes

Part I: Using the Finish Trunk Command to Automate Device-Level Routing in a User Assisted Flow

This is the first part of a mult-part blog series that will highlight features in Virtuoso that address device-level routing of interconnect for advanced node designs.

Below is short video showing what can be done today using the Finish Trunk command with the ICADVM18.1 ISR3 version of Virtuoso when the design has WSPs (Width Space Patterns) defined, has connectivity, and is setup to run the Pin to Trunk route flow:

You will notice that the video above makes use of the Finish Trunk command, which can be accessed when clicking on the Right Mouse Button (RMB) when in the Create Wire command or by just clicking the bindkey 2:

One of the most powerful options of the Finish Trunk command is the Trunk Extending option that can be set to Both Directions. When the user executes the Finish Trunk command with this option, the trunk is extended in both directions from the last location of the wire being created by the Create Wire command. If Trunk Trimming is turned on (as in the case of the video above), the trunk will be trimmed to the last via connecting the last pin to the right and left of the wire. The image below shows how to access the Trunk Extending options from the Pin to Trunk toolbar and the image to the right shows the last pin in the row to the right and left of the wire to which the trunks will be extended and connected to:

The images below show the routed results after the Finish Trunk command was executed with Trunk Extending set to Both Directions and Trunk Trimming turned on (note that yellow highlights indicate the last device pin to the right and left in the row):

For more detailed info on how to use the Finish Trunk command for both device level and block level designs, please download the following Pin to Trunk RAKs:

Link to Pin To Trunk Device Level Routing RAK:

https://support.cadence.com/apex/articleattachmentportal?id=a1O0V000006De3JUAS&pageName=ArticleContent&attachId=0690V000004fQoHQAU&sq=null

Link to Pin To Trunk Block Level Routing RAK:

https://support.cadence.com/apex/articleattachmentportal?id=a1O0V000006De3YUAS&pageName=ArticleContent&attachId=0690V000004fRgOQAU&sq=null

Since the resulting interconnect created by the Finish Trunk command is converted to Trunk objects, the EM Trunk Optimization can be later run to automatically fix EM violations. For more detailed information about EM Trunk optimization please download the EM Trunk Optimization RAK:

Link to EM Trunk Optimization RAK:

https://support.cadence.com/apex/articleattachmentportal?id=a1Od0000007MVZ5EAO&pageName=ArticleContent&attachId=069d0000003JLttAAG&sq=null