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NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY GRADUATE COURSE ACTION FORM

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DEPARTMENT/PROGRAM Electrical and Computer Engineering/Computer Science

COURSE PREFIX/NUMBER ECE761

PREVIOUS PREFIX/NUMBER

DATE OF LAST ACTION Unknown

COURSE TITLE Design Automation For VLSI

ABBREVIATED TITLE VLSI DSGN AUTOMATN

SCHEDULING Fall Spring Summer Every Year Alt. Year Odd Alt. Year Even Other CREDIT HOURS 3 OFFERED BY DISTANCE EDUCATION ONLY

CONTACT HOURS Lecture/Recitation 3 Seminar Laboratory Problem Studio Independent Study/Research Internship/Practicum/Field Work

GRADING ABCDF S/U

INSTRUCTOR Xun Liu, Assistant Professor Graduate Faculty Status Associate Full

ANTICIPATED ENROLLMENT Per semester 50 Max. per Section 50 Multiple sections Yes No

PREREQUISITE(S) ECE746 VLSI Systems Design

COREQUISITE(S) none

RESTRICTIVE STATEMENT none

CURRICULA/MINORS Required Qualified Elective

NA

PROPOSED EFFECTIVE DATE January 10, 2005 APPROVED EFFECTIVE DATE type date here

CATALOG DESCRIPTION: VLSI CAD (computer-aids-to-design) tools research: physical design automation--layout, module generator, silicon compiler; optimization techniques: graph theory, simulated evolution, simulated annealing. Projects required.

RECOMMENDED BY: _______________________________________________________________________ Department Head/Director of Graduate Programs Date ENDORSED BY: _______________________________________________________________________ Chair, College Graduate Studies Committee Date ________________________________________________________________________ College Dean(s) Date APPROVED: _______________________________________________________________________

Dean of the Graduate School Date

TYPE OF PROPOSAL New Course Drop Course

Course Revision Dual-Level Course

REVISION Content Prefix/Number Title

Abbreviated Title Credit Hours

Contact Hours Grading Method

Pre-Corequisites Restrictive Statement

Description Scheduling

DOCUMENTATION AS REQUIRED Please number all document pages

Course Justification

Proposed Revision(s) with Justification

Student Learning Objectives

Enrollment for Last 5 Years

New Resources Statement

Consultation with other Departments

Syllabus (Old and New)

Explanation of differences in requirements of dual-level courses

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Proposed Revisions, with Justifications

The proposed revision is to add a prerequisite, ECE746, to ECE761. This revision is needed to bring the course up to date with the current technology and methods. The state-of-the-art technologies in the computer aided design (CAD), particularly the physical design, of VLSI circuits have changed significantly with the development of semiconductor fabrication techniques. The design complexity has increased by several orders of magnitude. Consequently, VLSI CAD has become a very challenging area that cannot be mastered by graduate students without an advanced graduate level course. To justify such an advanced course, a prerequisite course at the graduate level is required. In this revision, ECE746 is selected as the new prerequisite for ECE761. ECE746 provide the students with knowledge about CMOS devices modeling and abstraction, which is critical for the study and development of CAD algorithms in ECE761. With the addition of the prerequisite, ECE761 can focus on the algorithms without covering preliminary circuit-level issues.

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Student Learning Objectives

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to—

• Outline the major parts in VLSI physical design (PD), • Implement algorithms in C/C++ to solve problems in PD, e.g., partitioning, placement, and routing, • Apply the methods in PD to design a small computing system (1000s gates), • Propose and evaluate new methods in PD, Enrollment for Last Five Years

ECE 761 Semester Students Total Credit Hrs TotalFALL '03 12 36

Total 12 36 New Resources Statement

No additional teaching or laboratory resources will be required by the changes described in this action.

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Syllabus (Fall’03)

ECE 761-001 Design Automation for VLSI – Fall 2003 6:00pm – 7:15pm T H, 214 Daniels http://courses.ncsu.edu/ece761/lec/001/ Instructor: Dr. Xun Liu Office Hours: 5:00pm – 6:00pm F or by appointment Course Text: Naveed Sherwani, ``Algorithms for VLSI Physical Design Automation'', 3rd ed., Kluwer Academic Pub., 1999. ISBN: 0792383931. Course purpose: This course is an introduction to technologies of Electronic Design Automation within VLSI physical design. We will discuss and implement algorithms that are widely used in state-of-the-art commercial EDA tools. Furthermore, class projects will be formulated so as to lead to work on research problems. Course objectives: By the end of the course, you should be able to:

1) Outline the major parts in VLSI physical design (PD); 2) Implement algorithms (in C/C++) to solve specific problems in PD, e.g. graph partitioning, placement,

routing, etc; 3) Apply the methods in PD to design a small computing system (10k gates); 4) Propose and evaluate new methods in PD.

Attendance and Grading: Attendance is required. Grading: homework (10%), mini-projects (39%) course project (31%) final exam (20%) Policies and procedures:

1) Homework and mini-projects: Unless the assignment specifies otherwise, you must work independently. 2) Grading: If you believe that you should get more points that you got, write a statement making your case

and take it to the instructor within one week of the date that the graded assignment was returned. 3) Exam: There will be a final exam (20% of grade) . 4) Course project: Teams of 2-3 students are required to propose their own course projects. Project reports

and final presentations are required. 5) Consulting with the instructor: You can discuss course related questions with the instructor during office

hours or by email. Incomplete grades and late assignments: A minimum of 25% of the grade will be deducted for all late submissions, with 25% of the grade deducted for each 24 hours it is late. No submission will be accepted after 72 hours from the due time. If serious reasons prevent a student from completing an assignment on the scheduled date the opportunity to make-up will be offered according to the official academic policies, see http://www.ncsu.edu/policies/academic_affairs/pols_regs/REG205.00.4.php.

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Academic integrity statement: Work in this course is to be done under the Academic Integrity Honor Pledge: "I have neither given nor received unauthorized aid on this test or assignment." Students must abide by the Code of Student Conduct, http://www.ncsu.edu/policies/student_services/student_discipline/POL11.35.1.php Students are required to work independently on homework assignments unless otherwise specified by the instructor (e.g., on ungraded homework problems or team projects). The decision as to whether a student cheated depends on the intent of an assignment, the ground rules specified by the instructor, and the behavior of the student. Two guidelines help an instructor decide if cheating has occurred: * Program plagiarism will be suspected if an assignment that calls for independent development and implementation of a program results in two or more solutions so similar that one can be converted to another by mechanical transformation. * Cheating will be suspected if a student who was to complete an assignment independently cannot explain both the intricacies of his or her solution and the techniques used to generate that solution. It is unreasonable to expect a complete definition of cheating; each case is important enough to be given careful, individual scrutiny. It is, however, helpful to have guidelines and precedents. Here are some examples of cases which are clearly cheating and clearly not cheating. Cheating: * Turning in someone else's work as your own (with or without his or her knowledge). Turning in a completely duplicated assignment is a flagrant offense. * Allowing someone else to turn in your work as his or her own. * Several people writing one program and turning in multiple copies, all represented (implicitly or explicitly) as individual work. * Using any part of someone else's work without the proper acknowledgment. * Stealing an examination or a solution from the instructor. This is an extremely flagrant offense. Not Cheating: * Turning in work done alone or with the help of the course staff. * Submission of one assignment for a group of students if group work is explicitly permitted (or required). * Getting or giving help on how to do something on Unix or another operating system used in a course project. * Getting or giving help on the meaning of diagnostic messages from the compiler. * High-level discussion of course material for better understanding. * Discussion of assignments to understand what is being asked for. The instructor and course staff will not condone cheating. When cheating is suspected, instructors will take reasonable action to establish whether it has occurred. If it has, the instructor or the Office of Student Conduct will apply appropriate disciplinary policy. All violations and penalties will be reported to the Office of Student Conduct, in accordance with NCSU policy. Records are kept by the OSC for a period of two years after the violation; they do not result in a permanent notation on a student's record. However, the student always has the right to bring the case before the Office of Student Conduct, if, for example, (s)he feels this will result in a more sympathetic hearing. Failure to request that the case be brought before the Office of Student Conduct will be deemed a waiver of this right. A list of possible disciplinary actions is given below: Actions within the course: * No credit or reduced credit for the assignment. * Loss of a letter grade for the course. * Makeup assignment over the same material; no credit. * Forced drop in the course. Actions by the University: * Failure in the course. * Suspension from the University for a designated period.

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* Expulsion from the University. The following policies apply to all cases of cheating and plagiarism: * For a first offense, the penalty will always be more severe than the penalty for failing to turn in the assignment (or take the exam) in question. * For either repeated offenses or a flagrant offense by any student, the instructor shall refer the incident directly to the Office of Student Conduct for action.

Students with disabilities: Reasonable accommodations will be made for students with verifiable disabilities. In order to take advantage of available accommodations, students must register with Disability Services for Students at 1900 Student Health Center, Campus Box 7509, 515-7653. For more information on NC State's policy on working with students with disabilities, please see this page (http://www.ncsu.edu/provost/hat/current/appendix/appen_k.html). ECE 761 course schedule

Week Subject Assignment Due 8/20 Course Introduction 8/27 Basic algorithms 9/3 Data structure HW1 9/10 Partitioning Mini-project1 HW1 9/17 Partitioning 9/24 Floorplan Mini-project2 Mini-project1 10/1 Pin Assignment 10/8 TBD - Fall break Course project Mini-project2 10/15 Placement 10/22 Placement 10/29 Term project proposal Mini-project 3 11/5 Routing 11/12 Routing Mini-project 3 11/19 Routing HW2 11/26 Compaction HW2 12/3 Review 12/10 Project presentation/demo Course project 12/17 Final Final exam